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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Every single child we raise has a completely unique perspective, personality, strength, and weakness.
Week after week, I read through this women’s Bible study for the sake of my friends.
Quid pro quo, you scratch my back and I will scratch yours. It tends to be the way we humans operate.
He reminds them how his love is truly marvelous and unconditional, but then, he looks them in the eyes, and says they ought to do better because of his love.
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?
True faith, saving faith that receives the good news about the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world is a faith created in us by the Holy Spirit through the Gospel (Eph 2:8-9).
Forgiveness of sin, righteousness, and eternal life aren't handed out by God because we deserve it.
Though they have never left the church, they have been lost all the while.
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.