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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To obtain this righteousness, you have to admit you don’t have it and could never produce it on your own because you are unrighteous.
There is a bit of Narcissus in all of us. We are all lost within ourselves.
What the gospel does is take people who were enemies of God and transform them into lovers of God
Free speech isn't dead yet, and when it comes to the proclamation of the gospel, it never will be.
Success is emphatically not your primary identity.
We know we are made for something great. We humans were created in God’s image and restored through Christ in his perfect image.
The notion that your goodness is “good enough” to make you right with God is a lie straight from the father of lies himself.
This is the sound of freedom. The Eternal One died so that we who are dying might live eternally with him.
When you see the year ending, thank the Lord, because he had led you into this cycle of years.
C.S. Lewis, Grief, and the Holiday Season
Faith sees your neighbor not as a means to an end, not as a way to score points, but as an object of love: Christ's love and yours.
The issue is not the existence of so-called inner rings, but our desire and willingness to spend our lives in order to gain from an inner ring what is freely promised in Christ: hope, security, and identity.