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.

All Articles

Our faith is not a mountain but a grain of sand, not pure gold but gilded plaster. And all it takes is a few nicks and scratches to reveal its shallowness.
The only thing Hobbits love more than a good meal, is good company with whom they can share it.
Warning, Remember, O man, that thou art dust… And lust, he mocks in mute self-condemnation.
Believe in God, belong to a church, and behave yourself isn’t the Gospel.
As it turned out, the novels in which I had sought escape, became part of the means whereby the Lord rescued me from my own death.
A star appears in the East. A spotlight over its Creator. A single constellation bows over that Light of Light from whom darkness flees.
The biblical witness is clear: all the so-called gods and lords and idols who are the object of people’s devotion, to whom they offer their sacrifices, to whom they pray, whom they call God and Lord, are sadly nothing but a front for the father of lies.
There is truly only one commandment and only one sin. That one commandment is “You shall have no other gods,” and that one sin is idolatry.
With but a donkey's jawbone He whacked a thousand men And iced yet even more
Nonetheless, if we wish to treat apologetics as a practical endeavor for concrete engagement with people who ask about Christianity, it seems best to start with the questions young people are actually asking.
I have found that Gandalf’s words above ring true, not only in Middle-earth, but in our world as well.
I once heard a grad school professor say that America really is a polytheistic nation since so many people believe in so many different gods.