Confession is Key

Have you ever had a revelation of truth from God's Word, a revelation seemingly simple but so profound it could not be anything but the finger of God?  The raw power of God's truth is greater than the most dynamic force found in nature.  The words of scripture are more explosive than a volcano or hurricane.  Rather than bringing death upon His listeners, God's holy Word bursts with life.  I had an epiphany of sorts this morning when I was reading Leviticus 4, a chapter devoted to the "sin offering of ignorance."  If a priest, the whole congregation, a ruler, or a member of the children of Israel sinned in ignorance against God, they were required to bring a prescribed animal before the altar.  They would place their hand on the animal's head and kill it as a sin offering before the priests.  This would be a public ceremony for all to see.

The LORD prompted my thoughts in rapid succession.  The bull, lamb, or goat would be killed before all, just like Jesus the Lamb of God was slain as a sacrifice for sin in public.  He was beaten, scourged, humiliated, mocked, stripped nude, and nailed to a cross for all to see.  There is no need for animal sacrifice anymore under the Old Covenant of the Law because Christ has fulfilled it and ushered in the New Covenant in His blood.  Leviticus 4 deals with sins of ignorance, yet there was public confession and sacrifice.  Jesus became sin for us though He had never sinned.  Today God revealed to me what is missing in many churches today - public confession.  I am not referring to "confession" before a priest as mediator (for there is one Mediator in heaven who is Christ, our High Priest), but the confession of sins before fellow believers.  Is this necessary?  Let God's Word be true and consider it well.

God led me to consider the implications of James 5:16:  "Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much."  Here are some excerpts I wrote this in my journal this morning:  "A lack of public confession results in a lack of prayer, and a lack of prayer causes us to drown in trespasses and ignore repentance.  Confession is the first step toward repentance.  A lack of repentance brings with it a lack of power and abundance of sin.  Our spiritual progress, growth, and fruitfulness will be severely impeded.  If we say we are without sin we call God a liar (1 John 1:10) for He says clearly, "...all have sinned." (Rom. 3:23).  Today we coddle our pride using embarrassment to cloak it, masking our sin with plastic righteousness.  Forgive me, dear LORD, for protecting myself from confession and in so doing barricading myself from your grace and healing touch."

Biblical confession is sorely missed in the church today.  We need people like Ezra, who were not ashamed to weep over the sins of the congregation before all.  Ezra 10:1 reads, "Now while Ezra was praying, and while he was confessing, weeping, and bowing down before the house of God, a very large assembly of men, women, and children gathered to him from Israel; for the people wept very bitterly."  We're so worried today about making people feel ashamed about their sin.  I can hear someone blurt out, "There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit."  (Usually only the first part of Romans 8:1 is quoted by such folk, by the way!)  Shouldn't we feel ashamed when we do wrong?  The Bible condemns sin consistently and constantly.  As children of God we are no longer condemned because all of our sin past and future has been cleansed with Christ's blood.  Even so, sin must be confessed.

Read James 5:16 again:  "Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much."  If we shirk confession, then prayer will be lacking.  Faith in Christ and prayer are the keys to this healing and restoration, as we see in the verse prior to this:  James 5:15 reads, "And the prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven."  How the devil would love for us to think confession is an outdated, almost unsanitary notion and thus remain spiritually sick and weighed down by sins.  Why do you think the church is weak and powerless?  One obvious reason is the sin which remains unconfessed within it!  Prayer from just anyone will not do:  effective prayer which avails much is sent from the hearts and lips of the righteous!  We are not righteous in ourselves but Christ's righteousness has been imputed to every believer.  Yet we must walk in righteousness.  We must keep ourselves free from sin.  And if we do not confess our faults to one another, and we do not pray for one another, we will not be healed.  The prayer of a man who stubbornly hides his sin and continues in it will be ineffective and weak.

God gave me this idea.  Allow a portion or yield the entire time of corporate prayer held at church (as the Holy Spirit leads!) to be a time of confession and prayer one for another.  No one must confess, but all will be encouraged to confess because all who are born again are in an intense spiritual battle.  We all fall, we all make mistakes, and sometimes we repeat those mistakes over and over.  Paul rebuked the Corinthians for their disregard for Christ's body during the receiving of the Lord's Supper in remembrance of Christ and for this reason many were sick among them.  God even allowed some to die because of their sin!  Do you see a personal need for healing?  If you do not see your need for prayer you are blinded by the deceitfulness of sin, are somehow ignorant of the necessity and power of prayer, or perhaps not even born again!  Jesus prayed publicly and was made a public spectacle for my sin and your sin.  If we will not be honest and open with each other, how can we say we are open with a God who is a consuming fire?

