“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
our sins,
Sins in the plural refer to acts of sins, particular sins (not the sin capacity or sin nature). These are sins that we know as sins. The moment a believer sins, he breaks his fellowship with God. Immediate confession of a particular sin restores that fellowship.
PRINCIPLE:
We confess personal sins, not deny them.
APPLICATION:
The Lord Jesus takes care of our broken fellowship with God in glory. He intercedes for you personally. If we confess our sins, Jesus will take care of everything else. The basis of forgives is not our morality but the substitutionary death of Christ to take our place in suffering for sin.
He 7:25, “Therefore He is also able to save to the uttermost those [believers] who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them.”
We confess our sins; we do not deny them. Note that we are not to ask God to forgive our sins. God forgave our sins at the moment we trusted the death of Christ to pay for our sins. God has already forgiven the believer in Christ.
The idea of confession is calling sin what God calls it – anger, jealousy, pride, malice, bitterness. We call sin exactly what God calls it. We do not cover it up. We do not squirt perfume on it. We do not rename it. Confession means to name sin the kind of sin it is, label it for what God says it is.
If you are irritable and angry, then admit to God that you were angry. If you are full of pride, tell God you are a proud person. If you are selfish, tell God you are selfish. Call the particular sin for what it is before God. Don’t call it by distorted terms such as a “mistake.” That is a fancy toe-dance away from admitting your guilt. Just say, “Lord, I am angry, proud, selfish, and bitter.”
Tell God the truth. Be honest with Him. There is no way to fellowship with God and not be on the level with Him. You do not confess private sins in public but in private communion with God. This is a matter between you and God alone. If your sin involves someone else, then you want to deal with that later. Go to the person at that time and get it straight.
We do not have the right to regret our sins once we confess them. Feeling sorry for sin is an attempt to displace the work of Christ. Jesus accepted the responsibility for our sins on the cross. He personally paid the price for our sins. Therefore, the Christian should have no delusions about his ability to satisfy an absolutely holy God by something he does. Only Jesus can do that.
Some people believe that if they feel sorry for their sins, they will not do it again. Sorrow has nothing to do with resisting sin. Only a person controlled by the Holy Spirit can resist sin.
Grant,
You made one statement that caused a major, beneficial shift in my thinking…
“We confess our sins; we do not deny them. Note that we are not to ask God to forgive our sins.”
Man, that helped so much.. I’m not going there asking for something and somehow waiting for a response.. I simply, in humility, call it what God calls it and my High Priest takes care of my case..
Praise God!
From that point forward, any addressing of that issue (guilt or sorrow) is unbelief.
Bless you.. Brian
Thanks for the encouraging comments.
Hi if someone presents the gospel and says that we need faith plus confessing all of our sins to God citing 1 John 1:9; then would this not be adding works to saving faith? Thanks
Cari, you are right. We are saved by Christ alone through faith alone. Anything beyond that places human work into the equation.
Grant if a beliver was’nt confessing his sin on a regular basis then wouldn’t he receive chastisement from the Lord and be convicted of his sin(s) leading him to the confession of his sin(s) because he hates to sin.
Also if a professing believer doesn’t confess their sin(s) as a practice then could that infer that they may be unregenerate because of no conviction of sin?
Is conviction of sin chastisement from the Lord?
Thanks
Scott, generally God does not give tit for tat. He does not discipline the believer for every sin. He does discipline believers for protracted lack of fellowship (He 12:6-7).
Some believers can harden their hearts so that they remain insensitive to God’s conviction. This happened to David; he was out of fellowship for 2 or 3 years before Nathan challenged him for his sin. Later David wrote two Psalms about his protracted aberrance from the Lord (Ps 32, 51).
Ok. Good to know- thanks for commenting.