Well, the truth of the matter is, most people don’t think that have guilt and then this week’s lesson on confronting it, might easily be avoided. Until we turn the page and realize how truthful, and close this message hits home.
This week in chapter 11 of Enemies of the Heart, we get some direction on dealing with some of our inefficiencies, our wounds, our bad behaviors, but it might be easier said than done. Let’s face the reality.
Secrets lose their power when exposed to light. The light that exposes our secrets and frees the heart from the oppressive power of guilt is confession.
You might say, I have no guilt, I don’t have anything to confess, and with that I will say: hold on, let’s go into this together and on the backside we can be at peace together.
Admitting is not the same as confessing. In our 21st century western culture, we exchange it without discussion. A simple admission of culpability in a particular incident, you know the ones all too well: “The light was yellow when I started through the intersection”, “Yes, honey, I did leave the toilet seat up”, “Yes, I drank out of the milk jug last night”. Those are all the simple things in life that we throw out as we go through life. That is just human nature.
That kind of confession can actually fuel destructive behavior rather than curb it, leading to more secrets and greater guilt.
Do you tend to categorize things to confess? The easy ones like above versus the big ones like, “I can’t keep from thinking about Kim”, or “I need to stop …”
One of the most powerful and promising scriptures that we may be familiar with is 1 John 1:9
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. – 1 John 1:9 ESV
This is a truthful and powerful statement, but in all honesty, with my upbringing, this is a crutch and a hinderance to my Christian walk. Not saying that what John said was an issue, it is beautiful. Not saying the verse doesn’t have a big part of a healthy life. What Ii am saying is that my culture and belief of this statement are a long ways away from what John was writing about.
Years ago when I was trying to get my life straightened out, I would drink a lot and I would always make it to church Sunday morning to make sure that I confessed for my shortcomings. The things I knew I did that were inappropriate or opposed the bible I read. I was confessing and trying to get rid of that guilt feeling I had.
The real danger was how my attitude changed when I began to take these practices. When I was tempted to sin, I would reason to myself. I know this wrong, but if I go through with it I can always confess it and God will forgive me and everything will be fine. It did not take long until my confession habit was actually just supporting my sin habit.
This confession is not what John was referring to. This confession behavior was not about change, it was about guilt relief. This behavior is also what unbelievers witness many times and label Christianity as a bunch of hypocrites, and can you blame them?
When was a time that you got caught in the confession loophole? Where your confession actions merely supported your sin habits?
From time to time, we all get caught in the confession game. We pray and confess to God, or even to someone else about what our shortcomings are, yet our routine has nothing to do with change, we just want to feel better.
We play the confession game because somewhere along the way we were taught that the purpose of confession was conscience relief. That is, we confess in order to make ourselves feel better about what we’ve done. And if we want to put a theological spin on it, we confess because we think it will somehow help God feel better about what we’ve done. According to our twisted way of thinking, confession puts everything back just the way it was before we did whatever it was we did that made us feel like we needed to confess.
But that does not make much sense. Which it doesn’t. It is this behavior that keeps the pot stirred. Why there is continued struggle, lack of change and sometimes even more tragedy.
Confession Defined
The English dictionary says confession is “to admit to or acknowledge something”, and I think that is what American Christians hold on to. But in the Scriptures, confession is associated with change. Confession is just one step in a sequence of steps that lead the guilty out of the darkness and into the light; it is the beginning of the process that ultimately leads to a change in lifestyle or behavior.
Confession is a vital part
Confession is monumental, but it is not the answer to the freedom truly available or actually desired. As I described earlier, my drinking confessions never changed me, they did not even benefit me. I was caught in a cycle.
In the early Catholic days, when you came to your priest and confessed your sins, they made note of them. You were not allowed to confess the same sin twice. The church believed that true confession was to be followed up with penance. Penance comes from the word repentance. Repentance is often pictured as a person walking in one direction, realizing an error, and changing direction to walk in the opposite direction; turning. This is supported clearly by Old Testament and New Testament scripture.
If any of the people—men or women—betray the Lord by doing wrong to another person, they are guilty. They must confess their sin and make full restitution for what they have done, adding an additional 20 percent and returning it to the person who was wronged. – Numbers 5:6-7 NLT
We see that there is more to wholeness than just admitting the wrong. Some say that is the Old Testament and Jesus came to change all that. Well, we might want to read what Jesus said about it when he was on the scene:
“Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to them; then come and offer your gift. – Matthew 5:23-24 NIV
God is so serious about change and restitution that he actually says, don’t bother coming with your money, if you still need to do some business of confession and repentance. For the Jew, in Jesus day, it was not about feeling better about themselves, it was about making things right with the one you sinned against. It was not enough to be sorry. God is interested in change. God wants to support us in change, but he will not shy away from the hard work we need to do. Take Zacchaeus for example, he acknowledges his wrong and goes before Jesus to make things right:
Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount. – Luke 19:8 NIV
Unlike many people in our world today, Jesus did not say, aw, that is okay, it was not your fault. You’re a good man, you don’t have to do that. Don’t make this hard on yourself, I forgive you. No, look how Jesus responded:
“Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.” – Luke 19:9-10 NIV
Jesus did not alleviate the consequences of the sin, Zacchaeus still had to take painful action to make amends for wrong he committed.
Let us take the challenge of confession into context with our life. We all want relief, but we have to want change as much as we want relief. If we want things better, we need to own our part and allow change to happen to alter the cycle of sin management.
There will be a follow on post to this topic this week, and next week we will continue into chapter 12.