Confession

Let me add my good morning.

As has been mentioned a couple of times already, today we are beginning a new series.

And I thought before we begin, it is worth just stopping to acknowledge a lot of people

have been working to get us ready for this series.

And two people that I particularly wanted to just thank, even though they're not in

this room, is Matt Giglin, who has done a stack of the graphic work for this series,

which you'll see in the Bible studies and here on the platform on the screen.

And also Romeo Sanuri, who is part of our 1115 congregation, who helped make these happen.

So we are blessed to have people with considerable gifts and also with generous hearts who like

to use those gifts to bless us.

It is our prayer that this series will feed and encourage you, will challenge you, will

draw you closer to God, will spur you on.

And that has been the heart behind every bit of work, whether it's a picture, a word on

a page, people standing at the door, songs that have been chosen by our teams.

And so how about before we begin, we just come before God and ask him to do that work in us.

Father God, we thank you for this incredible opportunity together as your people.

We thank you for the reminder as we work through Leviticus that what we are doing now is meeting

with you together.

Father, what we do when your word is open is encounter your presence.

And so we ask that the result of this morning and every week that we gather in this series

would not be a good service or some more information, but it would be that we are changed,

that we are transformed, that we are better equipped to live the lives that you have given

us through the death and resurrection of your son.

And so please draw us close to you this morning.

Give us an incredibly vivid view of you and your glory that we might be better equipped

to live the lives that you have given us.

Amen.

I remember the night I became a Christian.

It was quite possibly, even to this point, the most overwhelming night of my life.

I was 14 years old.

I was on a camp and I cried.

Well, 14-year-old boys aren't supposed to cry, especially when there are girls around

who they're trying to impress, but I did.

I wept.

I was absolutely leveled by this incredible, unconditional love that God would offer to

even someone like me.

Even as a 14-year-old, I had a reasonable awareness of the parts of me that were fairly

unlovable.

There was probably more bits that I wasn't aware of, but there was enough there for me to

know that loving me took effort.

And so to hear about this incredible love just blew me away.

Even though I had parents that loved me well, I had good friends in my life, it was clear

to me that night that there was something special about the way that God loved me.

There was something more about that love.

And I was just overwhelmed.

I was just filled with gratitude and I was convicted.

And at that moment, I was absolutely committed to live every second of every minute of every

day of every week of every year that God would give me in service of him.

I knew that this was a life-defining moment.

It happened on a camp in January of 1996.

I remember where it was.

It was at Illaroo Farm.

I don't know if that campsite even still exists.

And I came home from camp still absolutely on fire for God.

Just so excited to be a Christian, ready to change the world, ready to be totally different,

ready to leave behind what I used to be like and the reputation that I had and all those

sorts of things, ready to be different and leave sinful habits behind.

12 months later, I went on the same camp as a 15-year-old.

And I remember at the same point in the camp where they were giving people the opportunity

to start following Jesus, explaining what he had done and how much he loved them,

I had this moment of deep and intense guilt.

Because standing there, I suddenly realised that that resolve, that commitment, that conviction

that I had had only 12 months earlier, had almost entirely worn off.

In fact, if I'm honest, probably by mid-February of that year, it was gone.

I was back into the usual rhythms of life and the new me that I was aspiring to seemed like

a kind of embarrassing overstatement.

I hadn't arrived as this new person that I was supposed to be if I was going to follow Jesus.

Now, I knew and I firmly believed that God's love for me wasn't going to be undone by my sad

and maybe even pathetic attempts at following him and living for him.

But I also knew that there wasn't much in my life that said,

hey, Sam is different now to what he was 12 months ago.

There wasn't much evidence to say, hey, Sam's a Christian, whereas he wasn't before.

And so now the preacher's standing at the front of the room,

inviting people to put their trust in Jesus, to become Christians,

and I'm sitting there thinking, well, something clearly needs to change,

but I can't do that because I've already done that.

I did the becoming a Christian thing.

