Integrity Is Confession Of Sin Series

Sermon Brief

Date Written: September 21, 2006

Date Preached: September 24, 2006

Where Preached: OZHBC (AM)

Sermon Details:

Sermon Series: Living a Life of Integrity

Sermon Title: Integrity is being willing to confess your sin!

Sermon Text: Daniel 9:5-6

5…we have sinned, committed iniquity, acted wickedly and rebelled, even turning aside from Your commandments and ordinances. 6 "Moreover, we have not listened to Your servants the prophets, who spoke in Your name to our kings, our princes, our fathers and all the people of the land.” Dan 9:5-6 (NASB)

Introduction:

Last week I spoke to you about humility before God was a must in the life of the believer. I told you how pride and arrogance were incompatible for the believer to walk in Christ!

Well the message today is basically a continuation of that message, but yet it can stand on its own as well. This morning I want to share with you about confession of sin!

There is NO greater roadblock in the Christian’s life than pride and arrogance; it is because pride and arrogance prevent us from seeing what God sees… it prevents us from looking at ourselves honestly and truthfully.

When we are prideful and arrogant we refuse to believe that we are doing things that are NOT of God and we overlook what we call mistakes or downfalls… but God cannot and will not overlook them… He calls them SIN!

Sin is what separates us from a holy and just God. It was because of sin that Adam and Eve were driven from paradise and humanity fell from the physical presence of God.

We are without hope because this sin creates a wide chasm that we cannot cross. We are on the sinful side of this chasm and God is on the other side, we do not have the wisdom, ability or knowledge to reach Him. And because of this sinful state we are in, we are FOREVER doomed to torment, pain and hell…

But the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is that there is a way to be delivered from our sinful state. The Bible shares with us in John 3:16-17, “… For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him…”John 3:16-17 (NASB)

In other words, Jesus came to this world to offer humanity deliverance from sin and salvation for the soul. Jesus came to open a doorway so that we could escape hell’s torment!

Now, I know that there are many people who look at John 3:16 and totally misunderstand what Jesus is saying in this passage. They think that Jesus is saying that if we simply believe in Him that we will be saved, but that is NOT what Jesus is saying…

When we look at the context of what Jesus was saying to the Pharisee, Nicodemus, here in this passage we see that Jesus is really telling him that a basic knowledge of Him or a basic belief is NOT enough! You see Nicodemus had even said to Jesus, you are a great teacher and the things you do let us know that you are from God. So Nicodemus had a basic belief in Jesus, but what Jesus was saying is that Nicodemus had to submit and surrender by placing his faith and trust TOTALLY in God’s hands…in the person of Jesus Christ!

The point I am trying to make here is that the forgiveness of God and the salvation offered by Jesus… they do NOT come through an easy ‘believism’ in Christ. In other words, it is NOT enough to have a head knowledge about Jesus. But we must place our full faith and trust in Jesus.

But how do we do this… how can we come to God and surrender to Him? How can we place ALL of who we are in faith and trust in the hands of God?

I believe that our passage of Scripture this morning represents a great illustration of one surrendering to God and one placing ALL of what they believe in God… We can see that Daniel placed all his trust and faith in God and reserved NONE for his own good works.

Daniel places all his faith and trust in God by first understanding WHO God is and then by understanding who he is. Daniel comes to God with a confession and he seeks God’s forgiveness, mercy and grace. He does this because he knows it is the only way Israel will be restored.

And like Daniel in this passage of Scripture, if we are to live a life of integrity in this world… if we are to be the ‘city set on a hill’ as described by Jesus in Matt 5… we have to learn the importance of CONFESSING our sin!