Confession and Repentance

So, I know in the past I've said in my introductory paragraph that a blog entry would be short... and it's turned into a total lie.  However, this one really is a quick one (by my standards at least).  I think its importance actually comes in part from the fact that it's so simple.

Basically, God showed me this past week that I haven't really been understanding the process of confession and repentance.

I tend to fall into what Timothy Keller (in his book The Prodigal God, which is an excellent book that also derives some of its effectiveness from being short) would call the "elder brother" category.  Now, I'm an only child, but this refers to the story (Luke 15:11-32) of the lost son(s), in which the older brother is angry when the "prodigal" son is allowed to return.  He had been slaving away sedulously (vocab word for the week) all those years, and the rebellious younger son was welcomed back despite being profligate and wicked.

I don't think I begrudge people their welcome back to God, but the point of the "elder brother" idea is that dedicated people often use (or attempt to use) their morality as leverage on God.  I've been slaving away, so you have to do ____ for me, etc.  Now, when these slavers (like me) actually do mess up, they try to earn their forgiveness the same way.

Ever spend a lot of time beating yourself up for your failures?  I know I have.  I thought that was just part of the deal, like a specific amount of self-flagellation would be necessary as proof of being properly sorry so God could forgive you.  The "bigger" the sin, the more beating up of self needed, right? Interestingly, this is also the younger son in the story's plan, but the father cuts him off in midstream when he tries to execute it.

That's what happened to me too.  I (gasp!) sinned this month, and I was starting to grovel about it when God challenged me to put my silly English major brain to work and remember what some words actually mean: confession, and repentance.

Confession essentially just means stating what you believe to be true.  We confess Christ, for example, when we say we believe he is the Savior.  It's just telling it like it is. 

Repentance, in the literal sense, means turning away from something.  It's not the same thing as being sorry at all... it's more like facing in a different direction.

Confessing sin, then, is just telling God what happened. 

Repenting of sin is the part where you stop thinking about it.

Is that shocking? It is to me!  Something in me doesn't even want to accept that it could be that easy, but the fact remains that Jesus already dealt with our sin on the cross, and God continues to be the good father who cuts us off in the middle of our beating ourselves up.

It's so practical and efficient that it has to be God's design.  We get to just tell God, "I sinned, and this is how."  He is already fully aware of how bad it was, so no editorializing or grovelling on our part is necessary.  Then we're allowed to just leave it behind, trusting that confessing is all we need to do to be forgiven (1 John 1:9). 

By the way, not thinking about sin is just like not thinking about a pink elephant (which you just did, of course).  In order to do it, you have to think about something else, not focus on what you're trying not to think of.  If we try merely to turn away from sin, we have to keep checking to make sure it's still behind us. If you just try not to think about sin, not only are you still thinking about it but you also are much more likely to do it again! We become what we look at, I think.  That's why I recommend instead thinking about Jesus dying on the cross, or the fact that no matter what happens, I'm God's son.  Don't turn away from sin, turn toward Him.  Looking that way moves me to awe and worship instead of gloom and self-focus.  I think that's the only way to do it.

"One thing I do: forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 3:13-14).

What a privilege!