Confess Your Sins to One Another

Are we okay?

Amazing.

It's good to be here.

I always find it such a privilege and a and a joy, honestly, to come and share the word.

It feels like it's been a while since I've have um been up here bringing the word.

So you know, over the last few weeks we've been in our series One Another.

It's been good, hasn't it?

It's been really good.

So there's been what have we had?

Serve One Another.

No, we haven't done Serve One Another.

Well, there's another one because someone can do that one.

Forgive one another.

Love one another.

Michael last week brought be united to one another.

Have we done honour?

Build one another up.

Um, so I'm doing it to you and me.

It's a good start, it's going well.

He said, didn't he don't screw it up?

So I'm blame him.

Um so um I have um been given the honour today of confess your sins to one another.

Shotgun that, isn't it?

Why did you give that one to me?

But um no, there are there are over 50 one another commands in the New Testament.

So there's so many.

Um, and yeah, we're gonna dive into that today.

So if you have your Bibles with you, I'm gonna read from James 5, 13 to 16.

It says, Is anyone among you suffering?

Let him pray.

Is anyone cheerful?

Let him sing praise.

Is anyone among you sick?

Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord.

And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up.

And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.

Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another that you may be healed.

The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.

Let's pray.

Father, we thank you.

We thank you so much for your word.

We thank you that it transforms us from the inside out.

Lord, I thank you that you have gifted us your word.

Such a precious gift to us, Lord.

And I pray today that you would speak to us.

Lord, I pray that my agenda would just leave right now, and yours would be leading us forward, Lord.

Would it be your word spoken?

Say what you want to say, God.

Be honored, be magnified in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

So you'll have to forgive me.

I'm just recovering from a little bit of a cold, so I've got my tissues and I might be a bit sniffly, but um, we're good.

Um, so I don't know what comes to mind for you when I say the word confession.

Um, when you heard me read that scripture when I when I mentioned I was going to be speaking on confess your sins to one another, I don't know what came up for you, what memories you have.

I don't know, maybe you grew up and you would regularly visit a confessional booth.

I don't know.

Maybe when you hear the word confession, you think about punishment.

Maybe you have things in the past where you've maybe confessed something and you've had a bit of a strange reaction.

Maybe you've confessed to somebody and there's been betrayed trust.

Maybe there's been confession and that's resulted in loss.

There's real risk, isn't there, in confessing.

I remember some of the times that I've gone through in my Christian walk where there've been some really, really tough times where I've had to sit down with a trusted friend and lay it all bare.

And those times have been really, really hard, beautiful, but hard.

You see, when we think about confession and when we participate in confession, we do open ourselves up, don't we?

We lay it all bare, we're vulnerable.

You know, these thoughts can go through our mind.

What am I gonna lose if I confess?

What is this gonna change for me in my life?

If these people knew what I was really struggling with, what would they think?

So it's so easy to brush things under the carpet, isn't it?

Minimize it.

Oh, it's fine, it's not really a big deal.

I've got this, me and God, we've got this, it's fine.

It's so easy.

And then I don't know, have you ever thought as a follower of Christ, like, well, Lord, like you went to the cross, you did everything, like I'm set free, I'm forgiven, I'm restored.

Like, why then?

Why is a Christian to are you asking me to confess my sin?

If Jesus paid for it all, past, present, and future, why confession?

Ephesians 1 7, in him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins in accordance with the riches of God's grace.

I'm like, Lord, Psalm 103, 12, as far as the East is from the West, so far he has removed our transgressions from us.

So if my debt is being paid, why confess?

Why is it necessary?

And do you ever think, well, God, you know it all anyway.

You know everything that I have done, haven't told anybody about, but you know, you know everything I'm gonna do.

Psalm 139, you have searched me, Lord, and you know me.

You know when I sit and when I rise, you perceive my thoughts from afar, you discern my going out and my lying down, you are familiar with all my ways.

Before a word is on my tongue, you know it completely.

So, like, why?

Why God?

And why do we have to confess to one another?

Because that's even harder, right?

It's alright, if like, oh God, come on, like, we will have some time, a moment.

I'm gonna confess to you, Lord, what you already know, but now you're asking me to sit down with a brother or sister and confess all of those deepest, darkest, ugliest parts of my life to someone else.

No wonder we find it hard as followers of Christ.

Because we can, can't we?

Just forget about it, minimize it, crack on, keep living life.

