Can anyone tell me the story of Noah?
Lewis: All of these people were being really nasty to each other so God was about to send a flood but there was one family that was nice and didn’t get involved, and that was Noah’s family. So God told Noah to build a big boat and take all the animals on board and they floated for a very long time and eventually they found land and God said: “I will never do anything like this again,” and he put a rainbow in the sky to show it.
Is it tricky to think about God being someone who punishes people?
Nmeso: Yeah, because in the Bible God is all-loving, he won’t hurt anyone, he saves people. But when you think of him wiping out the whole world you think again: “Oh, could this be lies?”
So it’s confusing when we think about God being all-loving, but then we hear about God sending a flood?
Lewis: It’s because he has to. It’s because it’s safe for the world to not have as many bad people, but still have some bad people.
Do you think there’s a difference between the Old Testament God and New Testament God?
Caleb: Well it’s the same God all the way through, so I don’t think much is different, but I guess some things will be different because in the New Testament he sent down Jesus so that might change things a bit.
Lewis: Maybe he didn’t punish people as much in the New Testament.
Why do you think that is?
Caleb: Because Jesus could deal with them himself, instead of God having to do it, but in the Old Testament Jesus wasn’t there.
Ayuk: There’s new knowledge in the New Testament and you can relate it to that Old Testament and figure out some things better.
Is it ever confusing how God seems to change in the New Testament?
Nmeso: I don’t think he really changes. I think it’s just an addition of Jesus, so it’s still the same person, still the same God, but just that there’s someone who’s doing the work for him, instead of him appearing all the time.
Caleb: A bit like what Nmeso said, because there’s Jesus who’s like a human form of God, then God wouldn’t have to do everything because Jesus could do some of it. So I don’t think it’s because God changed, it’s because Jesus started doing some of it. Like, if in the New Testament if Jesus hadn’t come, God would have probably stayed the same.
So do you think Jesus changes how we see God?
Seth: It changed the appearance of God because it now gives you two images of God. Because some people say God is Jesus and some people say Jesus is a man with God’s powers because God adopted this person to be his son.