I did the going down the front, praying the prayer, putting your hand up,

whatever you want to call it.

So what was I supposed to do with this incredible guilt and correct perception

that not a whole lot had changed?

I mean, I don't know about you, but if you've been around church for long,

you've heard enough testimonies or stories of Jesus

that go something like, before I met Jesus, I was a jerk.

I met Jesus and now look at me.

That wasn't my story.

Before I met Jesus, I was a jerk.

Then I met Jesus and 12 months later, I was still a jerk.

In fact, let's be honest, there's some of you who think that I'm still a jerk now.

But seriously, in that moment, I was feeling this obvious awareness

that I wasn't anywhere near where I was supposed to be.

I couldn't do that first step.

I'd already done that.

So what do I do now?

And so I figured, as somebody who had said I'd become a Christian,

had been hovering at church and youth group for 12 months,

everyone around me assumed that I was going great.

I had two options.

Rather than admit how kind of pathetic my attempts at following Jesus were,

I could play it down, not just to them, but to me as well,

and go, maybe it's not so bad.

Maybe I am moving forward more than I think.

Or I could try a lot harder and make up for the fact

that I'd wasted this first 12 months.

I figured they were my two options.

I knew there was a standard that, or at least I felt this pressure

that I had to live up to some sort of standard,

I didn't want to be another Christian hypocrite.

I wanted God to still love me.

I wanted to be as good as all these other Christians around me seemed to be.

And really, if I'm honest, I think what I expected was

that I was supposed to be like Jesus.

I even had a WWJD band to remind me I was supposed to be like Jesus.

And maybe that's a pressure that you feel, trying to follow Jesus right now.

Maybe you're not having that moment like me on camp,

but with a little bit of a push, a little bit of self-reflection,

you feel a discomfort of, I'm supposed to be here,

and in reality I'm somewhere down here.

Christians never explicitly say,

hey, you've got to be perfect.

We wouldn't use that word,

but think about the way that you respond to moral failure.

When you come across it in other people,

do you find yourself wondering whether or not they're really Christian?

Do you find yourself measuring who the best Christians are

based on their level of goodness or their level of morality?

Or what about in your own life?

When you become aware of sin in your life,

are you tempted to justify it as not so bad?

Because let's be honest, it's uncomfortable to carry guilt.

It's uncomfortable.

Or maybe when you find sin in your own life,

you feel that increased pressure to somehow make up for it.

Somehow pray more, serve more, give more, attend more.

Does it all just get compounded by this fear

that people might find out about this sin?

Somehow the secret might get out.

Find out what?

That you're not as good as you're trying to pretend that you are?

Find out that you're not as perfect as Jesus?

Wouldn't that be a shock?

And so you're trapped in a cycle of doing everything you can to cover it up,

to keep your failure a secret,

to not let anyone else know that you make mistakes.

And every time you do that, you increase the pressure on yourself

to hold up this standard of godliness.

You increase the pressure to maintain this show,

this pretense.

And maybe it adds guilt that just drives you.

And so you're serving a lot.

You're ticking all the obvious boxes of following Jesus,

but deep down you are feeling this incredible pressure.

You are driven by this ridiculous weight.

Because somewhere along the line,

you and I and most of us started to believe the lie

that as a Christian, you had to be perfect.

Or at very least, you had to be better than most people.

Better than the people who aren't at church.

We started expecting ourselves to have kind of arrived as Christians.

And maybe it's from a verse like verse 5 in 1 John 1.

We open the Bible and it says,

This is the message we've heard from Him and declare to you.

God is light.

In Him there is no darkness at all.

And if we claim to have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness,

we lie and do not live out the truth.

And so we start to panic.

We think, well, I want to live in fellowship with God.

I want to be a Christian.

And so I can't acknowledge darkness.

I can't acknowledge failure.

Because then, apparently, I'm a liar and I have no fellowship.

And so we feel this pressure.

