Confession

I'm doing a distance learning theology course (I'm not a swot, honest, I just have an interest in it and decided to follow up) and the section I'm doing at the moment is all about worship and the Holy Spirit. To point out, this has very little relevance to what I'm about to say, I'm just putting in the framework for what I'm saying. Plus it lets me establish my credentials or whatever. They're pretty much non-existant. I have one and a half GCSEs in RE, and that's it. There you go. Problem of authorship solved. :D (I'm doing history, we're always looking at sources and stuff and the author is one of the first things you look at, but I ramble). Um... What was I going to say? Oh, confession. Right.

I suppose you think it means confessing all your sins, admitting you're an evil person, all that rot. So did I. But apparently the real meaning goes much deeper. It basically means telling the truth about yourself.

Now, I got a little worked up the other day when I read in one of the textbooks I'm using that a problem with the evangelical movement and the whole renewal thing is that there's a complete lack of emphasis on confession. The author seemed to have a bit of a thing about them not acknowledging the fact that they're sinners. Which is bogus. I am not a sinner. Nor is anyone else who has put their trust in Jesus for salvation. I'm not a sinner saved by grace, I'm not at all a sinner. Therefore, I get a bit annoyed when text books that should know better start trying to tell me that I am. So the whole not acknowledging sins thing is unnecessary. This is rather a complex issue, and not really what I was intending to talk about. So I think I'll leave that little bit there and post on it later when I'm not supposed to be playing my clarinet etc.

So anyway, confession is not just admitting your sins, its telling the truth about yourself. Though the focus usually seems to be on the negative, what about the positive? Here's just a few things I jotted down while I was working on it:
* (I don't know how to do bullet points, put up with the stars :D )
* I am a son of God (yes, I'm female, but in the world at the time this was written, the sons got the inheritance, so I'm a son in legal terms according to what the world was like)
* I am not a slave to fear.
* I am a heir of God and a coheir with Christ.
* I will share in Christ's suffering and also his glory.
* I have the Spirit in my heart.
* I have access to the Father.
* I am free of sin.
* I am holy and accepted.
* I am perfect in God's eyes.
* I am dead to sin.
* I belong to Christ.
* I am not condemned.
Now, I do have all the verses I've got that from around somewhere (they're in my Bible if nowhere else), but just right now I don't really have time to go hunting about for them. I think most of that can be got from Romans. Wouldn't surprise me. I've paraphrased it, and I'm going off memory for some of it, but given how recent the teaching we've had on the latter ones (the top couple I got out of the Bible as I was doing it, the latter I decided to add because it's the truth and that's what the thing was asking for and there was still room in the little box), I think you can trust my memory. In fact, I'm certain of it. It's pretty good for most things. I can still recite, for example, the first scene of MacBeth from memory, from when I did it four years or so ago. Those statements not just true for me of course, it's true for everyone who has accepted Jesus as saviour.

I really have to go play my clarinet and whatever, but I'll leave you with a little reminder from VeggieTales.

Remember, God made you special and he loves you very much. Byebye!