This is an excerpt from the third chapter of By Water and the Word: God’s Gift of Baptism for You by Brian Thomas (1517 Publishing, 2026), pgs 52-60.
Even when the bitter places sink down deep into our bones, the Restorer never relinquishes his grip on you.
To Live Well is therefore not a general advice book, but a message suffused with the gospel.

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It’s a miracle anyone believes the Gospel. It goes against everything else we believe in.
Why was Jesus crucified? Not to save victims, but to save sinners.
The dying words of Jesus were not, “Make it worth it,” but “It is finished.”
No, when the Lord is ready for battle, of all creatures, he commissions Mary’s little lamb.
A crisis of faith always occurs when we begin to believe that God has betrayed us.
I became like God’s child David, whom the Lord pardoned of his adultery and murder. I became like Noah, Abraham, Judah, Aaron, Gideon, and so many more wayward children.
God cannot love me unconditionally without prerequisites, especially after all I’ve done, can He?
Stephen Fry, the English actor, author and game show host once disparaged the “grammar Nazis” who felt it necessary to enforce all the rules of language but who had forgotten, or just didn’t care, about the joy of language.
We're of little faith. Or rather, we have big faith, but it’s in something else. Our faith is in our ability to control situations, manipulate them to our advantage.
I'm in the middle of a series on Paul's letter to the Ephesians.
Faith does not require that we always Hoorah what the Lord does. God wants children, not brown-nosers.
The chief verb of the liturgy is the gift of God’s forgiveness for the sake of Jesus Christ.