Recalibrating to Confession

Introduction

If I say the word confession, some may wonder, “Is that really something I need to be concerned with as an evangelical?”

Isn’t that for Roman Catholics, talking to a priest through a screen in a booth?

Isn’t that for Anglicans as they sit with the Book of Common Prayer open?

Is this really something that a Baptist does?

It also could feel foreign to us because we live in a culture that has no shame for sin, thus confession is not in the vocabulary.

And as people who live in the culture, we are not exempt from that impacting our mindset.

And yet, when we read the Bible, the confession of sin is everywhere.

From David’s heartfelt prayer in Psalm 51 after committing adultery and executing a murder plot filled with lies...

To Isaiah’s heart-wrenching cry in the presence of God’s glory in Isaiah 6, where he says, “Woe to me! I am a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips...”

To Paul’s ownership of his identity as the “chief of sinners”

When we grow unacquainted with things the Bible values, we have to recalibrate.

This morning is an opportunity for us to that with confession as we look at the first 19 verses of Daniel 9.

Outline

So that is our big idea this morning:

We must recalibrate ourselves to confession.

And in order to understand why, we will break down the nature of confession in five brief points:

1. Confession is prompted by the Word of God.

2. Confession begins with the identity of God.

3. Confession owns up to our transgression of God.

4. Confession petitions based upon the mercy of God.

5. Confession is primarily concerned with the glory of God.

Context

Before we read our text—a reminder of where are.

We are studying Daniel 7-12—the apocalyptic visions of Daniel the Prophet.

In chapters 7 and 8, Daniel was seeing what would take place in the Ancient Near East, leading up to the time of Christ.

The Babylonian Empire was allowed by God to take the people of Judah into Exile for a generation in order for Judah to be disciplined for their sin and idolatry.

But Babylon would not last forever.

Chapter 7 showed us Babylon would give way to Persia.

Persia would give way to Greece.

And Greece would give way to the Romans Empire.

This was all foretold in a dream that Daniel has about four beasts.

Chapter 8 followed up with a vision about Persia and Greece and the way that a persecutor of God’s people would rise up out of the Greek Empire.

Both of these visions took place in the time of Belshazzar ruling as a vice-regent in Babylon—so somewhere between Daniel 4 and Daniel 5.

This morning, we move forward.

Daniel is reading Scripture in the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus.

Daniel is an older man now, living under a new authority—the beast that is known as Persia.

Text—these are the very words of God

Daniel 9:1–19 ESV

In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus, by descent a Mede, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans— in the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that, according to the word of the Lord to Jeremiah the prophet, must pass before the end of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely, seventy years. Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. I prayed to the Lord my God and made confession, saying, “O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, we have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules. We have not listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land. To you, O Lord, belongs righteousness, but to us open shame, as at this day, to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all Israel, those who are near and those who are far away, in all the lands to which you have driven them, because of the treachery that they have committed against you. To us, O Lord, belongs open shame, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against you. To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against him and have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God by walking in his laws, which he set before us by his servants the prophets. All Israel has transgressed your law and turned aside, refusing to obey your voice. And the curse and oath that are written in the Law of Moses the servant of God have been poured out upon us, because we have sinned against him. He has confirmed his words, which he spoke against us and against our rulers who ruled us, by bringing upon us a great calamity. For under the whole heaven there has not been done anything like what has been done against Jerusalem. As it is written in the Law of Moses, all this calamity has come upon us; yet we have not entreated the favor of the Lord our God, turning from our iniquities and gaining insight by your truth. Therefore the Lord has kept ready the calamity and has brought it upon us, for the Lord our God is righteous in all the works that he has done, and we have not obeyed his voice. And now, O Lord our God, who brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand, and have made a name for yourself, as at this day, we have sinned, we have done wickedly. “O Lord, according to all your righteous acts, let your anger and your wrath turn away from your city Jerusalem, your holy hill, because for our sins, and for the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and your people have become a byword among all who are around us. Now therefore, O our God, listen to the prayer of your servant and to his pleas for mercy, and for your own sake, O Lord, make your face to shine upon your sanctuary, which is desolate. O my God, incline your ear and hear. Open your eyes and see our desolations, and the city that is called by your name. For we do not present our pleas before you because of our righteousness, but because of your great mercy. O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive. O Lord, pay attention and act. Delay not, for your own sake, O my God, because your city and your people are called by your name.”

