bekahcubed

Categories Book Reviews

Book Review: It Sucked and Then I Cried by Heather B. Armstrong

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Just to show how un-blog-savvy I am, I had no idea who Heather B. Armstrong was until I read a news article (by chance) about how famous people were leaving social media. Armstrong was cited as an example. Apparently, she was fired from a job for talking unfavorably about her workplace on her blog – and then became a wildly successful “mommy blogger.”

Even having read this article, I had completely forgotten who Armstrong was by the time I picked up her book (maybe a week later?) because it was in a Dewey Decimal section I was working my way through (306.8743 – mostly memoirs or sociological treatments of motherhood). It wasn’t until I saw “creator of Dooce.com” under her name that I remembered the article I’d read.

So I entered this memoir of motherhood with few preconceptions.

First impressions: Heather Armstrong is NOT A MORMON. This is the defining feature of her life. Every page of this memoir screams out her insistence that she is NOT A MORMON any longer. Even if her family is all Mormon and she lives in Utah and she went to BYU. She is NOT A MORMON any longer. Lest anyone start thinking she’s a Mormon mommy blogger and uncool, she must remind them that she drinks alcohol (NOT A MORMON!), listens to cool bands at cigarette-smoke-filled bars (where all the other people in Salt Lake City who are NOT A MORMON! are), curses like a sailor (NOT A MORMON!), and doesn’t wear holy underwear (NOT A MORMON!)

Hearing Armstrong declare (implicitly and explicitly) that she is NOT A MORMON! was exhausting. I wanted her to tell me something about who she was that would make me like her. Does she have interests, beliefs, passions, personality traits of her own? I couldn’t tell. It seemed like she only stood against, never for. Yes, plenty a memoirist drinks, goes to live concerts in bars, curses, and dresses immodestly – and sometimes I still manage to like them. But in order for me to like an alcohol-obsessed, rock-concert-going, cussing, immodest memoirist, they have to tell me something real about themselves – about who they ARE, not just who they AREN’T. I wasn’t a fan.

And then there was Armstrong’s tendency towards hyperbole. She just positively eats up her baby – slathers her with butter and jam and eats her up. And motherhood is absolutely the most awful thing ever and she throws things at her husband when he walks in the door from work because he’s done something other than try to entertain a baby all day and how dare he get her pregnant in the first place. Motherhood is awful, awful, awful, she says (and then goes off on eating her baby again.)

The thing is, nothing she was describing about her own situation sounded that awful to me. Her baby smiled at her at one month. Her baby slept through the night (12 hours!) at three months. My baby didn’t smile at me until three months and still hasn’t slept twelve hours. Armstrong complained about naptimes and how they have to be just right and blah-blah-blah-blah. My baby gave up napping the same time she started sleeping eight hours (about 3 weeks ago). But you don’t see me whining and complaining that it sucks and then I cried. Yes, I probably complain more than I ought – but I also recognize that this is how life with a baby goes, so sometimes I stop my whining and just do what needs to be done.

So, imagine my surprise when I discovered somewhere around month six of Baby Armstrong’s life that Armstrong has actually been clinically depressed all this time and is now checking herself into a psychiatric hospital because she’s afraid her husband will leave her if she doesn’t get a grip on things!

What? She’s not just a whiner? Something is actually wrong with her? See, I assumed that all the awfulness of her really-not-very-awful experience caring for a new baby was hyperbole to balance out all that hyperbole about sweet-smelling baby whose smiles seem straight from heaven-that-I-don’t-believe-in and who I eat up every day with a side of caramel sauce.

Maybe that’s saying more about me than about her. But I think maybe it also says something about her writing. She couldn’t tell her story well enough that I could figure out that she was experiencing something more than just what every mother experiences?

So, yeah. I wasn’t a fan.

Rating: 1 star
Category: Memoir of motherhood
Synopsis: Armstrong is NOT A MORMON. Turns out, she’s not just a crazy hyperbolist who whines more than is necessary. She’s actually suffering from rather severe postpartum depression and anxiety. Bummer she couldn’t have somehow communicated that to the reader before she commits herself to a psychiatric hospital.
Recommendation: Nothing redeeming in this one. Skip it.

Categories Thankful Thursday

Thankful Thursday: Looking Back

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Yesterday, Facebook reminded me that it’s been one year since the urine test at my midwife’s office confirmed that I had preeclampsia. I was 30 weeks and 5 days pregnant.

