The following entries are excerpts from Chad Bird’s new book, Untamed Prayers: 365 Daily Devotions on Christ in the Book of the Psalms (1517 Publishing, 2025), pgs. 311 and 335
Why did the church dedicate a day to St. Michael anyway? Who is he, and what does he do?
The Antichrist offers another continual presence. It is every whisper that tempts us toward autonomy, that tells us to carry it alone, that insists suffering is meaningless.

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As Simeon sang, you might lead your hearers in a song of defiant and hopeful confidence to close out a year characterized by death and despair.
Advent is not a call to prepare to engage in a transaction with God.
The well-meaning advice “time heals all wounds” is offensively false when we confront the overwhelming evidence that the constants in our lives are death, taxes, and suffering.
At the center of this gospel reading is a conversation. It was of the memorable variety. It involved a peasant girl from a small town and a mighty messenger from God.
He assumed the weakest form to do his greatest work.
Whatever else may come, however worse it may get, the light has come and will come again.
On this day in the year 1093, Anselm was consecrated as the archbishop of Canterbury.
We at 1517 are utterly committed to keeping the main thing, the main thing.
Mark makes no effort to impress listeners or win votes. His voice aims only to prepare those who hear it for the coming of the Lord.
Where there’s more sin, there’s more grace! Are you comfortable with that? That the greater the sin, the greater the grace? Could it be that easy?
Jesus desires for us to watch. The question, however, is, “How do we watch for the return of Jesus?”
This is an excerpt from Martin Luther’s Commentary on Saint Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians (1535), written by Martin Luther and translated by Haroldo Camacho (1517 Publishing, 2018).