In "Problems of Confession Part 1," Pastor Albert N. Martin continues his series on the private disciplines of grace, focusing on the practical and experiential difficulties of confession. He addresses two main problems: first, whether one should confess sin and believe it real if there is little or no brokenness, arguing that believers must confess and bemoan their hardness while meditating on gospel motives. Second, he tackles whether one should believe themselves forgiven if there is no conscious sense of forgiveness, asserting that faith in God's objective promises must precede and sustain the wait for the experiential enjoyment of reconciliation. Martin expounds on Psalms 38, 51, and 130, emphasizing that while forgiveness is immediate upon confession, the healing and restoration of joy may take time as part of God's loving chastening.
Primary Texts
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Psalm 38This psalm is presented as a detailed example of a penitent believer struggling with the lack of conscious enjoyment of forgiveness despite acknowledging sin, providing a framework for the second problem of confession.
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Psalm 130This psalm is expounded as a profound resolution to the problem of lacking a sense of forgiveness, demonstrating faith's posture of waiting on God's promises from the 'depths' of sin-consciousness.
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Psalm 51This psalm is used to illustrate the distinction between immediate forgiveness and the often-lengthy process of spiritual healing and restoration of joy after sin, using the metaphor of broken bones.
Introduction: The Hand Defiled and Problems of Confession0:06
Problem 1: Confessing Without Brokenness4:55
Resolution to Problem 1: Confess Hardness and Seek God's Turning9:00
Practical Steps for Problem 1: Meditate on Gospel Motives15:36
Problem 2: Believing Forgiveness Without a Sense of It21:30
Resolution to Problem 2: Believe God's Promises and Wait24:19
Reasons for Delayed Enjoyment of Forgiveness39:11
The Role of Confession to Others and Temperament48:02
Key Quotes
“our confession is to be specific, but not descriptive. Specific as our sin has been specific, but not descriptive, less in going into too great a detail of the confession, gory aspects of our sin. We even retempt ourselves to sin in our confession.”
“And if you've never had problems with the matter of confession, then it's probably because you have not taken seriously your sin, your feelings, your conscience, or the Bible and God very seriously.”
“But it is spiritually tragic simply to rest upon your oars and quote wait for God to break you over your sin before you deal with it because that's doing exactly what the sinner does who takes the truth of divine sovereignty and salvation and then does nothing.”
“it's not either or it's not laying back waiting until I'm broken before I come to the cross nor is it simply confessing in cold blood and saying my work is done but it's beginning to confess many times just as with praise when you're convinced it's your duty to praise you begin to praise God many times when you don't feel like it but as you begin to feed the mind with the things for which God is worthy of praise what happens? your spirit catches up with the activity of praise and the same principle applies with reference to confession”
“God's justice is displayed as much in forgiving a believing sinner as in damning a soul to hell because he punished that sin in the person of his son”
“God may forgive in a moment but many times there's a lengthy period while those bones are mending create in me a clean heart renew a right spirit within me cast me not away from thy presence restore unto me the joy of thy salvation you see sin as it were ravaged the whole inner storehouse of the saint and though God forgives the sin in a moment rarely does he refurnish the storehouse in a moment and during that period when the storehouse is being refurnished we may feel some of the pain and the bitterness of our departure from the Lord”
“child of God you better face that in this simple little idea no matter what you do just claim verse John 1 9 and all is back to ground zero again is just not biblical nor is it true to the experience of God's people who really take God and sin seriously”
“I've got more respect for the Catholic that at least goes to the priest and tells him his sin and waits for the Padre to say thy sins be forgiven thee then for the Christian who bows his knee mumbles a little prayer and then pats himself on the back and says thou art forgiven at least the Catholic has gone and told someone else about his bad things and not just mumbled some words and pronounced himself forgiven”
Applications
All listeners
Confess sin whenever and wherever it is brought to remembrance, not necessarily in a formal posture of prayer.
Do not passively wait for God to break your heart over sin; actively pray, 'Turn me, and I shall be turned,' engaging in the means God has ordained.
When confessing sin without brokenness, meditate on gospel motives (e.g., Christ's suffering, God's holiness) to cultivate a sense of the terribleness of sin.
If counseling someone who lacks contrition for sin, direct them to the fact that God only delivers the broken in heart and encourage them to seek God to work this brokenness in them.
In the midst of guilt and estrangement, look completely out of yourself to God, believing His objective promises of forgiveness based on Christ's work, and mix faith with those promises.
Maintain a posture of faith, continuing to plead and wait upon God until He grants the sense and enjoyment of the forgiveness already believed.
Recognize that the delayed enjoyment of God's presence after sin can be a deterrent to future sin, making one consider the high price of indulging in sin.
When sin affects another human being directly, confess not only to God but also to the person wronged, asking for their forgiveness.
