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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As human beings, we usually think that mercy should have limits; that it should never exceed its confines. This attitude is rooted deeply in the human heart.
But Jesus comes to us today and reminds us that He has the power to make disciples in the midst of conflict and suffering.
Because this life is transient and we already live in the new and eternal age restored in Christ (at least in part), our preoccupations are different to those bound to this world and life.
Jonah rejected his first call and job description and headed in the opposite direction . Now, after spending three days in the belly of the big fish, Jonah is called again.
In our transactional view of our faith - “If I don’t… then God won’t.” “I need to, so God can” - we are seriously underestimating who we are dealing with.
God makes all things new. He refashions us from those turned in upon ourselves, turned to idols of our own choice and making, to experience the freedom He gives by pronouncing us His righteous children.
We like to close with something great. We even have a saying for this behavior: “Saving the best for last.” God Himself has a way of saving the best for last.
What does being free from sin, which is obviously a good thing, have to do with being free from the Law, which sounds dangerous?
Samuel plays a very important role in preserving the line of Judah by anointing and instructing the first kings of the united monarchy—especially King David.
My deepest awareness of myself is that I am deeply loved by Jesus Christ and I have done nothing to earn it or deserve it.
Jesus is our sympathizer, our propitiation, and our advocate. We will be tempted but God will provide the way out, the way out is Jesus, the one who died for our sins.
Rituals resist domestication and confront us with a world and worldview brought forth from the Bible and through twenty centuries of Christianity for the purpose of arresting our contemporary worldview through its self-sameness.