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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Have you ever heard of Spanx? Although they’ve only been around since 2010, their predecessors have been around for centuries.
Christianity isn’t about our faith. It’s about God’s faithfulness to His promises.
People have often tended, quite wrongly, to view me as saintly. I attribute that undeserved reputation to the fact I have always had a very strong sense of the kind of person I should be.
The common knock against “grace people” (or to put it another way, “Christians”) is that preaching too much grace will encourage licentious living.
My experience as a Christian did not revolve around Christ. It revolved around asking, “What is God’s will for my life?” Hunting the answer to this question was my god, and I paid homage to it every day.
Jesus is faithful even when we are faithless. He is our Strength, and Song, and Salvation. He's all this for us because He is God, and God is love.
As a pastor I am often asked if pets go to heaven? The question may sound childish, or even sentimental, but it is extremely important for those who ask it.
True faith, saving faith that receives the good news about the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world is a faith created in us by the Holy Spirit through the Gospel.
Some form of the Rule of Benedict will not save or reinvigorate the church. The church already has what the church needs to do her work in the world: she has the Gospel.
You are God’s people. Yet you are nothing in the world’s sight. To be honest, often less than nothing. Don’t feel bad, I’m nothing with you.
Every Christian face-plants. It doesn’t matter how long we’ve been saved by grace, we still face-plant.
Likewise, when God says, "Do this and you will live," we go about under the illusion that we have the ability to accomplish what God demands of us.