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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You are made new by the eternal satisfaction for sin in Christ, by the precious treasure at God’s right hand.
Christian freedom and Christian love go together in a most wonderful way.
The promise is trustworthy because God has proven Himself to be trustworthy.
The Devil cultivates fear of God and promotes motivation and zeal for outward works and earthly virtue out of pure eternal self-concern.
We just finished celebrating the 500th Anniversary of the Protestant Reformation.
What is it to be an heir of the Reformation? It is to look outward to Christ bleeding and dying on the cross as Great Rescuer of sinners—of me.
When I was about 10, I went on a hike with a boys brigade. We were all racing down this path at lunchtime when I decided to beat everyone to the bottom by deviating from the path.
The Lutheran Reformation was a reformation of the Christian imagination alongside its theology.
So bondage meets freedom, and God becomes our Master through Christ.
We are forgiven for Christ’s sake. Losers set free to trust in God’s promises.
God created Israel to be the vessel into which he would place both his Law and his Son.
Rather than presenting Christ’s words as a rule or a threat, Luther reveals it to be the promise of God.