The women at the tomb were surprised by Easter. Amazed and filled with wonder at Jesus' Easter eucatastrophe. And so are we.
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.

All Articles

Recovery helps us see beauty in the ordinary; the miracle and wonder of creation in the oak leaf or the evergreen needle.
Satan cannot stand the Gospel, and so he goes to work to undermine and render God’s Word an impotent and absurd message.
Conflict demands resolution, tension demands a balancing act in the face of uncertainties.
By focusing intently on what one wants to avoid, we often crash right into the moral hazard we are trying to evade.
I hear voices in my head accusing me, telling me these sins will be there on the Day of Judgment unless I make atonement.
If this opening verse offers to us both door and doorkeeper, then the doorkeeper stands with the door held securely shut.
As the devil awakens after a long slumber, recovering from the resurrection event, he finds his shackles loosened and the glorious screams of torment throughout his dark empire
"Are you Republican or Democrat?” “Liberal or conservative?” “Yankees or Red Sox?” “Star Wars or Star Trek?”
The accusations of the voices we hear on a daily basis are deafening. There is no shortage of voices that will remind us of our failures.
I walk in the local mall for exercise several times a week. I purposely avoid weekends and hours when the mall is likely to be crowded because, while I am not a racewalker, I do like to keep up a steady pace as opposed to stopping, starting and inching and this is difficult to achieve even when there are few people around.
In Christ we are already dead to sin and the eternal consequences of sin. “There is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus,” writes Paul (Romans 8:1).
If God is God, He doesn’t need anyone to defend Him. Nor does He need anyone to march for Him.