You can read about my initial reactions here.

After a brief moment of grieving over the homebirth I knew this ruled out, I made Matt Redman’s song “10,000 Reasons” my prayer and my resolve.

“Whatever may pass and whatever lies before me
Let me be singing when the evening comes:

Bless the Lord, O my soul,
O my soul, worship His holy name
Sing like never before, O my soul
Worship His holy name”

I didn’t know what all would come to pass.

Hospitalization. Monitors. IVs. Throwing up in front of my husband and the nurses, unable to even move my arms to keep my hair out of the way. And that was just the first day (a year ago tomorrow).

Topping two hundred pounds. Having a “bottom number” blood pressure reading that would be bad if it was the “top number”. Pneumonia. Fluid restriction. Liver shutting down. Not being able to see color for six weeks.

Labor induction. Uncontrollable shaking. So swollen I couldn’t see. A c-section.

Two hours before I could touch my baby, a half dozen before I could hold her. Twenty-six days before I could take her home.

Her first taste of breastmilk came from a bottle. It was mixed with formula. Her first latch wasn’t at my breast, it was at a nipple shield. Only one breastfeeding session a day for that first month.

Three months before her first smile. Eleven months before she’d sleep more than three hours consistently.

It’s been a hard year. A very, very hard year.

But one year past the official declaration of preeclampsia, another song by Matt Redman springs into my heart and from my mouth as tears roll down my cheeks.

“Standing on this mountaintop
Looking just how far we’ve come
Knowing that for every step
You were with us

Kneeling on this battle ground
Seeing just how much You’ve done
Knowing every victory
Was Your power in us

Scars and struggles on the way
But with joy our hearts can say
Yes, our hearts can say

Never once did we ever walk alone
Never once did you leave us on our own
You are faithful, God, You are faithful
You are faithful, God, You are faithful”

Thank you, God, for your faithful presence, for your enduring grace, for Tirzah Mae and I alive today – on this day one year out.

Categories Following Christ, Relationships

The Difference Thanks Makes

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As we get close to November and start thinking towards Thanksgiving (and before the 30-Day Thankfulness Challenges start popping up on Facebook), I’ve been noticing thankfulness in daily life.

Now, I usually think of thankfulness in terms of thankfulness to God – and generally get frustrated when the focus is on thankfulness towards other people (don’t even get me started on what I think of how “the pilgrims gave thanks to the Indians on the first thanksgiving.”)

And thankfulness to God is essential. He is, after all, the source of every good gift (See James 1:17).

But being thankful to God doesn’t preclude thankfulness to others. In fact, I think thanking God should naturally flow out into thanking others. As I become aware of God’s gifts, I become aware of how he uses others as gifts in my life. That’s when I can give thanks, like Paul did in Romans 16:3-4: “Greet Prisca and Aquila, my fellow workers in Christ Jesus, who risked their necks for my life, to whom not only I give thanks but all the churches of the Gentiles give thanks as well.”

Recognizing that God never commands being thankful to anyone other than Himself, I still think that thankfulness to others can be a powerful part of the Christian life. Why?

Because even if we aren’t commanded to be thankful to others, we are commanded to encourage one another (See 1 Thessalonians 5:11, 14). And thankfulness is hugely encouraging.

Because even if we aren’t commanded to be thankful to others, we are commanded to love one another (See John 13:34-35, Romans 12:10, Ephesians 5:2 and others). And thankfulness is nothing if not loving.

The best example I can think of for thankfulness to others (and how it encourages and demonstrates love) is my husband.

I cook dinner for us almost every evening, and it almost never fails that sometime, in the course of the meal or the evening, Daniel will thank me for making dinner.

When I make a phone call or post a letter or run an errand for Daniel, he makes sure to thank me – verbally, in a text, in an email.

I sometimes often get discouraged with my housekeeping abilities or my time-management skills or a dozen other real or perceived faults. And almost always, Daniel’s response is thanks.

“Thank you for taking care of our daughter all day.”

“Thank you for doing dishes.”

“Thank you for folding the laundry.”

“Thank you for growing us tomatoes.”

“Thank you for listening to me.”

It’s not big things that he’s thanking me for. If I chose, I could brush off his thanks with a “no problem.” And those things aren’t a problem (usually). But that’s not the point.

The point is that when he thanks me, I feel encouraged. I feel strengthened. I feel loved.

That is the difference thanks makes.

And it challenges me to do the same for others.

