confession of sin

Consider and Confess Your Bankruptcy

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, confession of sin, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God Leave a comment

There was a certain creditor which had two debtors: the one owed five hundred pence, and the other fifty. And when they had nothing to pay, he frankly forgave them both. – Luke 7:41,42

It is said, “When they had nothing to pay, he frankly forgave them both.” There is a time when pardon comes and that time is when self‐sufficiency goes! If any person in this place has, in his own conscience, come to this point—that he feels he has nothing to pay—he has come to the point at which God is ready to forgive him! He that will acknowledge his debt and confess his own incapacity to meet it, shall find that God frankly blots it out! The Lord will never forgive us until we are brought to the starvation of pride and the death of boasting. A sense of spiritual bankruptcy shows that a man has become thoughtful—and this is essential to salvation. When we come to feel our bankruptcy, we then make an honest confession. And to that confession a promise is given— “He that confesses his sin shall find mercy.” 

How can we believe a thoughtless person to be a saved man? If we so think about our state as to mourn our sin and feel its wickedness—and if we have made a close search into our hearts and lives and find that we have no merit and no might—then we are prepared in all thoughtfulness to say, “In the Lord I have righteousness and strength.” Must there not be serious thought before we can hope for mercy? Would you have God save us while we are asleep, while we are giddy, frivolous, trifling and without concern about our sin? Surely that would be giving a premium to folly! God acts not so. He will have us know the seriousness of our danger, otherwise we would treat the whole matter with lightness and miss the moral effect of pardon—and He would be robbed of His Glory.

Bankrupt Debtors Discharged by C. H. Spurgeon

Do Not Delay!

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, confession of sin, prayer, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

…behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation. – 2 Corinthians 6:2

Satan has destroyed multitudes of men, tempting them to ask for more time, instead of coming up to the mark at once and asking for immediate pardon. What are the fabled virtues of tomorrow? Why do men dote upon the unknown future? To an immediate decision I would press you at this moment and may God, by His Divine Spirit, deliver you as a bird from the hand of the fowler, that you may no longer procrastinate and waste your life in disobedient delay! This being the temptation, let me hint to those of you who are bankrupt, what your wisdom is. It is your wisdom to face the business of your soul. Your soul‐matters are the most important things you will ever have on hand, for when your wealth must be left and your estate shall see you no more—and when your body is dead—your soul will still be living in eternal happiness or endless woe! Therefore, do not neglect your state in reference to God. It is the most important matter! Give it the first place.

Settle this business before you attend to anything else. Take care that you face it like an honest man and not as one who makes the best of a bad story! It may be bad, yet the best thing you can do is to go right through with it in truth and soberness before the Lord. Hope lies that way. Do not let your danger be concealed like a thief who hides in the good man‘s pantry till the hour to rob his house. Suffer not the sparks to smolder where they may consume your all! Quench the fire before you sleep! When you face the matter, be very true and sincere with yourself and with God because you are not dealing with creditors who may be cheated, but you are dealing with GOD who knows the secret thoughts and intents of your heart…Do not make the slightest attempt at paying, for you cannot do it! But take quite another course—plead absolute poverty and appeal to mercy! Say, “Lord, I have nothing, I am nothing, I can do nothing. I must throw myself upon Your Grace.”

Bankrupt Debtors Discharged by C. H. Spurgeon

Face the Truth

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, confession of sin, salvation, Sovereignty of God 3 Comments

And when they had nothing to pay, he frankly forgave them both. – Luke 7:42

Some of you have never given serious thought to your souls and to your condition before God. It is an unpleasant subject. You suspect that it would be still more unpleasant if you looked into it. You want amusement, something to while away the time because you do not care to examine the state of your heart before God. Solomon exhorts the diligent man to know the state of his flocks and look well to his herds. But he that is careless and idle would rather leave such enquiries and let things go as they please…He labors to beguile the hours that he may conceal from himself his true condition. But what a fool he is! Would it not be infinitely wiser if he would look things in the face and have it out and know his actual state? I have often prayed this prayer— “Lord, let me know the very worst of my case,” for I do not wish to entertain a hope that will, at last, deceive me. Disappointment will be bitter in proportion as false hope was sweet. This is the temptation of the bankrupt soul—to shut its eyes to the unwelcome Truths of God.