In the First Year of Darius (v. 1-2)

Before we get to our points, let me elaborate just a bit more on when Daniel 9 is taking place.

We get a couple of historical markers from the prophet.

First year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus: As we covered in our study of Daniel 6, this is probably Cyrus the Great, with “Darius,” operating as a title for him which means, “Great One.”

He was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans: Made king by who?

God, of course.

We have certainly come to learn throughout Daniel that God sets up and removes kings

In the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years: This would be 539 BC, when Persia toppled Babylon, after the overthrow of Nabonidus and Belshazzar

Daniel is probably in his late seventies or early eighties at this point.

So fully understanding where we are at in ancient history, we are now ready to start parsing through this text.

1. Confession is prompted by the Word of God.

In the Text

In the first year of Darius, Daniel is studying the Scriptures.

When he refers to the “books” in v. 2, he must be talking about the Old Testament writings completed at the time, because he finds the words of Jeremiah there.

In particular, he is studying Jeremiah’s words regarding how long God’s people would remain in Exile and Jerusalem would remain desolated.

He sees it is seventy years, which must be referring to Jeremiah 25:11-12

Jeremiah 25:11–12 ESV

This whole land shall become a ruin and a waste, and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years. Then after seventy years are completed, I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation, the land of the Chaldeans, for their iniquity, declares the Lord, making the land an everlasting waste.

And if he was reading about this promise, he also would have read about the reason the Exile occurred in the first place:

Jeremiah 25:8–9 ESV

“Therefore thus says the Lord of hosts: Because you have not obeyed my words, behold, I will send for all the tribes of the north, declares the Lord, and for Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and I will bring them against this land and its inhabitants, and against all these surrounding nations. I will devote them to destruction, and make them a horror, a hissing, and an everlasting desolation.

These things lead Daniel to turn his face to God (v. 3) and to:

Seek him in prayer

Plea for mercy

And fast with sackcloth an ashes

And his prayer is a prayer focused on our subject matter for today—confession.

Verse 4: “I prayed to the Lord my God and made confession.

And it is God’s Word that brought this action about.

The Word prompted the confession.

Application

If we need to be recalibrated to confession, this is the place we must start.

We must go forward with the Word of God.

Not a podcast

Not a YouTube video

Not a “How to Confess Sin” book

It starts with the Word. It is prompted by the Word.

This is how our relationship with God begins.

We hear the Gospel and we are convicted by the Word.

We confess our sins to God and then turn from them and trust in His Son who died for our sins and rose again to defeat them.

We do not believe out of thin air—God uses the truth of His Word to bring us to repentance and faith.

And this is how our relationship with God continues.

As we are confronted with our sins by the Word of God, we confess them to God and turn from them, intending not to continue in our sin, and we trust in Christ to forgive us.

The way we started is the same way we proceed.

The Christian life is one filled with confession, repentance and faith as a part of our daily routine.

If we are lacking in confession, we are most likely lacking in our exposure to God’s Word.

We probably need more time hearing the voice of God if we are feeling prompted to voice a confession of our sins to Him.

A commitment to the Word and the confession of our failings go hand in hand.

Divine Inspiration

Now, in order for this to make a difference in your life, you must see the Word of God the way Daniel does.

Notice what he says in v. 2:

“According to the word of the Lord to Jeremiah the prophet...”

He is reading Jeremiah but he counts it as the Word of God.