Categories Recap

Recap (2015/10/17)

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It’s been a while since I posted a Recap – which means there’s a lot to share, but it also means I’m going a little less detailed and just hitting the highlights (in the interest of time :-P).

In the living room:

  • My little brother is in Nebraska for about a month between military postings, so Daniel and I and Tirzah Mae made another quick trip up to Lincoln to spend time with him (we haven’t seen him since another little brother’s wedding almost 2 years ago.) That was pretty great.
  • Tirzah Mae has started “helping” with laundry, pulling the laundry out of the basket and either mouthing it or putting it on the floor. After a few days worth of frustration at having to refold my laundry multiple times, I arrived at a solution. Tirzah Mae stands at the basket of unfolded laundry and hands me one article at a time (“Thank you, Tirzah Mae”). I fold the item and then place it somewhere out of reach (often on the other side of a barricade of my body and the basket.) She hands me another article and we continue until the laundry is done. Then I try to keep her occupied until I can get all the folded laundry gathered and put away!

In the kitchen:

  • I just took Melissa D’Arabian’s Ten Dollar Dinners back to the library, but not before we ate her yummy recipes for a couple of weeks straight (well, apart from some standard household staples). You should check out my review, linked above, if you haven’t already.
  • We picked up our half a pig when we took our vacation at the beginning of last month, which means we’ve been enjoying pork chops and ground pork and BACON!
  • I am so excited that it’s fall and I can start making crockpot soup for every meal. And soon, I’ll be able to put a casserole in the oven without feeling like I’m in an inferno. Which reminds me. It totally belongs in the “on-the-land” section, but we just purchased and picked up a double convection wall oven today. I’m dreaming of having EVERYONE over for turkey dinner. Thanksgiving at my house next year, peoples.

In the nursery:

  • Tirzah Mae is standing now, generally for 5 second intervals but occasionally for as long as 30 seconds or a minute
  • Tirzah Mae is sleeping now. From 8 or 9 at night to 5 or 6 in the morning. Her mother feels like she’s been granted a second chance at life.
  • I had been worried about Tirzah Mae’s language development because she wasn’t babbling as of her nine month appointment, but I’m not worried anymore. Our daughter clearly has no problem hearing and replicating all sorts of consonants. If we called Daniel “dad”, she’d have said her first word; but since he’s papa, she’s still just babbling :-)
  • For years, I’ve been telling moms about the “picky phase” children enter from one year to eighteen months. It’s ’cause nutrient needs decrease quite a bit, making children able to be more selective. And now, I’ve had a chance to see it firsthand. Tirzah Mae went from eating three or four cups worth of watermelon at a sitting to eating maybe a tablespoon or two worth of food. It’s a good thing I know better, ’cause if I didn’t, I’m sure that would freak me out.

In the craft room:

  • I’ve made up an autumn smelly blend for use in a candle-lit simmer pot – and I like it quite a lot. It’s 2 drops cedarwood essential oil, 1 drop clove bud essential oil, 1 drop cinnamon bark essential oil, and 2 drops of tangerine essential oil. Mix with water in your simmer pot and light that candle. Yummy!
  • I also have a Christmas craft book just about due to return to the library, so I had to get started on the project I wanted to do with it – a Nativity scene with a stable and manger made from twigs. I selected appropriate twigs from our more-than-ample pile of brush and have cut them to size, but haven’t yet assembled them into said stable and manger. But since the book has to go back this next week, I’m gonna have to get cracking!

In the garden:

  • Tomatoes keep trickling in – just slow enough that I can use them before they go bad.
  • I’m subbing homegrown hot peppers for all sorts of things, since my hots went crazy while my bells…not so much
  • Everything else is torn out – and plans are simmering for next year’s garden

On the land:

  • We have framing!
  • We have that fancy upstairs school room!
  • We have a roof!
  • We have windows and doors!
  • We have plumbing!
  • We have electrical! (Although it isn’t live yet.)
  • I just bought kitchen appliances!
Categories Book Notes, Following Christ

C.S. Lewis to Bloggers

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In his masterful turn-the-world-upside-down book The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis has his diabolical character Screwtape write the following:

“It remains to consider how we can retrieve this disaster. The great thing is to prevent his doing anything. As long as he does not convert [his conviction and subsequent remorse] into action, it does not matter how much he thinks about this new repentance. Let the little brute wallow in it. Let him, if he has any bent that way, write a book about it; that is often an excellent way of sterilising the seeds which the Enemy plants in a human soul. Let him do anything but act.”

