Practicing Confession

Welcome

Well, good morning friends! If we haven’t met yet, my name is Dan Osborn and I serve as one of the pastors here at Park | Forest Glen. I’m grateful you’re able to join us this morning as we continue in our series through the Old Testament book of Daniel in a series we’ve been calling ‘Wavering People, Unwavering God” because that is what we have seen over and over again in this book; that while you and I have this tendency to waver back and forth, Daniel shows us that God is unwavering. He is consistent.

If you have a bible with you, open up to Daniel 9. If you need a bible, you can grab one from the seat in front of you and you’ll find Daniel 9 on page ***.

Introduction

I’m not afraid of the dark, I’m afraid of what thrives in the dark.

As a Christian, I’ve often wondered what the point of things like this are…they are horrifyingly creepy…what on earth is the point.

And after much contemplation I’ve come to what I think is a profound conclusion…a universal truth: icky things live in the dark.

There is something about being in those spaces where you know there are things crawling around but you just can’t see them…makes my skin crawl.

The same is true for our spiritual lives…there are dark places where things hide and thrive…like the spiritually poisonous things…they love the dark and want to stay there.

What we’re looking at today is the process of shedding light those dark places of our lives—things that are hidden, that if we’re honest, we’d rather keep hidden. We are talking about the practice of confession.

Now, even as we get started, I know that is a word that means different things to a lot of us. It’s a word that tends to bring up a lot of shame…or even painful memories. Some of you think of heading to a booth and telling a priest what you’ve done…other’s of you may think of ‘getting caught’, ‘found out’ or having to admit something you’d rather not share....something like that.

Whatever it is you associate with ‘confession’ it’s generally not something that makes us feel very good.

And yet, the art of confession is a practice that, when viewed in the right way, can have a rich and healing impact in our lives…much in the same way that initially walking out of a dark theatre in the afternoon hurts at first, but once your eyes readjust you being to see the world around you again.

So here is how we’re going to use our time this morning. I’m going to read the first half of Daniel 9—and Daniel is offering his practice as a model for confession. And as we unpack this, we’ll see four lessons on the art of biblical confession.

And my hope is that when we’re finished, confession will no longer be this strange idea that brings about shame, but we’ll see it as life-giving and freeing.

Finally, before we get started, I want to say that the kind of confession we’re talking about today has to do with areas in our lives where we have fallen short—where we have sinned and missed the mark. I am not talking about things you may have experienced that were done to you at the hands of others. And I’m calling this out because if I’m not careful in talking about confession, I could end up communicating that things like abuse and trauma…things that can also be hidden away for very different reasons need to be dealt with in the way we see Daniel talking about confession. And while I firmly believe the scriptures give wisdom and guidance about how to talk about those kinds of experience, I do not believe Daniel 9 is one of those places.

Alright, that said, I’ll read the passage, pray, and then we’ll get started.

Daniel 9:1–19 ESV

1 In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus, by descent a Mede, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans— 2 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. 3 Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. 4 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, 5 we have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules. 6 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. 7 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. 8 To us, O Lord, belongs open shame, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against you. 9 To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against him 10 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. 11 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. 12 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. 13 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. 14 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. 15 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. 16 “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. 17 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. 18 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. 19 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.”

PRAY

What is Confession?

Alright, let’s get started.

We’re going to work through four lessons on the art of confession.

But, real quick, before we do that…let’s get on the same page.

What is confession?

Look with me at v. 3 (Dan. 9:3-4a

Daniel 9:3–4 (ESV)

3 Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. 4 I prayed to the Lord my God and made confession....

The first thing we see is that Daniel makes this confession through prayer and what that tells us initially is that practice of ‘Confession’ is closely tied to prayer, or approaching God. Even the word we translate as ‘confession’ here, in the original language of Hebrew, is a word that means ‘to acknowledge’ or ‘recognize’.

It recognizes what is true about God and us.

A helpful way to think of it is this way…and this is broad: confession is saying back to God what he already knows to be true. It’s not informing God of anything…it’s not giving him new information that he doesn’t know…it’s affirming that we see what he already sees.

And I think it’s important to pause here for a moment because we need to put this context of what we know about God from the rest of Bible. Because what we imagine God to be like will have a profound impact on how we understand practice and purpose of confession. Do we see him as the angry authority figure trying to catch us doing wrong or do we see him like a loving parent who knows us, wants what is good for us?

And I think the book of Psalms are a great place for us to look and two things come to mind.

1. The Kindness of God

Psalm 145 says this so well, let me just read a portion of it

Psalm 145:8–9 (ESV)

8 The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. 9 The Lord is good to all, and his mercy is over all that he has made.

