May 10
23
Presented May 23, 2010 by Pastor Eric Cuenin.
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Well, I think we’re finally coming to a conclusion on our series about sin, the doctrine of sin. We originally planned on making it a week or two, but I found myself thinking that that wasn’t all I needed to share, there was much more to share about sin, and there’s still much more to share about sin, but we want to go on to some other things. So let’s attempt to complete our study on this doctrine tonight, and I want to discuss this evening in particular the important aspect of confessing our sin.
I think sometimes we feel that the only thing we need to know about confessing our sin is 1 John 1:9, and actually I’m not going to come to 1 John 1:9 until we come to the end of our message this evening. I’m not saying it’s a bad verse or a bad portion. It’s a very good verse and it’s a very good portion, and it’s a very important part of confessing our sin, but I want to lead ourselves in that direction as we go through scripture and try to understand a little bit about confessing our sin.
I think so much about confessing sin has to do with relationship with the living God, and I think sometimes we don’t look at confessing sin so much as being that big of a deal. We kind of portray confessing sin perhaps being more of just part of our Christian life day by day. And sometimes maybe it’s only when we feel like we’ve done something horrendous.
We are under the delusion that perhaps most of our sins aren’t all that bad, that I don’t have that much to confess, and sometimes days go by when we even feel like it is necessary to confess those sins. But I want to tell you this: Our relationship with Jesus Christ is firm and secure eternally with him, but we have to understand, on the other hand, that this very intimate relationship with which we share with the living God gets in disarray when we do not confess our sins.
We find that perhaps God is not answering our prayers, perhaps we are functioning in arrogance and in pride thinking that I’m better than I really am, and I caution you this evening if that is your spirit and your attitude because we all can fall into some traps in our existence that may even fall under the heading of doctrine of demons.
Doctrines of demons can fall in such that we think that our sins are pretty good and we are deceiving ourselves, and our relationship is becoming affected in the sense that we do not have the joy in Jesus Christ as we ought. Perhaps confessing our sins affects that joy.
Sometimes you say I don’t have much joy in my Christian life, I just seem to be finding something missing in my Christian life and I just don’t know what it happens to be, and sadly one of the things that happens to be missing in the joy of our lives and that fullness of the joy that we should be experiencing in Jesus Christ is we’re not always as apt to confess those sins that affect us. We don’t come to that place where we say we’re sorry to the living God that we are living in some sort of sin because we think in our arrogance they’re too small or perhaps we’re effectively hiding them from God himself, and so we caution you in regard to some of those things.
Well, the very first area that I want to talk about tonight, confessing sin is humbling.
Will you turn with me in your Bibles to 1 Peter 5:5-6. 1 Peter 5: 5-6 is an interesting passage of scripture. It talks about a lot of the responsibility of a pastor in feeding the flock and not lording it over God’s people, and then we come to verse 4 and it talks about the chief shepherd and about a crown of glory.
Then it says this in 5: And like manner the younger submit yourselves unto the elder.
Sometimes the younger do not want to submit to the elder because we do not like to submit. We do not like to feel that our relationship with whomever is dominating over me and I want to tell you that the fact of the matter is, we’re told to be subject one to another and I like this part. It talks about how we are to attire ourselves. We’re to be clothed with humility and sometimes we find ourselves clothed with arrogance instead of humility. We don’t submit to anyone and if we can’t even submit to people that we see and are respectful and are people that are perhaps our elder in the faith, people that we should be respecting because of their love for Jesus Christ for their lives that they lived for so many years before God in humility and in close fellowship, how in the world are we going to submit to God?
We clothe ourselves with humility, and then it says for God does what? And I think this is important. This is not persistent enough in our lives or from the pulpit or in our own personal devotion because it says for God resisteth the proud.
