Sermon Transcript
Occasionally, I’ll hear someone say that church or following Jesus is boring. They say, there’s never anything new. You guys just say the same thing week after week. Sometimes when I show up, you give me juice and a little cookie, and that’s about the most exciting thing that ever happens. All I can tell you is that if you feel that way, you’ve probably missed something.
At a minimum, you’ve missed what we’re talking about today, because what we’re talking about today, if you actually do it, it is terrifying. Now, many of you won’t do it. You’ll think it’s not really necessary for you. You’ll hear this and you’ll think, You know, that sounds okay, but I’m just going to opt out of that, and you will continue to just believe that Christianity is kind of rather bland or boring. And my heart will break for you a little bit because you’ll miss out on the most life-giving thing that I’ve experienced in the Christian faith.
But for the rest of us who obey Scripture and take this step today, we will be scared to death. Which means we will not be bored. So, I can tell you I’ve been actively practicing this for at least the last 15 years, and every time, even after 15 years down this road, it still makes me nervous. So, here’s our objective this morning. I actually want us to say it together so maybe we will remember it.
If you feel comfortable saying something at the same time as as other people do. I’d really appreciate it just saying this together. So repeat after me. It’s only going to be one word to start with, but repeat after me. Confess.
That was awesome. Your mess. All right, there we go. Let’s do it again. Confess your mess.
Confess your mess. Oh, that was good. Bonus. That’s what we’re talking about this morning. Our scripture is 1 John 1:8-10.
Which we have already read, but repetition is the key to memory. So let’s say— let’s read this. I’ll just read it. You can listen. Verse 8, if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His Word is not in us. So, as we look at this today, we will see the brutal truth about us, what we should do about it, and what God promises. The brutal truth about us, what we should do about it, and what God promises. So, first, the brutal truth about us.
We have sin.
We love evil. We walk in depravity and rebellion. That’s us. If we’re talking about confess your mess, that presupposes, of course, that we have a mess to confess. And some of us may be able to admit that we have a mess, and some of us may not be able to admit that we have a mess.
If we have kids, it’s easy to see they have issues, it’s obvious, we see their rebellion. If we’re married, it’s really easy to see our spouse has sin and selfishness. But to look in the mirror and say, I’m messed up, I have sinned. There is something wrong with me. That is really difficult for some of us to do.
We can look at others pretty objectively, but oftentimes we have a tendency to look at ourselves and justify ourselves, excuse ourselves, think of ourselves higher than we really are. This is one of my small frustrations with church. Actually, not our church specifically, although it applies to our church as well, but I’m really just talking about church in general, Christianity at large. Small frustration. There is this glaring contradiction between what we say we believe and what we say to each other.
So, someone at church asks us, how are you doing? That probably happened this morning. I bet you either asked that to someone or someone asked that to you. Someone said, How are you doing? And I’m guessing that no one in this room answered, whether you ask it or somebody asks it to you, I’m guessing no one in this room answered that question by saying, I’m a sinful mess and I need help.
Anybody say that this morning when somebody asks you, how are you doing? Anybody ever say that when somebody asks you? How you doing? You know, like, how you doing today, Bob? Oh, you don’t want to know.
My heart is so wicked. If you saw what was in there, you would flee in terror. Nobody says that.
But isn’t that our theology?
Isn’t that basically the foundational tenet of Christianity? We’re so sinful. We’re so messed up, the only way we could ever possibly be redeemed is through the crucifixion of God the Son. That’s what we say we believe.
And then we come to church and somebody asks us, how are you doing? I’m good. I’m doing well, if we want to have correct grammar. Okay, okay week for me overall. No real issues here, or none that I’m going to tell you about.
Well, which one is it? Right? Am I a wretch that needs rescue and redemption or am I doing all right?
I don’t think that it can be both. And I totally understand that’s not really what people are asking when they ask us that and we don’t need to get into some kind of theological discourse when we’re at Safeway and the bag boy is like, how’s your day going? Okay. I get it, I’m not saying we should do that. But one reason I point this out, and it bothers me to some extent, even though I do the same thing, okay, you ask me how I’m doing, I’m like, I’m great.
One reason I think maybe we should rethink our answer to that question is just last week someone told me, I’m still pretty messed up, but I’m doing okay. I’m just going to go ahead and go to church anyway.
I’m still pretty messed up, but I, you know, I think it’s okay if I go to church anyway. Now, what does that imply?
