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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The night has passed and the day broken. In response to the morning dawn, birds sing, beasts arouse themselves and all humanity arises.
It turns out that when Elijah battled depression, God sent someone to just be with him. To comfort him.
When explaining that sinners were saved by grace alone Erasmus would not go so far as to say that the reception of God’s grace erased human responsibility.
Is this text about marriage or Jesus? The answer should be obvious by now: Yes!
Erasmus laid out his argument for a theology of grace and free will in much the same way modern Protestants have done since the Enlightenment.
As long as the church teaches the gospel, it will suffer persecution.
Luther's response to Erasmus was not meant to be a polite contribution to an academic duel.
Here is the foundational cure for the evils of racism in human society, faith in Christ as definitive for racial identification.
Luther’s allies and opponents also would not allow him to put off responding to Erasmus indefinitely. They badgered him constantly to write a response.
Faith is a living, bold trust in God’s grace, so certain of God’s favor that it would risk death a thousand times trusting in it.
God’s love is axiomatic; it just is. It’s a truism without a logical explanation.
What Luther is doing in his Catechism is teaching how the gospel is an action of the whole Trinity, not just one of the persons.