He is perusing Jeremiah’s pen-strokes, but believes it is God’s voice he is hearing as he reads it.

If we view the Word as ultimately being a divinely inspired product of God and not man, we will approach it with an expectation that God will speak.

And we He speaks we will be enlightened and encouraged and comforted—but we will also be convicted, and that conviction will lead us to confession.

Illustration

I’ll illustrate it this way:

You may not believe this, but sometimes I do things that bother my wife.

I am sure she says nothing to a large portion of my annoying habits and idiosyncrasies.

But sometimes, she will let me know if something I have done has really bothered her.

I do not ignore her voice.

I want to hear her so that I can realize what my actions have caused and then I want to make change so that she will not be upset.

These are the basics of relationships, right?

Why would it be any different with God?

We must hear from God if we are going to confess to God?

Confession doesn’t happen in a vacuum, but in response to the Lord’s voice in Scripture.

We need the Bible if we are going to recalibrate.

2. Confession begins with the identity of God.

In the Text

This teaching point and all the rest, will be found in the prayer itself.

Consider all of the ways that Daniel is praying according to the identity of God.

The Lord—Adonai—the Master—is great and awesome (v. 4)

The Lord is righteous (v. 7)

The Lord is righteous in all he has done (v. 14)

The Lord, as the Deliverer of Egypt, has a great name (v. 15)

The Lord is wrathful (v. 16)

The Lord has great mercy (v. 18)

Before we recalibrate to be a confessing people, we have to know who we are praying to.

The Lord is great and awesome in righteousness and wrath.

This tells us He is perfect and He punishes the sin that falls short of His perfect standard.

And yet the Lord is great and awesome in His name as a Deliverer of His people and He is filled with mercy.

This tells us we have hope of being forgiven of our falling short of His perfect standard because is a God who rescues and loves to NOT give people the punishment they deserve.

Basing confession on the character of God is the consistent pattern of confession in the Bible:

Consider David’s words in Psalm 32

As David confesses sin, he acknowledges that

God is a hiding place

He is a Preserver of his servant in trouble

He surrounds His servant with shouts of deliverance:

Psalm 32:7 ESV

You are a hiding place for me; you preserve me from trouble; you surround me with shouts of deliverance. Selah

Or consider Psalm 51:

As David asks for mercy, he asks for it according to the steadfast love of God and abundant mercy of God:

Psalm 51:1 ESV

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions.

Or as I mentioned before—Isaiah 6. Before Isaiah cries out “Woe is me,” and confesses his unclean speech and the unclean speech of the nation, he sees:

the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up

And he hears:

the angels singing out the character of God:

Isaiah 6:3 ESV

And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!”

Illustration

This is important because our confidence in our needs being met is going to be based on the One meeting the needs.

If I am a child and my uncle that I don’t know super well takes me to the circus, and I want a sno-cone, I have no confidence that I will get the sno-cone.

That is because I don’t know if my uncle is a generous, sno-cone buying sort of guy.

But if I am a child and my dad takes me to the circus, and I want a sno-cone, I will be more confident.

The confidence will come from knowing that my father has proven himself to be a generous sno-cone buying man.

I can look back to other trips to the circus and baseball games and state fairs and recount all of his generosity and anticipate more of it, based on what I know of his character.

This is the way Daniel is with God in this text.

He knows who God is and he is praying with a confidence that God will forgive him based on what he knows of God and what God has done in the past.

Application

If the confession of your sin is lacking in your life, it may be a sign that you are out of touch with God’s character and attributes.

A remedy for this is to grow as a meditating theologian.

Now, when I say that, it has nothing to do with oms and a mystical emptying of the mind.

That is what false Eastern religion presents as meditation.

In the Bible, meditation is a filling of the mind with the truth about God.

It is what we see in the Psalm 1 man:

Psalm 1:2 ESV

but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.

We must grow in our study and understanding of God and delight in who He is and meditate upon it.

