Confession: When I refused to confess my sin,

my body wasted away, and I groaned all day long (Psalm 32:3 NLT). David is telling us poetically, that guilt was eating away at him.  We've been looking at blame and excuses, and about being unwilling to take responsibility for our actions (Genesis 3:12, 13).  Still on its own taking responsibility and making amends does not deal with the guilt that we might try and suppress, medicate or otherwise seek to mitigate. Suppressed guilt is one of the reasons we often don't like ourselves very much. We can sin against God, against each other, and in fact we can also sin against ourselves (1 Corinthians 8:12; 6:18). However after committing adultery and then murder to cover it up (1 Samuel 11), David tells the Lord “Against You, You only have I sinned” (Psalm 51:4). If then our sin is primarily against God, then ultimately He alone has the authority to forgive (or not).  This is helpful to know when others don't forgive us, or when we have trouble forgiving ourselves.

In the first verse of Psalm 32 we read “Blessed is the one whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered.”  Part of what this means, is that the cure for guilt is to be forgiven. In order to be forgiven however, we need to confess our sins. And when we do, He is faithful and just, not only to forgive us, but to cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). And He can be just because of the substitutionary death of Jesus for us, on the cross (1 John 2:2).  Of course, it's just one of the many reasons why our “higher Power” in twelve-step-programs needs to be the God of the Bible.

But actually twelve-step-programs lead us further in bringing the Kingdom into our relationships. It's another difficult step however. After making a fearless moral inventory of ourselves the next step (5) is “Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.”  This in fact is one small step for mankind in bringing in the Kingdom. And if you think step 5 is hard go figure James 5:16 which commands “Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.”  Many will protest “I don't need to confess to others to be forgiven!” And this is true, we confess to God to be forgiven, but we confess to others to be healed. It's promised right there in James!

Step 5 suggests we start our confessions with one safe person (our sponsor), this because frankly, this side of the fall,  confession is not generally safe. In varying degrees of safeness however, the fellowship in twelve-step programs promotes a non-judgmental atmosphere where there is total acceptance of others. And as, with the gospel, it is in this spiritual atmosphere that we are set free to change.

Father, the picture I have of putting James 5:16 into practice, is for us to come together at the foot of the cross where,  in it's shadow and in Your presence, we know deep within our hearts that although we are flawed, we are fully accepted and loved. And here, in that place, we are able to extend love and acceptance first to ourselves, and then to each other. Here blame, excuses and our unwillingness to take responsibility flee away.  Here, we start to experience the same intimacy Adam and Eve had with each other and with You before the fall. Help us return there Lord,  in Jesus Name Amen

Excuses: “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”

After Adam had blamed Eve for giving him the forbidden fruit, God  asked Eve what she had done. The above was her response (Genesis 3:12, 13). It's difficult to make a hard and fast distinction between blame and excuse. But let's work with blame admitting just a little more than “I didn't do it,” and excuse admitting “Well yes I did it but .....”

There seems to be no lengths to which we will go to avoid taking responsibility for our actions. And there seems to be a progression involved starting, as with Adam, taking no responsibility at all;  Moving, as with Eve, to admitting we did, it but pleading extenuating circumstances; Next admitting we are wrong and actually making changes; Finally making amends where appropriate. We're talking about bearing fruit worthy of repentance (Luke 3:8), and about restitution (Numbers 5:7).  

Continuing to look at these things through the lens of twelve-step-programs, we see the first step is about coming out of denial, out of our propensity to rationalize. Eve was deceived, and it seems that few of us realize just how easily we too are deceived. We can see it in others, and might even judge them for it. But the fact of the matter is that for each and every one of us it is true that 典he heart is deceitful above all things, and desperatel

It gets tested, and/or revealed in step 4, which is to make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. This is a truly difficult step, and a place where many drop out of the program. The point is that in order to do this, we will likely have to live again the pain of past hurts. This will likely propel us first to blame and then to excuses. And to move fully into this step we will need to forgive. And we will need to do all this hard work before we can honestly and fearlessly look at our part. Of course we don't want to get stuck in the past, but we do need to visit it in order that, with Jesus as our higher power, it can be redeemed. And as part of this our forgiveness needs to be from the heart (Matthew 18:25). Much of this is a process, and a painful one at that. But it is a necessary one if we want to be free of the past (John 8:32)

Working the steps then helps us to figure out what is our part and what's not. We call this taking care of our side of the street. In addition to forgiving others, we need to take responsibility for our part, and to make amends when and where appropriate (Step 9). There is a lot of work to do before this step. Timing is important, for before we do our amends we likely need to show over the long haul, both to others, and to ourselves, that we really have changed. People we have hurt are likely to be skeptical, words are cheap, we need to bear fruit worthy of repentance, and producing fruit takes time (Matthew 3:8).

Father, in this bringing of the Kingdom of heaven to earth, we all have a long way to go. We need Your help Lord. Thank You, that when we fully surrender, You change even our desires, and then give us the grace to do what without You we cannot do (Philippians 2:12, 13). Thank You Lord in Jesus Name Amen