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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While I was still an over-eager seminarian the professor warned me, “Mr. Riley, this is exciting stuff.
You say: Since forgiveness depends on faith alone, why must one nonetheless do good works? Answer: If faith is of the true sort, it cannot be without good works, just as no good work can be where unbelief dwells.
Faith does not distinguish between worthy and unworthy, saint and sinner, great faith and anemic faith, it only focuses on Christ Jesus.
Above all, Luther understood the importance of the Biblical narrative as the story of God’s love and man’s salvation revealed in Christ Crucified.
History was one of dad’s favorite subjects and he shared his knowledge with infectious enthusiasm.
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.
Good preaching does something for you. It delivers to you a Good Samaritan.
The Lutheran Reformation was a reformation of the Christian imagination alongside its theology.
Rather than presenting Christ’s words as a rule or a threat, Luther reveals it to be the promise of God.
But where love is necessary we pray for our enemies and bless them in the hope that God will repent and convert them to the Gospel.
The Law though it does many things—restrains, exhorts the Christian unto righteousness, punishes—always rightly accuses and condemns sinners of their sin before a righteous, holy, and just God.