This is an excerpt from the introduction of Stretched: A Study for Lent and the Entire Christian Life by Christopher Richmann (1517 Publishing, 2026).
We can bring our troubles, griefs, sorrows, and sins to Jesus, who meets us smack dab in the middle of our messy mob.
Confession isn’t a detour in the liturgy. It’s the doorway.

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Cindy’s tragedy was that she was blind to the Christ from whom all her good gifts came.
The term Gospel came to mean a new kind of proclamation so that the Law and the new doctrine [Gospel] are distinguished in such a way that the new doctrine gains primary influence.
Really, once you’ve heard and believed the Gospel, the goal now is to learn more and more about the law of God, so that you can mature into a commandment-keeping, law-loving, obedient disciple of Jesus. Right?
Christ alone has finished your salvation. Christ alone could and has made satisfaction for your sins.
I looked up at the cross and saw what God had become to bring me home. He had become what I was.
Our faith is not a mountain but a grain of sand, not pure gold but gilded plaster. And all it takes is a few nicks and scratches to reveal its shallowness.
The only thing Hobbits love more than a good meal, is good company with whom they can share it.
When God is at work, oftentimes the best activity is non-activity, the best speech is non-speech. Sometimes God wants us to shut up.
Believe in God, belong to a church, and behave yourself isn’t the Gospel.
We chase after status, wealth, luxury, glory, honor, youth, beauty, and pleasure. We work ourselves to death. For what?
If April 1 is April Fools’ Day, then March 25 is Divine Fool’s Day. Falling nine months before Christmas, it’s the day when God set in motion what appeared to be a foolish plan.
It's a January day in New York City and the building I work in is just off the water. What this means is that it's cold out and not just cold but cold with a biting wind. As the phrase goes, "you can feel it in your bones."