verse4today: Let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God (II Cor 7:1).
Posted on 2010-09-03 via Twitter
In today's reading from the One Year Bible, Joshua discovers that Achan violated the covenant of the Lord. He offers Achan the opportunity to confess his sins with these words: "Give glory to the Lord, the God of Israel, and give him praise. Tell me what you have done; do not hide it from me" (Joshua 7:19). Then Achan confesses his sin and endures his punishment.
My reading of that verse follows a conversation I shared last night with seminarians about the importance of a prayer of confession in the weekly liturgy of the gathered community. We talked about our hope that the liturgy creates and sustains a humble but confident people and, that one way to reach that goal is for the liturgy to include a prayer of confession, followed by words of assurance of our forgiveness.
Our conversation also included discussion about the placement of the prayer of confession in the service. We agreed that it may fit at the beginning of a service as an opening prayer or later in the service as part of the "Prayer for God's People." We also hinted at the possibility that the confession of sin might be a form of praise, alluding to the description of Isaiah's memorable encounter with God where the sight and sounds of a Holy God lead him to cry out "I am a man of unclean lips!" (Isaiah 6:1-13)
Today's reading clearly describes confession of sin as a form of praise. And, were it not for passages like this one, who would have thought that we could glorify God by confessing how we have failed Him? We might think that the disclosure of our failures as followers of Jesus would discredit the Lord, that our sins would somehow diminish his glory, if not in our minds, surely in the minds of others. But according to Joshua, that is not the case. Following Joshua's line of thought (as well as of David), we may conclude that we may give God praise when we sing of his glory, when we "raise 'em and praise Him," when we clap our hands to the Lord, when we shout "Hallelujah," or when we describe his marvelous attributes. But, according to Joshua, we also give God praise when we confess our sins. Not sure how that is, for it contradicts so much of my thinking in other areas of life. but I am sure of it.
One thing that comes to mind for me is that the Confession of Sin is just that, a confession. In confessing our sin we are acknowledging, dare I say praising, God’s grace and love for us in that, even though we have sinned, we are already forgiven by Jesus’ blood shed two thousand years ago. We are in a sense praising God for His amazing grace to us by the sacrifice of His Son. We humbly open our hearts and declare our shame before our God and acknowledge that He righteous and just.
And, the more I reflect on this, I wonder if confessing our sin is a way of praising God’s holiness, justice, righteousness,mercy, grace, without which we would have little reason to confess?
I couldn’t agree more. Our relationship with God is made stronger, like it is in our earthly relationships, when we there is nothing getting in the way of it. By confessing we acknowledge our sins to God and celebrate Him in that it was by His power, His grace, that we can have an open and unfettered relationship with Him.
God Loves a broken spirit and a contrite heart. It has been said that when we pray, in addition to the words we release, God hears the heart. When we lift our hands or say the prayer of confession, our hearts are humbled before God and He hears. We acknowledge God as Savior, which is praise, we honor God as redeemer, which is also praise, and we humble ourselves in God’s presence, knowing that only He can forgive our tresspasses. That’s praise. How sweet it is to know that when I confess my sins to God, He also hears the heart, and receives it as praise. What a wonderful God we serve!