And we do, don't we?

So, shall we dig in and look at why God asks us to confess?

Yeah?

You up for it?

So if we go back to James 5, 16, therefore, confess your sins.

The word for confess here, it literally translates from the root word homo logueo, if I've pronounced that right, probably haven't.

But it translates same speak or same word, homo, same logos, word speak.

So when we confess and when we think about confession, we are speaking and agreeing with God.

So basically, we are saying, Lord, what you say is sin, I also say is sin.

I agree with God's view of sin.

See, confession isn't just about saying, I'm sorry.

It's definitely not about groveling and begging God to forgive us.

It's not about beating ourselves up so hard because we've been a terrible person, because we feel bad.

To confess is to agree with God about our sin.

I mentioned before that there's a few different things that we can do when it comes to our sin.

First one, justification.

Confession is not saying, Oh God, I'm I'm I'm sorry that I'm I'm not speaking to her.

I'm not speaking to her, God, and I'm sorry about that.

But she started it, and um I just need to protect my peace.

Confession, agreeing with God is saying, God, I'm giving it a silent treatment and I'm nursing a bit of grudge.

What you call sin, I call sin.

We can minimize, oh yeah, sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, Lord.

It was just harmless banter, works being so boring.

Um confession is saying, Lord, this isn't just an innocent friendship with my co-worker across the line.

I let my conversation go where it shouldn't go.

What you call sin, I call sin.

Self-loathing.

Confession is not, and I don't know about you, but this one, I can do this quite a lot.

Lord, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm such a terrible person, I'm a terrible, horrible, gossip-spreading person.

Like, I don't deserve you, Lord.

And confession is saying, Yeah, God, I wasn't really sharing a prayer request with that person so that people could pray.

It was gossip.

What you call sin, I call sin.

You see, calling ourselves a terrible person and loathing in that self-pity when we've messed up is not confession, that's condemnation.

And God hasn't hasn't come and done what he's done and given us everything so that we can live in that.

There is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.

So it's not beating ourselves up, it's not all of that stuff, it's actually coming to God, to the throne of grace that we can so boldly approach, right?

It's a throne of grace.

Don't forget that.

We can come boldly and say, God, I come into agreement with what you say about sin.

Does that make sense?

So we know what confession is.

What about to one another?

Why then do we have to confess to one another?

James is instructing us here to agree with God about our sin out loud to someone else.

Really?

Why?

Should we look at the rest of the verse?

It says, Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another.

So where there's confession, there's prayer.

How can we truly pray for one another and support each other if we don't have that honest vulnerability with one another?

Your spiritual walk, my spiritual walk, is a community project.

Your spiritual health is a community project.

I get I can generally, genuinely, should I say, don't mean this in a judgy way, and I hope it doesn't come across this way.

It's just like I don't understand when when people say, Oh, like I love God, but I just don't don't want to go to church, I don't need to go to church.

Or, you know, my faith is just between me and God.

It is, but actually, it calls us to be part of a body.

Over 50 one another commands, how can we live that out without being in the body of Christ?

Please, if you love Jesus, please learn to love being part of his body.

It is hard sometimes.

I know that many of us in this room will have gone through hurt when we've been part of the body and stuff to work through, but please, please don't give up on community and being part of his body.

No, you do not need to go to church in order to be saved.

But if you are, why would you not be part of his body?

We are all part of the body, all parts are important.

Let's say you've your arm, right?

Your arm is part of my body, my arm.

If my arm is not attached and it's severed from the body, it's still an arm, but it can't function on its own.

It can't function unless it's attached to the rest of the body.

But what severs us often from each other isn't just that distance or not coming to church.

It is the falsehood and the pretenses that we can have, the masks that we wear.

Did you know actually, when I was studying for this um message, the word secrets, I can't remember, it comes from um secretus, the word secretus, and it it means to separate.

Isn't that like incredible?

So secrets separate us from one another.

Confession brings us together.

I'm gonna read Ephesians 4 25.

It says, Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbour, for we are members of one another.

We're members of one another.

We've got to stop hiding when we're part of the body.

If we don't confess to one another, how can we specifically pray for and support one another?

Galatians 6.2 says, bear one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ.

How can we bear one another's burdens if we don't share them?

How can we fulfill the law of Christ if we can't bear one another's burdens?

And does that mean we share that with everybody?

Share everything with everyone?

