This is an excerpt from Chapter 1 on Sinner Saint: A Suprising Primer to the Christian Life
The Fourth in the fire is Jesus.

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Scripture is clear: God’s Spirit pursues sinners from conception to the grave with his life-giving Gospel and gifts.
Peace comes when we give up worrying about self-interest, self-preservation, and self-satisfaction and instead keep our eyes fixed on good God and Savior Jesus.
God has gifted pastors with a terrible privilege. We’re invited to go inside peoples’ pain. A stranger stands emotionally naked in front of us begging, “I can’t get what he did out of my head. Please, help me!”
He comes to fill our old, stony heart with the new wine of his forgiveness.
We surrender confidence in God because we lack faith in Christ, and we lack faith in Christ because we rebel against the fact that each, single moment of self-destruction is nailed to that cross.
Blood is the thing. In the Scriptures, sin must be covered or "atoned for" as it's called, by blood.
John’s message doesn’t inspire religious leaders to repent. Instead, John’s message provokes them to resentment and rage.
At the Passover, when Jesus said, "Take, eat, this is my body... take, drink, this is the New Testament in my blood, which is given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins," he wasn't inventing a "new" thing.
We who have been given so much are the way by which the Father cares for those in need.
He who created the heavens and the earth is adored by angels, shepherds, magi, and cows.
Immanuel is born to rescue all of us weak-hearted, cowardly, self-deceiving children of this world. He comes to set us free in the liberation of His death.
What Jesus says is simple, but the simplest things are difficult, and difficulty causes friction.