When we come to feel our bankruptcy, we then make an honest confession. And to that confession a promise is given— “He that confesses his sin shall find mercy.” The two debtors had acknowledged their debts, and they had also openly confessed, though it must have gone against the grain a bit, that they could not pay. They humbled themselves before their creditor and then he said, “I frankly forgive you.” If one of these debtors had bounced and bragged, “Oh, we can pay,” in all probability he would have been sent to prison. As for you, poor Trembler, I do not know where you are but here is comfort for you—when you go to God in your chamber and cry, “Lord, have mercy upon me, for I am guilty, and I cannot justify myself before You, nor offer any excuse to You”—then it is that He will say, “Be of good cheer! I have put away your sin; you shall not die.”

Bankrupt Debtors Discharged by C. H. Spurgeon

Sinner, You Can Become His Friend

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, confession of sin, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God Leave a comment

For He hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God. – 2 Corinthians 5:21,20

Oh, that these lips had language, or that this heart could speak without them! Then would I plead with every unconverted, unbelieving soul and plead as for my life. Friend, you are at enmity with God, and God is angry with you; but on His part there is every readiness for reconciliation. He has made a way by which you can become His friend—a very costly way to Himself, but free to you. He could not give up His justice and so destroy the honour of His own character; but He did give up His Son, His Only Begotten, and His Well-Beloved; and that Son of His had been made sin for us, though He knew no sin. See how God meets you! See how willing, how anxious He is that there should be reconciliation between you and God today. It is not from lack of kindness on His part; it is from lack of willingness on yours. The burden of your ruin must lie at your own door: your blood must be on your own skirts.

Now observe what we have to say to you today is this: we are anxious that you should be at peace with God, and therefore we act as ambassadors for Christ…I once knew Him not, neither did I care for Him. I lived well enough without Him, and sported with trifles of a day, so as to forget Him. He brought me to seek His face, and seeking His face I found Him. He has blotted out my sins and removed my enmity. I know that I am His servant, and that He is my friend, my Father, my All. And now I cannot help trying in my poor way to be an ambassador for Him with you. I do not like that any of you should live at enmity with my Father who made you; and that you should be wantonly provoking Him by preferring evil to good. Why should you not be at peace with the One who so much wants to be at peace with you? Why should you not love the God of love, and delight in Him who is so kind to you? What He has done for me He is quite willing to do for you: He is a God ready to pardon. I never knew a single case of a man who trusted Jesus, and asked to be forgiven, confessing his sin and forsaking it, who was cast out. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

The Heart of the Gospel

Knowing and Understanding

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, confession of sin, prayer, promises, repentance, salvation Leave a comment

Our fathers understood not Thy wonders in Egypt… – Psalm 106:7

They ‘understood not His wonders in Egypt”, because their hearts were hardened by their association with a proud, worldly, idolatrous and yet cultured nation, and they had turned aside from the spiritual faith of their fathers. Wonders were wrought, and they saw them, and were amazed; but they did not see beneath the surface, nor perceive the Lord’s meaning in them. The fact is, dear friends, these people had no deeply spiritual work upon their hearts. Beloved, I pray to God for you who are newly called out from the world, that the first working of grace in your souls may be deep, true, clear, and lasting. I would have you not only know but understand. Depend upon it- a man’s after-character is very much shaped by the mode of his conversion. Why do some turn back altogether? It is because their change of heart was not that thorough radical conversion which involves the creation of a new nature. They felt certain superficial impressions which they mistook for the new birth, and they made a hasty profession which they could not afterwards maintain. They were not thoroughly saved from the dominion of sin, or they would have held on till the end. Many professing Christians of whom we have a good hope that they will prove to be sincere, never had any deep conviction of sin, nor any overwhelming sense of their need of Jesus: hence they have seen little of our Lord in His glorious offices, and all-sufficient sacrifice, and have gained no thorough understanding of His truth…I am afraid for you if you have only a flimsy experience, a skin-deep conviction, a blind man’s apprehension of heavenly light. No wonder if very soon you forgot, and afterwards rebel. Let us pray to God that both in ourselves, and in those whom we bring to Christ, the work of grace may be deep and thorough; and may our faith in Jesus be sustained by a clear understanding of the gospel, and of our Lord’s dealings with us! ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2204.cfm