I do not want in my fellowship before the living God for him to resist me in any manner. I do not want the living God to resist me in my life because I am not confessing my sin, I’m too proud, I’m hiding things, I just don’t want to tell God, or I just think that everybody is much worse than me. After all, you know, I’m a pastor and I couldn’t possibly do anything all of my people do. I don’t want God to be resisting my life, because we’re told here God resisteth the proud, and I need grace. I need grace.
And sometimes one of my great prayers before I preach or before I go before someone or even in the morning when I step out is Lord I need some grace in my life. I need all the advantages I can get from you, Lord. I need you to be gracious to me even though I don’t deserve it, and I am humbled before your face because you are the Almighty God, you’re the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, and somehow though I am poor and needy yet you think about me. Can you imagine the living God thinks about me? Sometimes we don’t think we have enough time to even think about each other, yet God thinks about you.
And so when I talk about confessing my sin, I realize that I must somehow not be in a position of resistence. I need to be in a position where God will give me the grace that I need in my life, that he will somehow shower me with that grace day by day in my life that I so terribly need, and so I see this, and then it says this: And you say, you know, where are we going here? It says in verse 6 it says: Humble yourselves, and what’s that word? Therefore.
With all of that that has been said, and keeping this in mind, what should you do before God in case you think that maybe I’m just getting a little aside from confessing your sin? I’m not. I’m trying to lead you somewhere so you will understand the value of confessing your sin, and one of the problems we have is that we are sometimes so proud and arrogant we refuse to confess our sins except through somehow once in a while we go through the motions: Forgive me, Lord, for my sins. It’s kind of like sometimes when we’re so hungry and we sit down to eat, and we don’t even know that we just prayed and thanked God for the food. If somebody quizzed you 15 seconds later and asked you what you just prayed, you say, you know, I guess I thanked God for the food. Specifically, what did you pray? I have no idea.
With all of this in mind, you don’t want God to resist you particularly in your relationship with him. You are told to humble yourselves, therefore, under what kind of hand? Is this just some kind of light hand? This is the mighty hand of God who I need to take into account. This is the mighty hand of God who I give an account to day by day, moment by moment, and second by second in my life, and though I don’t always like it, particularly when I’m proud and particularly when there’s some kind of sin in my life where I am resisting God, and I’m saying to God that it’s not so bad and I’m rationalizing it and saying to the Lord, oh, maybe it’s all, you know, just some faulty thinking on my part because I think all the other Christians do it too, but I am in terrible conviction over this sin, and I realize there is something terribly wrong in my life and that perhaps God is not honoring what I am doing in my life because perhaps I am resisting him and, in turn, he is resisting me.
So he says humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, and this is what I want. Here’s the grace that we want. He giveth grace to the humble. I like that. Please, Lord, give me some grace in my life. May I fall down on my face before you that he may exalt you in due time.
Oh, boy, I know what that means. I’m going to be rich now, right? Maybe the exalting you in due time is just the very fact that he’s going to give you some wonderful joy in your heart and your life and your relationship with him that is so fulfilling that all you can do is sing a song in your heart, and some people say, oh, well, that’s not much. Oh, that’s a lot.
What was the last time you experienced the fullness of the joy of Jesus Christ? It goes along with the fruit of the spirit, and it goes along with the grace that we need that comes with the great and wonderful relationship with the living God day by day in our lives. That’s what sustains us, folks. That gives you peace in your heart. When it seems like the world is caving in all around you, that is what gives you that peace, it gives you that joy, and it doesn’t matter if something really bad happens, you don’t like it, you don’t care for it, but this joy in your life, it’s just so good. It’s just so good.
Well, we live in a wicked, wild world. It affects us. It afflicts us. We sometimes become like the wicked and wild world, and we act like the world and we think our sins are inconsequential, and yet we know that God sees us and sometimes we still don’t care. Isn’t that an amazing thought?
