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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Yet, just as the Jews had two choices, true God or no God, the Christian has the same, true Jesus or no Jesus.
One of my favorite things to do in the summer is read out under the shade of my backyard tree. There, I have a reclining chair and small little side table.
If affairs always begin by believing lies, then repentance always begins by believing the truth: the truth that you are in the wrong, the truth that you have a God who loves you in Jesus Christ, and the truth that he and he alone can save you not only from adultery but from every sin that seeks to lead you down the path of destruction.
People have often tended, quite wrongly, to view me as saintly. I attribute that undeserved reputation to the fact I have always had a very strong sense of the kind of person I should be.
You can talk to me about how Jesus is really forgiving and how you want me around, but what happens when things don’t change in a month?
What on God’s green earth does dynamite, a chemical explosive, have to do with the Gospel of Christ?
Who was this Jesus, who could do such things?
Looking at our dining room table most days, you might think we were running a cartoon factory out of our house. Drawings. Everywhere.
In Christian terms, this is a perfect example of the doctrine of vocation, where God calls us to serve our neighbor.
I don't remember the first time I heard the gospel, but I do remember the first time I began to understand it.
She wasn’t so much giving up on her husband as giving up on herself. She was giving up trying to be the person who changes another person. It was going to take more than her to reform the man she loved.
It's difficult enough for us to bear anothers' burdens, but carry another person's sin for him? Why would we do that?