Confession

By Alex Florez

Scripture Reading: Ezra 9:4-9, Psalm 32:1-5, Proverbs 28:13, Colossians 3:12-17, James 5:16, 1 Peter 2:9, 1 John 1:5-10

I’m not a dog guy, but I’ve heard about a disciplinary strategy for when a dog uses the living room carpet as a bathroom. The technique involves rubbing its face in the muck in order to make the pup associate the rebuke with the actual infraction. I imagine a person on their hands and knees holding Fido’s face up to the incriminating evidence, gritting their teeth, and berating the poor beast: “Look what you’ve done! Bad boy! Bad, bad boy!” This seems pretty mean, but I get the logic: You push the pup’s nose within an inch of the puddle it made so that some version of doggie shame will strike so deeply that it’ll never make the same mistake again.

Does this actually work on dogs? This shame-based discipline has the opposite effect on me. When I wallow in my mistakes, or when others hold my nose (so to speak) to the mess I’ve made, I feel guilt for what I’ve done and shame for who I am. I internalize the idea that my error is emblematic of my core filthiness. I convict myself of being the human equivalent of a badly misplaced pile of excrement.

When we see ourselves as base, unforgivable creatures, our subsequent choices reflect the verdict and perpetuate the behavior. And if we ostracize ourselves because of our shame, we find new and creative ways to defile the living room carpet, as it were, landing us in an even deeper pile of our own making.

We need a better tool than shame and better recourse than isolation to deal with sin.

The Lord gives us confession as a means of acknowledging our sin and pursuing restoration with Jesus, and He gives us a community of believers with whom we can share the holy journey from conviction to confession, from repentance to redemption.

If sitting and festering in our own filth is a losing strategy for a healthy life; sitting in it alone is a near guarantee of inevitable spiritual death.

These passages in Ezra, Colossians, and 1 John demonstrate the corporate nature of confession and the power of the body of Christ when it comes to stepping out of darkness into light, out of filth and into fitness for His holy presence. The liberating nature of confession and the healing properties that come with God’s forgiveness are powerfully articulated by the apostle James: “Confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, so that you may be healed” (James 5:16).

God isn’t interested in rubbing our faces in our own filth. Yes, He wants us to acknowledge our sin but not to shame us. Confession is simply an essential element of repentance, and repentance conditions us to receive His forgiveness. As such, confession is no longer a scary part of being castigated by our master; it is a necessary rhythm for messy children who need the tireless mercy of their Father.

And, oh, “how joyful is the one…whose sin is covered!” (Psalm 32:1).

Written by Alex Florez