Wade Johnston, Life Under the Cross: A Biography of the Reformer Matthias Flacius Illyricus, Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis: MO, 2025.
This ancient “tale of two mothers” concerns far more than theological semantics—it is the difference between a God who sends and a God who comes.
This story points us from our unlikely heroes to the even more unlikely, and joyous, good news that Jesus’ birth for us was just as unlikely and unexpected.

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“Praying the Bible” sounds odd to the ears of most believers today. That’s unfortunate.
God does not give us an undebatable answer to suffering. Instead, God suffers, too.
You are the baptized, for in Christ we are all wet. The demographic dividers are washed away.
He shows up when we are at our worst to usher us back to his side, lead us to repentance, rescue us, and reclaim us as his own.
Sometimes, we get prayer dementia. We can’t remember what we were going to pray for, we can’t put the words together, and, frustrated, there is nothing we can do but sigh and groan.
Do our petitions move God?
We must also address the stigma surrounding addiction within so many churches.
Jesus weeps because his heart pulses with furious rage and fierce love.
The Lord’s Prayer is liturgy and catechism, action and instruction, praxis and theology.
Prayer is not just about asking for things. It's about receiving what has already been given to us in Christ.
Praying the Word of God back to God carries didactic import. It teaches us.
When we forget that we live by promise, that's when the danger tends to creep in. Because failing to embrace promise means we usually fall back into notions of luck, or even worse--into works.