Hi Bee, thanks for your reply. Yes, the Old Testament does look fairly tough indeed!

Ok, sorry about the length of this post, but I'll have to reply in some depth for me to make any sense..

The Old Testament (Testament meaning 'agreement' of course) framed one relationship with Yaweh. The Jews were (and are) God's chosen people. He looked after them (brought them out of Egypt, Babylon, gave them the promised land etc.,) and in return they agreed to make him their God alone. He explained when giving the 10 commandments that the very first commandment was to have Him alone as their God "for I am a jealous God" etc., I understand all of this (in context) to mean that He saw their best future lay with Him and that they would be decieved and led astray if they turned to false Gods. There's another phrase (in the New Testament, I think) that correlates here, to paraphrase: a good father chastises his children, a bad one never does. In other words, a good father will correct and discipline his children when they go astray, not for the pleasure of doing so, but for their own good. In the same way you might ground your kids for skipping school or taking drugs (maybe something stronger for the latter offence! ;-> ) You don't do it to see them cry, but because you want to warn them away from behaviour that's harmful or self destructive, for as long as you have any influence in their lives. And I'm sure many kids resent being disciplined terribly - how often has some kid, banished to his room, declare angrily "I hate my parents! They're such killjoys!"

If you look closely at when bad things happened to the Jews in the Bible, you'll find it was when they themselves abandoned God first and said more-or-less "Get lost God! We can manage fine without you, thanks!" So it wasn't He who abandoned them, but they who abandoned Him. Yet He was ever-ready to come to their assistance at the first sign they had turned theirb hearts back to Him. As any parent will know, there are times when you simply have to wait until your children screw themselves up enough to ask for your help, and until, they do there's not much you can do.

The New Testament brought a new dimension to this relationship - the Old Testament God had required sacrifices etc., but the New Testament (new agreement) was to do away with all that (like Abraham's son - yes, God tested Abraham and Job - but He never tests any of us past what He knows we can bear, and Abraham's would-be sacrifice prefigures the Crucifixtion, but there's too much to go into here). The whole idea was that Jesus would be the perfect sacrifice (offering to God) since He had no sin. Therefore, blameless, He took on himself all the guilt of our sins and so we need no other sacrifice. It was his death on the cross that makes Him the gateway to salvation for this reason. Plus the New Testament widened God's chosen people to include the Gentiles (non-Jews) though Jews got first call on Jesus' message.

But I suppose, Bible aside, the facts you mentioned about the world today are typically the main reasons why people either believe there is no God, or that He is not a good God if there is.
You know, all the religious wars, the misuse of Christ's name by leaders for politics. We only have to think of George Bush or some Islamic fundamentalists to see how God is used to justify people's wants. Some people mentioned the inquisition, others mentioned Hitler. I've alreadf spoken about the inquisition - it was largely a political tool, nothing very out of the ordinary for its time in either aims or methods as any student of the Middle Ages will readily appreciate. And inquisitions exist for much the same reason today (anti-communist, anti-terrorist etc., mainly political). And of Hitler had studied his christianity a bit further, he would have known the Jews were God's chosen people - hardly a suitable target for a 'Christian's' genocidal rampage!! It is worth noting, that far from being Christian, on the contrary the Nazis were deeply steeped in occultism, and made a big cult of various Teutonic and Norse gods such as Thor, Odin etc., as well as other occult themes (even during pro-Nazi rallies in the mid 1930s, Nuremburg etc.,)

One of the best ways for an enemy to discredit their foe is to dress up in the uniforms of their foe and commit acts that will then be attributed to the foe, rousing the indignation of the people. What I am saying is that many of the acts carried out by so-called Christians that horrify us, on closer inspection turn out not to have been carried out by people who were truly christian at all.

But apart from those evidential arguments, there is a basically logical argument to be made that demonstrates God is a good God:

People often ask, if God is good, why does He allow wars, hunger etc.,

What does God direct us to do?

Love your neighbour (including your enemy), don't kill, don't steal, don't lie, don't hanker after what your neigbour has, don't sleep around with other people's husbands or wives, etc., (basically the 10 commandments)

Now, is anyone wiling to argue that we would be worse off if we all followed these commandments? Would there be MORE war, MORE injustice, MORE sorrow and pain? Surely not. Therefore the things that God commands us to do are GOOD for us. Does this sound like an evil, vindictive God? If we even followed the basic commandment of loving our neighbour, we would ensure no one was hungry or cold or lonely. The world would in fcat be a far better place if we did these things, but being weak as we are, we often find it easier (in the short term) to be selfish, love only ourselves and those who do something for us, be dishonest (stealing, lying), kill the other guy instead of accepting a just solution etc.,

So why doesn't God stop these things happening anyway?

