Confession….as I stated on my Monday post, I was recently convicted after reading the book of James where it says, “Confess your sins to one another and pray for one another so that you may be healed,” (James 5:16, NIV). God has blessed me with a Bible study made up of an amazing group of women who are vulnerable, honest, encouraging, and challenging. One aspect of our small group that I cherish is the honesty that exists there. When areas of our life, sinful, selfish, rebellious areas of our life stay in the dark, then that murky, entangling, heavy laden sin soon becomes all encompassing and we forget how to turn to Jesus…at least that is what happens in my life.
So how do we break that cycle, how do we turn to Jesus, confess the sin, bring it to light and be healed? Confession.
We confess to Jesus and we confess to one another. We invite accountability into the mix. We invite community to be a part of the healing. We line up beside our sisters to keep them from falling back into sin.
But if we want honesty in a group of friends, we must first, ourselves be honest. I must be honest.
I have confessed this sin before, but I hide behind previous confessions. I mean if I repented once, then the problem is taken care of…I will never sin in that area of my life again…I will never stumble ever again …..For one thing, yes, Christ takes care of our sin once and for all…however, I am not perfect and I should never claim to be…this life is all about daily bringing my faults to Christ and repenting, healing, growing, and moving in a new direction.
So once again I confess my sin. I choose not to be ashamed that I have fallen into the same pattern of sin, I choose not to stay in the dark and watch the separation between Christ and I grow, I choose not to hide, I choose not to be silent, but confess and bring my sins to the light and humbly repent and ask for healing.
My sin….masturbation. Not a sin that lots of women like to talk about, but lots of women struggle with. But I mean…that’s a guy sin, that is gross, mature Christian sisters don’t struggle with that…want to bet? The stigma against females and masturbation is what keeps this sin in the dark and what keeps women from confession and what keeps women from healing and growing in faith. So right now I want to break the lies, claim this struggle, confess, and repent. I never thought I would confess this particular sin in such a public venue, but I really feel like that’s what God wants me to do. Even if this gets read by one reader…I pray that God would use that.
I choose not to be broken, but to confess, be healed, and grow in faith.
Going green!
Cath
So how do we break that cycle, how do we turn to Jesus, confess the sin, bring it to light and be healed? Confession.
We confess to Jesus and we confess to one another. We invite accountability into the mix. We invite community to be a part of the healing. We line up beside our sisters to keep them from falling back into sin.
But if we want honesty in a group of friends, we must first, ourselves be honest. I must be honest.
I have confessed this sin before, but I hide behind previous confessions. I mean if I repented once, then the problem is taken care of…I will never sin in that area of my life again…I will never stumble ever again …..For one thing, yes, Christ takes care of our sin once and for all…however, I am not perfect and I should never claim to be…this life is all about daily bringing my faults to Christ and repenting, healing, growing, and moving in a new direction.
So once again I confess my sin. I choose not to be ashamed that I have fallen into the same pattern of sin, I choose not to stay in the dark and watch the separation between Christ and I grow, I choose not to hide, I choose not to be silent, but confess and bring my sins to the light and humbly repent and ask for healing.
My sin….masturbation. Not a sin that lots of women like to talk about, but lots of women struggle with. But I mean…that’s a guy sin, that is gross, mature Christian sisters don’t struggle with that…want to bet? The stigma against females and masturbation is what keeps this sin in the dark and what keeps women from confession and what keeps women from healing and growing in faith. So right now I want to break the lies, claim this struggle, confess, and repent. I never thought I would confess this particular sin in such a public venue, but I really feel like that’s what God wants me to do. Even if this gets read by one reader…I pray that God would use that.
I choose not to be broken, but to confess, be healed, and grow in faith.
Going green!
Cath
December 2, 2009 at 10:27 PM
wow... powerful.
December 3, 2009 at 1:33 PM
That was really helpful! Thanks!
December 3, 2009 at 4:08 PM
This helps me so much to be honest with the sin in my life. Thank you so much this helped me more than you will ever know, thank you for your boldness.
December 4, 2009 at 10:07 AM
"We line up beside our sisters to keep them from falling back into sin." What a great challenge/encouragement! I want to have and to be this kind of sister. Thanks, Cathy!