Psalm 145:14–16 (ESV)

14 The Lord upholds all who are falling and raises up all who are bowed down. 15 The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food in due season. 16 You open your hand; you satisfy the desire of every living thing.

That first part may be one of the most repeated phrases in the Old Testament—that God’s is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in love.

Here’s the second thing that comes to mind from the Psalms: that God knows each of us perfectly.

Psalm 139:1–3 (ESV)

1 O Lord, you have searched me and known me! 2 You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. 3 You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways.

God is abounding in steadfast love, and in that love, He knows us perfectly. And it is to this God that we are invited to confess.

My son is about 5 years old…and he is a terrible liar. Which I guess is a good thing. We’re working on some bedtime routines in our home and lately we’ve been having the same conversation with him…that when his little night light is on, that means he has to stay in his bed.

He’s learning…though his main problem is he gets so lost in his own world that when his cars are crashing into one another, exploding, fall off the bed with loud bangs…it tends to tip me off that he’s not actually asleep.

But I’ve noticed recently that when he hears me coming over to his room, I can hear him sprint across the room, crash into his bed and quickly pull the covers up…and the dude just lays there…doesn’t crack a smile…just playing it off like he pulled a fast one on me.

And the amazing thing is, every time, he’s convinced he got away with it. He’s convinced that he’s fooled me…and he’s never been remotely close to it. So when I pop in the room and I ask him what’s going on, I am, in a sense, inviting him to say back to me, what I already know to be true. And the thing is: I want him to do this. I want him to be honest with me…I want him to bring to light the disobedience that’s hiding in the darkness…and it is because I love him that I want this from him.

In a sense, this is what confession is. It is God, out of his steadfast love, inviting us to be open and honest with Him…to say back to him what He already knows to be true of us. Because without it, we are lying…hiding…and often, ashamed. We end up staying in the dark…this is not how God has created us to live, in shame and fear.

The reality is, we all know what it’s like to hide something from someone else…we know what it feels like to feel like we have to keep something hidden. It’s why we often hear people talk about the ‘weight of guilt’. It’s trying to put words to what it feels like to walk in darkness…out of fear of what would happen if we brought it to light.

But from the beginning, what we need to see is that the biblical art of confession starts with a God who wants and desires real relationship with people and so he invites us to a real kind of relationship with him through confession. Now, we can look at Daniel 9 and what we’ll, briefly, are four lessons on the art of biblical confession.

Confession Focuses on God’s Goodness and Our Brokenness

Here’s the first one: confession focuses on God’s goodness…and our brokenness.

Look at how Daniel starts at the end of v. 4, (Dan. 9:4

Daniel 9:4 (ESV)

4...“O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments...

This sets the tone from the beginning about who God is and what he is like. And Daniel will come back to these kinds of statements often, confessing what is true about God to God.

Verse 14 and 15, he does the same thing (Dan. 9:14-15

Daniel 9:14–15 (ESV)

14...for the Lord our God is righteous in all the works that he has done...15…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...”

But, while part of the focus is on God’s goodness, Daniel also focuses on the failure and brokenness of God’s people. That while God is this way, we are that way.

Or, while we are wavering, God is unwavering.

And so again, verse 4 (Dan. 9:4-5

Daniel 9:4–5 (ESV)

4...“O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, 5 we have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules.

And I think this is where things start to get messy with confession because it requires that we have an honest and realistic view of ourselves—not as perfect people, but as flawed.

In the biblical worldview, humanity is not basically good with just a few bumps in the road every now and then…we are fundamentally flawed. And Daniel uses all this language in v. 5 (Dan. 9:5) to capture that.

That word ‘sinned’ is a word that means to miss the mark…it’s like the image of an arrow being shot, intending to hit a target but misses. And what it means is that God has created for all of us, a specific way of life…one that honors Him...but, on our own, we miss it.

Daniel says we’ve done wrong and acted wickedly…meaning that in our actions we hurt people…and that more often than we’d like to admit, it’s with the intention of hurting or harming other people.

He says we’ve rebelled…and this picks up on the longer story of Bible that speaks of us rejecting God’s rule and reign and instead wanting to live according to our own rules and standards.

Finally, he says we’ve turned aside…means we’ve gone our own way.

The sum total of this is captured we’ll in the New Testament: Ephesians 2:1-3

Ephesians 2:1–3 ESV

1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— 3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.

And in this first lesson on the art of confession, we see is that we’re to hold up what we know to be true about God and what know to be true of us and realize there is a vast difference between us and Him; to realize there is a gap…where is perfectly holy, righteous, good…and we are not.

Lesson One: Confession focuses on God’s goodness…and our brokenness.

Confession is Based on God’s Justice

Lesson Two: the need for confession is based on God’s justice.