Well, He could, being all-powerful. He could freeze that finger on the trigger this instant, stop the bullet in mid-flight, force us all to tell the truth like Jim Carrey in 'Liar Liar'. But is that really what the world wants? We say we do, but like the strict Calvinist in the apocryphal old tale, we think a good 'fire and brimstone sermon will do our NEIGHBOUR a world of good'! Because we tend not to look so much at our own faults. Let's be honest - we all like to think we do fairly OK, and are moral people, and perhaps often we are. But who can 'cast the first stone'? Not me anyway! Have you ever lied to your partner, told your boss you were sick when in fact you dossed off for the day, claimed welfare when you were well able to work, helped yourself to a few extra bottles of wine from the shop where you worked, maybe justified it all through various extraneous circumstances? (for example, though the list is endless, add to it at will). ALL of these things would also have to stop if God were to intervene in the direct way people sometimes demand of Him. Because God is a fair and just God as well as a good God. These things are as much a part of the whole system of corruption as the bigger sins like war. Not everyone would be comfortable with that!

To stop all of the evil things we do, big and small, God would first have to take away His biggest gift to us: our free will. This is our capacity to choose good or evil, to consciously decide to be for God or against Him. But if he did that, we would no longer choose to do good because we wanted to - we would do good because we had no choice. And where's the good in that? Ok, it mightn't seem to make much sense, so here's a kind of parallel: you have a girlfriend. She loves you and wants you to be happy. She does lots of things to make you happy. you feel happy - and lucky to have such a girl. Scenario two - you have a girlfriend. You've hypnotised her into doing only the things you want. She does them, but you never know whether she does them because she wants to, or because you are pulling the strings. Which do you think is ultimately the more satisfying realtionship for both?

Without free will, we would be like Isaac Asimov's robots in "I, Robot" - serving our master because we had no choice, doing good because we couldn't do anything else. Doing good, but without any love or charity in our souls.

Finally, if God were really evil..... don't forget that God (for the sake of this argument we are assuming He exists and has certain attributes) is also all-poweful / omnipotent. Try and imagine an all-poweful and sadistic God.... life would simply be one endless torture without any good points coupled with total despair (a bit like Hell, really). I once read a science fiction story about a world where people had tried to make a powerful supercomputer and it took over (very original! ;-) ) It had trapped five people inside it and delighted in inflicting every conceivable torture and humiliation it could devise on them. It controlled them so carfeully that they couldn't kill themselves and wouldn't die, so the computer could prolong the agony endlessly for its own delight. Eventually one guy figured a way to beat the computer and kill the other four, releasing them from the living hell, but alas, there was no one to kill him, and the computer vented all its frustrated fury on him afterwards.... I don't remember the name of the story, but if God was truly a vindictive evil God, life would be something like that.

Sorry for going on at length, but the question required a carefully explained response. In short:

When the Jews turned their backs on God in the Old Testament, hard times usually came their way which implies God was looking out for them when they followed Him. He was always ready to accept them back if they changed their minds, like the ever-loving parent who can't say No when their child needs help. Both facts point to a good God.
In the New Testament, He went so far as to send His son to be the perfect sacrifice for our sins. Not just for the good people, but for everyone. All we have to do is accept this sacrifice. This points to a good God.
If we did more of the things God asked us to do, there would be a lot less suffering in the world. This points to a good God.
God could stop us from doing evil, but only by taking away His gift of free will. leaving us loveless automatons acting on instinct alone like animals. He would rather we had free will and loved Him freely, even if this means some of us will turn our backs to Him. This points to a good God.
If God was both all-powerful and a vindictive sadist, life would be a living hell all the time. I think even the most unfortunate can find something redeeming in life. This points to a good God.

All in all, I think we'd have to say God is good!

And I can add my own personal experience - as I said in an earlier post, all the good things I wanted from life never came to me through indifference to God or the occult, but followed quickly enough when I accepted Christ as my saviour. He has been nothing but good to me, I have no complaints. For all the years I spent dabbling in witchcraft and the occult, in the end I found the real magic - the real power - was in Jesus and God.