But you've got to understand, that's not what this verse is saying.

That's not what any other verse that might sound even vaguely like that is saying.

Because the next verse says,

If we walk in the light as He is in the light,

we have fellowship with one another,

and the blood of Jesus, His Son, purifies us from all sin.

So we're already walking in the light and yet we still need purification.

So it's not telling us we need to be perfect.

But somewhere along the line,

our own fear and insecurity has meant that is a lie we have begun to believe.

And I want to begin this series by saying that if there is any part of that sentiment that resonates with you,

if there is even a hint of this that you think,

yeah, that sounds right.

I need to be better than the people around me.

I need to be good enough for God.

You need to hear that that is a lie.

You need to really listen today and throughout this series because Jesus wants to show you what He means when He says,

My yoke is easy.

My burden is light.

following Jesus is a journey.

It's about becoming something.

It's about being slowly and progressively transformed.

If you're a Christian, if you're following Jesus, you are not a finished product.

I can say that with absolute confidence.

You are on a journey and you have not yet arrived.

You are not at the destination.

You are not done.

Margaret Graham, who is the wife of the famous evangelist Billy Graham, has on her tombstone,

end of construction.

Thank you for your patience.

Jesus says following Him is like being on a narrow road.

It's a road that leads to life.

It's a road that ends in the perfect life, in the perfection that maybe we desire.

But being on the road is not the same as being at the end of the road.

Anyone who has kids and has been on a road trip with those kids knows that there is an obvious

and important distinction between being on a journey and arriving at your destination.

You've sat in the car and heard the haunting chorus of,

Are we there yet?

Are we there yet?

Are we there yet?

And after answering no for the thousandth time, maybe you chose to get a bit creative.

We're on the way.

We're almost there.

Or maybe, you know, the doozy, which I believe is untrue.

But anyway, it's not about the destination.

It's about the journey.

Your kids will quickly teach you that that's not true.

The whole point of a journey is to get somewhere.

You know, the journey might increase your joy on the journey if you do fun things,

but you are on a journey to get to somewhere.

And kids are pretty astute.

They will work out that no matter how you spin it, being on the way, being on the journey,

and actually arriving at your destination is not the same thing.

The joy of the journey, the point of the journey is only served when you arrive.

And so if you're a Christian, you haven't arrived yet.

You need to hear this.

Jesus says he will carry his work on.

He will make sure you arrive eventually.

But that arrival, that completion will be at the end of the journey.

That will be heaven.

That will be when we finally get home.

The Christian life is a journey between two points.

It's the point that I just talked about when I was 14,

when you discover that on the cross, Jesus died so that you could be forgiven.

And you receive the new life, that the journey begins there.

And the other point is heaven, when finally one day you'll be face to face with God,

every bit of sin and sickness and evil and everything that is bad in you and in the world is totally removed.

But right now as a Christian, you live between those two points.

Following Jesus is a journey.

And so this series is about how do we live on that journey?

What does it look like to not just wander aimlessly, but actually to flourish, to thrive on this journey?

What does it look like to maintain momentum, to keep going, to find joy, to grow in your delight in God on this journey?

What does it look like to not just shut your eyes, block your ears and hope that eventually one day you'll be home?

What does it look like to love Jesus and enjoy him more and more every step of the way?

In heaven, we will be perfect, sinless, just like Jesus.

But until then, that's not a standard that Jesus expects of you.

That's not the measure he's holding up next to your life.

And as long as we keep expecting that of ourselves and each other,

we're making it more difficult for one another to do this journey.

In fact, for some people who are checking out Jesus,

some people who are trying to decide whether or not this whole Christian thing is worth it,

this expectation, this unwritten law that we have about being good enough,

is enough to turn them away.

Because, again, they correctly understand, hey, I can't do that.

And for some Christians, it's this unwritten standard,

this pressure,

that makes following Jesus far harder than it's supposed to be.

Being a Christian means being unfinished,

which means every person in this room who is following Jesus is unfinished.