It implies at least some people think, maybe a lot of people, I don’t know, maybe this is the general impression of church, but at least some people think you need to get yourself put together before you come to church. Which is false. And none of us, I don’t think any of us would say that to anyone. Nobody would say, you have to get yourself put together before you come to church. None of us would say that, but people think that.
So, why? Why would they think that church people are doing great and to fit in with church people they would need to be doing great too. Why would they have that impression? Maybe because when they’re at church and they ask people, how are you? Me included, everyone, okay, everyone replies to that and everyone lies and says, I’m pretty good.
Maybe they have the impression that everybody in church is doing pretty good because we all lie. And say we’re doing pretty good. Maybe they have that impression because we’ve given them that impression. But let me just let you in on a little secret.
No one is pretty good.
No one. Everyone is hanging on by a thread of grace. Everyone is, I don’t know, at most 2 decisions away from complete oblivion. That’s how we’re doing. So, how did I respond when that person said, you know, I’m still a little messed up, but I’m going to go ahead and go to church anyway?
I said, I come to church because I’m messed up. That’s why I’m here. Well, what do I mean by that? I mean, I come to hear about a God who loved me so much He was willing to die that I would be forgiven. I come to worship the one who sees me to the bottom and yet loves me to the sky.
I don’t come here because I’m doing all right. I come here because I’m not. I go to a hospital because I’m sick, not because I’m doing fine. I go to a restaurant because I’m hungry, not because I’m full. And I come to church because I’m a mess.
Not because I am all put together.
Someone else asked me recently, this was a different person, but he asked me, Dan, as a pastor, so if we don’t know each other, I am Dan. I am one of the pastors on staff here. Nice to meet you. But he was like, Dan, as a pastor, do you still struggle with sin?
Yes, of course. Right? All the time. In fact, don’t miss this, right? If I said I didn’t struggle with sin, I would deceive myself and the truth would not be in me, verse 8.
If I said I didn’t struggle with sin, I would make God a liar and His Word would not be in me, verse 10. Yes, Of course, I still struggle with sin. Beth, that’s my wife, and our boys, our sons, I mean, my sons are only 3 and 6 years old, but they wouldn’t hesitate to tell you there’s a lot wrong with me.
Right? Daddy has to say, I’m sorry, a lot. They even tell me sometimes, Daddy, you need to say, I’m sorry. So my family gets it. Beth and our boys see that.
They know that about me. And now you know that about me. You’re like, I knew that already, Pastor. Okay, awesome. I receive that.
That’s totally fine.
So I’ve put my cards on the table.
The question is, can you admit that about yourself?
That is what these verses are bringing to the surface. We have sin in us.
I had a student one time, a college student, tell me that he had calculated how for him it didn’t matter which religion was true. He said, whatever religion ends up being the right one, I will be okay, because, this was his reasoning, he noticed accurately that every religion other than Christianity was basically about being a good person, being an ethical person, being a moral person, and that Christianity, in a different way, was basically about believing in Jesus, he thought. So, he thought if Christianity ends up being true, he’ll be okay because he believed in Jesus, and if any other religion ends up being true, he’ll still be okay because he thought he was a pretty good person. So, he’s safe either way, he thought. Now, that’s a pretty sharp observation.
It’s true. Other religions are basically about, and you’ve probably heard me say this too often, but other religions are basically about being good enough, right enough, long enough, and then you will get your treat. Now, they have different opinions. I say this too, probably too often. They have different opinions on how to be good enough, right enough, long enough, and they have different opinions on what the treat is that you will earn at the end of the road after you have been good enough, right enough, long enough, but that’s the general synopsis of all of them.
Be good, get your treat. Christianity, however, unlike the rest, is about Jesus rescuing you. So, you might think that you can have both, except for the fact that if you look at yourself and conclude, I have been good enough, right enough, long enough. I have accomplished it. I have made it.
I will earn my treat. If you think that, then you have deceived yourself. You have made God a liar, and the truth is not in you.
The only reason we would want Jesus to rescue us is precisely because we have not been, we have not been good enough, right enough, long enough. We have failed at ethics and morality and need a Savior. This is why I say, which some, if not all of you, have heard me say before, if any other religion is the right one, I am doomed.
If Hinduism is right and reincarnation is real, I am coming back as a rat, maybe a mosquito.
