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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The church is the only place God promises to lift us out of ourselves not in order to become more like God but so that we may finally be freed from our obsession with becoming little gods.
This text arguably contains the clearest teaching concerning the bodily resurrection from the dead in the Old Testament.
Hebrews reminds us you cannot “be the church” unless you go to church.
Everywhere we look, there is suffering. But Jesus is not calling us to look. He is calling us to listen.
Our experience with good fathers – even when they are not our own – can point us to God the Father.
What do Habakkuk and Israel have? Nothing but the word of God. Nothing but the promise of God. Nothing but God himself.
This is an extremely important chapter and it speaks to the motif of DEATH and RESURRECTION in a powerful way.
The emphasis for All Saints Sunday is not on the saints, but the Sanctifier, Jesus Christ.
In his death, Jesus has done the ultimate act of charity. He has given his life for all.
In contrast to the human courts of our land, the Divine court never makes errors nor excuses
The LORD your God is one—He is your LORD. Therefore, you may/can/shall live as His child, and this is what that looks like!
Are we still haunted by God? Do our sins bother us to the point that we worry about God’s righteous wrath? Does the concept of justification, how one can be right in the eyes of God, even cross our minds?