Every person in this room who is following Jesus right now has sin.

Whether or not anyone else knows, you know.

You have sin in your life.

Maybe sin you've been wrestling with,

maybe sin you've grown comfortable with,

but you have sin in your life.

The issue is not if you fail as a Christian,

but what you do when you fail as a Christian.

Have a look at verse 8 with me in 1 John 1.

If we claim to be without sin,

we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.

Now, none of us is actually walking around saying,

hey, I'm perfect.

Well, at least I haven't heard that.

But what we do by not actually specifically acknowledging

our areas of failure or weakness

is essentially imply that we're perfect.

We essentially give off the sense that there's nothing wrong.

And what we're doing by not regularly recognizing and acknowledging sin

is, in brackets, claiming perfection.

Making God out to be a liar, according to this verse.

Or walking in the darkness.

Putting on a show.

Not showing what's really going on in our life.

And if you talk a big game like that as a Christian,

if you walk around acting like you've got it all together,

then people will expect you to have it all together.

If you're not confessing sin,

it's a fair assumption that you either don't have any,

or at least you don't think you do.

And that's a recipe for pressure.

For you and the people around you.

That's a recipe for insecurity for you.

Because what happens if you suddenly do become aware of your failure

after you've been pretending that you're perfect?

And ultimately, it's a recipe for hypocrisy.

That's why the world looks at the church and thinks,

why would I want to be one of them?

They say this and they do this.

And so I just want to ask the question,

I want you to ask yourself the question,

why do we do that?

Why do we try and act like we're better than we really are?

What is it that we think we gain?

Who is it that we're trying to impress with our apparent perfection?

I mean, we know that we do it.

That's where we get our hypocrite tag.

We know that we do it because so often people who aren't like us,

who aren't as moral as us,

who don't have the same background or upbringing as us,

feel incredibly uncomfortable in our churches.

So why do we do it?

Why do we hold ourselves and the people around us

to a standard that is clearly impossible?

Because it's not a pressure the Bible ever puts on you.

It's not a pressure Jesus ever puts on you.

Jesus never says, hey, you're saved by grace,

but you stay in depending on how good you are,

depending on how much progress you've made.

See, the power of failure and sin over us is the fear that goes with us.

The power of it is the fear that we have

that somehow we might lose God's love for us.

It's a fear that Satan loves to grab hold of.

Satan is sometimes called the great accuser.

And what he does in those moments of failure

is he presses the button that we already have

of being insecure before God.

He reminds us of something that's actually true.

We don't deserve to be loved by God.

But he does it in a place where suddenly we're feeling

that pressure more acutely.

And he will just keep reminding us how bad we are.

putting the pressure on us to either improve,

be better, or give up.

So many well-intended Christians live with this pressure

when they fail.

They try harder and harder to be better.

They serve more and more to cover up the guilt

for their moral failure.

But inside, they're just wracked with guilt and petrified

that God is going to stop loving them,

that people are going to find out what they're really like.

But you've got to understand,

Jesus doesn't respond to failure like that.

I mean, in verse 9 it says,

If we confess our sins,

he's faithful and just

and will forgive us our sins

and purify us from all unrighteousness.

Jesus responds to your shame and guilt and sin and failure

with the gentle invitation to come back to him.

With the gracious offer of unconditional forgiveness

and cleansing and purification.

When he looks at your sin,

his response is,

Confess it to me.

Hand it over and find that I respond

the same way I did the first time you did this.

With forgiveness and love.

This verse doesn't say he might forgive us.

He doesn't say he'll,

when you come,

weigh up how many bad things you've done before,

what your track record is.

It says he is faithful.

He is just.

He will forgive you.

He will purify you.

So often,

our failure leads to insecurity and fear

when it comes to following Jesus,

but it actually doesn't have to.

Failure is going to be part of the journey,

but God in his grace

has actually transformed your failure

into an opportunity

for you to get deeper security in him.

