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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But another possible translation for the Greek word we translate as ‘overcome’ and one maybe more consistent with the context is ‘comprehend.’
Even now we sing as we live in His gifts, and await His second Advent—His second-coming.
What comes to us at Christmas is not a great seasonal bargain to enhance our happy holidays. It is the priceless gift of God’s Son.
God graciously bursts our foolish plots by coming our way, into our very flesh, and being God with us.
Those clinging to God in Christ can be assured that it’s all clean.
Whether one believes Jesus to be God or not, His words and actions proclaim that He did not come to be served but to serve.
Many Christians (including preachers) have succumbed to the idea that good preaching must be about practical living, and so most sermons are geared to scratch this pragmatic itch.
I once heard an old, retired Lutheran professor give in interview on a podcast. He was asked by the interviewer why people should bother going to church if they could just be saved through a personal relationship with Jesus?
Music is an inherent part of our humanity as image-bearers of God. And like all gifts, it is meant for the good of the receiver.
We are continuing our summer series on a theology of worship through the lens of language. Before moving forward, let me highlight a few points by way of review.
Like any language, the liturgy has syntax—a structure that provides order and intelligibly communicates meaning through all that is said.
Over the next few months, I invite you to join me in looking at what the Bible and the Lutheran Confessions have to say about the subject of worship through the lens of language.