When we looked at the development of sexual sin in Step 1, we said a major threshold was crossed when sexual sin goes public (moving from images or conversations with anonymous people to arousing interaction with a real, known person). The same is true in the destruction of sexual sin; a major threshold is crossed as sexual integrity goes public (moving from private dialogue with God to public confession with real, known people).
If you have made it through the first four steps with integrity then change has happened, but it is starting in Step 5 that you lay the foundation for change to last. Privacy kills change and fuels sin. Transparency kills sin and fuels change. Chances are this step may scare you as much as any step you have taken since the first one. But remember it is not nearly as scary to move forward as it is dangerous to go backward. Don’t allow fear to make you forgetful.
This is a stage in the change process when many people want to only deal with their sin privately. But to deal with a private sin privately is like trying to wrestle an alligator in a swamp. You would be in its home turf. Every situational advantage would go to your sexual sin. If, however, you chose to wrestle the same alligator in a tree every situational advantage would go to you. Confession is when you cease fighting sexual sin on its home turf.
“If you want to stay stuck in your sin, confess it only to God. If you want to overcome it, confess it to someone else (p. 37).” Steve Gallagher in At the Altar of Sexual Idolatry
Remember, sin is not tamed. It is either killed or it kills. There are no “pet sins.” It is usually at this stage in the process when we begin to doubt this truth. Sin has been weakened. Life is probably getting better. A sense of hope should be emerging. These are good things, unless they cause us to relax and cut our journey towards God’s freedom short. Do not be deceived; unless your sin is exposed not only to the light of God’s truth but also Christian community, it will regain its strength.
“It is possible that Christians may remain lonely in spite of daily worship together, prayer together, and all their community through service—that the final breakthrough to community does not occur precisely because they enjoy community with one another as pious believers, but not with one another as those lacking piety, as sinners. For the pious community permits no one to be a sinner. Hence all have to conceal their sins from themselves and from the community. We are not allowed to be sinners (p. 108).” Dietrich Bonhoeffer in Life Together
As we examine what confession should look like and what it requires of us, we will do so in three sections: (1) to whom to confess; (2) how to confess (more than disclosure); and (3) preparing for confession.
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