Humble yourself before your children and plead with them to forgive you when you have sinned against them, even praying with them to hear your confession to God and ask for their forgiveness.
Know your own temperament; if you are prone to doubt and introspection, lean heavily on the objective promises of God to avoid becoming a 'lackey of your temperament and feelings.'
If you have a naturally outgoing and confident temperament, be especially careful not to mistake natural confidence for the work of the Spirit or engage in 'self-absolution.'
A full transcript is available on the
tab. 65 paragraphs, roughly 56 minutes.
Machine transcription
Introduction: The Hand Defiled and Problems of Confession
Now, we continue this morning our study in the broad general area of the private disciplines of grace, namely, personal Bible study and prayer. And for some weeks we've been engaged in the study of the subject of prayer, thinking particularly, of course, of private prayer, the kind of prayer which our Lord describes in Matthew 6 when He said, When thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and thy Father who seeth in secret. And I've suggested that the various aspects of biblical prayer that we likened initially to the slices of a pie can be collated or gathered together under the figure of a hand. First of all, the hand coming full with something to bring to God. And this takes, within its scope, such things as adoration, praise, worship, and these elements of biblical prayer. And we are in our praying to come with our hands full.
And now, for several weeks, we've been concerned with the second general area under which we find these various aspects of prayer collated or gathered together, and that is the hand defiled. It's seeking cleansing from God. And this, of course, is a biblical notion. We are commanded in the book of James, Cleanse your hands, ye sinners.
Who shall ascend into the hill of God? He that hath clean hands. And so this is a biblical concept, that when we come into the presence of God, we are to come with clean hands. The clean hand, of course, being a figure of spiritual cleansing.
Now, thus far, we have established the duty of confession from various portions of the Word of God. Two weeks ago, Mr. Brown spoke to you on the substance of confession. And I listened to the tape of that lesson and was tremendously pleased that you got a good, solid bit of biblical materials with a little inoffensive Hebrew and Greek thrown in along the way.
And I trust you came to the conclusion that the substance of confession is essential to essentially agreeing with God, saying to God the same thing about my sin as God says about it. And then that classic statement, I don't know if it was original with Mr. Brown, whether it was or not, it's excellent that our confession is to be specific, but not descriptive. Specific as our sin has been specific, but not descriptive, less in going into too great a detail of the confession, gory aspects of our sin.
We even retempt ourselves to sin in our confession. And then Mr. Brown closed the lesson dealing with the matter of the occasions of confession and the main thrust of what he shared with you was that sin is to be confessed whenever it is brought to remembrance. And may I add to the word whenever, the word wherever.
We need not be in the formal posture of prayer in order to confess our sins unto God. And I believe that Mr. Brown gave you the essential biblical materials concerning the substance of confession so that I propose to move on today to a third area of this matter of confession and with this to conclude the second area of prayer, hands being cleansed. And I want to deal this morning with what I'm calling the problems of confession.
Having seen the duty of confession, the substance of confession, the occasions of confession, the circumstances of confession, the circumstances of confession, the circumstances of confession, the occasions of confession. Now, this morning, this is a very practical and what the old writers would call an experimental lesson. That is, it has to do with the experience of grace within the soul. When you read the word experimental in Christian literature, it's not talking about experimental in the scientific sense that you're testing something or you're trying it out, you're making an experiment.
But it has to do with what we would call experiential. It has to do with our own experience, experience of grace. And in this matter of confession, there are tremendous experimental problems. And if you've never had problems with the matter of confession, then it's probably because you have not taken seriously your sin, your feelings, your conscience, or the Bible and God very seriously.
Problem 1: Confessing Without Brokenness
For the moment a man or a woman begins to take sin, his conscience, God, the Scriptures, and his own feelings seriously, he's going to come into the orbit of what I am calling some of the critical problems of confession. And I propose to guide your thinking this morning, if time permits, by means of three questions that bring into sharp focus the problems of confession. Here's the first. Should we confess our sins and, believe our confession to be real, if we feel little or no brokenness for the sin we are confessing?
Now, you see the question?
Should I confess sin or sins and believe that confession to be valid if I feel little or no brokenness for the sin thus confessed? Let me explain. We sin. To be specific, perhaps an unkind word is spoken to husband or to wife.
Perhaps a jealous thought is entertained toward another man or woman. A lustful thought is entertained. An unkind deed is committed. Immediately or subsequently, conscience smites us with its accusing voice, Thou art the man you have sinned.
Our judgment, enlightened by the word of God, agrees. That the voice of conscience is indeed the voice of God speaking according to the word. We're not listening to conscience simply because he hollers. We see where conscience gets his information and we say the source of his information is right.
The mind and the spirit tells us that in such a situation we ought to confess that sin that we have committed. But, we feel no real grief for the sin. We feel no real pain that we've offended God. We feel little real concern that this is a moral deed that caused the sufferings of the Son of God who is our Savior.
