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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As the story unfolds we see Luther’s Heidelberg theses on display, even before the Fellowship leaves Rivendell.
O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus he says to these bones. Behold, I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live.
On this night of nights, Christ arises victorious and sends the devil’s hordes running with no darkness to find cover; death’s dark shadow is gone
The only thing Hobbits love more than a good meal, is good company with whom they can share it.
If April 1 is April Fools’ Day, then March 25 is Divine Fool’s Day. Falling nine months before Christmas, it’s the day when God set in motion what appeared to be a foolish plan.
These words sum up the whole person and work of our Messiah. Here is the Gospel in Hebrew.
There are so many paradoxes that we can appreciate as we seek to grasp more of the meaning of the miracle of Christmas.
Isn’t it strange how the Jesus we end up with bears such a striking resemblance to ourselves? Our Jesus thinks as we do, acts as we act, speaks as we speak.
It had just been a few weeks in my friend’s life since he had been converted to the Christian faith. He was very much still learning the ropes of what it meant to be a Christian.
On that night in Bethlehem so long ago, not even your mother who held you in her arms understood that you had come to turn the world upside down in a through-the-looking-glass sort of way.
The mother of this prophet is visited by the Mother of God. In the coming together of these two pregnant women, we see the coming together of the old and the new.
We shouldn’t be surprised when the worldviews of the sub-creators (or their characters) show up in movies, television, books, theater, music, and other works of art.