God actually sees your failure

and thinks this is an opportunity

for you to be even more certain

that I love you.

One of the things that I love to do

with both my boys

is building with blocks.

Sometimes they ruin

my excellent creations,

but I overlook that

because they're little.

But something I've noticed,

particularly in my eldest son,

Bailey,

is this fierce independence

when it comes to building.

It's also,

you know,

that's kind of a euphemism

for he doesn't like sharing,

but he also likes to do things by himself.

And so sometimes he'll be struggling

to get the next piece on his tower

or to attach this

ridiculously inappropriate piece

off the side of this house

or zoo that he's built.

And I'm sitting there

kind of trying to be patient.

Do you want daddy's help?

He says, no.

Okay?

I'll keep watching

while he fumbles about

for a little bit longer.

You know,

the internal wrestle in me

just wanting to fix it

and make it work.

But I sit

and I patiently wait

and eventually

I get to the point

I think, okay,

I'll offer again.

He's starting to get agitated

and frustrated.

You know,

pieces are about to be thrown.

There's about to be a tantrum.

And I say,

would you like daddy

to help you do that piece?

He shuts me down

a little more aggressively

the second time around.

And the struggle is

that in that moment

his desire is actually good.

He wants to grow

in his capability.

He wants to get better

at this thing.

He's frustrated

that his skills

are not moving forward,

that he can't actually

get this piece to fit

the way that he wants it to.

But that good desire

becomes toxic

when it stands

between him

and the one thing

that can actually

solve his problem.

In this case,

namely me.

Sitting there

offering to help.

that good desire

to be capable

is toxic

because in that desire

he rejects help.

And in the same way,

our good desire

to please God,

the rightness

of wanting to live

increasingly

holy lives,

of wanting to increasingly

be more and more

like Jesus,

that's a good desire,

the rightness

of responding

to failure

with shame

and guilt

becomes toxic

when it drives you

away from the one

thing that can help you

become more like Jesus.

The one thing

that can help you

deal with shame

and guilt.

The only way

you can deal

with sin

and failure

in your life

is through Jesus,

through his death

in your place

and he's saying

every time you fail,

not just once,

once upon a time,

every time you fail,

come back to Jesus.

I mean,

did you catch

this kind of

strange little sentence

at the beginning

of chapter 2?

It says,

my dear children,

I write this to you

so that you will not sin.

But if anybody

does sin,

we have an advocate

with the Father,

Jesus Christ,

the righteous one.

He is the atoning

sacrifice for our sins,

not only for ours

but also for the sins

of the whole world.

Jesus is the only thing

that deals with sin.

He is sufficient

to deal with

all of your sin

and not just your sin

but the sins

of the whole world

and this is written

to Christians.

It's written

to dear children,

to those who have

begun the journey,

to those who at some point

decided to start

following Jesus

and here we're being told,

don't leave

confession behind.

Don't leave

acknowledging that

you're inadequate

just to the beginning

of the journey.

this is a regular

part of the journey

following Jesus.

Putting your hand up

saying,

God,

I still need your grace

just as much as I did

when I began.

Every time you sin,

there is still grace,

there is still forgiveness

and it's offered freely.

The only thing

that can stand

between you

and that forgiveness

is your own pride,

your attempts

to self-justify

your actions,

your attempts

to impress people

and God,

whether it's

from playing down sin

or trying to make up

for it,

so long as you think

that somehow

God needs you

to be good enough

for Him to love you,

you will spend

your whole life

crushed

by a standard

that you will never

live up to.

So long as there is

even a skerrick

of belief in your mind

that God's love

is dependent

on how good you are,

you will spend

your life trapped

in a cycle

of guilt,

failure,

denial,

pretense,

judgment of others

and ultimately

the fear

that one day

God and everyone else

will find out

what you're really like

and treat you

the way you deserve.

God knows

what you're like.

The Bible

said that Christ

died for us

when we were

still sinners.

