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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We confuse our success and failures with God’s judgment of us.
It wasn’t that I didn’t love. I loved deeply, but I was also aware of the much deeper reservoir of self-love that kept me from ever loving fully.
I don't remember a time not knowing I was a sinner. Seriously, I've always understood that Christ died for me.
The following is an excerpt from “Let the Bird Fly” written by Wade Johnston (1517 Publishing, 2019).
Where American freedom shouts for individual rights and liberties, freedom in Christ binds neighbors together because our blessings are for each other.
It’s no wonder we’re so attached to images; we are one. We are human hyphens between the celestial and the terrestrial.
In this religious Sodom, we had a Jesus with the heart of Moses whose gospel was a new and improved law.
As important as the training of your children is, much more important is handing them over to God—from the very beginning, from infancy, and beyond.
Imagine yourself at an advanced age. What do you want to remember when you’ve forgotten virtually everything else? Sing that.
We can’t all afford to travel the world, but the more we read from outside our own context, the bigger we see the world.
They cannot know that I am already a father, but, this side of eternity, I won’t ever meet my child because of a miscarriage.
We tell the little story of the Gospel because our great stories ultimately reflect Christ.