Look with me, starting at v. 11 (Dan. 9:11-12)

Daniel 9:11–12 (ESV)

11 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. 12 He has confirmed his words, which he spoke against us and against our rulers who ruled us, by bringing upon us a great calamity...

Daniel says that because God’s people have ‘missed the mark’, they are now experiencing God’s judgment.

Now you’ll have to think back with me for a moment to the beginning of this series. Remember, Daniel and the Israelites are currently living in exile. Many have been forcibly removed from their homes to live under the rule and reign of a foreign power—the Babylonian and Persian empires—and this was in direct fulfillment of what God told the people of Israel would happen if they were to reject him.

But see, this is not just an example of God being petty and just deciding to arbitrarily punish people for not following his rules.

No.

Actually, what this is showing us is that God is one who deeply cares about what is just and good…That he is not willing to simply over-look the sin and evil that has been committed by his own people—they don’t just get a free pass. And while, we are sometimes uncomfortable with the idea of God’s judgment, we have to remember that it is directly tied to his Justice—and we want a God who cares about justice. We want God to do what is right and bring judgment on what is evil.

The problem is when we recognize that we too are the ones who have, as Daniel says in v. 5 (Dan. 9:5)

Daniel 9:5 ESV

5 we have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules.

And that this gap between who God is and who we are means we are rightly open to His Judgement as an outflow of His Justice. That He has set up a standard, we have not met it, and God’s justice demands that something be done to make it right.

This is the second lesson about the art of confession: the need for confession is based on God’s Justice.

Confession is Rooted in God’s Mercy

And here’s the third: the art of confession is rooted in God’s mercy.

Look with me at v. 17. This is after Daniel has spoken what is true of God, what is true of us, and that God’s justice demands something be done...

Daniel 9:17–18 (ESV)

17 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. 18 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.

And at the very end here, what we see is that Daniel can bring things things before God because he is sure of God’s mercy. That, as a loving Father, who is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, he offers to us what we have not earned and do not deserve.

Rooted, not in our righteousness, because on our own, we have none. Rooted in God’s great mercy.

A helpful way to think about it is that Mercy is when God does not give us what we do deserve. In confession, we are coming before God to say what is true of Him, what is true of us…and one of the things we’ve seen true of us in Daniel 9 is that because of our failure we do deserve judgement.

But, in not giving us what we deserve, God’s mercy means his judgement passes over us. It means his wrath that Daniel spoke of is not poured out on us. And that’s not because he simply decides to let things go or pretend they never happened! No. That would be an afront to God’s justice…if he just picks and chooses what he takes serious, then He is arbitrary, not just.

See, the amazing thing about God’s mercy is not that he skips over his wrath and justice, but that it is poured out on another.

I find it so interesting in v. 16 (Daniel 9:16) that Daniel ask the Lord to have his anger and wrath turn away at this time from Jerusalem and from the Holy Hill.

Daniel 9:16 ESV

16 “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.

But see, friends, the reason God does turn away in this moment is because there is another who would enter Jerusalem…and there is another who would stand up on a Holy Hill to take on the fullness of God’s wrath…and fullness of His judgement. You seen, I can say confession is rooted in God’s great mercy, because the whole story of the bible points to the person and work of Jesus who would ultimately be the opposite of everything Daniel says is true of us.

Jesus is the one who lived the perfect life, perfectly obedient to all of what God had called us to do…never once missing the mark…never once turning aside. And yet Jesus is the one who lovingly and willingly entered Jerusalem, knowing it would end in His death. He was crucified on that Holy Hill, to take on himself the judgment we deserved…dying in our place, for our sin!

And the way the New Testament tells the story of Jesus’ death highlights what is happening on the cross. In 1 John, 2:2 we’re told 1Jn 2:2

1 John 2:2 ESV

2 He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.

That word propitiation is not one we use really at all today, but it speaks to the process of removing wrath. And what this is saying is that on the cross, Jesus is removing God’s wrath because he is willingly taking it on himself.

And yet as we celebrated last week, we know that the cross did not end with Jesus’ death, but his resurrection and victory over death itself—all of this so that we would have a way to experience a new and restored relationship with God. That when you place your faith in Jesus, in His death and resurrection, seeing him as the propitiation for YOUR sin…we receive God’s mercy.

So much so that, again, we find in 1 John,

1 John 1:9 ESV

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

You see, this is the third lesson about confession, perhaps the most important: that confession is rooted in God’s great mercy.

Application

So what do we do with this?

We must see confession as an invitation: to a walk in light, free of guilt and shame we carry with us.

We confess—as a regular practice. Both to God and to others.

It does not mean there will be no consequence—but the gospel ensures there is healing and restoration.

We will have a moment to practice confession together.

Trust in Christ.