Christ died

for us

fully aware

of everything

you had ever

done up to that

point,

fully aware

of everything

you were going

to do

from that point

forward,

more aware

of your deepest,

darkest secrets

than you are.

He already

knows

grace.

And when you

fail,

grace is on

offer.

Again,

this isn't an

if you fail

issue,

this is a

when you fail.

When you fail,

God offers

grace.

He offers

forgiveness.

And this matters

more than just

in the instantaneous

sense of not

feeling bad,

of kind of

escaping that

discomfort of

shame.

encountering

God's grace

like this

again and

again is

essential to

journeying well

as a Christian.

Essential to

this journey

between what

Jesus has done

on the cross

and what he

has prepared

for us in

heaven.

Confessing sin

is an assurance

building activity.

It's a gift

that God has

given us.

It is a tool

that God has

given us so

that we don't

just fall over

the finish line

one day and

think,

thank God

that journey

is over.

But so that

we hit the

finish line

with momentum.

So that each

day we get

more and more

excited for

what the future

is because

we're tasting

that future

in the momentary

grace that we

get every time

we come to

God without

failure and

hear the

words,

you are

forgiven.

Completely,

irreversibly,

unconditionally

forgiven.

I mean,

think about

what you did

when you first

became a

Christian.

You confessed

now,

it might have

been clumsy,

it might have

been vague,

it might have

been general,

but on some

level,

when you became

a Christian,

you said,

God,

I know I

don't deserve

this,

I know I

don't deserve

to be loved

by you,

but please

forgive me.

And he

did.

In that

moment,

he did.

And every

step since

then,

if you're still

going as a

Christian,

has been a

response to

that moment

of tasting

and experiencing

God's

incredible love,

of having

the weight

lifted.

But what

regular

confession of

sin does

is draw you

back to

that experience.

Draws you

back to the

power of

that experience.

It's kind

of like a

long distance

relationship.

I don't know

if you've ever

had a relationship

with somebody

across oceans

or states

or whatever

it might be.

If you don't

speak to or

see the person

that you love

regularly,

it's inevitable

that over a

period of time,

the power of

that love to

drive your

actions and

emotions is

going to

slowly decrease.

Now,

it might still

be sufficient

to keep you

faithful,

to keep you

committed to

that person,

but it's not

going to have

the same

drive as if

you are face

to face

enjoying that

person's

company regularly.

It's not

going to have

the same

impact on

you as if

you were

actually in

their company,

delighting in

all the things

that drew you

to them in

the first

place.

It's not

going to have

the same

drive that's

possible when

distance is

removed and

you get to

enjoy that

person day

in and day

out.

Now,

in the same

way,

your first

time experience

of God's

grace when

you became a

Christian,

if you are

one,

is ultimately

powerful enough

to get you

to the end

of this

journey.

I want to

make that

really clear.

That grace

that God

showed you

in forgiving

you once

is enough

to get you

to the end.

God promises

he's not

going to let

you go

if you've

taken step

one and

said,

I want to

be forgiven.

God has

you and

he will

make sure

you get

to the

end.

But God's

desire,

again,

is not that

you collapse

over the

finish line.

God's desire

is not that

you bang

your head

against the

wall and

following him

throughout your

life and

then one

day think,

again,

full life,

a joyful

life,

a secure

life.

He wants

your momentum

to build

in following

him.

He wants

you to be

more confident

of his love

for you at

the end of

your life

than you

were day

one when

you hadn't

even had

the chance

to disappoint

him yet.

He wants

you to

grow.

He wants

you to

keep tasting

grace and

confession is

a gift that

he has given

us for us

to taste

grace.

It's an

opportunity he

has given

us that we

might taste

and experience

his incredible

love.

It is a

chance to

air our

dirty laundry,

to show

him the

deepest,

darkest parts

of us,

the things

we're most

ashamed about

and find

that again

he says,

I love you

and I

forgive you.

