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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This is an excerpt from the prologue of “On Any Given Sunday: The Story of Christ in the Divine Service” by Mike Berg (1517 Publishing, 2023).
Past, present, and future are tied together in Christ.
We don't make Church "happen." Only Christ can do so. It's his happening.
Unprompted, without any warning, for no reason at all, without any instigation say, "I love you." And that will wash over your parents like a beautiful absolution.
I hate to break it to you, but "are" is not an action verb. "Are" is a being verb.
Even if the numbers are bad, the news about Jesus crucified for sinners and raised to new life hasn’t become any less good.
There is a revival, no less real and even more definitive, taking place in every church, every weekend, where God’s people gather around his gifts.
His love for you is so deep that in his mercy, while you were yet a sinner, God sent his only begotten Son to die for you.
Zephaniah has given us something more visceral to help us understand the love of God: the sound of salvation.
We too are God’s baptized, beloved, blood-bought believers. And no one can ever take that away from us.
Hidden beneath the sinner is a glorious saint. Jesus has declared it to be so in your baptism.
Predestination, Jim knew, is no longer a frightening doctrine of mystery when you understand that God makes his choice about you in the simple word of God, given from one sinner to another.