True Confessions

“True Confessions”

I John 1:5-10

1 John 1:8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

If you are a Christian you are the target of my message this morning. I wanted to tell you up front so that everyone could get into the context of what I’m about to say. I’ve been observing Christians for over 40 years now and hopefully during that time I’ve learned a little about how God’s people need to live in today’s world. One thing that stands out is that there are many who are saved who don’t seem to be very happy; that is they don’t manifest joy in their lives. You can tell that they are not enjoying their Christian experience because they seem miserable. I believe that there is a reason for this and the reason is that they have unconfessed sin in their lives and no Christian will ever be happy if that is the case. King David is a wonderful example of this truth. In Psalms 51:12 he prayed: “Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy free spirit.” Thankfully the Lord has provided a remedy for this in His Word and that’s what I’m speaking to you about today.

Ill- How many of you are old enough to remember a magazine called? True Confessions is a confession magazine targeted at young women readers. It was originally published by Fawcett Publications, beginning in 1922. With a cover price of 25 cents, the front cover of the October, 1922, issue heralded, "Our Thousand Dollar Prize Winner—'All Hell Broke Loose'." During the 1920s, Jack Smalley was the editor, and early issues in the run sometimes featured cover illustrations by Norman Saunders. Directed at a female readership between the ages of 20 and 35, the magazine climbed to a circulation of two million during the 1930s, carrying such articles as "The Romantic Story of Jack Dempsey's Cinderella Bride." True Confessions was in competition with rival publishers of Real Confessions, and Crime Confessions). What do these magazines have in common? They all deal with confessions or the exposure of the truth. People are by nature very interested in knowing what happened and when and where and how. Some times this desire to know becomes an obsession. God is interested in confession too. I’m not taking about going into a little booth in a church and telling a priest what you feel guilty about. He wants the truth from us so that He can forgive us and renew a right standing within us. Our text tells us that sin is possible in the life of a believer and the remedy that God has provided.

I. Forgiveness is possible when we confess to God

a. The fact that we sin

1 John 1:8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

b. The “fessing up” to sin

To confess means to agree to a thing and confessing our sins means that we agree with God about what we have done! King David finally came to a place of confession after his awful sins with Bathsheba and in Psalm 32 we read:

Psalm 32:5 I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the LORD; and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. Selah.

Paul speaks of dealing with sin in Hebrews:

Hebrews 12:1 Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,

c. The forsaking of sin

ILL - Several years ago, I read Patrick Morley’s book “Walking with Christ in the Details of Life.” It is a book of meditations that includes one called “Revival: The Gospel of Addition.” In it, he said the following, “The American gospel has evolved into a gospel of addition without subtraction. It is the belief that we can add Christ to our lives, but not subtract sin. It is a change in belief without a change in behavior… A changed life is one that has added Christ and subtracted sin.

The Scriptures make it plain that we cannot “walk in the light, as he is in the light…” unless there is a forsaking of sin. When we were children we probably were sorry when we got caught doing something, with our “hand in the cookie jar” but when we are really ready to deal with our sin there will be a desire to “forsake it” and “…go and sin not more!”