This is an excerpt from Chapter 6 in Sinner Saint: A Surprising Primer to the Christian Life (1517 Publishing, 2025). Sinner Saint is available today from 1517 Publishing.
On its journey from Byzantium to Constantinople to Istanbul, this special place helps us understand the broader arc of Christian history, which goes on until Christ's return.
We needn’t fear statistics and studies as palm readings into a certain future. God is God, and his Spirit is alive through his Word.

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God lit within these ashes the fire of a promise: whoever they touched, that person became clean.
He does not offer a linear route or a series of actions. He offers Himself. In very simple straightforward words, He declares, “I am the way.”
The more I heard the song, the more I heard the heart of the Gospel in the song.
Christ's death for us is how and why God declares us righteous. Christ's righteousness is imputed to us as free gift.
Who should we baptize and when? How old does the person have to be? What if we get it wrong? Will something terrible happen to us?
She wasn’t so much giving up on her husband as giving up on herself. She was giving up trying to be the person who changes another person. It was going to take more than her to reform the man she loved.
Whatever level of sin you're rummaging around in, forgiveness and grace is yours.
Kierkegaard attempts to take us through Abraham’s mind as the patriarch prepares to sacrifice his son, his only son, his son whom he loves.
The God who calls us to love our neighbor as ourselves will seem hopelessly out of touch with your insulated life of self-sufficiency.
Today, people often bemoan the loss of children in the church.
There is no Psalm as well known as Psalm 23
We have now reached a point where many believe so strongly in individualism that nothing else matters.