No, and I'm gonna come to that a bit later with some practical steps.

But there's another part of the scripture that I want us to look at.

See, it says, Therefore, confess your sins to one another, pray for one another, that you may be healed.

Sin, the things that we do when we act in a way that kind of isn't aligned with how God wants us to live.

It can take a toll on our body, can't it?

Has anyone experienced that?

I have.

You know, those things then you think, oh, I have just brushed it under the carpet, and oh, like, oh, it's fine, I can just deal with it, but it starts to bubble and it starts to stress and it starts to get you anxious, and it then, oh, I've been there.

You know, David described it like this in Psalm 32, 3 to 7.

After David had committed, saying he said, When I kept silent, my bones wasted away.

Through my groaning all day long, for day and night your hand was heavy on me, my strength was zapped, as in the heat of summer.

Oh, have you ever been there?

You see, our sin, it can take a toll on our physical health, our spiritual health, and our emotional health.

Our heart can get sick, and hope deferred makes the heart sick, says in Proverbs.

Is all sickness caused by sin?

No.

No, no, no, that's not what I'm saying.

Can it sometimes bring about a sense of dis ease in the body?

Yes.

And I do want to say at this point here though, because it is sensitive, isn't it?

Let's be very, very careful as a body not to be like Job's pals.

Now, if you're new to the Bible, right, Job was a man, a very godly man who lost everything, his children, his wealth, his health.

And his friends showed up to support him, saw his pain and physical agony and loss, and they accused him of hiding secret sin.

Well, what have you done?

Surely this, surely that.

God called them out for it.

God called out his self-righteous friends so that listen, when your friends come to you and they're struggling, the last thing that your friend needs is for you to play a spiritual detective.

Honestly.

Can I say that?

Our job is not to analyze, diagnose people's pain.

Our job is to bear a burden and pray for one another.

And our job is to bring our own sin into the light so that we can journey that with other people as well.

Yes, of course, as relationships grow and you get closer to one another and you build trust, there's gonna be challenge, there's gonna be accountability, and that's a beautiful part of having Christian friendships.

But let's not skip over bearing the burden, praying with one another and be in that safe space.

If we go back to Psalm 32, um, I'm just gonna read it again from when David was talking about how he felt in that sin and then what happened when he confessed.

It says, When I kept silent, my bones wasted away.

Through my groaning all day long, day and night, your hand was heavy on me, my strength was sapped, as in the heat of summer.

Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity.

I said, I will confess my transgressions to the Lord, and you forgave the guilt of my sin.

Therefore, let all the faithful pray to you while you may be found.

Surely the rising of the mighty waters will not reach them.

You are my hiding place.

You will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance.

You see, when David stopped covering his sin, the weight was lifted.

The sin was no longer his hiding place.

He wasn't hiding the sin anymore.

God became his hiding place.

Proverbs 28:13 says, Whoever conceals their sins does not prosper, but the one who confesses and renounces them finds mercy.

Proverbs 28:13

So we can see, can't we, from looking at the scriptures how important it is to be open, to be honest, and to confess with one another.

So, how in a body, in a church, do we build a life where confession is normal?

Shall we look at that?

Give you some points.

Okay, the first one: build your safe circle.

And it takes effort.

Takes effort, doesn't it?

Finding people that you trust, finding people that you can bear everything to, and you have to put yourself out there.

And you know what?

I don't know about you.

In the past, I've had some really safe circles that are not circles anymore.

And that can be really, really scary when you want to step in and do that again.

It can take a lot of effort to truly get to know somebody and find that place where we can trust one another.

Because we're not really gonna find ourselves in a great spot if we just confess everything to everyone.

Imagine if I just stood here now and like aired all of my dirty laundry.

You can still have privacy, don't need to take everything public.

It's finding those brothers and sisters.

Find your brothers and sisters.

And you know what?

We have groups.

There might be certain things that you share in your groups.

Like I got really, really mad at my co-worker and said this and that.

You might feel okay and comfortable sharing that in your group, but there might be other things.

It's like, no, no, I need my brother or my mentor or somebody that I know I can safely share this with.

Please don't give up on investing hard in relationships.

It takes hard work, but it is so worth it.

The next point is confess early and often.

Making confession a lifestyle.

You know, we were talking about David earlier, and I always think of his story.

And again, if you're new to the Bible, David was a godly man, a man after God's heart.

