Free to Confess

You have just walked back into the locker room, the championship game is over, and your team…won. There is excitement, celebration, maybe relief, and plays and moments are being retold.

Now if you would have lost, there still may have been plays and moments talked about, but in a much different way. You may focus on certain moments in hopes to defend and justify yourself. It wasn’t my fault that we lost, surely I did my part. We want to convince ourselves that we weren’t the cause or the reason for the loss. We fear the consequences or disappointments that come from failing, so we want to find ways to justify ourselves, that we did all we could.

But when we win, when the outcome is secured and the result is positive, we share more stories than just the things we did well. Along with our successes, (if we had any), we are much more excited to talk about other people’s successes. We feel free to give credit where credit is due, because that person is on our team, and our team won the championship.

But in addition to successes and sharing moments of good plays made by us or by others, we also feel more free to share our own failures. We share the plays where we messed up, but someone else stepped in; or the times that you doubted you could do it; or even the times you didn’t listen to the coach or committed a penalty or foul.

Why is this? Why does a good result in the game make us so different? Not just different as in we are happy versus sad, but different as in we are free to be honest, to be truthful. In one scenario we are prone to defend and justify ourselves, and in the other we feel more free and confess the good, the bad, and everything in between.

What we see is that when the fear of consequences or failure is removed, we are much more likely to be honest about who we really are and what we have done.

And if there is any truth in this, that we are more free to be honest when the end result is positive, how much more should we feel this when it comes to confessing our sins. Jesus has died as a payment for our sin, and raised to prove that it was true. He has taken all the cost and consequence of our sin, and has promised to forgive us, and save us, and keep us if we would believe in Him.

What a promise, that if we confess our sins he will forgive our sins; and that if we come to him he will not cast us out.

Prayer of Confession

Father, what an amazing promise that when we confess our sins, we do not need to wonder if you hear us, if you forgive us. Your word says that perfect love casts out fear, and your son has loved us and gave himself for us, and he indeed is the savior of the world. Father, we confess that we doubt if you will forgive us, we doubt if you hear us, we doubt if you love us. Help us in our doubts. Father what motivation and hope you have given us to confess our sins and to come into the light before you. Help us now to be honest before you with our sin, without fear, in this moment of silent confession…