That’s about as high as I can aim. If Islam is right and I need to comply with the 5 Pillars, I am going to hell. I have failed at the 5 Pillars. If Buddhism is right and there really is an Eightfold Path to enlightenment, I will be unenlightened forever. I have not measured up to any of those standards.
I fall short in all of them. If any of those are the metric that I need to meet in order to get my treat, I won’t get my treat. That’s what it means to say, I have sinned. It means I have not measured up. It means I have fallen short of the needed standard.
I have not been good enough, right enough, long enough. I will not be safe. If any religion other than Christianity is the true one.
There is no way to simultaneously say, I need Jesus to rescue me, and at the same time say, I am good enough to measure up to the standards of other religions. If you are good enough to measure up to those standards, then you don’t need rescue. And you’ve never faced your sin.
You haven’t even admitted that you have a problem. So, why would you need a Savior?
I know, okay, I’m a parent, right? So, I get this. I know we all want to believe that we’re all good little boys and girls, and we want our kids to believe that. We want our kids to have a positive self-image believing they are all good little boys and girls. We want that for them.
I want that for my kids too. Here’s the problem with that. What are we going to do, what are they going to do with all the evidence to the contrary?
What are we going to do with our closet that’s packed full of skeletons? What do we do with that? The narrative that says we’re all good little boys and girls does not give us a complete enough picture of our lives.
Because there’s some stuff in our past, there’s probably some stuff in our present, there’s some stuff yet to come that just can’t fit in with the story that says that we’re good. It contradicts that story, which means we need a more comprehensive narrative than just, we’re all good little boys and girls. We owe our children a more comprehensive narrative, one that will actually account for the closet full of skeletons that they will eventually have. And spoiler alert to the end of this message, Christianity provides that better narrative. It doesn’t deny our sin by claiming, oh, we’re all just good little boys and girls.
It addresses reality, we have a mess, but at the same time it still provides us a positive self-image by saying we are a forgiven mess, a loved mess. And what could be a more secure story to live in than that? It accounts for all the undeniable facts of our depravity, but it also redeems us from them. Oh, it sounds pretty good. So, spoiler alert over and more of that at the end.
So, we are a mess. What are we to do with that? We have sinned. I mean, we can admit this. You know, we are grown-ups, so we can admit The story that we’re all good little boys and girls can’t really account for everything that’s in our lives.
We have fallen short, we still fall short. What should we do about that?
Confess our sins. Verse 9, confess our sins. The word confess here has a meaning of agree with, be in alignment with, in step with, concur with what has been said. So, when God says that we have sinned, when He points at us and says, you are a sinner, we say, amen, comply, agree, concur, you got me, you’re right, God. So, that’s part of it.
We agree with God. But I don’t want us to walk away today believing we only need to confess our sin in our head to God, just praying silently to ourselves, you are right, God, I am a sinner. I have fallen short. Okay, that is a great start, but if that is all we do, we will miss a big step because confess has an element to it that is spoken to another person. You know, if a criminal says he is going to confess, We don’t expect him to just say something in his heart to God.
If that’s all he did, then he didn’t really confess. If we’re talking about confession, we actually need to speak what we have done to someone else, to another person. If you don’t believe me, you’re like, I don’t think that’s what it means there. I’ll go look that up. If you don’t believe me, just believe James, the brother of Jesus, James 5:16, confess your sins to one another.
Confess them to one another, so not just in your heart. So, we can’t get by with simply, oh, I talked to God about it, so I’m good.
No! Okay, that’s a great start. Again, that’s required, but there is more to it than that.
So, I want to walk us through what is involved in confessing to another person. Whether that’s a trusted friend, a pastor, a therapist, okay, someone. You can pick the person, but I want to talk about the necessary mechanics of confession because I see a lot of people get it wrong.
And when they get it wrong, they don’t get the benefit that they would have gotten if they had done it otherwise. So, what typically happens in Christian circles is that people set up what is usually called accountability partners. Which is a good thing. And if you haven’t been around church long enough to know what accountability partners are, basically you and a friend or you and several friends set regular times to get together and essentially confess your mess and pray for one another. You tell each other what’s happening, all your hopes, fears, failures, successes, and your accountability partner encourages you and prays for you.
And that’s great. We still want to promote that. So, great idea. But here’s what can easily happen in an accountability relationship that limits the benefit of such a relationship. When we get to the confess our sins portion, we can make ourselves sound a whole lot better than we really are.