And he he made some questionable choices, David.

Um there was a time where David got up from his bed one night and he went up onto the roof and he saw a woman bathing, Bathsheba.

And he was like, she's quite nice.

And he inspected the woman was very beautiful.

And then he sent somebody to go and inquire about her.

And then after that, he sent someone to go and bring her to him.

She got pregnant.

She was married to somebody else.

So then David tried to like concoct all of this plan so that it would look like her husband got her pregnant, but that didn't work.

So then he had her husband killed.

So it was this timeline of like decision, decision, decision, decision, decision.

And I often read this scripture and I go, hey, imagine.

Imagine if like David went out onto the roof, saw beautiful Bathsheba and went, right?

Who am I going to tell about that?

I'm going to tell someone now, at this moment, like, hey, I've gone out and there was temptation.

And I saw, like, imagine.

And that didn't happen, and it doesn't always happen.

And it doesn't mean God isn't big enough to cover everything from this to that.

Like, you know what?

Some of us have gone so far down that line.

And it just can feel like, wow, this has got so big.

We can still bring that to the Lord.

We can still confess that.

But let's be mindful.

If we can build that practice of early confession and doing it often, that's wisdom.

That's wisdom.

James 1, 13 to 15 says, When tempted, no one should say, God is tempting thee.

For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone.

But each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed.

Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin.

And sin when it is full grown gives birth to death.

So we can read that as well and remind ourselves of the wisdom that there is in early confession.

Okay.

Are you all okay?

Have I gone have I gone hard on you this morning?

Right, are you ready for the last one?

Point number three.

I can I'll invite Terence as well to come back if he's ready.

Um number three, be somebody that others can confess to.

Are you someone that somebody else can safely confess to?

Will you pray?

When someone comes to you in trouble with a struggle, can we show the grace of God?

Will you restore gently?

See, when somebody comes to you and it's so hard and painful to be like, oh, this is what's happened, that's so hard for that person.

But you get the opportunity to reflect God's grace in the most beautiful way.

You know, when um, you know, in the human body, like you know, if like you got a cut or uh and there was a bleed or an infection, do you know that all of the cells in the body all rush as an inflammatory response to that wound?

How amazing is that?

How amazing is God when there's a wound, let's be mindful not to be like mm, mm-mm, mm-mm, the sin out, no, no, no.

Can we draw closer as a body towards the wound because we need to pray for each other for that horizontal healing?

You know, we we don't have to like the sin.

But can we love the person through it and walk step by step?

We're gonna struggle.

We are all gonna face moments where we need a brother or a sister.

Can we be the body that helps fight off the wound, heal the wound, and protect it while it heals?

You know, just as we come to a close, I know that sin is a it's a really heavy topic, but it's very real.

And um, it's a journey of grace, isn't it?

Like, I gave my life to Jesus in 2009, and I've been walking this journey.

Am I there yet?

No.

But if you knew me back then, God has taken me on the most beautiful, humbling journey, but I couldn't have done it without my brothers and sisters.

I couldn't have done it without honesty and vulnerability, you see.

I was reminded when I was preparing of, you know, Adam and Eve, when they first sinned in the garden, they felt so ashamed that they tried to hide themselves, they hid from God, covered themselves with fig leaves.

Didn't do anything, didn't heal anything, it didn't fix any shame.

But God made them garments.

He made them garments that covered.

It's never ever too late to come out of hiding.

It's never ever too late to let God clothe you with garments.

So if you are here today and you're not a follower of Christ, I just want to encourage you as well.

It's never ever too late.

It's okay to come to God with all of the mess.

As a follower of Christ, it's okay to come to God in the mess.

He wants to heal us and restore us, and I just don't want anybody here to miss out on that opportunity.

The gift, the gift of confession to one another.

Shall we pray?

Father, you are so faithful, you are love, you are light.

God, I thank you that you don't leave us on our own.

Lord, I pray today that you would pull us out of hiding wherever we have tried to cover up ourselves and our sin and our shame with fig leaves.

God, would you draw us out into the light?

Cover us with your grace.

We thank you for the cross, for the sacrifice, for your blood that was shed, so that we could be made heal, be whole and healed in Jesus' name.

Lord, would you help us as a community to develop those safe friendships, Lord?

Where we can confess to one another, restore one another, pray for one another, and that healing would happen across this community.

In Jesus' name, amen.