Rev. David Holwick ZG Spiritual Recovery series
First Baptist Church Step 5
Ledgewood, New Jersey
November 4, 2001
Daniel 9:3-10
|
Step #5: Admit to God, to ourselves, and to another human being
the exact nature of our wrongs.
I. Confession is not as popular as it used to be.
A. Outshined by "The Exorcist."
When I was a kid, Catholics had to go to confession.
No confession, no communion.
They hated it.
Many people must have, because it withered.
This was brought home a while back when "The Exorcist"
movie came out.
Hundreds of Catholics called their churches - not for
confession, but for exorcisms.
I can see why that is so.
Real confession is tough.
B. Have you ever spilled your guts to another person?
1) Bill Wilson of A.A. fame - this step is most difficult
because it requires humiliation.
2) Bonhoeffer discovered the same thing.
Prior to World War II in Nazi Germany, Pastor Dietrich
Bonhoeffer ran an underground seminary in Pomerania.
The teachers and 25 students set it up as a commune.
His experience produced a spiritual classic, "Life Together,"
in which he documents the Biblical insights he gained.
In the last chapter of the book he gives some reasons for
the practice of mutual confession.
Primary among them is the isolation that sin brings.
Sin drives Christians apart.
Says Bonhoeffer, "Sin demands to have a man by himself.
It withdraws him from the community.
The more isolated a person is, the more destructive will be
the power of sin over him."
But confession to a fellow brother or sister destroys this
deadly isolation.
It pulls down the barrier of hypocrisy and allows the free
flow of God's grace in the community.
And it does something else - it humbles us.
Bonhoeffer wrote:
"Confession in the presence of a brother is the profoundest
kind of humiliation.
It hurts, it cuts a man down, it is a dreadful blow to
pride.
To stand there before a brother as a sinner is an ignominy
that is almost unbearable.
In the confession of concrete sins the old man does a
painful, shameful death before the eyes of a brother."
#2792
II. Daniel's confession.
A. The prophet Daniel's background.
1) He is from an elite family in Israel.
2) His nation is destroyed and he is in exile.
3) Others lost the faith; Daniel devoted himself to prayer
and reading the Bible.
4) From the Bible (Jeremiah) he discovers God's purpose in
the exile and he accepts it.
B. Daniel prays on behalf of his exiled nation.
1) "We have sinned, done wrong, been wicked, rebelled." 9:5
a) No words are minced.
b) God warned them but they didn't listen. 9:6
2) They deserve what they got.
a) God is righteous but they are covered in shame.
C. Not even the national disaster has brought them back to God.
1) His final appeal is to God's mercy. 9:9,18
2) His prayer is heard almost immediately. 9:20
III. Who should hear our confession.
A. The person we wronged.
1) Hardest confession of all?
a) Don't just speak to them to get it off your chest.
Speak to THEIR heart.
b) Don't make excuses, just speak the truth.
2) Often there can be no reconciliation until confession
has been made.
a) After you confess, ask them for forgiveness.
B. Another person we respect.
1) Longtime Christian tradition.
a) Catholics emphasize confession to a priest.
2) Does not have to be to a minister.
a) The Bible never limits it to religious professionals.
b) James 5:16 - "Confess your sins to each other."
3) Verbalizing our sins can be therapeutic.
a) Some websites even have donated confessions. (anon)
C. Ourselves.
1) Sometimes we need to hear ourselves admit our faults.
a) Similar to spiritual inventory.
2) Face up to who you really are.
D. God.
1) All sin is ultimately against God alone. Psalm 51:3
2) Lay your sins before him.
a) Like Isaiah and Paul, admit you are unworthy.
IV. Confession should be true.
A. It must be honest, with no hedging or evasion.
Joseph Queenan is a writer who lives in Tarrytown, New York.
A few years ago his alcoholic father called him to apologize
for all the pain he had inflicted on Joe and the family.
Joe knew what the pain had been.
For years his father had beaten the kids, terrorized his wife,
and wrecked the house.
He had gone through an endless series of menial jobs.
And like most alcoholics, he was a compulsive liar.
He was so lazy he didn't even bother to invent new lies.
At least three times a year he would tell them his wallet had
been stolen at the Philadelphia train station.
He would even use the kids.
Once, when Joe was 5, his father borrowed $20 from their
Catholic priest.
He took Joe to the local bar and for the next three hours
rehearsed the amount of money - $15, $10, $5 -
he was to tell his mother the priest had loaned them.
Joe's father was a devout Christian.
As Catholics, they said the rosary as a family devotion.
His father dragged it out so it would take 40 minutes.
One day during the ritual, their dad pitched forward dead drunk
and passed out in the middle of the room.
They left him there, face down on the carpet, all night long.
In the morning, he couldn't remember any of it.
Like many alcoholics, if he didn't remember it, then it probably
didn't happen.
He couldn't remember beatings, thefts, car accidents, or lies.