Surely this will increase our desire to know Him.

To bring our sins to Him.

To confidently ask for forgiveness based on His revealed heart in the Word.

To recalibrate in confession, we need to know who our confession is aimed at.

He has not hidden Himself.

3. Confession owns up to our transgression of God.

In the Text

This is the bulk of what confession is.

It is owning up to your sins and telling them to God.

It is recognizing that you are wrong and God is right and asking Him to forgive you.

Before he even prays, Daniel’s actions show that he recognizes how sinful his people have been.

He doesn’t just turn his face to God, but he does so with fasting and in sackcloth and ashes.

Sackcloth was an uncomfortable, rough material. A lot of time it was made from the hair of goats.

It was neither fashionable or pleasurable to sport.

Ashes were a symbol of mourning. To dust yourself with them demonstrated you were in grief.

Sometimes these things were used for simple mourning, but often they were used to express grief over sin.

Daniel’s commitment to them shows that he is sorrowful and mournful over the sin of the nation.

And to wear them while fasting and praying, demonstrated that he knew the sinful nation needed to seek God’s face.

Now, outward signs of repentance mean nothing without true inward grief over sin. And that inward grief is shown in Daniel words throughout the prayer.

God is great and awesome (v. 4), but the people are not.

They have sinned and done wrong (v. 5, end of v. 8)

They have been rebellious—which he says in a number of ways

Acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from commandments and rules ( v. 5)

Have not listened to God’s Word through the prophets (v. 6)

Open shame belongs to them (v. 7-8)

Committed treachery against God (v. 7) —Hebrew literally means acted unfaithfully—like an adulterous spouse

Rebelled against Him (v. 9)

Haven’t obeyed the voice of God (v. 10)

Haven’t entreated the favor of the Lord (v. 13)

Done wickedly (v. 15)

All of these are expressing the same idea—Judah have acted like spiritual rebels

They have committed nationwide sins (v. 11) —all Israel

They have not turned from sin or gained insight from the truth (v. 13)

And Daniel recognizes that they did these things with knowledge of the Lord’s warnings.

In v. 12-13 he says that the calamity of Exile is simply a confirmation of the words God spoke through Moses.

Deuteronomy 28:49 ESV

The Lord will bring a nation against you from far away, from the end of the earth, swooping down like the eagle, a nation whose language you do not understand,

Deuteronomy 28:64 ESV

“And the Lord will scatter you among all peoples, from one end of the earth to the other, and there you shall serve other gods of wood and stone, which neither you nor your fathers have known.

Application

Here is the reality for us this morning—and it is not an easy pill to swallow—

Many of us do not confess our sins because we do not blush over them enough to begin with.

We don’t give enough thought to how we fail our God.

We don’t give enough thought of how we do not properly love our neighbors.

We don’t give enough thought to how fall short of Jesus’ standard of love for us in the church—to love one another as He has loved us.

We get up.

We sin.

We go to bed.

And days and days go by where we don’t stop and take an account of how we are living and feel shame for it before God.

Daniel is not general here.

He is specific.

He has taken stock of the state of the spiritual heart of his nation and he is confessing it in detail to the Lord.

And we need more of this.

Even if we do confess our sins before God, do we simply leave it to generalities?

God, I know I wasn’t perfect today—please forgive me.

God, I know I probably didn’t do enough for You today—please forgive me.

Listen—that is a start, but it is easy to speak in generalities and not feel the weight of the sin you have committed which Jesus was crucified for.

God—I know I was prideful in my heart when my boss paid me that compliment.

God—I know I acted entitled when I pouted about the TO-DO List my wife gave me.

God—I know what I watched on Netflix or read in the romance novel I shouldn’t even be reading led me to sinful lust.

To put sackcloth on the heart and dust ourselves with ashes before God, our sins need names.

Not so we would beat ourselves up and drown in self-pity—that’s just worldly sorrow.

