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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No longer do we read about Jesus promising to satisfy and raise and abide in His people. Instead, we encounter a Jesus who goes on the attack.
The new life Christ opened for us in His justifying resurrection, the new life into which we were baptized is a life of faith.
So many distractions—so many false and foreign gods—so many side paths and rabbit trails. What choice, what decision? Who will we follow?
God’s Word of forgiveness, new life in baptism, and life given in the Lord’s Supper direct our lives in this world of sin and cause us to follow Christ’s light through the darkness.
Jesus, the Son of God from all eternity, the agent of creation, the Savior of all people, promises to abide IN His people.
Sermons begin with an audience of one, me. But, preaching to oneself is always dangerous.
Instead of providing a way out, the LORD gave Elijah a way through, which included the calling of Elisha as his apprentice.
The baptized, those rescued and redeemed by God’s grace alone through faith in Jesus Christ alone, are given an entirely new life to live, an entirely new way to walk.
Jesus promises more than a disembodied “spiritual” existence after death. He has promised to raise our perishable, mortal bodies to immortality.
Here is the foundational cure for the evils of racism in human society, faith in Christ as definitive for racial identification.
Do we honestly believe what we tell our hearers really makes any significant difference in the coming week for them?
The presence of the Glory Cloud at the presentation of the manna makes clear who is providing this meal.