How do the words “The righteous shall live by his faith” go from a context of hope in hopelessness to the cornerstone declaration of the chief doctrine of the Christian faith?
As soon as people understand what crucifixion means, the cross becomes offensive.
This is the third installment in the 1517 articles series, “What Makes a Saint?”

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Only a god could be wise. We are seekers, lovers of divine wisdom, but it is forever beyond our grasp due to human limitation.
You say: Since forgiveness depends on faith alone, why must one nonetheless do good works? Answer: If faith is of the true sort, it cannot be without good works, just as no good work can be where unbelief dwells.
And so we determine that God is a stern, short-tempered Lord and a gracious, long-suffering Father. And the fact is, He is both.
Jesus tears down every “but” that people try to build between us and God. He died and rose for us, and—not but—He makes Himself our Lord and Savior.
Even now we sing as we live in His gifts, and await His second Advent—His second-coming.
Christ intercedes on your behalf before the Father for all the sins that work guilt deep down in your soul.
The text says there was no room for them. And this should give us cause for a little head-scratching.
To lose a leader like this is always too soon!
A friend of mine recently expressed to me his rather unique thoughts on Narcissus.
Babies need to be baptized for the same reason that all Christians need to be absolved: All of us are born into and contribute to this sin-wrecked show of a life.
Faith does not distinguish between worthy and unworthy, saint and sinner, great faith and anemic faith, it only focuses on Christ Jesus.
Her name meant “Rebel” or “Rebellion”. In a culture where your name was thought to reveal your whole character, either in a prophetic sense or as it was known and manifested, it was an interesting choice.