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 gives us the power and authority to proclaim the forgiveness of sins to burdened sinners who entrust us with their pain, guilt, and defeat.
The law had to have its way with the expert to bring him around (and back) to Abraham's response.
In Memory of My Friend, James Arne Nestingen
The word which justifies by bringing faith in baptism is the same powerful word that recreates, regenerates, and re-births a human being in baptism.
Toy Story is indeed a Christmas story.
When the church is a political actor, the gospel doesn’t have the final word.
All our sin and shame is answered for in the death and resurrection of our Lord.
You are the friend in low places. It’s only from this place that you are free to look outside yourself for the remedy to the issues that plague you and humanity.
You are a child of God. You’re blameless, holy, perfect, and righteous. Don’t feel that way? Too bad. God is greater than your heart.
You’re not new because of what you do. You’re new and so you do new things, even in spite of yourself, because of your sinful nature.
We don’t start with behavior and work toward Christ. We start with Christ and everything works out from there.
Through water, blood, and word, the Spirit never stops pointing us to Christ, and even more, giving us Christ.