There is no real brokenness. There is no real sense of contrition. There is no real sense of the foulness of the deed. But the conscience tells us we've sinned.
The judgment concurs with conscience that indeed we have broken the law of God. And our minds instructed by the scriptures tell us thus having broken the law we ought to sin. Now what shall we do? Because the scripture says in Psalm 34, 18 that the Lord is nigh unto them that be of a broken heart and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.
Psalm 38 I'm sorry, Psalm 34 and verse 18 The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart. And saveth such as are of a contrite spirit. And I have no brokenness. I have no contrition.
Can I expect God to save me as it were in that situation? Psalm 51, 17 The sacrifices of God are a broken and a contrite heart. A broken and a contrite heart. O God, Thou wilt not despise.
So what do we do? Here's the problem. Do we wait until a spirit of brokenness grips us before we can confess our sin? But how can we expect God to give us a spirit of brokenness if we're standing out in the spirit of impenitence refusing to acknowledge the sin?
Shall I confess as it were in cold blood and believe in sort of a naked act of faith I'm pardoned in spite of how I feel? Now do you feel the problem? How many of you have had that problem? Alright, that's the problem of confession.
Resolution to Problem 1: Confess Hardness and Seek God's Turning
Alright, now what do you do when you have it?
What does the word of God say we should do?
Now the question is yours. Yes. Mike? Probably the fact that our heart is not broken and we don't have a contrite spirit that that would be a sin right there.
And that if by confessing that to the Lord and praying that He would change that we might be able to deal with the other sin and confess it. Alright, so if I read rightly or hear rightly what you're saying it's this.
Here the mind has this specific sin. We're not as we think of that sin in relationship to God and His law and His Son and His work for us. What you're saying is that even though we have no particular brokenness or contrition for that sin that surrounds that very sin with another sin. The sin of impenitence.
The sin of hard heartedness. And what you're saying Mike is if we start with this outer sin with which we now encase the inner sin. If we start by confessing this and ask God to forgive us and cleanse us of this we may then know some measure of brokenness for this sin. Is that what you're saying?
Sometimes it's easier to see the hard heartedness and it's easier to confess that. Alright. Anyone want to agree or disagree with Mike? I think he's touched on a very, very fundamental principle of experimental religion of what we do in the problems of confession.
Alright, someone else. Yes, Joy?
Alright, anyone know who it was that prayed that prayer? Paul?
Alright, let's look at it because this is a key text with reference to the problem that we're dealing with. Jeremiah chapter 31 and verse 18. Will you read it for us please, Paul? I have indeed heard if we have been wanting to talk I was chastised and I was chastised and the Lord God turned on me and I shall return with our Jehovah my God.
Alright. And then verse 19. Surely after that I was turned and repented and after that I knew myself I stood upon my fly I was ashamed yet even confounded for I bear the reproach of my youth. And we've got to read verse 29.
Alright. Repeat me my dear stand unto me be a child of delight for thus I have been speaking against him I do constantly remember him still therefore my bowels are covered for him I will stand certainly have mercy upon him and I will be whole. Alright. There's a great text, isn't it?
And here's the confession of acknowledgement of the sin and yet the realization that unless God disposes us to deal with the sin as we ought to deal with it we'll be guilty of the sin of not dealing with our sin as our sin demands it ought to be dealt with. And yet in the midst of all of that you see is this wonderful strain of God's own covenant faithfulness so that the principle that Mike has enunciated and that Joy has underscored in his passage is a very very vital one that if the conscience smites us for specific sin A and if the judgment concurs that conscience is speaking according to the word and yet there is the realization of the insensitivity the lack of brokenness that we are warranted to confess that to God and acknowledge that unless he works in us the continuing grace of repentance we cannot even repent of that sin as we ought. But it is spiritually tragic simply to rest upon your oars and quote wait for God to break you over your sin before you deal with it because that's doing exactly what the sinner does who takes the truth of divine sovereignty and salvation and then does nothing. God will save me I'll be saved do what I will if I'm to be damned I'll be damned do what I should do or what I try what do you tell a person like that? You say no God commands you to seek the Lord
while he may be found call upon him while he is near apply yourself to all of the means that God has ordained for the salvation of sinners. Well you see we can fall into a same kind of a hyperism in our Christian lives in saying since I cannot break my own heart and since I know it's dishonoring to come to God simply acknowledging sin as it were in cold turkey I'll just wait until in a sermon or something else God breaks me. No here's the prayer turn me and I shall be turned. Alright?
