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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At times, evangelical Christianity can be a paradox. For as much as Protestants have spurned Roman Catholicism, they’re much more Catholic than they’d ever like to admit.
It's easy to become habituated to sin. It comes naturally, after all. The power and pressure of sin on us, from conception to the grave, is immense.
Advent accents preaching, making known that it is the Lord who comes to bring salvation, to proclaim this in all the earth.
There is a difference between preaching about Christ and preaching Christ.
A Roman execution device isn't exactly a picturesque scene of divine love on display.
Many Christians are worried—perhaps legitimately—that the state is a short step away from turning the Law of God into hate speech and silencing the legal preaching of God’s Word.
Out of His mind indeed, as He took our place between murderers and received the insults and torture of humanity.
Your Big Brother, Yeshua… Joshua… Jesus, has done all things for your salvation.
In the United States Marine Corps, part of my training involved Enemy Prisoner of War (EPW) handling. The 6 rules of EPW handling are:
That’s where a true encounter with God leaves you. Unable to point the finger at anyone else, all you can do is fall on your face, confess your sin, be absolved, and join the angels in singing, “Holy, holy, holy.”
Few smells are as pervasive as the smell of smoke. Anyone who’s sat around a campfire can attest.
Mordor’s bleak existence and the successful salvific mission of Frodo and Samwise is what makes Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings such a psychologically enjoyable epic.