Dear Reader, I have been meaning to finish this series of posts for a while. I would love to get some feedback about these last three posts when you get the chance.
Okay, so we've talked about the paradigm of confession. We still need to discuss the place of community of confession. What i love about the place of community here is that we have been empowered with an authority to forgive sins. John writes, “And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld." As a community of believers, we have been empowered by the Holy Spirit to aid our brothers and sisters in Christ in releasing them from the shackles of sin! (20:23) In I Peter 2:9, we learn that we are, "a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.” I think Dietrich Bonhoeffer sums it up best when he says, “A man who confesses his sins in the presence of a brother knows he is no longer alone with himself; he experiences the presence of God in the reality of the other person. As long as I am by myself in the confession of my sins everything remains in the dark, but in the presence of a brother the sin has to be brought into the light.”
What are the necessary elements for confession? The first is examination. We need to begin by asking God to shine light on those things that are not pleasing. Psalm 139:23, 24 gets us on the right path. “Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” However, when we ask God to do this, get ready for things to hit you that you may or not want to recall. The second element is sorry. This is the way of taking confession seriously. Jesus told us in Matthew 5:4, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.” Yet, this sorrow should not consume us. God declared in Jeremiah 31:13, “Then maidens will dance and be glad, young men and old as well. I will turn their mourning into gladness; I will give them comfort and joy instead of sorrow.” We must also have a determination to avoid sin. As I John 1:9 says, “If we confess our sin, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
We finally see that the paradigm of confession and the part community plays in confessions leads us to a plan for repentance. Confessing to another allows light to shine on the sin. It also helps to forge a plan for repentance—to turn away from the sin.
To whom do we confess? Who is qualified? We have to ask God to lead us to someone who is spiritually mature. We must also ask to be led to one who possesses wisdom and common sense. We also need someone who is compassionate. We also have to confess to a person who has a good sense of humor and is not given to gossip.
The discipline of confession brings us to the end of pretense. As we saw here in Nehemiah, the children of Israel desired to end pretense. God calls us, as believers, to be a community of both saints and sinners so that the church can confess its frailties, its humanity. May God burn a desire in each of us to experience the life-giving power of forgiveness and grace.
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