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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Those clinging to God in Christ can be assured that it’s all clean.
Renowned Scottish philosopher, writer, and historian Thomas Carlyle once quipped, “The History of the World [is] the Biography of Great Men.”
One of my favorite things to do in the summer is read out under the shade of my backyard tree. There, I have a reclining chair and small little side table.
Abraham didn’t understand God very well (at least not early on). I don’t say that as a dig against the Patriarch. I don’t think any of us understand God very well either.
If God is God, He doesn’t need anyone to defend Him. Nor does He need anyone to march for Him.
In a world so wired by law and rules, judgement is everywhere.
That week, I began to doubt myself. Did I really believe?
The goal of Christian living isn't to gather in and store up two, three, four barn-fulls of good works for ourselves.
It seems like the sky is falling every other day now. From politics to culture to religion to about anything else, there’s one purported cataclysm after another on the horizon.
He has given you clothing and shoes, food and drink, house and home—as well as grocery stores, carpenters, and farmers to provide those goods.
Every Christian face-plants. It doesn’t matter how long we’ve been saved by grace, we still face-plant.
Likewise, when God says, "Do this and you will live," we go about under the illusion that we have the ability to accomplish what God demands of us.