Wade Johnston, Life Under the Cross: A Biography of the Reformer Matthias Flacius Illyricus, Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis: MO, 2025.
This ancient “tale of two mothers” concerns far more than theological semantics—it is the difference between a God who sends and a God who comes.
This story points us from our unlikely heroes to the even more unlikely, and joyous, good news that Jesus’ birth for us was just as unlikely and unexpected.

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It is difficult to overestimate the importance of these early Lutheran hymns – and their physical availability in hymnals – in the piety of common people living in Lutheran towns and territories.
The gospel is for sinners – both the tax collector and Pharisee, both in need of the Great Physician.
God chose Russell Brand, chose to defy his fast-escaping life and drink up all his swift-running sin in the River Thames.
The profound significance of Christ’s resurrection comes from the threefold justification it provides: it justifies the sinner, the sinner’s hope, and God himself.
Some part of us always wants our ability under the law to be just as important (or more) than grace.
The Good Shepherd doesn’t leave the sheep to fend for themselves.
The notion that your goodness is “good enough” to make you right with God is a lie straight from the father of lies himself.
Applying the pressure of law to ensure you do not to take grace for granted squeezes the life and power out of the gospel.
Jonah’s biggest blunder was a failure to understand that God’s grace is always undeserved and always falls on those who are unworthy of it.
Heaven is yours now.
This article is written by guest contributor, Christopher J. Richmann.
He represents our likeness, fulfills it, and so has the prerogative to reproduce his likeness in us.