Be Ye Followers of God

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, confession of sin, prayer, promises, repentance, salvation, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

We have sinned with our fathers, we have committed iniquity, we have done wickedly. Our fathers understood not Thy wonders in Egypt; they remembered not the multitude of Thy mercies; but provoked Him at the sea, even at the Red Sea – Psalm 106:6,7

Great things, whether good or evil, begin with littles. The river that rolls its mighty volume to the sea was once a tiny brook; nay, it started as a spring-head, where the child stooped down to drink, and, with a single draught, seemed as if he would exhaust the supply. The rivulet ripples itself into a river. Sin is a stream of this sort. It starts with a thought; it increases to a resolve, a word, an act; it gathers force, and becomes habit, and daring rebellion. Want of understanding lies at the fountain-head of sin: “Our fathers understood not Thy wonders in Egypt.” Out of this lack of understanding comes the greater offense of ungrateful forgetfulness. Failure of memory follows upon a want of understanding: “They remembered not the multitude of Thy mercies.” This readily leads on to the sad consummation of rebellion. Provocation follows upon forgetfulness. Inward faults display themselves in outward offenses: “They provoked Him at the sea, even at the Red Sea.”

To confess our personal sin will tend to keep us humble; and in view of the Lord’s mercy, which has spared and pardoned us, a sense of our guilt will make us grateful. The less we think of ourselves the more we shall think of Him whose “mercy endureth for ever”; and if we see where our fathers’ sins began, and how they grew, and what they came to, we may hope that the Spirit of God will help us to turn from the beginnings of evil, and forsake the fountain-heads of our iniquities. This will tend to repentance and holiness. May we be so wrought upon by the Spirit of God that we shall not be as our earthly fathers, but become like our heavenly Father, who says to us, “Be ye followers of God, as dear children.” We are not to take our fathers after the flesh for our example wherein they have gone astray; but our Father who is in heaven we are to imitate by the power of His grace. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2204.cfm

Be Humbled and Warned

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, confession of sin, prayer, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God, The Father, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

We have sinned with our fathers, we have committed iniquity, we have done wickedly. Our fathers understood not Thy wonders in Egypt; they remembered not the multitude of Thy mercies; but provoked Him at the sea, even at the Red Sea…Save us, O Lord our God. – Psalm 106:6,7,47

OUR FATHERS! From them we derive our nature. We inherit our fathers’ propensities; for that which is born of the flesh is flesh. As is the nature, such is the conduct. Hence the Psalmist writes in verse 6: “We have sinned with our fathers, we have committed iniquity, we have done wickedly.” If we must mention our fathers’ faults, it is not to screen ourselves; for we have to confess that our life’s story is no brighter than theirs. It is not because the fathers have eaten sour grapes that the children’s teeth are set on edge; for we ourselves have greedily devoured those evil clusters: “We have sinned with our fathers.” “As in water face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man.” When we read of the sins of others, we ought to be humbled and warned; for “all we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way.” We have no space wherein to set up a monument to our own glory. As we cannot boast in our pedigree, for we are the children of sinners; so we cannot exalt ourselves because of our personal excellence, for there is none that doeth good, no not one. We come before God and confess our iniquities as a race and as individuals; and we cry unto Him, in the words of the forty-seventh verse, “Save us, O Lord our God.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2204.cfm