READ Scripture: Hymn 267. (1 John 1: 6-9)

I’m not sure there has been anything more life changing to me than coming to really live the truth of these words in 1 John.

Confession brings forgiveness…and forgiveness lets us walk in the light with God, and with each other.

Have you tasted the freedom of walking in truth and in light? Of not having to hide, not having to be ashamed? Have you experienced what it is like to truly be forgiven, accepted, unashamed, whole, free?

The good news of Jesus Christ is that it is possible to live in that freedom!

The bad news of being human is how difficult it is to stay in that place. Confession and the freedom it brings are not an easy path for us to follow.

It’s not an easy path, but for different reasons.

Some of us in the room today don’t really feel like we “sin”. I mean, is there really some standard out there of good and bad? Why should I be made to feel guilty about the way I live my life? I’m as good as most folks.

Others in the room today don’t see this sin and confession stuff applying to them, either… but for a different reason. Some parts of the church have taught that God does a work in us, a work some call a second work of grace, which removes the possibility of sinning from our lives. Those people might see confession as important when we first begin as followers of Christ, but not as important to life NOW.

And then there’s a whole other group of people that have a hard time seeing themselves as anything BUT sinners or failures or wrong doers. Some people are constantly confessing, but never really believe they can live in the power of forgiveness and grace.

Each of those is vastly different, but each has something in common: each group misses out on the power and the freedom of confession and forgiveness. Some never see the need to confess, and some never accept the forgiveness.

Which one is the hang up for you?

I’ll be honest: at different points in my life, BOTH have been a hang up. Both have been barriers that keep me from living in the freedom of God’s forgiveness.

Will you join me today? Will you join me in looking at 1 John, not in an academic way, not in a “huh, that’s interesting way”…but will you join me in listening for God’s voice, his voice pleading with us to live in the freedom that he intends for us?

Confession and forgiveness are our keys to freedom. How will you and I learn to live them today?

 

Listen to 1 John 2:1-2 [READ]

These verses capture the heart of the message found in the first chapter. Live lives pleasing to God! Live differently because Jesus is in your life! God’s goal for us is a changed life.

And when we fail, when we mess up, when we miss the mark… there is freedom and hope in Jesus Christ. He stands by our side, he supports us, and he is the one who has done something to make up for our wrongdoing.

The problem is, we don’t live differently.

On the whole, we do fail and sin just like everyone else. Statistics show this; Christians aren’t measurably different than the rest of society in any significant way.

This isn’t what God intends! Flip back to the first chapter of this letter, in verse 5. [READ 5]

God IS light. God is good, perfect, holy, different, OTHER than we. [READ 6]

God IS light, and if we say we follow him, we can’t walk in the darkness. That’s a lie. It’s not what God intends.

These are the verses for the people in the first group I mentioned earlier, for those who don’t really think that there is a standard of right and wrong that matter.

The message of Christianity is that it does matter how we live our lives. God is good, perfect, and holy…God is light, and if we walk with God, we cannot walk in darkness. Our actions matter. God wants us to live differently. God wants us to live in the freedom of the light. That leads to the promise in verse 7. [READ 7]

Do you know the power of this verse?

I was talking with a friend this week. One of the things he’s been working on for quite awhile is not keeping secrets from his wife. He knows the power that shame has, and he’s tried to overcome that by living differently, by sharing with his wife the good things and the hard things he’s facing.

He was driving home this week, and he had this overwhelming feeling of shame. “I live a double life. I’m horrible. I’m ashamed of the things I keep secret.” It was overwhelming and horrible emotion.

And then, just as quickly, the truth came back to him. “No, I’m not. I’ve told her the truth. She knows, and she still loves me. I don’t have to hide, and I don’t have to be ashamed.”

It was an overwhelming sense of freedom. He tangibly felt it from living in truth, from being in the light.

It really is better this way! Everything within us says that we can’t let out our dark secrets, our shameful side. We can’t let anyone know how bad we really are. We have to put on a mask, live a lie, so that people will accept us.

But that is a lie! It is a lie that actually keeps us from the true freedom of living in the light!

Listen again to verse 7 [READ]

When we walk in the freedom of the light…when we live differently…when we follow God’s ways…what is the promise? We have fellowship with one another! We experience true community, true relationship with others. When we live in the light of truth and of God’s way, Jesus cleanses us from our failings, our sin, our darkness, our shame.

This is the powerful truth of Jesus Christ! You and I really can live honestly, truthfully, in freedom and openness. And, like my friend, the feeling of freedom that brings is beyond compare!

Verse 8 [READ]

I don’t want to get into arguments today about whether it’s possible to live so much in obedience to Jesus that we don’t ever sin again. With God, all things are possible.

But I know that this verse was written to Christians, not to people who didn’t know Jesus. I know this is God’s word to us, as his followers. And I know that in my life, and in the lives of many faithful people I know, we still struggle with sin, even after years of following God.

Here’s truth I think we can all agree upon, truth found in 1 John. God intends us to live lives of integrity, wholeness, and truth. God gives the power to live differently. And when we fail, Jesus Christ brings forgiveness.

What do we do when we fail?

That’s what really matters to me. What hope do we have, and how can we get out of our self-defeating ruts that keep us going down the same failing paths?

This is where confession comes in. Verse 9 [READ]

I have a standard joke I pull out every once in awhile in worship planning. When we talk about what we can do to have everyone participate on a particular Sunday, I suggest we ought to turn to our neighbor and tell them our deepest, darkest, most shameful secret!

Admit it: you’re just like me. You hate confessing. You hate admitting you’re wrong, you’ve failed, you’ve not done what you wanted or should have done. You hate the fear of condemnation from others if they really knew what you had done, what you’ve thought about doing. The last thing you want to do is be vulnerable to someone else about what you’ve done wrong.