I felt the sting as I read.

But will I convert the conviction of the Lord into obedience?

“But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.”

~James 1:22-25 (ESV)

Categories Following Christ

Legalism and Lawlessness

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Suppose you were six years old and your parents had just given you some new boundaries for riding your bike.

You could ride from one next door neighbor’s driveway to the other next door neighbor’s driveway – a distance spanning approximately two yard widths.

Elated to learn your new boundaries, you hop and your bike and ride as fast as you can to the far edge of your next door neighbor’s driveway – and sit there looking at the next driveway down until your mother calls you in for dinner.

Ridiculous, right?

So what about this one?

Given the same boundaries, you reason that if you get on your bike and start riding down the sidewalk you might not be able to stop and turn in time to avoid outriding your boundaries. So you get on your bike and sit in the center of your own driveway until your mother calls you in for dinner.

Equally ridiculous.

When I was six (or whatever age I was) and those were my boundaries, I’ll tell you what I did. I got on my bike and rode from one driveway to another and back again. Over and over and over again until my mother called me in for dinner.

I trusted that my mother meant what she said when she gave me those boundaries. I trusted that meant I wouldn’t go wrong as long as I was inside them – and that something would go wrong if I was outside them. And so I fully enjoyed life within those boundaries (except the times when I didn’t – because even six-year-old me was a sinner, who sometimes thought life was better outside her boundaries – but that’s neither here nor there as this example goes).

The above scenarios are what I think of when I see Christians who don’t seem to know how to get together without drinking alcohol. They’re what I think of when I see Christians who want to forbid anyone from drinking alcohol lest they cross the line from drinking to drunk.

The above scenarios are what I think of when I see Christians who only listen to secular music. They’re what I think of when I see Christians who get upset because any other Christian is listening to secular music.

My little scenarios are simplistic, I know.

A wise little girl would recognize that she needs a certain amount of space in which to turn – so she leaves herself that space when approaching the boundary. And a wise Christian recognizes that if she has a personal or family history of alcoholism, she may need to abstain.

A loving little girl might recognize that her three-year-old brother has more constricted boundaries than she – so she might choose to play with her brother inside his own boundaries rather than pushing on to play where she legitimately may.

But it seems to me that, so long as I am neither going against my own conscience nor offending my brother, God is glorified when I fully enjoy everything within the boundaries – neither confining myself to the fence nor to the point farthest from the fence.

Categories Health

A Taste of Sore Throat Relief

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Our family has had colds this week, which means mama has been pushing lots of fluids and encouraging lots of rest. I hate colds like these, ones where you’re exhausted but can’t sleep thanks to the postnasal drip and where your throat feels like it’s on fire from the aforementioned drip.

With colds like these, you have to pull out the big guns for sore throat relief. That is, if by “big guns” you mean standard-variety home remedies.

As I was contemplating my options for sore throat relief, I realized that the spectrum of relief includes all five of the basic tastes.

Say what?

While we typically refer to the “taste” of something as being whatever gives it its characteristic flavor, this is an incorrect understanding of taste. Taste is one of our senses, experienced through the “taste buds” located on our tongues. There are just five basic “tastes”: Bitter, Salty, Sour, Sweet, and Umami.

And it just so happens that you can try a sore throat remedy in every taste.

Bitter: Baking Soda Gargle

The Technique:
Add 1/2 tsp baking soda to 1 cup warm water. Gargle in throat and then spit out.

Why does it taste bitter?
Baking soda (chemical name: sodium bicarbonate) is basic (with a pH above 7) and basic compounds taste bitter.

The Claim:
Bicarbonate kills bacteria and other bad bugs that colonize your throat.

Evidence:
Tenuous. This is a commonly recommended home remedy – and if it provides you relief, great. It’s cheap and not likely to be dangerous. On the other hand, it’s unlikely that it’s actually killing anything bad. Any relief is probably from having warm water on your throat. Sorry.

Salty: Salt Water Gargle

The Technique:
Add 1/2 tsp salt to 1 cup warm water. Gargle in throat and then spit out. This technique is often combined with the above (1/2 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp baking soda to 1 cup water).

Why does it taste salty?
‘Cause it’s salt (chemical name: sodium chloride) and salt tastes salty :-)

The Claim:
Salt kills the bacteria and other bad bugs that colonize your throat.

