This is an excerpt from the third chapter of By Water and the Word: God’s Gift of Baptism for You by Brian Thomas (1517 Publishing, 2026), pgs 52-60.
Even when the bitter places sink down deep into our bones, the Restorer never relinquishes his grip on you.
To Live Well is therefore not a general advice book, but a message suffused with the gospel.

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Rather than telling our children, “You can be anything you want to be,” let’s tell them, “Be the best possible servant you can be.”
Jesus dies for the sin of the world. That means he dies for the person who disappoints us. He shed His blood for the person who doesn’t love us the way we want to be loved.
No matter which side, it’s easy for all of us to build Bible verses into grenades aimed at obliterating the political other.
Jesus comes to pop our bubbles of pride, implode our towers of vanity, expose our arrogant adulting ways, and brings us down, down, down. Down to his level, which is the level of crucifixion.
You may have seen the uproar from a recent blog post suggesting that virgins who forego college, learn to cook big meals and abstain from tattoos make more desirable wives.
Our complaints about God's grace always sound the same: "It was good to see him in church with his son this morning.
We too believe that we can be just like God, perhaps even by helping God to be a God in our image.
The following is an excerpt from Martin Luther’s Commentary on Saint Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians (1535), translated by Haroldo Camacho (1517 Publishing, 2018).
Why confess sin? Is it so we can get rewarded by God? A little extra grace or material good for our troubles, maybe.
The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.” But the fool also says in his heart, “There are many gods.” And we, dear friends, are the fools.
The author, Flannery O'Connor, said, "All I can say about my love of God is, Lord help me in my lack of it."
Led by God’s Word we can grasp why this gap exists, grows, and threatens us. Simply put, we don’t take sin seriously. We don’t take the effects of our sinful rebellion on all of creation seriously.