Bill? What's the example of Achan in Joshua 7 where it says in verse 19 that Joshua said to Achan my son I am for you give glory to God the God of Israel and give praise to him and tell what you have done do not hide it from me so Achan answered Joshua and said truly I have sinned against the Lord this is what I have done alright so here's an example where there may not have been any true repentance or brokenness and yet there was the acknowledgement and there's a sense in which he would have added sin to sin had he not at least acknowledged it he would have added to the sin of disobedience the sin of duplicity and there's a sense in which again you see if we say because of the sin of insensitivity I won't acknowledge the sin of an angry word to my wife I'm adding sin to sin and I'm making one sin the excuse for the commission of another sin and this is never the will of God for his children alright someone else yes that comes to the second problem of confession so you're anticipating may I hold off on that alright because this does tie together yes Ralph
Practical Steps for Problem 1: Meditate on Gospel Motives
alright so the thing you're suggesting is that in the midst of the confession seek to load the mind with those gospel motives that are calculated to produce true brokenness and that's what I had down here as a as a practical suggestion confess the sin but while confessing meditate on the things calculated to produce a sense of the terribleness of the sin begin as it were with the acknowledgement of the sin in cold blood God's word indicts you for that sin and you begin and you come and say oh God I have sinned I did sin when I spoke that hasty word I did sin when I was selfish in that situation Lord I have sinned in this or in that but oh God I confess in my confession that I'm not broken over the sin Lord help me as I attempt to see that sin in the light of all your goodness
to me I've sinned against light I've sinned against privilege Ralph has suggested turning to passages that explicitly treat the subject of sin of the crucifixion Psalm 22 Isaiah 53 those latter chapters in the gospels and meditate upon the sufferings of Christ and view that specific sin in the light of the cross view that sin in the light of the shrouded heavens and the anger of God against his own son on behalf of that sin so that it's not either or it's not laying back waiting until I'm broken before I come to the cross nor is it simply confessing in cold blood and saying my work is done but it's beginning to confess many times just as with praise when you're convinced it's your duty to praise you begin to praise God many times when you don't feel like it but as you begin to feed the mind with the things for which God is worthy of praise what happens? your spirit catches up with the activity of praise and the same principle applies with reference to confession let me read from this very helpful little book that Noel Brown mentioned to you last week as well or two weeks ago by D.M. McIntyre The Hidden Life of Prayer in the section on confession he mentions
this problem of confession and he says this believers of a former age used to observe with thankfulness the occasion on which they were enabled to show and this is a quote now from one of the old writers a kindly penitential mourning for sin end quote at other times they would lament their deadness yet it never occurred to them that the coldness of their affections should induce them to restrain prayer before God on the contrary they were of one mind with a laborious and successful wrestler at the throne of grace who determined and this is a quote he would never give over enumerating and confessing his sins till his heart were melted in contrition and penitential sorrow alright do you see the principle problem number one with reference to confession should we confess our sins and believe the confession to be real if we feel little or no brokenness for the sin confessed and the answer that we deduced is that we must confess and in our very confession bemoan our hardness and take the practical steps needed to deal with that hardness
meditation upon the cross meditation upon the goodness of God meditation upon the holiness of God meditation upon the awfulness of sin alright any further question or contribution before we leave problem number one yes send alright alright so here's one of the added benefits of not leaving the issue till the heart's been broken namely it's a preventive against returning to that sin quickly sin quickly and easily confessed many times will be sin quickly committed again because you've not waited to feel the bitterness of the sin yes in the case where we have eyes that see these things and when we recognize that there is no contrition of sin that we can recognize this what about in the case when you're counseling and you're telling people that they know not the case where they recognize that this is not right they do know that this isn't right because the words that he says that yet they're not safe but there would be no recognition of these things well I think the same principle applies as we must direct them to the fact that God only delivers the broken in heart God only saves the broken
Problem 2: Believing Forgiveness Without a Sense of It
in heart and then encourage them to realize that until there's brokenness for their sin there's no forgiveness they can mouth the words of penitence you know it's one thing as I've often said here it's one thing to put the publican's prayer in a sinner's mouth so that he parrots it back to you like a parakeet but only the Holy Ghost can give him a publican's heart that causes him truly to beat upon his breast and cry God be merciful to me the sinner so the same principle applies that it's God's work but it's our responsibility to seek the Lord to do this in us whether it's the sinner making his first approach to God or the saint making his one thousand one hundred one millionth approach to God over a specific sin alright any further question now on the first problem of confession alright problem number two should we have having confessed our sin with some degree of brokenness believe ourselves forgiven if we have no sense of forgiveness and divine nearness now let me explain what I mean by that problem there are times when the returning prodigal is very very much aware of the father's arms around him and the father's tears of joy being splashed upon his own face
