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March 27, 2024 | Daily Devotionals | March 27

Make Confession a Spiritual Discipline


If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. 1 John 1:9

 

One time when I was speaking in Sacramento a guy confronted me about the issue of confession by asking point-blank, “So, Kenny, what’s in it for me if I take the risk and confess?”

 

I replied, “Do you want more of God’s power in your life?” 

 

He responded, “Yes.” 

 

“Do you want to deal Satan a right hook straight to the jaw?”  

 

 “Absolutely,” he smiled.

 

“Do you want people to trust you and be close to you?” 

 

“Sure.”

 

“Do you want God to use you more?” 

 

“With all my heart.”  

 

“Good, then no secrets,” I said.

The great Scottish writer and philosopher Thomas Carlyle said, “The greatest of faults is to be conscious of none.” I’m grateful to Mr. Carlyle for helping men see why God has given us confession as a tool for spiritual growth. The Scriptures encourage honest confession because it produces awesome results in the life of God’s man.

When God said to the Apostle Paul, “My power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9), He was saying that when God’s man is at his most vulnerable, that’s when God’s power flows most freely in and through him. Confession puts us in that place of godly strength. Like so many other realities of the “upside down Kingdom of God,” it’s exactly the opposite of what the world tells us. In today’s culture, denial equals weakness. But in God’s Kingdom, submission to His authority equals strength… strength through weakness. 

 

Jesus said, “Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light” (John 3:20-21).  After I read that, I viewed confession as an offensive weapon that diminishes Satan’s power to influence me. If Satan is the father of lies, confession takes away the footholds that secrets create for him. Don’t let the mole tunnel into your brain and convince you that confession is weakness. In Christ, it is one of our greatest tools for expelling the lies of the enemy.

 

Father, thank you for allowing me to confess with no condemnation.

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