If I would ask every one of you in this audience this evening in our congregation, and I would ask you this important question: Does God see you all the time? Every one of you would, without a doubt, without a second thought, you would say yes, God sees me every second. That’s who he is. He’s omnipresent. In fact, he knows my thought afar off, which scares me when it talks about confessing our sins, doesn’t it you? If it doesn’t, it should.
I’ve mentioned to you in days gone by that there are on occasions moments that I think of sin in my life from years and years gone by where I was a poor testimony as a teenager to some of my unsaved friends, and I feel bad about it. I should have known better, you know, and I think to myself, I’m so sorry, Lord. I’m so sorry that I acted that way, for some breach in my life where I just wasn’t living a holy life, and it comes back to me and I don’t want it to come back to me but it comes back, and I learn from it, and it hits me between my eyes and I feel bad about it and I say, “Lord, forgive me. You know what I’m talking about, this thought that I’ve had in my mind of what happened so many years ago that I’ve been thinking about, will you forgive me for that in detail?”
Is it humbling to tell God? Yeah. Maybe it’s not as humbling, though, as perhaps something that I’m doing right now. Do you ever think about that?
Sometimes we think it’s my family’s fault that I’ve just sinned the way that I did. I can’t help it. If you would have just given me a different spouse, different parents, different children, different siblings, if you’d given me a different environment, Lord, I’m sure I would be easily able to clean these things up in my life and live for you then and have this wonderful relationship with you. Sometimes we just don’t like to own up, and when we don’t own up, we tend not to confess.
It’s humiliating to be so accountable to God and confess wrongdoings to him. It’s humiliating. He’s holy, I’m not, and I’ve got to tell God this icky thing that’s been going on, you know, whatever it may be. I don’t like it and I just — you know, does God maybe he knows it already and I don’t have to tell him. He knows my thought afar off. He knows I don’t feel real cool about things. But why can’t I confess it? Why can’t I fall on my face and say, “That’s it. I admit to it. You’re right God. You’re absolutely right to make me feel convicted about these things, and let me get it get it out of my life.”
I find sometimes one of the good things about accountability with other people — for instance, if you got to go and you have a terrible sin in your life and you tell somebody, “I can’t get this sin out of my life and I really trust you and I want to tell you all about it, and it really stinks and I hate this sin in my life but I seem to do it over and over and over again and I just don’t want to do it anymore.”
You know what really helps is if you have that entrusted person is for that entrusted person to tell you this: “Will you come back a week from now and tell me that you did that again next week?” You don’t want to go back and tell them, particularly if you really respect that person and you know that you’re going to dread telling that person.
When you were little, did you like go and telling dad and mom that you broke something? Did you like it if you did something really bad and you had to go and tell them, “I got sent to the principal’s office today”? Do you ever notice those times usually the principal has to call up your home or send a letter home with you? It doesn’t come out of your mouth. I know if I don’t do anything about it, it will all disappear, right? It will all go away if I don’t do anything about it, but sometimes things just don’t go away, and accountability is a good thing. Sometimes it helps.
Well, another thing confessing your sin brings glory to God. Did you know that? Have you ever thought about the fact that when you confess your sins it actually — now listen to me — it actually is a way for you to bring glory to God? You say I don’t think so.
Turn with me to Joshua chapter 7.
You say, you know, why are we going to the Old Testament to find glory to God way, way back to Joshua chapter 7?
Well, in Joshua chapter 7 I found this great verse on confessing sin and glorifying God that I really, really enjoy and I had to share it with you. It had to become a point in my message. I liked it so well that I enjoyed it and it spoke to my heart and it overjoyed me. I thought to myself this helps me in my Christian life, and I want it to help you in your Christian lives.
Look at Joshua 7:19. This is the account of Achan and his sin. Joshua said unto Achan — this is a terrible situation. Israel just had this wonderful victory at Jericho. They were feeling strong, man. They’re all flexing their muscles. They’re going to take on, you know, Ai and all these things in chapter 7 here, and then he said, oh, you know, we don’t need all these people to take on this crew. They’re a lot smaller and, man, you know, this is going to be an easy win for us, and it didn’t work out that way at all. In fact, they were soundly defeated and people died in the battle and it was because of Achan’s sticky fingers.
