When we talk about confessing in a religious sense, what is the focus? Most of the time, it is on sin. Confess your sins. Catholics go to confession. When you hear many evangelistic messages or training, the focus is on a person realizing and confessing their sin. Many times, we focus very much on what we or others have done wrong and the need to detail that, focus on sin and being a sinner. "Confess, you sinners!"
BUT...
What does the Bible really say about confession, especially as it pertains to salvation? I did a little quick word study and found some interesting results.
The number of times that confession is spoken of concerning sin: 7,   plus 5 if you include corporate sins (like all of Israel) **corporate confession is not about individual salvation** You can add 2 more references if you include where the law refers to confessing sin for the blood sacrifice (which is now done/finished in Christ)
So, if you include verses that don't really connect confession with personal salvation, you are up to 14, but really, 7 verses telling people to confess sin. Now we can add 3 more. Three verses refer to confessing sins to each other. This is about human reconciliation and accountability. Ok, So we see that there are some verses concerning confessing sin, but now one last category.
The number of times that the confession is of Christ/God: 22.

Isn't that interesting.  The number one thing we are to confess is Christ.  Now in truly coming to Christ, you acknowledge that you need Him and His salvation.  Only sinners need Christ.  It is important to identify and turn away from that which is not Christ (sin).  BUT...the focus is not supposed to be on what we have done but on what He has done and who He is.  Confession should be primarily about confessing Christ, embracing Him and His work on the cross, not focusing on our filth.

One more fun exercise to illustrate this.

• Thief on the cross.  Knew he was a sinner Lk.23:41 but His confession focused on Christ, "remember me".
• Zaccheus focuses on new behavior and a way forward to which Jesus responds, "salvation has come to this house."
• When the keeper of the prison asked Paul & Silas what he needed to do to be saved, they never mentioned sin, but instead told him to confess Christ.

So, here we see people not led through an exercise of rehearsing their pasts.  They already knew they were sinners and their focus was to be on Christ, not on what they had done.

As we talk to people, we need to remember that if someone doesn't understand that they are a sinner, that they need to understand that all have sinned and fallen short of what God is (Rom 3:23).  For those who have come to understand their need for a Savior, their confession needs to focus not on a recitation of what they have done, but a confession of who they are trusting, the living Christ, Jesus!  Let us not put so much focus on what man has done, but focus on confessing Christ!

There are a lot of great Christian teachers out there today. I myself have several books on my reading list by some of the prominent Christian thinkers/teachers of the day including Timothy Keller. I have been known to, on occasion, watch a sermon by Mark Driscoll. There are others, Chuck Swindoll, James Dobson, John MacArthur, Billy Graham, the list goes on and on.
These men have some good things to say.I have learned things from these men. However, I do not always agree with these men and I do not ever take what they say as gospel truth without first checking it out and thinking it through on my own.

These men, as good as they are, do not know me.  Nor do they know the people I serve at Bean's Corner.  I have not seen them interact with their children, I do not know how they get along with their wives.  They may talk about it sometimes, but I have never seen it personally.  None of these men know me or have ever spent the time to get to know me and listen to me.  As a result, they are limited in how they can speak into my life.  I can definitely learn from them, but they cannot disciple me because they are not sharing their real life with me and sharing in my real life.  We are called to make disciples and that can only be truly done with personal contact.  The men that God has me discipling need to be able to know and see my life and have me know and see theirs.  It can't be done through books, videos, or mp3's.

This is why we must be careful with how much we follow such men.  There are things we can learn from them and I will continue to avail myself of the resources they provide and the wisdom that they have.  But I must remember that they too are fallible people and that I have a responsibility to have the WORD be my primary source of study and wisdom.  When I allow a teacher to become my primary source of thinking about the Word instead of reading it myself, I am in trouble!

The other lesson from this is that even when the pastor/teacher is local, you must KNOW him.  As I have written in previous entries on this blog, it is essential that anyone involved in the discipling ministry (and that is supposed to be all pastors) share their lives.  How I live my life, interact with my children, love my wife, conduct myself, is all fair game.  This is not some kind of threat to me and my family.  It is instead a marvelous opportunity to live a real Christian life in a real way that illustrates both what we teach, as well as the difficulty in putting our beliefs into practice.  Even (and especially) my failures are rich grounds for growing disciples according to the Word of Christ.

So, make sure that as you do ministry or consume teachings, that you don't just find yourself involved in nothing personal. If your favorite and regular teachers are not part of your personal life and you not part of them, perhaps you should think about that.   As Paul said, "Having so fond an affection for you, we were well-pleased to impart to you not only the gospel of God but also our own lives, because you had become very dear to us." (1 Thessalonians 2:8 NAS)

Last night I attended a meeting of the Nominating Committee.  It was a long meeting with much accomplished.  On Monday I attended a Deacons Meeting.  I recently attended a Trustees Meeting.  We just had a wonderful Koinonia Kostume party.  There was a wonderful Ladies retreat.  Men's breakfast is going well.  One of the things that we often hear if we are involved in churches is the lament about people who aren't involved.  Now to be sure, every church including ours needs more people than are helping and every church has those who don't do much or anything.  But I will say this.  I am constantly humbled and overjoyed by all the people who ARE involved here at BCBC.  We have such an incredible group of people who take being part of the church seriously and serve with dedication and joy.  I am so thankful for all those who labor so hard to see the Work of the Lord accomplished.  There are people who do things that no one even knows about and there are so many faithful servants behind the scenes doing great work.

I watched people step forward to help make the Koinonia Kostume night go well.  I watched people step forward to man the registration table for our directory pictures.  There are individuals who have been working at doing at BCBC longer than I have been alive!   All this is a source of great joy.  We will continue to work on broadening our base of servants and as we share the work, more will be done easier, but we have so much to be thankful for with so many that are willing to try.  This is of great encouragement to me and I am so thankful for all those who labor for the cause of Christ at Bean's Corner!