How secret sin rips at our regenerated souls!  Lot's righteous soul was vexed by the sin which surrounded Him in Sodom:  how much more should we be vexed by sins in our own hearts!  The immorality of the city stopped at his doorstep, but many believers have been bound, gagged, and overcome by sin in the heart.  Jesus came to set the captives free, and we are scared that a Christian convicted by sin might feel uncomfortable!  I ask you:  how uncomfortable was Jesus on the cross?  What kind of shame was He subjected to as He hung naked on the cross of Calvary?  Consider the truth of God's Word.  He wants to shake us out of our complacency, free us from bondage, and heal us of our guilt and shame.  The will of Jesus Christ is for our good.  Sometimes pain must come before healing.  Allow the Christ to lance our wounds with His Word so we might be purged, cleansed, and healed.

Are you willing to confess to one another, pray, and see the healing God brings?  When we are obedient to Christ and to the leading of the Holy Spirit, our lives will be a powerful testimony of the grace, healing, and love of our Savior.  Never barricade yourself from God's grace because of pride.  We serve a God who is gracious, compassionate, full of forgiveness, and slow to anger.  He has punished us less than our iniquities deserve, and has given us great deliverance through Jesus Christ.  Believe and receive!

Australia Update!

People at church come up to me often and say things like, "So when are you going to Australia?  I thought you were already there!"  No, I'm not currently in Australia - but I will be in God's time.  In April Laura and I interviewed for the pastoral vacancy at Calvary Chapel Sydney.  I recently heard from the fellowship and it will likely be a couple of months before the process is complete.  In the meantime we will keep praying for God to prepare our hearts, for unity and steadfastness in Sydney, and spiritual discernment to know God's perfect will.

I read this passage after dinner tonight and it is really wonderful.  Ezra 8:21-23 reads, "Then I proclaimed a fast there at the river of Ahava, that we might humble ourselves before our God, to seek from Him the right way for us and our little ones and all our possessions. [22] For I was ashamed to request of the king an escort of soldiers and horsemen to help us against the enemy on the road, because we had spoken to the king, saying, "The hand of our God is upon all those for good who seek Him, but His power and His wrath are against all those who forsake Him." [23] So we fasted and entreated our God for this, and He answered our prayer."  This is fitting for me, my family, and the fellowship in Sydney.  How important it is to humble ourselves, pray, and fast that God would reveal the right way for us to go.

Since the very beginning the temptation has always existed to trust in a hand of flesh when we are to trust in God alone.  We trust what our eyes can see and our minds can understand rather then seeking God's will.  We obsess and plan, worry and fret over our circumstances as if God is suddenly powerless to act.  Ezra knew that God's hand is upon those for good who seek Him.  The word "entreated" is "to search out, to strive after, ask, beg, request."  Are we willing to deny ourselves and become humble beggars so God may help us?  If we are sufficient in ourselves our need for God is reduced to convenience.  After Ezra and the people sought the LORD, He answered them.  He will answer us too if we will do the same!

The times and seasons of my life are in God's hands.  I recall to mind what God has said:  "You will preach, and you will be sent."  The gates of hell shall not prevail against God's church, and nothing is able to separate me from the love of God.  Christ is our hope and confidence no matter our circumstance.  He will fulfill His Word!

Freedom from Addiction

Sometimes I see ads for a free game claiming to be "the most addictive game" on the internet.  I wonder how that could be seen as a positive thing.  Perhaps it is because people don't see a problem with addiction or actually invite addiction to things they enjoy.  Paul says in 1 Cor. 6:12, "All things are lawful for me, but all things are not helpful. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any."  Paul decided he would not be brought under the power of any outside influence of the world.  He would only allow himself to be influenced by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Addiction could be defined as making a need out of the unnecessary.  It is a passion which has become an controlling obsession.  Alcohol is not required for life to be sustained, but many people cannot think of facing a day without it.  Drugs, Ipods, cell phones, energy drinks, television shows, social networking sites, the internet, and countless other things can become addictions people crave to cultivate.  We love our addictions, and love to hate them too.  As long as we see addiction as a healthy choice, we won't recognize the padded chains that bind us.  When Christians habitually give themselves over to the power of anything rather than God, we cross the line of idolatry and transgress.  A good thing in itself can become a bad thing, and a bad thing embraced can foul the best of men.

Are you under the power of any but Christ?  Only He can break the heavy yoke of addiction from our shoulders.  Jesus says in Luke 4:18-19, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed; [19] To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord."  Willpower is nothing before the power of sin and Satan.  After Christ has shattered your chains and crushed the head of the enemy of your soul underfoot, let us choose to live in the liberty and freedom Christ has given.

