Sermon quotes on confession of sin
Kent Annan
Confession produces freedom and restores right relationships, which releases the river of God’s justice to roll down. Yes, that river is sometimes fed by streams of tears. Confession includes lament, which is a kind of longing for the wrong to be made right, even if it’s too late.
Taken from Slow Kingdom Coming: Practices for Doing Justice, Loving Mercy and Walking Humbly in the World by Kent Annan Copyright (c) 2016 by Kent Annan. Published by InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove, IL. www.ivpress.com
Anthony of Sourozh
Public confession requires several conditions. First, a person who has acted against the integrity of the Body, the integrity of its faith, must be prepared to expose himself because what matters is his salvation from death into life, the integrity of the Body to which he belongs and the honour of God. At the same time, what is needed is a community of people capable for the same reasons of receiving him and not rejecting him, able to redeem and renew him and not become estranged from him.
Coming Closer To Christ, Confession and Forgiveness, SPCK, 2009.
Augustine of Hippo
The confession of evil works is the first beginning of good works.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ.
The Cost of Discipleship
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
A man who confesses his sins in the presence of a brother knows that he is no longer alone with himself; he experiences the presence of God in the reality of the other person. As long as I am by myself in the confession of my sins, everything remains in the clear, but in the presence of a brother, the sin has to be brought into the light.
Life Together, Harper and Row, 1954, p. 20.
Frederick Buechner
To confess your sins to God is not to tell [God] anything [God] doesn’t already know. Until you confess them, however, they are the abyss between you. When you confess them, they become the bridge.
Annemarie S. Kidder
Locked into captivity by an airplane seat, a kindly disposition of keeping a friend company, or a telephone connection, we become ex officio confessors to those with troubled consciences and traces, or bold footprints, of guilt.
Making Confession, Hearing Confession: A History of the Cure of Souls. Liturgical Press, 2010.
G.K. Chesterton
The Bible tells us to love our neighbors, and also to love our enemies; probably because generally they are the same people.
Annemarie S. Kidder
The history of repentance is as old as humankind.
Making Confession, Hearing Confession: A History of the Cure of Souls. Liturgical Press, 2010.
Annemarie S.Kidder
Repentance resulting from self-examination is a lifelong endeavor, occasionally surfacing in the public or private act of confession as an act of “courageous memory” in recalling one’s past.
Making Confession, Hearing Confession: A History of the Cure of Souls. Liturgical Press, 2010.
Max Lucado
Confession is not telling God what he doesn’t know. Impossible. Confession is not complaining. If I merely recite my problems and rehash my woes, I’m whining. Confession is not blaming. Pointing fingers at others without pointing any at me feels good, but it doesn’t promote healing. Confession is so much more. Confession is a radical reliance on grace. A proclamation of our trust in God’s goodness. “What I did was bad,” we acknowledge, “but your grace is greater than my sin, so I confess it.”
Grace: More than we Deserve, Greater than we Imagine
Martin Luther
Therefore when I admonish you to confession I am admonishing you to be a Christian.
Large Catechism.
Erwin Lutzer
Forgiveness is always free. But that doesn’t mean that confession is always easy. Sometimes it is hard. Incredibly hard. It is painful to admit our sins and entrust ourselves to God’s care.
F.B. Meyer
Confess sin instantly.
Jen Pollock Michel
To confess isn’t to tell God anything he doesn’t know. It’s simply to agree with God on our wrong-doing and wrong-being: that we sin because we are sinners.
Taken from Teach us to Want: Longing, Ambition, and the Life of Faith by Jen Pollock Michel Copyright (c) 2014 by Jen Pollock Michel. Published by InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove, IL. www.ivpress.com
Jen Pollock Michel
Confession allows us to be the worst of sinners and yet remain confident that God is committed to us still. Holy desire is best paired with confession.
Taken from Teach us to Want: Longing, Ambition, and the Life of Faith by Jen Pollock Michel Copyright (c) 2014 by Jen Pollock Michel. Published by InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove, IL. www.ivpress.com
Cornelius Plantinga
[T]he sober truth is that without a full disclosure on sin, the gospel of grace becomes impertinent, unnecessary, and finally uninteresting.
Not the Way it’s Supposed to Be: A Breviary of Sin, 1995, p. 199.
Richard Sibbes
Confession is verbal humiliation.
A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 59.
Charles H. Spurgeon
It does not spoil your happiness to confess your sin. The unhappiness is in not making the confession.
Lee Strobel
Believing the right things about Jesus isn’t enough. You’re not adopted as God’s child until you confess and turn away from your wrongdoing and receive the freely offered gift of forgiveness and eternal life that Jesus purchased with his death on the cross. Until you do that, you’ll always be on the outside looking in.
Tish Harrison Warren
Confession reminds us that none of us gather for worship because we are “pretty good people.”
Taken from Liturgy of the Ordinary: Sacred Practices in Everyday Life by Tish Harrison Warren. Copyright (c) 2016 by Tish Harrison Warren.. Published by InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove, IL. www.ivpress.com
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