Joshua 7:19: Joshua said unto Achan my son. Give I pray thee what? Glory to the Lord God of Israel. How is he going to do this? Is he going to make restitution? Is he somehow got these things he’s going to have to do to make things right? This is it. He says and make confession unto him and tell me now what thou hast done. Hide it not from me.
Well, this is very transforming when it comes to your own confessing your sin if you realize and recognize that confessing your sin before God will bring him glory. Now, that’s the good news.
I’m not telling you this evening that when you confess your sins you will not have any penalty for all those things. I hope you know better. And sometimes when you do a sin, sometimes there is a payment to be made on your part, that you will have to pay the piper as we say.
Sometimes it wasn’t enough to, when you were a kid in school, to go and tell the teacher, some of us that are older, do you remember? Sometimes it meant you might get a walloping. But I just confessed. Here’s the penalty. Pow, right?
Well, in this case here, he brought corporate judgment, actually, on Israel by his evil behavior. They were warned again to say you will obey God. Yes, we’ll obey him, and God said you will not take from them, but it’s so nice and I have so little and I really, really want these things.
So in Joshua 7:11 it says this: Israel has sinned.
Now, you say I don’t understand this. I thought Achan sinned, but in this verse it says Israel has sinned. See that is the problem. Israel was involved in this, and we have to find out as well the lesson, that sometimes when you sin it affects other people, doesn’t it? It does. I don’t see how it affects other people. Well, you haven’t been around very long, have you? Sometimes sin will affect everyone around you.
If you sin — hey, dads and husbands. If you sin really badly, really badly, do you think it might affect your wife and your children? I think so. People might say that family has sinned even though it was, perhaps, the father.
Israel hath sinned. They transgressed my covenant which I commanded them. They have even taken of the accursed thing and have also stolen. They dissembled also, that is, they deceived. They put it even among their own stuff tragedy fell on the camp.
You will not escape when you confess all your sin, all of the consequences of the sins that you did.
In fact, do you remember the sin of David? Nathan confronted David and he confessed. He says, it’s me, it’s me after that trial, and David was so angry after Nathan confronted him. Do you remember he paid with regard to the sin with Bathsheba, didn’t he?
Notice Joshua 7:25-26 here in the same portion. Joshua said, why hast their troubled me — or troubled us, excuse me. The Lord shall trouble thee this day. Maybe Achan was hoping it would all disappear.
And all Israel stoned him with stones and burned them with fire and they had stoned them — after they had stoned them with stones and they raised over him a great heap of stones unto this day so the Lord turned from the fierceness of his anger wherefore the name of that place was called the Valley of Achor unto this day, meaning Valley of Trouble.
Sin is contagious. It spreads. God warned them, and I believe that perhaps the family may have been involved in the sin as well, we can’t say absolutely, but we see they paid as well, but sin is contagious, and God hated their disobedience.
In Joshua 7:1, God was angry. It says at the end of that verse the Lord’s anger was kindled against the children of Israel. In verse 4 they lost the battle. You see the consequences. Oh, it was just a little stealing. What did I do? Big deal. They went up there of the people about 3,000 men and they fled. They lost the battle before the men of Ai, and the men of Ai smote of them about 30 and 6 men.
By the end of the verse you’ll notice even the very spirit of the people. We’re told the hearts of the people melted and became as what? Water. Wow.
Do you think 36 people dying because of your sin is a small matter? It’s a lot of people to die because you decided that you were covetous, that you wanted to steal something, that you didn’t care about everyone else around you, and that it was your only little secret sin.