Put on Christ

"Then the children of Israel who had returned from the captivity ate together with all who had separated themselves from the filth of the nations of the land in order to seek the Lord God of Israel. [22] And they kept the Feast of Unleavened Bread seven days with joy; for the Lord made them joyful, and turned the heart of the king of Assyria toward them, to strengthen their hands in the work of the house of God, the God of Israel."

Ezra 6:21-22

 

There is no debate that our world is one in severe moral decay.  Some would say that man is basically good:  according to God's law man is completely wicked.  Nothing wholesome or pure comes from a man's heart in his natural condition, being born into the sin of Adam and reaching new depths every day in willful depravity. We need not think long before we can recall something horrible done by other people.  Our own conscience smites us for our faults and we cannot claim perfection for a single day.

 

Last "Bible Night" (our weekly more in-depth family Bible discussion) we discussed the purpose of God's Law.  The Law of God was given so every mouth may be stopped and the whole world be found guilty before God.  The 10 Commandments are like a mirror which reveals our sinful condition, for if we break the Law in one point we are guilty of all.  I posed the question:  "Now that Jesus has fulfilled the Law, are we supposed to try to keep the 10 Commandments?"  "Of course," is the response I would have given at the age of 10 or even 20.  The correct answer is "No."  I received some quizzical looks from my sons.  I explained that the Commandments are good, revealing God's perfect righteousness.  But we are only made guilty because of the Law.  Just because we are incapable of keeping God's Law does not make it invalid.  It is because Christ has ushered in the New Covenant of His blood that has freed us from that Old Covenant of the Law.

 

I always thought growing up that once we are filled with the Holy Spirit it makes sense we should try to keep God's Law through the Holy Spirit's power.  But this falls woefully short of God's will for His followers.  How many times did Jesus say, "It is written...but I say to you..." just in the Beatitudes?  Six times in Matthew chapter 5 alone!  Galatians 3:23-26 explains better than I could:  "But before faith came, we were kept under guard by the law, kept for the faith which would afterward be revealed. [24] Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. [25] But after faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor.  [26] For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus."  The Law has no power to make us pure or help us become children of God.  The Law can only condemn a man.  It is faith in Christ which justifies.  The Law functions as a schoolmaster or tutor to lead us by the hand to Jesus.  Once we have Christ, we are released from the authority and penalty of the Law.  The time of the Law is over:  the age of grace has begun!

 

Those who are not born again remain under the Law and the penalty of it:  death.  But when we confess our sins and trust in Christ as Savior, we are filled with the Holy Spirit who now guides, teaches, and helps us to do God's will and glorify God.  We have eternal life in heaven freely given by God's grace.  Instead of words written upon tablets of stone, He has given us His law written upon our hearts.  Jesus always did the will of the Father, and it was because He was filled with the Holy Spirit - not because words were written down that Jesus tried hard to follow.  God moved the hearts of the children of the captivity in Babylon to return, build the temple, keep the Passover feast, and separate themselves from the filth of the nations.

 

One danger of the time in which we live is we would use grace as a cloak for our sins.  Some might cite the fact we are no longer under the authority of the Law to do what is unholy.  We now have freedom in Christ not just to do what we want, but to live in a way that pleases God and brings Him glory.  I believe why the church is anemic and powerless over the clinging, pervasive filth of this world today is we have not separated ourselves from it.  We are in the world but too often we live just like the world.  We are disappointed by our sins rather than being disgusted by them.  We trample the blood of Jesus through legalism:  many are more conscious about discerning the Lord's Body in the act of receiving Communion and disregard His sacrifice when outside the confines of a church building and away from other professing Christians.

 

If you do not battle with purity of heart and mind, you are losing the fight without knowing it.  Because we live in a body of flesh and in a world of filth there will always be conflict with our regenerated hearts.  We wage war against the lusts of the flesh through the power of the Spirit, not by following a list of "do's and don'ts."  The result of trusting in God and separating yourself from the filth of the world is found in the Ezra 5 passage:  great joy from God, and strength to do His work.  This separation does not mean isolation.  How can people hear about God and His truth unless we show them through a consecrated life of love for God and man?  As the Word says, Proverbs 18:1 says, "A man who isolates himself seeks his own desire; he rages against all wise judgment."  Instead of starting your own "perfect" commune or church to change the world according to your ideals, live a changed life through the power of the Holy Spirit right where you are.  Jesus revealed a love foreign to the world which could not be discovered by the Law.  Allow God to make you a model of His grace and love for His glory.  God not only cleanses the inside of the cup, but the outside as well!  Put away the filth of the world by putting on Jesus Christ and allowing Him to live His life through you!