Instead, we do it so that we can understand what has broken our fellowship with God and so we can commit these things to Him as sins that must be crucified and mortified.

Illustration

Just imagine if your child had a day where they were lazy and rebellious in the face of each of your commands.

And imagine if you call them into the living room for a heart to heart.

And they say, “Sorry I was bad today. Goodnight.”

You would say— “Hold on!”

You would want to be sure they knew what they had done.

They they understood the weight of it.

That they intended to do it no more.

Why would we think our heavenly Father, who is perfect, wants less than an earthly father, who is not?

God wants heartfelt sorrow for our sin toward Him.

This is the kind that leads to repentance and salvation without regret:

2 Corinthians 7:10 ESV

For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.

Godly grief must be found in us if we are going to recalibrate to confession.

4. Confession petitions based upon the mercy of God.

In the Text

Jeremiah’s prayer is filled with petitions and pleas.

Let your anger and your wrath turn away from your city Jerusalem (v. 16)

He also asks God to incline His ear and hear (v. 18)

He asks God to open His eyes and see (v. 18)

He asks God to hear and forgive (v. 19)

To pay attention and act (v. 19)

Ultimately, all of this is a plea for God’s mercy to be shown.

God’s mercy is essentially His choice to not give us the wrath we deserve.

John Boys helps us understand this:

God hath two hands, a right hand of mercy and a left hand of justice.

John Boys

In confession, Daniel is asking God to show the right hand of mercy.

In Exodus 34, as God reissues the Law to His people, after Moses broke the first set of tablets, God says this:

Exodus 34:6–7 ESV

The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.”

The Law on the tablets showed that God is a God of justice who will by no means clear the guilty.

But as God proclaims His character to Moses, He leads with mercy.

The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious...

God loves to show mercy and desires to show mercy.

When we come before God with a heartfelt sorrow for our sin and we ask for mercy, He is pleased to give it.

He is pleased to turn His anger away...

He is pleased to incline His ear and hear...

He is pleased to open His eyes and see as we ask Him to look upon the desolation sin has caused...

He is pleased to hear and forgive...

He is pleased to give attention and act on our behalf...

And this is what Daniel is clinging to in v. 18, which may be the most important verse in the entire prayer:

For we do not present our pleas before you because of our righteousness, but because of your great mercy.

Daniel has no confidence in the faithfulness of the nation, but in the faithfulness of a merciful God.

(Gospel) Application

Now, this is where we need to stop and do some of the theological meditation I spoke of earlier.

This is where we should recognize that the greatest evidence of God’s right hand of mercy, is also the basis on which we are forgiven when we confess.

After all, this is what we desire as we confess our sins—that they would be forgiven by the God who hears the confession.

How has any believer ever been forgiven by the God who will “by no means clear the guilty?”

This is where we turn to the good news of the Cross.

Isaiah 53:4–5 ESV

Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.

Christ was born under the Law written upon those tablets.

Christ lived a perfect life according to the Law written upon those tablets.

Christ had no sin to confess.

Christ had no Psalm 51 or Isaiah 6 moment.

But when He died, He died as if he was guilty according to the Law because He died in the place of sinners as our Substitute.

He bore our griefs.

He carried our sorrows.

He was pierced in hands and feet and by nail and thorn for our transgressions

Upon Him was the chastisement we deserved

Meaning, the God who will by no means clear the guilty has not forgotten his left hand of Justice.

Not at all.

Instead, He laid the left hand of Justice on Jesus, so that the right hand of mercy could be laid upon us.

Jesus bore our wrath so that it could be turned away from us.

The Father gave us the Son in mercy.

Jesus died for His church in mercy.

And all who trust in Him by faith, will never drink God’s wrath.

The cup is mercifully empty.

Jesus drank it all.

God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love Him (v. 3), has had every promise fulfilled in Jesus Christ—including the great promise of salvation.