Evidence:
Also tenuous. See the evidence for the “bitter” solution.

Sour: Lemon or Orange Juice

The Technique:
Mix a little lemon juice (with or without honey) into warm water and drink. Or just have some orange juice.

Why does it taste sour?
Citrus fruits contain citric acid – and acids give foods a characteristicly sour taste.

The Claim:
Vitamin C in lemon or orange juice stops cold viruses in their tracks, either by killing the virus or by boosting your immune system so it can kill the virus.

Evidence:
While many super-smart people have posited the above claim, scientific study has failed to support this claim. The relief you experience when you drink lemon water or orange juice is more likely thanks to the soothing effect of the water itself (numbing when cold, relaxing when warm). The water also helps by loosening secretions so you don’t get stuffed up (and since stuffiness promotes things like sinus infections and uncomfortable headaches, the water can help you avoid some of those complications.)

Sweet: Honey

The Technique:
Eat honey from a spoon, or add it to your warm lemon water or tea.

Why does it taste sweet?
Honey is primarily made up of the simple sugars glucose and fructose (the same two sugars that are linked together to form table sugar). Both sugars taste sweet – fructose is a little sweeter than table sugar, glucose is a little less sweet than table sugar.

The Claim:
Honey keeps you from coughing, which keeps the sore throat from getting worse. Also, if your sore throat is caused by allergies, locally grown honey will contain pollen proteins that will desensitize you to common allergens.

Evidence:
The anti-cough properties of honey are borne out by moderately good quality research studies. So if your sore throat is because you’ve been coughing a lot, honey will help it out. If you put your honey in water, especially warm water such as if you were making a warm lemon water or tea concoction, you’ll get even more benefit because the water will loosen any secretions so they can flow into your digestive system instead of hanging out in your throat to get coughed up. The allergy thing? I wish it were true, but there isn’t any clinical evidence to suggest that it is – and its theory is also tenuous since most of the things people are allergic to are wind-pollinated rather than bee-pollinated, so the honey is unlikely to contain the offending allergens.

Umami: Chicken Noodle Soup

The Technique:
Make chicken noodle soup (or have grandma make it for you :-P) Eat and enjoy.

Why does it taste umami – or, hey wait, what on earth is umami?
I’m so glad you asked! Umami is a meaty or brothy taste that we experience when we eat meat or broth (I know, right?) It is caused by the amino acid glutamate, which is found in most meats, mushrooms, and in that ubiquitous Chinese food additive monosodium glutamate. Chicken – and chicken broth – contains glutamate and therefore tastes umami

The Claim:
Chicken noodle soup fixes a sore throat because Grandma said so.

Evidence:
The majority of the benefit of chicken noodle soup is probably psychosomatic – most of us include chicken noodle soup in the “comfort food” category. But even if it isn’t a comfort food for you, it’s a warm water-filled food – which means it loosens up those secretions and it soothes your throat on its way down.

My preferred sore-throat treatment is warm water with lemon and honey, not so much because it confers medical benefits (although the anti-cough properties of the honey are sometimes welcome), but because it tastes great and it makes sure I’m getting that much needed water while I’m battling a cold. (Tirzah Mae gets breastmilk – the ultimate wonder-drug. Honey could contain botulism spores that a baby’s immature immune system can’t shed, resulting in life-threatening respiratory illness, so never give honey to a baby under age 1.)

Do you have a favorite sore throat remedy?

Categories Book Notes

The Abridged Screwtape, part 1

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Foreword from the editors

In the short years since its publication, Screwtape’s correspondence with his nephew has become something of a classic. Part training manual, part cautionary tale, it regularly tops the novice demon’s recommended reading list.

Unfortunately, with the human population growth explosion being such as it is, young demons are being pressed into service earlier and earlier with less and less opportunity to read even such short works as this. A great need exists for concise training materials that can be quickly read by novice demons overtaxed by the strain of managing multiple patients.

To this end, we, the editors, have put together this all new abridge collection of Screwtape. We hope it serves Our Father Below well.

Letter 1: Avoid reasoning and science

“The trouble about argument is that it moves the whole struggle onto the Enemy’s own ground. He can argue too; whereas in really practical propoganda of the kind I am suggesting He has been shown for centuries to be greatly the inferior of Our Father Below.”

“…the best of all is to let him read no science but to give him a grand general idea that he knows it all and that everything he happens to have picked up in casual talk and reading is ‘the results of modern investigation.'”

