Sin separates, confession reunites.
When Adam and Eve first walked the earth, they had an intimate relationship with God, sin destroyed that. They began to hide, put up barriers. They were afraid of being exposed. Every child walks this same path. Children have the interesting habit of saying exactly what is on their mind, regardless of whether or not they should. But then they stumble across sin. They find that they don't want others to know about some of their feelings and actions. This is when they enter into the secretive teenage years. I have heard so many parents complain that they just don't know what is going on in their teenagers life.
These early teenage years can be very lonely, insecure and isolated.
Then it happens.
For me it was about my junior year in high school. There was a shift. I no longer felt ashamed of my acne, my crooked nose, or my gut. I no longer felt ashamed for my shortcomings as a Christian. I began to let people in. I don't think I ever had fun in school until my upperclassmen years at Wylie High.
We are seeing it occur all over our church. There have been several people at our church with secret sin. When we started our small groups, we took turns laying it all out on the line. Afterwards, we made it a point to tell each other we loved them. It has been a freeing experience for all. It is an incredible feeling to be known completely, and still be loved. This is how God loves us, but we can't come to grips with that until we let another human love us completely.
David says it this way:
Blessed is he whose transgressions are forgiven,
whose sins are covered.
Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord does not count against him
and in whose spirit is no deceit.
When I kept silent my bones wasted away
through my groaning all day long
For day and night your hand was heavy upon 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 everyone who is godly pray to you while you may be found
surely when the mighty waters rise,
they will not reach him.
You are my hiding place;
you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance.
(Psalm 32)
4 comments:
I like your thoughts and would love to talk about this with you. I'll call.
I was a camp counselor to the High School Students at Camp Blue Haven about 36 years ago. One morning, after we had all just awaken, one of my campers announced to us, "Yall, I wet the bed last night, will yall not tell anyone?" It was so gratifying to see how, because of his confession, his fellow campers just accepted him in spite of his failure and I never heard or saw it mentioned again. Since I still remember it clearly, it obviously made a great impression on me about how powerful confession can be. Good job, Drew. Dennis
great story, I will definitely use that one, only I might change the name of the kid to Dennis
I found this quote by Joe Beam at Heartlight.
Because intimacy in its truest sense means warmth, bondedness, and closeness, it occurs only when two people allow themselves to be extremely vulnerable to each other. It comes about when both decide not to hide behind any masquerade, but instead to allow the other person to see into the reality of who and what they are. That, of course, is a frightening prospect. Most of us wear various “masks” in different aspects of our lives so we can feel accepted and loveable. We may wear one mask to work, another to church, and yet another in our personal relationships. We choose a mask that will provide the greatest likelihood of being accepted in each specific environment.
Removing all masks to let another see who we really are (“warts and all”) means risking everything in that relationship.
Joe Beam
Post a Comment