I am absolutely loving reading Keith Giles new book Jesus Unbound. As I have been reflecting on the violence portrayed in the Older Testament, let me give my own approach that is different from Giles and Peter Enns and closer to Greg Boyd’s. 

1. It is not about certain events did not happen or were simply human projections onto God but God accommodated himself like looking through a mirror dimly. 

2. Jesus own words in Matt.19 is God gave permission because OUR hearts are so hard, not because God desires divorce or I might add holy war or polygamy or slavery or violence and so forth. 

3. The Jewish view of God’s sovereignty gave God the responsibility over everything—whether good or evil. The forces of evil, chaos, and Satan are the cause of so much death, destruction, and violence, not God. 

However people work out these tough issues, I think one can still have a high progressive view of written revelation but others theological mileage may vary.