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.

All Articles

We are dangerously good at focusing on our exciting, or boring, walk of faith.
Yes, but. It's a phrase I find myself repeating often in life. When my husband asks for forgiveness, I too often respond, "I forgive you, but…” and then continue with a list of my grievances.
Only a god could be wise. We are seekers, lovers of divine wisdom, but it is forever beyond our grasp due to human limitation.
If the cross were to happen today, not on Golgotha, but in our own locale, would we take selfies?
I bet you have seen this verse pop up in Bible study before.
In the midst of suffering, hate, and sin, Jesus sets a table for soldiers. He feeds the fearful with forgiveness and eternal life.
Blessedness comes to us camouflaged as simple earthly words, water, bread and wine.
One of the most famous things Jesus ever said was “Follow me.” He said it over and over. So much that it was recorded more than twenty times in the New Testament.
In an age when the phrase “new and improved” applies to everything from phones to marriages, when we as a nation mimic juveniles, lustily pursuing the next new thing, the worst decision a church can make is to cater to this weakness.
We are all sojourners in a perilous cosmos, what is sometimes conceptualized as the theology of the pilgrim.
You are made new by the eternal satisfaction for sin in Christ, by the precious treasure at God’s right hand.
We practice infant baptism because that is the ancient practice, following the command of Scripture.