We can say something like, I slipped up, I acted out, I wasn’t my best this week. No details provided. The whole week, maybe the whole month summarized in just 3 to 6 words. That’s not confessing our sin. And if that’s all you ever tell someone else, you will never be free from that sin because whatever remains in the dark will grow.
You’ll never be free from it. You’ll never break the cycle of sin if you only say, I slipped up. If you’re in an accountability relationship, that’s great, continue. If you’re not in one, get in one. But in that relationship, you have got to confess the details of your life, not the 50,000-foot view of your life.
So, I’ll give you an example. There is an old Carrie Underwood song. Does anybody listen to or remember Carrie Underwood? Okay, great. Maybe you can help me sing it.
It is an old song, and by old I mean 2008, so that is what passes for old now. It is called Last Name. Do you remember this? So, the song describes— I have no idea if this happened or not, it is just a song, right? We understand this.
But the song describes a shameful evening that she had. So the song goes, and remember my singing voice is exactly the same as my speaking voice, so I’m actually auditioning for Nate right now, just wish me luck, okay. The words are, last night I got served a little bit too much of that poison, baby.
Last night I did things I’m not proud of, and I got a little crazy. Last night, I met a guy on the dance floor and let him call me baby, and I don’t even know his last name. My mama would be so ashamed. It started off, hey cutie, where are you from? And it turned into, oh no.
What have I done? And I don’t even know his last name. Anyone remember that song now that you heard the tune to it? You got it?
That’s kind of like a confession. It gives us more details than just, I slipped up this week. We at least know what she did. She drank too much, she met a guy, she went home with him. Her mama, at least, would be ashamed.
But I don’t think that’s the whole story. I still think there’s some editing and spin to make herself look better. How did she start off? I got served too much of that poison, baby. Really?
Is that how it happened? You were passive in how much you had to drink? It happened to you instead of you choosing to do it? Is that how dance clubs work? That’s a semi-honest question.
I’m sure this will surprise you, but I don’t frequent a whole lot of dance clubs because I can dance just about as well as I can sing, so If I want to impress someone, we should probably just steer clear of dancing, avoid that as long as we can. But my experience, as far as it goes, is that you order the amount of alcohol you want and it is up to you how much you drink. So, maybe a more accurate song would be, I drank just enough on purpose so I could blame my actions on the alcohol when I woke up in the morning. Maybe that’s a fuller story. And maybe it doesn’t stop there.
Maybe a true confession would say, I chose my clothing or lack of clothing on purpose to make sure I’d get noticed. And maybe instead of glossing over the details by saying, I met a guy, on the dance floor. Maybe it was I went to that particular bar because I knew there would be guys like that there, and when I saw one, I went up to him and I made sure we started to chat. And he actually started to walk away at one point, but I pursued him with a particular outcome in my mind. After I pursued him, I made sure the conversation went in a certain direction, and I made sure he knew what I wanted.
I even called the Uber when we decided to leave, not that Uber existed in 2008. No spin, no modifying, no leaving anything out. Confess the actual mess, not the sanitized G-rated Disney version of the mess. We confess the details. Why?
Because the details are sin too. All the premeditation, all the intentionality, all the purposeful planning, that is all sin. And if we don’t confess that, we haven’t actually confessed our sin. We haven’t done verse 9 yet. If we don’t do that.
We have only skimmed the surface of something. We have left a whole lot unconfessed.
And whatever is unconfessed will continue to grow. Like if you have a dark room and you open the door just a crack and a tiny beam of light streams in, but there is still a whole lot of darkness in that room. Still a lot of places to hide. And only when you fling the door wide open and light goes everywhere is the darkness gone.
Have you ever confessed like that?
Do you even have somebody in your life that you could confess to like that? Have you told anyone the whole story?
Listen, you don’t have to tell the entire world all the details. You don’t need to put a book on Twitter saying everything you’ve ever done, but you have to tell someone.
You really have to reach in clear to the bottom, clear to the bottom, to the very bottom, and bring everything to the light.
Like I said, this has been my practice for at least the last 15 years. I have people, that means plural, who know everything, everything I have done, even everything I have thought about doing.
You couldn’t surprise them with any information you have on me. They already know it.
Anytime I feel afraid or inadequate or I think I’m a failure, when I’m angry, I tell them about that too. You’re like, is that sin? Feeling like a failure, being angry, is that sin? Probably sometimes, but even if it’s not, here’s what I’ve noticed, okay, it’s just my observation after years of pursuing this path. If I feel inadequate, which happens, and I don’t talk about it, it will lead to something worse.