Letter 2: Keep him disillusioned with the church

“All you then have to do is to keep out of his mind the question ‘If I, being what I am, can consider that I am in some sense a Christian, why should the different vices of those people in the next pew prove that their religion is mere hypocrisy and convention?”

Letter 3: Promote little annoyances and disharmonies within the home

“Let him assume that she knows how annoying it is and does it to annoy – if you know your job he will not notice the immense improbability of the assumption. And, of course, never let him suspect that he has tones and looks which similarly annoy her.”

Letter 4: Keep him from praying

“Whenever they are attending to the Enemy Himself we are defeated, but there are ways of preventing them from doing so. The simplest is to turn their gaze away from Him towards themselves.

Letter 5: Do not rejoice overmuch in times of war, for the Enemy uses war to his own purpose

“Consider too what undesirable deaths occur in wartime. Men are killed in places where they knew they might be killed and to which they go, if they are at all of the Enemy’s party, prepared.”

Letter 6: Teach him to be anxious and to focus on his feelings

“[The Enemy] wants men to be concerned with what they do; our business is to keep them thinking about what will happen to them.”

Letter 7: Encourage extremes or keep people complacent, depending on the age

“All extremes except extreme devotion to the Enemy are to be encouraged. Not always, of course, but at this period. Some ages our lukewarm and complacent, and then it is our business to soothe them yet faster asleep. Other ages, of which the present is one, are unbalanced and prone to faction, and it is our business to inflame them.”

I’ve been reading (and haven’t yet finished) C.S. Lewis’s The Screwtape Letters with the Reading to Know Classics bookclub. Thanks Barbara for choosing this month’s read. Follow the links to find out what other readers are saying about the Letters.

Categories Theology

God of Judgment, God of Grace

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“In the Old Testament, God reveals himself as a God of Judgment. In the New Testament, God reveals himself as a God of Grace.”

If I had a dollar for every time I’d heard a well-intentioned Christian say something to that effect…

But wait.

I’m pretty sure I’ve said something to that effect.

The problem is, it’s wrong.

Or, at least, it’s incomplete.

God does indeed reveal himself as a God of Grace in the New Testament. But that doesn’t mean He fails to reveal himself as a God of Judgment.

God does indeed reveal himself as a God of Judgment in the Old Testament. But that doesn’t mean He fails to reveal himself as a God of Grace.

I’ve been thrilled to be teaching the Old Testament to three-year-olds in Sunday School this year. It’s great. I love the Old Testament. I love teaching the Old Testament.

And what’s struck me about the Old Testament this time around is that I haven’t yet seen an example of God’s judgment without His Mercy.

When Adam and Eve ate the poisonous fruit, God’s judgment on them meant death and banishment from the garden. Yet in God’s mercy, He promised a Savior and the ultimate destruction of their enemy the snake.

When Cain killed Abel, God’s judgment on Cain meant an end to his livelihood and a lifetime of wandering. Yet in God’s mercy, He set a mark on Cain to protect him from his greatest fear – that whoever found him would kill him.

When the people were so wicked that God could stand it no longer, God’s judgment on the world meant a flood that destroyed all people but eight. Yet in God’s mercy, He preserved eight – and promised to never again destroy the earth in that way (despite man’s evil continuing to provoke His anger.)

When humanity set themselves against God and sought to build a tower to display their own glory, God’s judgment meant confusing their language and their plans. Yet their punishment was God’s mercy, giving them a second opportunity to be obedient – to fill the earth and subdue it.

When Sodom and Gomorrah committed great atrocities before God, God’s judgment meant raining down fire and brimstone on them. Yet in God’s mercy, He let Abraham haggle with him over the fate of the city, promising to save the cities if even ten righteous men could be found. But even when ten righteous could not be found, God’s mercy saved the family of the one righteous man.

The New Testament really only requires one proof text – but it’s the proof text around which every other text hangs. God’s mercy meant pardoning sinful rebels. But his judgment meant pronouncing a death sentence on His Son.

God’s grace meant imputing His Son’s righteousness to wretches. His judgment meant nailing His Son to the cross for the wretches’ sin.

If you think that the Old Testament tells only of God’s judgment, read again.

If you think that the New Testament tells only of God’s grace, read again.

For wherever God reveals Himself, He reveals Himself as the Judge and the Justifier – the awful and the merciful.

“But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”
~Romans 3:22-26 (ESV)