I’ve been reading theough the OT prophets and in the past had always seen God presented in that negative, judgmental light.
But reading it recently, when you do it carefully, you see God as being loving and merciful, warning time and again of coming judgment for sin, calling people to repent so as to bless them, delaying judgment as long as possible and even as the people on occasion DID repent and change their ways temporarily.
He did not judge until there reached a point at which nothing else was an option, and even then, God takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked.
Seeing that mercy throught the OT has helped me tremendously in overcoming the twisted view of God that I had had over the years of being harsh, demanding, intolerant, and ready to judge and damn for the least little offense.
You are exactly right, and that’s a prison that I’m hoping to free people from in my writings. Of course, you can also see more examples in the link to a past blog I wrote on the topic, “The God of the Old and New Testaments.” The reality of God is very complicated and not simple black-and-white; it isn’t “Old Testament God = Bad” and “New Testament God = Good.”
Likewise, all the judgment in the Old Testament combined pales in comparison to the book of Revelation.