Confession is so very difficult for us.

It goes against everything in us. We rarely get rewarded for being honest and vulnerable and admitting our wrongs. But we DO often move ahead in life by cultivating our image, hiding our failings, putting on a good face.

Everybody hates a hypocrite, but if you find a person who hasn’t been a hypocrite, I’ll be in shock. We come to church, and people look so happy and so nice and clean and so GOOD that we think we can’t be ourselves. Nobody could possibly be wrestling with the things I’m wrestling with.

So we hide. We fake it. We learn the right answers and the right words and the right smile. Even the church teaches us by example to do the very opposite of what God wants us to do. We’re not taught to confess, to admit, to be honest and live in the light; we’re taught by example and by subtle social clues to lie and look ok.

And it is killing us. It’s putting us in prison. It’s keeping us from the freedom of confession.

Can we grapple with the hard but needed truth of verse 9?

If we confess our sins to God, he’ll forgive them. To confess means to admit, to regret what’s been done and own up to it and to honestly want to live differently. It’s different from a generic belief that everybody makes mistakes, everybody fails, everybody sins.

It’s taking specific actions in our lives, and admitting to ourselves and to God that we KNOW that action was wrong. It wasn’t what God wanted or intended. It hurt me, and it probably hurt others. And we are sorry we did it, we wish we hadn’t done it, we don’t want to do it, and God, would you please forgive me for it?

I think we actually have a hard time doing that with God. In part, it’s because with other people we are constantly playing the hiding and fake ‘em out game. We’re trying to impress and be somebody we’re not.

With people, even if we’re caught doing something, we explain, we justify, we rationalize, we soften our actions, we compare it to somebody else who is MUCH worse.

Verse 9 is really hard for us, because we need to learn a completely different pattern. God, I KNOW what I did was wrong. It hurt me, and it hurt others, and I’m sorry I did it. I don’t want to do that again. Will you forgive me?

Can we find the courage to break the patterns we’ve been taught, and learn to confess to God?

Because here’s the clincher. Here’s the power. Here’s the unbelievably good news. God isn’t like other people. We don’t get “in” with God by faking. When we come clean and confess to God, he IS faithful and he IS just and he WILL forgive our sins, AND cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

There is nothing more powerful in all the bible. Nothing! And I’m not talking about a one time occurrence that happens when we first decide to follow Jesus. NO! I’m talking about confession and the power of forgiveness as a way of life.

Listen, right now, those of you who are in the group that never can quite accept God’s forgiveness. God isn’t like every other human being you’ve met.

God’s love for us isn’t conditional. God doesn’t hold grudges. God doesn’t expect you to pull yourself up by your bootstraps and solve your problems yourself

NO! This verse is the heart of freedom in Jesus Christ.

We can and must come clean. Not just once, but as a lifestyle! We must be honest with ourselves and God and admit, confess, and turn away from the things we are ashamed of.

And this is the character of our good, faithful, just God of light: He forgives!

Why? Because Jesus is God himself, the one who was from the beginning. He came and lived and died on earth, and he rose from death to live again. That sacrifice made a difference. It did something to break the power of sin in the world. God’s offering of himself, of his son, makes us right with God.

We don’t have to earn it. We don’t have to deserve it. We just get it. It’s for us, and for the whole world, the freedom of forgiveness. God’s forgiveness doesn’t always take away the consequences of our actions. It doesn’t mean that the hurts we’ve caused others just go away.

But it means we are freed from shame, from thinking we aren’t valuable, from thinking and feeling like we aren’t worth anything. Forgiveness gives the freedom and the power to be someone…to be a child of God.

Do you want that freedom today?

Some of you have never, ever felt it, and you’re longing for it. Some knew it once, but now there’s a secret no one else knows that has been binding you, owning you, killing you on the inside, even as everyone else sees your smile and hears the “right” words from your mouth.

It’s time, today, to live in freedom. What do you need to confess to God today? What specific actions…not just a generic “I’m sorry,” not just a blanket “I fail sometimes”…what specific actions are you hiding? What’s keeping you in the darkness of shame, of rebellion, of guilt?

In a time of quiet, I want to invite us to face our most difficult failures, our shame, the sins in our lives. Admit them. Tell God today that you are sorry, that you wish they weren’t there, that you want to be freed from them in the past and in the future.

Cling to the powerful truth of 1 John 1:8: If we confess our sins, he IS faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Move into freedom now, today! (Time for private confession)

 

Two weeks ago, I was in church at Boise Friends.

Gil George, one of the pastors there, had us write down something we wanted forgiveness for, and we physically went up and nailed them to a big cross.

Then, Gil did something amazing: he spoke forgiveness to us. Those of us who aren’t Catholic aren’t used to that. We don’t often hear someone speak absolution, or forgiveness, to us.

When Gil did that, it literally sent chills up my spine. I was deeply moved by the power of hearing the truth from scripture that I am forgiven by God for the things I’ve confessed!

I want to speak that gift to you this morning.

Those awful, shameful things you thought of in the silence…those things you confessed to God, that you asked forgiveness for…

By the power of God and because of what Jesus Christ has done, I say to you that you are forgiven. You are free. Those things haunt you and bind you no more.

“Jesus Christ is faithful and just, and he forgives our sins. AND…he cleanses us from all unrighteousness.”

May we go NOW in the power of the light of God. May we live differently this week, in the power of truth and light. May we continue to know and experience the power of confession and forgiveness.

We are his children! May we have true, open, vulnerable relationships with each other because of what Jesus has done in us!