Forgiven & Cleansed!
"However You are just in all that has befallen us;
for You have dealt faithfully, but we have done
wickedly."
Nehemiah 9: 33
The Greek word for confess helps us understand confession of sin
and Nehemiah 9:33 gives us a good example. The Greek word for
confess is homologeo derived from two words that mean
“same”
and “speak.”
So homologeo means to “say the same thing as.” Therefore,
when
we confess our sins to God, we say the same thing about our sin that
God will say. We don’t defend, deny, or dissemble; we say what God
says. If God says our behavior was wrong, we also say it was
wrong.
One of the longest and beautiful prayers in Scripture is a
Levitical prayer of confession, spoken on behalf of all Israel
(Nehemiah 9:5-38). It was a confession of the rebellion
against God that led Israel into captivity in Babylon.
In 34 verses the prayer recounts the history of God’s faithfulness,
summarized in verse 33: You were righteous and right; we were
sinful and wrong. They even put the confession in writing and
signed it (verse 38)!
When we sin, we must say the same thing about our
sin that God says, knowing He will forgive and cleanse
us (1 John 1:9).
"The beginning of repentance
is the confession of guilt."
John Calvin
