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.

All Articles

In the Bible, we meet the God who also does not prance around naked as a jaybird.
God demonstrates his great love for us in the actions of Jesus, who came down into the flesh and soaked up all our sin.
Christ’s birth, he shows us, is entangled with human pride and sin, which is overcome by God’s love.
Basil the Great (330-379) gives a brief meditation on the Incarnation
What’s the big deal about Jesus’ name?
I didn’t see Christmas as a gift given to me to enjoy, I saw Christmas as a long list of expectations I needed to hold up to love those around me.
Can you imagine Christmas from creation’s point of view?
Luke shows us that when we try to fit God into our life movie, the plot is all wrong; and not just wrong but trivial.
We still think we can sort own own problems with more money, more education, more resources, more techniques, more, more, more.
Show me your righteousness, we can only point to Jesus
It is the love of God that reveals Him as the promise-making, promise-keeping God.
C.S. Lewis, Grief, and the Holiday Season