now there are those times when in confession of sin when God has brought us to some measure of brokenness we come immediately into a conscious sense and enjoyment of divine forgiveness and divine nearness but what about those times when there is true grief true shame for your sin and you're crying out to God for cleansing and forgiveness and by his grace your attitude is I shall not return to that sin the attitude is one I am seeking to be done with it I sign no peace treaty with it but there is no sense of forgiveness there is no feel of the father's reconciling arms about you what do you do do you rise from prayer as it were in cold blood believing you have been forgiven or do you wait until the sense of forgiveness comes before you can truly believe that the fact of forgiveness has occurred now how many have had that problem that's the problem you raised you see ok what do you do that's the second great problem of confession Gene
Resolution to Problem 2: Believe God's Promises and Wait
alright so what are you saying then we ought to do with the problem alright so you're saying believe I'm forgiven in spite of what I feel alright anyone want to agree with her or disagree with her
how many would like to agree with her how many want to disagree with her very good we ought to have a good debate going here this morning alright a few more that want to agree let's get the yeas first alright Dennis I would believe the promise of God situation according to that verse you always have you always have these mediating folks who good I think total agreement with what she said additional and then continually asking in prayer after that even at times when we're not specifically confessing in our own prayer time alright so you're saying then if we don't have a sense of forgiveness after we've truly confessed our sin it's because of unbelief is that what you're saying isn't that what you're saying Dennis and that we ought to confess that very sin of unbelief that would doubt such a promise as Gene has quoted alright others want to agree and let's support the yay position yes Ken alright
so what Ken is saying is it could be a matter not of the substance of forgiveness but of the conscious enjoyment of it and the two may be separated yes Mr. Dixon didn't David have that problem he was forgiven excuse me I'm asking the questions you make the assertions now alright didn't David have that problem ok very good and when David said I said it's forgiven yes when he prays Psalm 51 he said restore unto me the joy I think there's two different things here alright and what are the two different things alright Mr. Dixon says we have two different things we have the legal declaration of forgiveness and pardon and then we have the experimental enjoyment of that alright see were there some others over here yes Jim I think this is sort of on the same line but in one sense we do if we're true Christians we have the legal forgiveness of God in the sense that we're not condemned but on the other hand I think that disposition on the part of the Lord takes me in disposition when we do sin our repentance is not sincere enough a lot of times this is what I say I'm afraid of God trying to save me and if I really then so lack that I just blatantly went into that sin and I know God forgave me judicially but didn't forgive me in the sense that
he's not going to send a rod of discipline alright so what you're saying is there are times when having confessed we've been feel as in David's case the rod of correction may still be upon us and the lack of real enjoyment comes from the anticipation of that rod alright back to you Jim ok alright Mr. Clark what position were you you had your hand raised that you shook your head quite vehemently I agree with it's really impossible for us to accept the mind of a total man and I think and I feel and I can't have my thoughts up and down here my feelings way out of here my feelings won't affect my thoughts my thoughts won't affect my feelings in other words you just can't separate the two two different categories alright that's my point ok yes Bill I have to deal with this on the basis that I have my own parents my Lord used the parent child the lady did when I had sinned
against my parents I never never knew how he felt until he actually said you're forgiven I saw in his countenance he meant it and so as long as he wasn't smiling upon me and I didn't sense that restore of fellowship I still don't revert to what I've done against my parents ok that's a problem then isn't it alright then ok she's intransigent she's standing by her stuff I refuse to believe that my sins are not forgiven very good the real pattern is emerging you may not see it yet but it's coming yes alright and if we do that what are we actually doing ok we're seeking to exercise faith right very good alright Ralph
alright so we're coming to the conclusion that confession is not a simple little one two three thing isn't it when you come to psalms like psalm 38 I want you to turn there for a minute because this is a psalm in which we have some of the problems of confession and we're going to look at psalm 130 another great psalm on the problems of confession does this sound like what you're talking about Jim look at verse 1 oh lord rebuke me not in thy wrath neither chasten me in thy hot displeasure thine arrows stick fast in me thy hand presseth me sore there is no soundness in my flesh because of thine indignation neither is there any health in my bones neither is there because of my sin mine iniquities are gone over my head there's a heavy burden they're too heavy for me my wounds are loathsome and corrupt
because of my foolishness here's a man truly penitent acknowledging his sin but now look at his condition I'm pained and bowed down greatly I go mourning all the day long here's a man who had no sense of forgiveness no joy of restored communion I'm faint and sore bruised I've groaned by reason of disquietness of heart but look at his posture Lord all my desire is towards thee or before thee my groaning is not hid from thee my friends and everyone else turns aside from me but he's a man verse 15 in thee oh Lord do I hope for thou wilt answer me oh Lord my God is that the posture of unbelief or the posture of faith that's the posture of faith but at this point does he have any conscious enjoyment of God's forgiveness he doesn't so you see the minute you say if only you believe you'd have a wonderful sense of forgiveness you're running right counter to a passage such as this don't anticipate me now hang with me alright let's go on and see what he says in verse 21 forsake me not oh Lord my God be not far from him make haste to help me oh Lord my salvation
