This is an excerpt from the introduction of Stretched: A Study for Lent and the Entire Christian Life by Christopher Richmann (1517 Publishing, 2026).
01/22/26
We can bring our troubles, griefs, sorrows, and sins to Jesus, who meets us smack dab in the middle of our messy mob.
01/21/26
Confession isn’t a detour in the liturgy. It’s the doorway.
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04/23/15
She had obviously heard about Jesus previously, maybe even from off-handed comments or even rumors. Her daughter was sick so she sought the gossiped-about Jesus as he was leaving for Tyre and Sidon.
04/15/15
In divorce God married me to the cross. I didn’t want it; indeed, I hated it. But upon my shoulders God laid it. The ring of nails. The veil of darkness. The kiss of death. When we are stripped of all the good we think we are and have, we come face to face with the evil within. We fight and wrestle and gasp and die and become nothing.
02/12/15
Mark Twain would have been proud of me. He once quipped that the two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you figure out why. Not only had I figured out why I came into this world; my answer defined me.
02/09/15
Have you ever watched The Matrix? Crazy movie, right? The thing that continually keeps reminding me of that movie is the last thing you’d probably think of, even though the movie is rife with motifs, themes, and analogies of it.
02/02/15
Jesus tells the story of a man traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho who falls into the hands of robbers. The text reads, “They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead.”
01/20/15
Case in point: Jonah. Calling this man to be a prophet makes about as much as sense as hiring an executioner to be the CEO of a hospital.
01/17/15
The task—the joyful task!—of the interpreter is to go around the house, trying various keys in various doors, until they are all opened. This is one way to picture our reading of the Bible.
01/08/15
“No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.” These are the words of Jesus to a man who promised to follow him after saying good-bye to his family in Luke 9:62. Tough stuff.
12/15/14
The Son that He is sending into this world will need more than a mother; He needs a father.
11/26/14
One of the sad truths I realized about myself long ago is that I do nothing from completely spic-and-span motives. I mean nothing. When I hear someone say that they’re “utterly sincere” or they’re doing something “from pure motives,” I smell a lie.
11/24/14
We usually understand vocation in a very narrow sense; it’s your job, your “calling.” Vocation, however, is not so much what you do for a living but what Christ does through you for the living. It’s a 24/7 calling, not a 9 to 5 occupation.
11/12/14
Generally, we call that path the lectionary. I’m a big fan of the lectionaries in general. They do several things.
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