And what this means is that we can now confess our sins to God and make our petitions and pleas for forgiveness, and like Daniel, have confidence that God is just and faithful to wipe them away.

Daniel looked forward in faith to a Messiah he did not know...

But we look backward in faith on a Messiah whose name is like honey on our lips...

1 John 1:9 ESV

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

It is good and right for our sins to be wiped away because Jesus already paid the fine justice required.

We can be cleansed of all unrighteousness because Jesus already took the cost.

And it pleases our faithful God to mercifully forgive us as we come to Him in sackcloth and ashes, mourning and grieving our sin.

We should not relegate confession to something Catholics do in wooden boxes with priests.

In fact, we should be the most confessing people because we believe that because Christ died on a wooden Cross, we have a High Priest in heaven who is ever ready to hear our confession and forgive.

His name is Jesus.

And if you have repented of sin and trusted in Him, His ear is inclined to you.

His eyes are on you.

To recalibrate to confession is to turn to Him and no other.

He was Daniel’s only hope. He was Judah’s only hope. He is your only hope.

Here is how Charles Spurgeon put it:

Let your tears fall because of sin; but, at the same time, let the eye of faith steadily behold the Son of man...

Charles Spurgeon

Through Him and in Him, we find the unending sweetness of God’s mercy.

5. Confession is primarily concerned with the glory of God.

In the Text

Notice Daniel’s concern for the glory of God and the name of God in this passage:

As he recalls Israel’s deliverance from Egypt in the Exodus, he says that in delivering, God “made a name” for Himself. (v. 15)

In v. 17, he says, “For your own sake, O Lord, make your face to shine upon your sanctuary (temple).

v. 19—Delay not, for your own sake...your city and your people are called by your name.

In v. 16, Daniel says the people have become a byword—an insult—an object of scorn

In v 19, Daniel is saying, “It is not right that a people called by YOUR NAME would be a byword.”

Daniel is not just concerned for his people being forgiven and going home to Jerusalem.

He is concerned that God’s great name—the name that was champion over Pharaoh—would not be slandered in the nations due to the state of His people.

He wants his people to be forgiven and to return home, that God may be glorified.

Application

At the end of the day, this should also be our primary concern in our confession.

We want the name of God to be honored and glorified.

When we are out of touch with confession and we are not bringing our sins before God, there is a good chance that we operate with a lot of ignorance and blindness.

When we are not taking stock of our shortcomings and bringing them to the Lord, we can grow calloused toward the issue of holy living.

But when a man or woman comes to Christ daily with their sin and ask forgiveness, and they ask for the strength to crucify the sins they have confessed, God’s mercy and grace are at work in their lives.

And this becomes quite visible to the people around us—Christian and non-Christian.

Have you ever watched a brother or sister crucify sins and then live in freedom?

What does that make you think of God and His name?

It makes you think—He is GLORIOUS.

And this is sort of praise and glory we should desire to be ascribed to Him because of how we live our confessing, forgiven lives.

We should not be people who have moral lives that lay in desolation.

We should not be people languishing in guilt.

We should not be people who blindly go through life without much thought as to whether are actions are right in God’s eyes or hurtful to God’s heart.

We do not want a lack of confession to leave us in a place where people think, “This is a Christ-follower?”

Let us have the heart of Psalm 79

Psalm 79:8–9 ESV

Do not remember against us our former iniquities; let your compassion come speedily to meet us, for we are brought very low. Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of your name; deliver us, and atone for our sins, for your name’s sake!

CONCLUSION

And so, how is your confession going?

Is it your daily habit?

Is it the 2-3 minutes we take to confess our sins in church each Sunday?

Is it an imperative action you take or an often ignored afterthought?

Your sins are many.

My sins are many.

Why would you not bring them to Jesus?

He died for them.

His ear is yours.

His eyes are on you.

Do not delay.

Recalibrate your heart and your life.

Be a confessor my Christian friends.