now Mr. Dixon's question if he has truly acknowledged his sin and looked to God alone for forgiveness is that sin forgiven yes or no and how do we know if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness yes he is forgiven but has he been brought into the conscious enjoyment of that forgiveness yet and the answer is obviously no but now what does he do does he simply reason since I'm confident I am judicially forgiven it really doesn't matter whether I feel the sweetness of forgiveness no sir none of this cold turkey kind of religion for him this kind of contentment with a juggling of the legal status he says I'm going to wait upon God until the God who is forgiven gives me the joy and the sense of forgiveness that's the distinction Mr. Dixon made that's the beautiful distinction in Psalm 51 he acknowledges his sin but then he says Lord restore unto me the joy of thy salvation heal the bones that you have broken you see and now turn to Psalm 130 another great psalm that wrestles and resolves in great measure this , this problem of forgiveness and may I say if you are blessed with the possession of
volume 6 of John Owen please try to work through the latter half of that book which is an exposition of Psalm 130 which is one of the most helpful pieces of experimental Christian literature that I have ever ever read now look at the posture of the psalmist out of the depths have I cried unto thee O Lord I mean he's really down he's not in the depth but the depths out of the depths have I cried Lord hear my voice let thine ears be attended to the voice of my supplication now what's put him in the depths impending economic collapse no problems with his wife no problems with his neighbors no here's the problem verse 3 if thou Lord shouldest mark iniquities O Lord who could stand what's brought him into the depths is the consciousness of his sin but in the midst of the depths he says there is forgiveness with thee that thou mayest be feared I wait for the Lord my soul doth wait and in his word do I hope my soul waiteth for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning yea more than watchmen for the morning O Israel hope in the Lord for with the Lord there is loving kindness with him
is plenteous redemption he will redeem Israel from all his iniquities now is this a psalm of grumbling unbelief or a psalm of faith it's a psalm of faith but it's faith that is not content until it experiences the realities of the life of faith now you see many people put faith and experience as though they were opposites some people walk by their experience and their feelings and then we real mature Christians we walk by faith that is without feelings you see now that's a false dichotomy that's a false dichotomy as Mr. Clark has said we're whole people now you better get the order right now there is an order there's no dichotomy but there is an order of priority and the order of priority is we must believe the objective statements of God concerning sinners who believe in his son we must believe that promises such as first John one nine or Psalm one hundred and thirty and verse four there is forgiveness with thee and the only way you'll begin to get out of the depths of the sense of guilt and estrangement from God is to look completely out of yourself unto him John says
he is faithful and righteous meditate upon how God can be righteous to forgive he can be righteous to forgive because as one author said and it struck me as I read it this morning God's justice is displayed as much in forgiving a believing sinner as in damning a soul to hell because he punished that sin in the person of his son there is a just basis to forgive so as we look completely out of ourselves in the midst of our debts we cry to God on the grounds of what he has said and what he has done in his son and we mix faith with those promises then in that posture of faith we continue to plead and wait until God gives us the sense and the enjoyment of the forgiveness thus believed you see it now you don't lay back in the shadows unbelieving until you feel forgiveness because God says through the prophet Isaiah if ye will not believe ye shall not be established without faith it is impossible to please him is true confession an exercise of faith yes it is you see never forget that true confession is the exercise of a
Reasons for Delayed Enjoyment of Forgiveness
believing soul and therefore taking the posture of faith we may then wait now why do we have to wait now here's where some of you brought in some of the elements God may be chastening us for the very sin he's forgiven by withholding an immediate sense of joy as reconciliation he's going to let us feel the bitterness of our departure from him the same way a parent may say to a child who comes and says daddy I was wrong I sinned when I disobeyed you did thus and thus and the parent says you're forgiven but to enforce the lesson you're grounded for a week no use of the car every time he wants to go out and he thinks of all the enjoyment he has to sit in his own room he feels something of a bitterness of his departure now that doesn't mean he's not forgiven doesn't mean he's not forgiven but there's the bitterness the parent lovingly enforces the lesson now God does this with his children and there are times when we do not come back into the conscious enjoyment of the Lord's presence immediately I had to deal with one of the Lord's children this very week who's feeling that I've confessed my sin I've asked God to forgive me but I have no restored joy and I had to say could it be that God is letting you feel the bitterness
that it's a hard and a bitter thing to depart from the Lord so it can be the matter of the Lord's chastening hand upon us to let us feel that bitterness sometimes and I don't know how else to explain it but in these terms it takes time for the crippling wounding effects of sin upon the spirit to be healed sin cripples and wounds the spirit that's why David turned to Psalm 51 and then we'll look at another Psalm as well in Psalm 51 he uses the figure of broken bones of personal defilement look at verse 7 purify me with hyssop and I shall be clean wash me and I shall be whiter than snow it's one thing for God to put away our sin in a moment it's another thing for us to feel that we are cleansed from the defiling effect of that sin verse 8 make me to hear joy and gladness that the bones which thou has broken may rejoice you can break a bone in a moment but bones are not healed in a moment they're set and cast many times for weeks on end and that happens to you spiritually you sin and you break your bones spiritually God may forgive in a moment but many times
