The women at the tomb were surprised by Easter. Amazed and filled with wonder at Jesus' Easter eucatastrophe. And so are we.
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.

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Jesus’s touch of this leper is the touchstone of the gospel itself. It’s a living parable of his entire ministry.
Tomorrow Jesus will laugh his way out of the tomb, spit in the face of death, and kick the devil in the throat as he dances to the clapping glee of angelic masses. But today he just rests.
You can’t bear your own sins, to say nothing of getting rid of them.
I can look at all of my failings and foolishness because I know who Christ is for me. I rest in his wisdom and life not my own.
Like the women who came despite their questions, your hearers will gather despite their uncertainties, and they will be looking for a word of honest hope.
In the resurrection Jesus transcended time, space, and death; those things which limit human existence. So, the stone was not rolled away for Jesus, but for the disciples and for us.
This is the feast, the banquet to end all banquets. The LORD God is the maker and provider of this great feast which takes place for the resurrected faithful in the courts of Heaven.
The true liberty that Christ gives to us through the gospel is not political. It is spiritual freedom. It is freedom from fear of God's judgment and wrath.
Ultimately, there is only one Lord of the Universe, and he does not share power. If Jesus is Lord, Caesar is not.
The petition not to be led into temptation is found in just the right place within the seven petitions.
Jesus Christ is our peace because he doesn't criticize us. He declares us freed from our perceptions to accept the truth about ourselves.
Our anxiety about the future is a consequence of our old self’s attempts to achieve freedom for himself apart from Christ Jesus.