And again

he says,

I love you

and I

forgive you.

And again

he says,

I love you

and I

forgive you.

And as you

do it once,

you suddenly

think,

wow,

he even

forgave that.

And so

the next

time you're

more confident

and you do

it again

and you think,

wow,

he loved that.

And he gets

this track

record for you

that's not

just theory

you've heard

about,

but it's

love that

you've

experienced.

And so

more and

more we

need to be

people who

confess sin

to God.

and as we

do it,

who discover

that his

love is

more powerful

than our

pride,

our lust,

our greed,

our selfishness,

our laziness.

And every

time you do

it,

it'll be like

reliving a

mini version

of that first

moment that you

tasted grace.

That first

moment,

initial joy

of discovering

that God

loves you

more than

you can

possibly

comprehend

and that

he will

always love

you.

Every time

we stop

to confess

sin,

we get the

chance to

experience that

joy afresh.

And so

we need to

be people

who confess.

We need

to be people

who are honest

about how

we're going,

who walk in

the light,

that's what it

means,

who show

what's really

going on because

we're not

trusting in

our ability

to fake

meeting a

standard.

We're trusting

in God's

love for us

that is

stronger than

our failure.

And so if

you're not

regularly asking

for forgiveness

from God,

and I don't

mean generally

like, hey

God, I

haven't done

very well

this week,

I mean

specifically.

Like, hey

God, I

thought this

about that

person this

week and I

know that

doesn't

honour you.

Like, hey

God, I

lied about

this in

this way

because I

was more

worried about

my reputation

than yours

and I know

it's not

okay.

specific

confession.

If you're

not doing

it, then

God's love

will seem

small, distant

and inadequate.

You'll find

yourself like I

did a year

into my

journey of

following Jesus,

not really

going anywhere.

prayer.

So often, any

lack of energy

or enthusiasm

that Christians

have can be

traced back to

an entree-sized

encounter with

God's grace.

Expecting

yourself to

survive the

whole meal

after just

snacking when

God has

offered you a

buffet.

All-you-can-eat

grace for all

of your life,

for every sin,

for every

failure.

prayer.

If you're

feeling flat,

if you're not

feeling enthusiastic

for God, if

you're not

driven to

love Him,

maybe if

those words

that I

talked about

at the

beginning where

I was just

busting to

follow Jesus

with every

minute,

sound familiar

but from

the past,

you're not

going to be

able to fix

that by

trying harder.

You're only

going to fix

that by

feasting on

grace,

by airing

your dirty

laundry and

discovering

again that

God loves

you anyway,

probably more

than you even

realize.

We regularly

confess here at

church at St.

Paul's.

We pray prayers

together to do

it.

We sing songs of

confession but

there's always the

potential in those

that we can say

the words,

let it go past.

So I want to

push you right

now.

I'm basically

finishing here.

I want to push

you to take

this grace

opportunity.

This isn't just

a right now

thing, this is

about every step

of the journey.

What we're doing

in this series is

trying to hand

you the tools

that we believe

God has given

us so that the

journey towards

home is one

where you get

more and more

momentum, more

and more excitement,

more and more

confident and so I

want to push you

as we finish

today to take

the opportunity

to confess sin

to God.

Specific sin.

If you're sitting

there and you

can't think of

anything, two

things you need

to know.

You definitely

have something to

confess because

we're all unfinished

and you've gotten

really good at

denying it.

Ask God to

un-teach you

that.

Ask God to

show you what

it is that's

unfinished.

If that's

your thing

you need to

confess, start

there.

Confess that

God, I've been

practicing this

faking for so

long that I

don't even know

the areas that

aren't good enough

anymore.

But right now,

take the

opportunity and

confess for

yourself.

We're going to

sing to confess

together in a

moment but before

we get there, I

want you right

now to go

through the

process.

Stand before

God, admit

who you are

and find that

his response

is the same

as it will

always be.

I love you.

I forgive you.

So.

forth, hope you

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