there's a lengthy period while those bones are mending create in me a clean heart renew a right spirit within me cast me not away from thy presence restore unto me the joy of thy salvation you see sin as it were ravaged the whole inner storehouse of the saint and though God forgives the sin in a moment rarely does he refurnish the storehouse in a moment and during that period when the storehouse is being refurnished we may feel some of the pain and the bitterness of our departure from the Lord now like it or not those are the facts of life and this ought to be a great deterrent for us in sinning I don't know how it is with you but there are times when this prevails very powerfully shall I for the moment's indulgence in that nasty spirit to give vent to something in me towards someone who's wronged me shall I be willing to do so at the price of perhaps going days without the enjoyment of God's presence that's a pretty big price shall I have my bones broken and have to go about in casts for a lengthy period of time child of God you better face that in this simple little idea no matter what you do just claim verse John 1 9 and all is back to ground zero again is just not biblical nor is it true to the experience
of God's people who really take God and sin seriously so that's the second great problem of confession it's the problem of having confessed with some degree of brokenness can I believe myself to be forgiven if I have no sense of the divine nearness the answer we've seen from scripture is it is unbelief not to forgive not to believe we are forgiven if we have truly confessed but having been forgiven we must maintain the posture of faith until we come into the enjoyment of restored communion with God yes I'm not thinking I deserve any sense of forgiveness unless there is a real complete and thorough sense done accidentally or easily it's a matter of the spirit and I noticed in this song here David confessed his sin but he pleaded for an eternally right spirit now I may confess my sin I may not have really got to the real sin which is not the sin that I sinned
but perhaps the wrong spirit that was beginning to be discontented with my life that led to the grumbling or right so perhaps the reason I have not got joy of the church is that I haven't really got down to the real problem which is the wrong spirit and if it's psychologically impossible to believe you're forgiven when you haven't confessed perhaps it would be psychologically impossible not to have the joy of restoration if you were really totally healed for the spirit is right again for God yeah well I would say though this passage indicates that there is the element of divine sovereignty that can never be bound up to the fact that we've met conditions one two three ipso facto we shall have result for you see Lord thou must restore thou must heal the bones turn thou me and I shall be turned and I would be jealous to guard that element so that we do not strap the conscience of a Christian who to the best of his integrity before God has sought to deal with the sin he sought to trace it to his roots he is turned from it there is brokenness he's looking to Christ alone unless we bring in this element he'll torture himself by feeling the reason I have no restored joy is I still have some little root I haven't dealt
with and he goes ransacking his heart and ransacking and ransacking until he's a psychological and a spiritual wreck whereas the psalmist says my soul doth wait for the Lord he's done looking at himself my soul doth wait for the Lord I've dealt with the sin there is forgiveness with God now I wait for God to bring back all that my sin robbed me of no just grieved at the fact that that's the way it was just grieved that he was lying beneath a weight of distance between himself and God and crying out Lord why go I am mourning all the day long Psalm 6 I make my couch to swim with my tears oh Lord how long how long yes but well this is
The Role of Confession to Others and Temperament
the other dimension of confession that of course we haven't dealt with in any detail but just simply to say bud that when my sin affects some other human being directly then my confession must be to them that's why Jesus said if thy brother sinned against thee and seven times or seventy times seven times comes and says I repent he assumes that if one man sins against another he's not only going to confess it to God but he's going to go to the person against whom he sinned and ask him to forgive him and if you have to do that enough it's a wonderful deterrent to sin like the girl I use this as the classic illustration that my wife dealt with in a summer camp years ago and she came with her problem of lying she said oh I just it's easy for me to lie so my wife showed her from the word all right you profess to be the Lord and to love him therefore every time you lie you've got to confess it to the Lord and go to the person you've lied to mother father brother sister teacher neighbor friend and tell him you're nothing but a liar tell him where you lied and you're sorry for month or two after camp was over we got a letter and the substance of the letter was this the Lord has delivered me from my lying I did what you told me I had to do in the light of the scriptures and I found it just wasn't worth it to lie anymore so I quit you see now the element of truth there bud was that she realized man if this is what it means to really deal with my sin I better think twice before I indulge myself the luxury of a lie
