Dare to Be a Sinner in 2007

Keeping on the theme of New Year's Resolutions, here's another one that might be worth trying:

Dare to be a sinner in 2007.

For those of you who are mortally offended that a pastor would write such a thing, here is a link to my presbytery's website where you can find all the contract addresses you need to institute disciplinary proceedings against me. 

But, for those of you who are intrigued by the comment, I'll admit that I stole it from Dietrich Bonhoeffer's book Life Together.  His final chapter on "Confession and Communion" begins this way:

"Confess your faults one to another"  (Jas. 5:16).   He who is alone with his sin is utterly alone.  It may be that Christians, notwithstanding corporate worship, common prayer, and all their fellowship in service, may still be left to their loneliness.  The final break-through to fellowship does not occur, because, though they have fellowship with one another as believers and devout people, they do not have fellowship as the undevout, as sinners.  This pious fellowship permits no one to be a sinner.  So everybody must conceal his sin from himself and the fellowship.  We dare not be sinners.  Many Christians are unthinkably horrified when a real sinner is suddenly discovered among the righteous.  so we remain alone with our sin, living in lies and hypocrisy.  The fact is that we are sinners!

But it is the grace of the Gospel, which is so hard for the pious to understand, that it confronts us with the truth and says: You are a sinner, a great, desperate sinner; now come as the sinner that you are, to God who loves you.  He wants you as you are; He does not want anything from you, a sacrifice, a work; He wants you alone.  "My son, give me thine heart" (Prov. 23:26).  God has come to you to save the sinner.  Be glad!  This message is liberation through truth.  You can hide nothing from God.  The mask you wear before men will do you no good before Him.  He wants to see you as you are, He wants to be gracious to you. You do not have to on lying to yourself and your brothers, as if you were without sin; you can dare to be a sinner.  Thank God for that; He loves the sinner but He hates sin.

Those words are good news for me!  They also show a way forward in the midst of our fractured churches and other Christian fellowships - they remind us that our fellowship is not based on a shared holiness, rather on shared depravity and shared reception of grace.

Comments

[Bryan]

Wow! That was absolutely what I needed right now, both personally and to share with others. I am so buying that book. Thank you for posting it!

[Tim]

Dare to be a sinner in 2007! I love it--too bad that most Christians don't think they are sinners. Pity the moralists.
Great recommendation of Bonhoeffer's book...may I also recommenend a more current book called "Confessions of a Pastor" by Craig Groeschel. This book is sure to send any moralist into conniptions--"this guy can't be a pastor!" So, he struggles with sin? He's just like the rest of us! How refreshing to read such honesty.

http://www.amazon.com/Confessions-Pastor-Adventures-Dropping-Getting/dp/1590527208/sr=8-1/qid=1167709079/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-4429473-3764668?ie=UTF8&s=books

[connie]

THIS is the sort of New Year "resolution" thinking I can appreciate. Thanks for this post.

I'm still basking in the fellowship we had New Year's Eve with several close Xian friends. As part of our "fellowship" together we prayed together and for each other as we shared specifically how we desired to grow in obedience forsaking particular sin(s), and growing in Godly wisdom. The time was so rich we completely ignored the traditional midnight hour celebration!

[David Wayne]

Bryan, Tim and Connie - many thanks for the comments and encouragement.

Tim - I've heard of the book, but don't know much about it - I'll check it out. I hope we are getting to a point where it is now safe for pastors to be human.

[Drew I.]

Great post.

I had a Christian friend at work that I always felt like I had to act "sinless" around. Our friendship was very superficial. In fact, I withheld any non-expletive expressions of frustration like "darn" when I was around him to conform to his belief that Christians should never be angry or sorrowful. He acted as though we must always be overflowing with perpetual joy. Yet his brand of joy was so false and hollow.

We Christians ought to be real. Not just confessing that we are sinners, but confessing that we are NOT impervious to pain. Jesus shares are burdens, but we still feel them. We still hurt, we still cry. Just because we have the Holy Spirit does not mean we are no longer human.

True joy comes not by pretending sin, grief, pain, and fear are absent. But joy comes when these things are faced and conquered with God's help.

[Keith Schooley]

Fantastic post, David. I'm firmly convinced that the major problem with the Church today is that we've lost our sense of being forgiven sinners. Either we don't think sin is any big deal, so neither is forgiveness, or we define sin as those things that only apply to outsiders, so then forgiveness isn't something that applies to us. It's the amazing power of knowing yourself to be deeply in need of God's grace, and the wonder of having received it, that gives us the power to be authentic with one another and to carry the light to others. I had another take on this same issue in Why Evangelical Christians can't confess sin.

[Randy Hurst (Prophet R)]

Dare accepted. Our good Lord seems to keep me traveling in the first class humility section on AIRLIFE. In fact, I saw Paul picking at his thorn in the flesh in the seat in front of me.

Great points made ya'll.

[john toner]

Wow - that's incredible. I'm almost ready to come join your church (I only live 20 minutes away) but then I realized - oops, I'm already a pastor in another church!

Thanks for knocking me off my horse!

[Jimmmaaa]

Very good. It reminds of the verse in Mark about Jesus not coming for the healthy, but the sick, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners." I think it is always easier to appear like you have it all together....even if you don't