God always deals with sin, does he not? Why does God always deal with sin? It’s because he’s a holy God, doesn’t he? You see that, on the other hand, is the wonder and the joy of why Jesus went to the cross for our sins. We don’t want to pay for the penalty of our sins. Do you want to pay for all of your sins when it comes right down at the end? God is holy. He does not tolerate sin. He is just. Israel needed to see that God penalizes sin, and he does so in a just way. He told them don’t disobey. They disobeyed.
Now Christians, we’re so thankful that Christ went to the cross for our sins. We’re so thankful for all of us who rise up and we say, oh, Lord, thank you for the wonderful salvation I have in Jesus Christ alone. I am so glad tonight that I am saved and I will not have to pay for my sins in eternity by going to hell. My sins are paid for. Glory I am saved. It’s a great and wonderful thing, you know? It doesn’t get any better than that, but I’m afraid to tell you that we still do wrong things. And because we do wrong things, we do need to confess them before God to keep our relationship in order with the living God, and that’s why we’re discussing this.
I find it surprising sometimes, you know, when I look at this passage here in Joshua and the people disobeyed. I wonder how often we think about our own personal disobedience before God and confess it. When you think of all the promises there are in the Word of God and all the commands there are in God’s Word, for instance, be ye holy for I am holy, be kind, love the Lord your God with all your heart, love your neighbor as yourself, be witnesses, make disciples.
One I do hear once in a while confessed when kids are younger, and it says children obey your parents, and parents have taught their children how wrong it is to disobey their parents, and sometimes moms and dads teach their little children that “What did you do?” and they say, “I disobeyed daddy and mommy,” and they confess that.
That’s one of the few times I really hear it very often, but there are some commands in God’s word, you know, and we can go on with this that somehow we don’t seem to think about that perhaps am I really carrying this through? Am I really obeying God in these matters? Well, you know, what am I going to do? I’m busy and all of those things.
Even husbands loving your wives and wives submitting to your husbands, even simple things in life, you know, they’re just incredible areas that we can talk about that sometimes fall under the area of confession that I wonder how often we even give consideration to.
Third thing: Don’t excuse sin. Now I said all of that, now we’re all thinking of excuses. I’m trying to think of a couple myself. Confessing means I will accept the blame. You know that, don’t you? I’m accepting the blame. I’m not going to blame anybody else for this. I’m not going to blame my wife. I’m not going to blame my husband. I’m not going to blame my children. I’m not going to blame my siblings. I’m not going to blame my parents. I’m not going to blame the nasty guy who sits down the row from me in church. I’m not going to blame the guy at work who keeps driving me crazy. He’s got a bad mouth, he talks wickedly, he’s an evil character, and he’s bringing me down the drain. What am I going to do? I’m starting to think like him and talk like him. What am I going to do?
It’s easy to blame people, and I realize none of us probably in every, every, every situation, some of us have more ideal than others but, you know, nothing’s perfect on the planet earth, is there? What are we going to do about it?
One of the things we have to do is we can’t always point at other people and sometimes we’ve got to find solutions, and God will exalt whom? Remember our the first thing? The humble. Exalt you for humbling yourself before the face of God. He will give you grace, so sometimes we have to come before God and pray and call out to him and say, “Oh, Lord, I need the grace. Keep me from these wicked and unreasonable people. I need that help.”
Can’t be like Adam. Remember what Adam did?
I’m not going to take the time tonight. I would like to leave you out a couple minutes early. It’s been a long weekend perhaps for us all.
Do you remember what Adam did? We were just there recently in the last few weeks. Do you remember Adam, when he fell in the garden, and God confronts him? Did Adam accept the blame? Did he say, “Man, Lord you got the right guy and I remember exactly what you said, and I accept all of this. Please, Lord, forgive me. I confess this to you.”
What did he start doing? He blamed God. He blamed Eve. If there were more people around, he would blame them instead of confessing it and accepting the blame which is part of confession. You accept it. You accept the blame. You don’t excuse sin.