You’ve got to evaluate yourself here. Like, if there’s a behavior that you know is sin, you don’t like it about yourself, but you do it sometimes, you’ve got to think about, well, what was the thought that led to that behavior? What was the emotion that led to that thought? What was the event that led to that emotion? Like, how far back in the chain can you track it?
And you want to talk about all this stuff that’s in your heart when it’s still way upstream in the sequence before it ever trickles its way all the way down here downstream. This is what I’ve learned. That’s why I talk about it when it’s way up here, when I’m anxious.
Scared, inadequate. Like, let’s deal with it up here so I don’t have to deal with it when it’s all the way down here.
Now, obviously, we’re uncomfortable telling anyone everything. It’s terrifying to feel exposed. We want to run from the light just like cockroaches. That’s us, right? Just run from the light.
We think the light will somehow hurt us. We think if we confess, then we will be rejected.
If we confess, then my reputation will be ruined. If we confess, then they will think badly of me. That’s what we think. That’s why we don’t do it. And that’s why we need our 3rd point, what God promises.
If we confess, He will forgive and purify us from all unrighteousness. God’s Word says, verse 9, if we confess, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. We think confession will ruin us. God says confession will save us. We think we will be rejected if we confess.
God says we will be purified. We think confession will cost us, but God says it will cost Him.
That is what forgiven means. It means you don’t have to pay the debt that you owe. God forgives us. We don’t pay the debt we owe because Jesus paid the debt that we owe. On the cross, Jesus paid for our sins, so we don’t carry the shame of our actions, the shame of our thoughts, the shame of our desires, because Jesus carried that shame for us.
Listen, this is why I love confession, the out loud to another person kind of confession, and I hate it at the same time. It is terrifying. But but it rips away any illusion I have of my own holiness.
If I only talk to God about my sin, it’s fairly easy for me to lose sight of the fact that my righteousness, my goodness, my purity come from Christ alone, that I don’t generate any of that. But the second I speak to another person what is in my heart, what is in my life, The brutal truth about me is undeniable. I am a sinner. I have no righteousness of my own. I no longer feel righteous or pure when I confess.
I am emptied of any of my self-sufficiency. I understand, I have crystal clarity in that moment that there is no hope of self-righteousness, of self-goodness. And then because of that, this is the great part, I embrace Jesus all over again. He reminds me, Dan, I know you don’t have any righteousness. That is why I am giving you mine.
I know you don’t have any purity. So, here, take mine. That is what the cross was about.
I get Jesus’ righteousness. He takes my shame.
Confession shows me the depth of my depravity, but then through confession, God reminds me, Dan, you are forgiven and you are purified from all unrighteousness. In confession, I am exposed all the way to the bottom. But I am loved all the way to the sky.
Nothing is hidden, and yet I am still loved.
And that is the best story to believe about yourself, the most comprehensive, the most encouraging, even the most life-giving story to believe about yourself. It is way better. It is so way better. And way more helpful than simply, we’re all just good little boys and girls.
That’s a pathetic story. It’s weak compared to the richness of, my mess is known, and yet I’m loved, I’m forgiven, I’m accepted.
If you don’t know Christ, and his forgiveness in that way. We invite you to receive it this morning. However big your mess is, Jesus sacrificed enough on the cross that your entire debt is paid. You owe nothing anymore.
You can pray to him and say, God, I have sinned. But I believe that Jesus loves me and that Jesus paid for my sin on the cross. I receive his gift of paying the debt that I owe, and I pledge to follow him my entire life.
For any of us, if you don’t have a person in your life you trust to hear your confession, any of our pastors, me included, would love to chat with you, whether that’s today, whether that’s right now, whether that’s someday in the future, okay? We’re available. We love you. We want you to walk in the freedom and forgiveness that Christ offers.
Let’s pray together.
Father, it’s amazing that You would see us, that You would see all of us, that You would see our entire life, our past, even our future, Lord, and yet You still love us. That is amazing that we can be exposed and accepted simultaneously. Thank You for the forgiveness that is available in Christ. Thank you that he paid the debt that we owe, Lord. We pray that anyone who has never received that, we pray that they would this morning.
And for all of us, Lord, whether we’ve ever received it before or not, Lord, let us know and feel and experience that you love us like that.
That You paid for our mess like that. We pray those things in Jesus’ name. Amen.