So a few years ago, Joe's dad called him up.
Joe's mom had left him, and he had lost his job and his pension.
But these events had convinced him to give up drinking.
He told his son,
"One of the things I've learned through Alcoholics Anonymous
is that you have to admit that you've hurt people.
"And you have to let them know how sorry you are.
"Son, I'm sorry for anything I may have done to harm you."
He then shook Joe's hand.
Joe Queenan liked the part about "anything I may have done."
And the apology with a handshake seemed like just another
ritual.
To many Christians, this is pretty much what confession means.
You tell God you're sorry, and assume he'll accept you.
After all, he has to - he's God, right?
Did Joe Queenan's father really confess to his son?
He sort of said he was sorry.
But he added the phrase, "for what I ¯MAY® have done."
He wasn't really owning up to it.
And yet I have to give his father credit for coming as far as
he did.
Many children receive far less.
We don't give much more to God when we confess our sins.
If Joe Queenan's father is serious about making amends, it will
take more to convince his son than a handshake.
If we are serious about confession, we also have to say more
to God than "I'm sorry."
#121
B. Confession must be backed up by action.
1) Genuine confession and repentance requires a change in the
direction of our lives.
2) Forgiveness is not automatic, with God or people.
a) Sincerity is judged by your subsequent actions.
V. Confession works.
A. Many relationships have been healed by it.
B. God promises to forgive our sins.
C. God always demonstrates grace.
1) This motivated Daniel to pray to him.
2) Proverbs 28:13 confirms that:
"he who conceals his sins does not prosper, but whoever
confesses and renounces them finds mercy."
3) The Lord's purpose is to restore, not ruin, a person who is
honest before him.
D. What do YOU need to confess today?
=========================================================================
SOURCES FOR ILLUSTRATIONS USED IN THIS SERMON:
# 121 "My Turn," by Joseph M. Queenan, Newsweek magazine; August 31,
1987, page 7.
#2792 "James: Faith That Works," by R. Kent Hughes. Baker Book House,
1991, page 265.
These and 18,000 others are part of a database that can be downloaded,
absolutely free, at http://www.holwick.com/database.html
=========================================================================
Other relevant material:
Discipleship Journal, #99
How To Slay The Guilt Monster
by Gayle G. Roper
1. Acknowledge to God that Christ has forgiven all your sins, even the
ones that haunt you.
2. Admit to God that your continuing feelings of guilt come from yourself
rather than from Him.
3. Offer your guilt to God in confession. Be specific. "I confess to
hanging on to my guilt over the nasty things I said to Margaret and the
way they hurt her."
4. If you are a concrete person, write down your area of guilt and set
the paper afire as a guilt offering to God. If you are visual, imagine
yourself lifting your burden of guilt, setting it down in the arms of
Jesus, and walking away. The idea is to establish a specific point at
which you placed the guilt where it belongs, in the strong arms of the
Savior.
5. When the feelings of guilt return, recall the fact of your
forgiveness. "Father, I am forgiven. Help me refuse to feel guilty over
an issue Christ has already dealt with." Put your burden of guilt back
in the arms of Jesus.
6. Understand that knowing a truth doesn't make the feelings go away
immediately. That takes practice, practice, practice. "The mature ... by
constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil"
(Hebrews 5:14).
_________________________________________________________________________
Discipleship Journal #93
DJ+ Plus: Small Groups - RELATING
When You've Hurt Someone
by Robert C. Crosby
Small groups are composed of people, and given enough time together, most
people will offend one another at some point. When that happens,
confession is good for the soul and the relationship. When you've hurt
someone, keep these principles about confession in mind.
* DO IT TODAY. Issues that arouse anger and frustration should be dealt
with quickly (see Ephes. 4:29). Putting it off only allows frustration
and hurt to turn to bitterness and resentment. Time does not heal all
hurts; sometimes it will suspend them and give them soil in which to
grow.
* SPEAK PLAINLY. We tend to excuse and justify our sins and hurtful
actions. "I'm sorry that what I said hurt you, but you've got to
understand what I've been going through." The apology gets you on the
road to healing; the "but" weakens the confession. Avoid the urge to
couch your confession in a bed of excuses.
* MAKE SURE YOU ARE HEARD. When confessing a fault or sin, the goal is
not merely to "get it off your chest." It is to speak to the other
person's heart. Look the person in the eye and, with sincerity, say,
"I am truly sorry for what I did and how it hurt you."
* ASK FOR FORGIVENESS. Confessing is important, but so is receiving
forgiveness. If the other person doesn't volunteer forgiveness after you
confess, it is entirely appropriate to say, "I hope you can find it in
your heart to forgive me."
* PRAY TOGETHER. This helps you reconnect spiritually and look to God
together for strength and healing.
Copyright © 2024 by Rev. David Holwick
Created with the Freeware Edition of HelpNDoc: Easy to use tool to create HTML Help files and Help web sites