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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Christ is joy and sweetness to a broken heart. Christ is a lover of poor sinners, and such a lover that He gave Himself for us.
Justice and love are united in God, and we see this most clearly in Jesus on the cross. There, both God's hatred toward sin and compassion for the world come together.
Cliché preaching may be symptomatic of shallow, consumerist culture, perpetuating a problem rather than the solution.
The point is that the whole lot was wicked. And so were the Galatian Christians. And so are we.
Jesus has conquered; he who has an ear let him hear. There is nothing to run from, nothing to be ashamed of, nothing to fear because the Lamb of God has done it all.
When we proclaim Jesus' death we are, at the same time, preaching that this cup from which we drink is the cup of salvation for all who believe and receive it.
War is a plague, but sometimes it needs to be fought to protect from greater plagues.
Elisabeth Cruciger is the first female Lutheran hymn writer. In fact, her hymn was included in the very first evangelical hymnal, published in 1524. With her life and her hymn, she becomes a witness, an example, and a proclaimer of the gospel to us almost 500 years later.
Jesus wouldn't allow religious people to determine his identity, define his mission, or put him in a safe, predictable religious box.
The parable of the two sons whom their father sent to work in the vineyard is not a well-known parable--or one about which we hear many sermons. What does it mean? And what does it tell us about life in the church? In this article, Del Campbell explores this parable for us.
Even though we are tempted to add our personal opinions to the meaning of Jesus' life and death, to increase the meaning of His sacrifice, there's only one thing that makes Christians "Christian." Christ crucified for us for the forgiveness of sin.
The view of Total Depravity as it is usually understood by outsiders (and even many insiders), is often misunderstood. Despite appearances to the contrary, Total Depravity does not mean totally evil.