Every day, I’ll be frank with you, if I mingle with enough people or if I listen to the news even on television, particularly if I listen to the news on television, I hear someone blaming someone else because they are unwilling to accept the blame. Oil spills, wars, all of these other things, everybody points fingers. You notice that? Nobody’s willing to accept the blame, and as they say in our modern terminology, you’re not willing to man up, right?
Every criminal, every family problem, every children’s fight, every occupational problem and go around every church struggle, it happens all the time. We never want to accept the blame. It is always them. That is the way of life. When you sin, don’t excuse it. Step up. Confess it. Take care of it. Humble yourself before God.
Remember the prodigal son? Do you remember what was said in Luke 15:21?
Let’s wind our way to 1 John in closing, okay.
Luke 15:21, I like this, and that’s why I want you to stop. Let’s face it. He was corrupt, this son. He wanted all of his possessions as a young man and he spent it in the worst way, on riotous living of all kinds. The son is accepted back by his father, but do you notice this very wonderful verse that reminds us of relationship with the living God. He said, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and in thy sight and am no more worthy to be called thy son.” What did he do? He accepted the blame. He didn’t excuse it. David said, “Against thee, oh, Lord, against thee only have I sinned. I have sinned against the Lord.”
Well, finally, confession brings us back into good fellowship with the Lord. This afflicting of your relationship with God takes away our joy, it takes away our arrogance, it takes away the grace that we need and God is not exalting us in due time. We’re missing out on all these blessings of this wonderful relationship in Jesus Christ that is so great. On a daily basis it gives us peace and joy.
Don’t you like it even in your family when you have a good relationship? I really enjoyed having my children here this weekend. I’m exhausted to be frank with you, folks. It’s God’s grace that I’ve made it through. I’ve gotten all of about eight hours sleep in two days, and so I’m — for the whole weekend or whatever it’s been and — but it’s been great, and you know what I really enjoy when those moments with my children when they come back? I like it when our fellowship is sweet. It’s not nearly as good just to have your kids home if you’re going to bicker and argue. You know that? It takes it all away. It stinks. I don’t like it.
But when your fellowship is sweet with your family, there’s something really nice about it. There’s no separation between you and them, and you know we get along and we enjoy each other’s company and we’re talking and we’re laughing and there’s something really neat about that, and you know what? It’s even greater with the Lord.
So in 1 John 1, since I know you’re all dying to get there and think about this passage, and I just wanted to share with you that I wanted to get to it right at the end because that’s not all that’s said about confession of sin in the Bible. There’s a lot more than just that.
1 John 1:3 That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you that ye also may have fellowship with us and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with the Son Jesus Christ, and why is this written? Verse 4: Your joy may be full.
And that’s kind of where I’m going tonight with confessing your sins. I don’t want you to be removed from that full joy in Jesus Christ. I want it to flow through, and it’s part of the fruit of the Spirit. You’re not going to get that, you know, that joy, that relationship. It all unhinges, too, in may ways on your confessing your sins and accepting the blame, not making excuses, and humbling yourself before the face of God.
Well, okay, verse 9: 1 John 1:9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. God is faithful, he is just, and that’s one of the reasons why I’m so thankful I’m saved tonight. He’s always just. He always pays a wonderful way for the penalties against sin because of his holiness, but he’s always very faithful in forgiving his children, is he not, just to forgive us our sins, and it goes beyond that. He cleanses us from all unrighteousness.
So tonight, when we’ve talked about the doctrine of sin, please remember this aspect for you Christians. We’ve talked about the horror of sin, the terrifying consequences of hell, and all those really rotten things, but I want to tell you tonight that when Christ has paid for your sins, he’s paid for them for eternity, but you still will do sinful things, and because you do sinful things, do not allow it to affect your fellowship and relationship with the living God.
Heavenly Father, as we leave tonight, we pray that things might be right before us and the Lord. And, oh, Father, may even as we go out of this place, may we be brought to mind in humility those things that are getting in the road between us, so help us tonight. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
Everyday Walk