and if we know that it means sitting down with our children and humbling ourselves before them and pleading with them to forgive us though we've had to do it dozens of times and maybe even praying with them this is what I find a great help and saying look let's pray even if they're not Christians and let them hear you confessing to God your sin let them hear you then pleading with God that he'll put in their hearts a spirit of forgiveness to you well you see when you start dealing with your sin that way you're going to think twice before you indulge the luxury of popping off at your kids again or your wife or the people you work with you see and so often we don't hedge up the way back into sin because we don't deal thoroughly with that sin well we only have five minutes and I wanted to get to the third problem of confession and time won't permit us to deal with it because it's it's a real problem so I'll only mention it you think upon it and you come back next week prepared to discuss it will you here's the third great problem of confession problem one was should we confess sin and believe the sin confessed if we feel no brokenness we saw some of the principles of the word problem two having felt some brokenness and having confessed and yet no sense of forgiveness shall we believe we are forgiven anyway what shall we do with this sense of estrangement and we've looked at the principles of the word now problem three is this should we upon the remembrance
of past sins long since confessed confess them again at their fresh remembrance should we upon the remembrance or upon the fresh remembrance of past sins long since confessed confess them again upon the occasion of that fresh remembrance for instance long after David penned psalm 51 suppose in the administration of his kingdom he heard of someone who was guilty of murder calculated murder and it brought to remembrance his sin with Uriah and the memory bank could not help but cough up that dastardly deed when he saw a similar situation should David confess that sin afresh upon the fresh remembrance of it should he not if Peter were to behold a Christian denying the Lord under pressure he could not help but associate that with his own denial and it would bring to remembrance something of the bitterness of his cursing and swearing that he knew not the Lord should he upon that fresh remembrance of sin confess that sin long since confessed and pardoned how many of you have had that problem alright what do we do
that's our lesson for next week the Lord willing the third great problem of confession alright we have time for two minutes of any questions or contributions yes Bill and then over to Jim oh tremendous principle here's where we have to know how we're put together some of us by nature are very introspective we would doubt our own name if we didn't have it on a birth certificate we would if we didn't have it on a birth certificate to look at once a year we would have to look here we doubt our own name and I'm not looking at anybody now you see I know I know some of you and you know that I know so I'm looking right up at the ceiling but you doubt your own name or I'll look at the floor if you didn't have it written on a birth certificate and on your driver's license a lot of other things now there's some of you you never have to look at your birth certificate you know who you are and you know your name and you're very outgoing and the rest and you see temperament coming back to the whole man grace does not alter our basic temperament it goes to work on those aspects of our temperament to become a vehicle for sin but grace doesn't alter our basic temperament God knit us together in our mother's womb of these various temperaments so the point Mr. Rogers made is a very valid one if you're
the kind of person and you must know yourself here who tends to you know look out on the day like today and you haven't been able to get up this morning and rejoice with the sun up and say thank you Lord for a beautiful sunny day you know what you did the moment you saw the sun this morning they predicted bad way I bet it'll be raining before noontime right that's the way you're built others of you had you gotten up this morning and it was pouring down buckets you'd say praise the Lord the rain's gonna all be over so by the time we go to church we'll have a lovely sunny day you see and that's basically a matter of temperament we both look at the same climactic conditions climatic conditions and two different results well that enters into the spiritual realm as well and we must then be careful that if our tendency is to be doubting and subjective there's only one man who was called by the adjective doubting in front of his name and he earned it that was doubting Thomas you see that was his temperament etc well then we know we must go heavy on the area of the objective promises of God lest we become lackeys of our temperament and our feeling then there are others of us that are we might mistake our very natural outgoing confident temperament for the work of the spirit giving us the joy of the Lord and we'll have to be especially careful that we don't engage in what I call self absolution I've got more respect for the Catholic that at least goes to the priest
and tells him his sin and waits for the Padre to say thy sins be forgiven thee then for the Christian who bows his knee mumbles a little prayer and then pats himself on the back and says thou art forgiven at least the Catholic has gone and told someone else about his bad things and not just mumbled some words and pronounced himself forgiven so this element of temperament is a vital thing well our time is gone let's commit our thoughts to the Lord
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Passages Expounded
Psalm 38
This psalm is presented as a detailed example of a penitent believer struggling with the lack of conscious enjoyment of forgiveness despite acknowledging sin, providing a framework for the second problem of confession.
Psalm 130
This psalm is expounded as a profound resolution to the problem of lacking a sense of forgiveness, demonstrating faith's posture of waiting on God's promises from the 'depths' of sin-consciousness.
Psalm 51
This psalm is used to illustrate the distinction between immediate forgiveness and the often-lengthy process of spiritual healing and restoration of joy after sin, using the metaphor of broken bones.
Texts Expounded
auto_stories
This passage is read and explained as a key text demonstrating a prayer for God to turn the heart to repentance when brokenness is lacking.
auto_stories
This psalm is presented as a vivid example of a penitent man acknowledging sin, yet experiencing no conscious enjoyment of forgiveness, illustrating the second problem of confession.
auto_stories
This psalm is extensively expounded as a resolution to the second problem, showing faith crying out from the depths of sin consciousness, believing in forgiveness, and waiting for its experiential enjoyment.