StriperAddict
Senior Member
“If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we *confess* our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us.” 1 John 1:8-10
The word rendered “confess“ means to agree with God and in the passage it means to agree with God that we have sin. John never meant to convey that we need to call to mind each of our sins and verbalize them to God in order to be forgiven of them the same way a person hopes to be forgiven by enumerating his individual sins to a priest inside a confession booth.
The “confession” John has in mind is agreeing with God about sin and it happens once, whenever any person realizes they are a sinner in need of saviors forgiveness and this “confession“ is synonymous with a “once and lasting” salvation experience.
When John “the baptizer“ was water baptizing Israel, we are told many Jews came to him “confessing their sins,” Matthew 3:6. The same word is used in Matthew as in 1 John 1:9.
The “confessing” in Matthew was not masses of Jews coming to the baptizer, citing their individual sins as a means of forgiveness as Bible teachers today tell us it is.
In this passage Jews came to be water baptized by Gods prophet in “agreement with God,” acknowledging publicly that they were a wayward people who failed their national calling to be a blessing to the world and they needed God’s cleansing to come back to him.
If we are to believe each Israelite enumerated his personal sins to John as those who would have us believe every time we see the word “confess” in our bible it means to verbalize our sins in order to be forgiven, those many Jews would still be standing in the water two millennia later and John the baptizer’s beard would be wrapped around the earth a 1000 times!
John the apostle wrote this passage because there were infiltrators in the believer’s meetings who said, we have no sin. They did not agree with God regarding their sin. John wanted everyone believers and unbelievers reading his letter to know without any doubt you can’t have a savior who cleanses you from all unrighteousness if you are not first in agreement with God that you have sins to be cleansed from.
Thank God Christ died for all sins ONCE and we are forgiven all sins ONCE! See Ephesians 4:32 and Colossians 2:13.
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Eric Rukin
The word rendered “confess“ means to agree with God and in the passage it means to agree with God that we have sin. John never meant to convey that we need to call to mind each of our sins and verbalize them to God in order to be forgiven of them the same way a person hopes to be forgiven by enumerating his individual sins to a priest inside a confession booth.
The “confession” John has in mind is agreeing with God about sin and it happens once, whenever any person realizes they are a sinner in need of saviors forgiveness and this “confession“ is synonymous with a “once and lasting” salvation experience.
When John “the baptizer“ was water baptizing Israel, we are told many Jews came to him “confessing their sins,” Matthew 3:6. The same word is used in Matthew as in 1 John 1:9.
The “confessing” in Matthew was not masses of Jews coming to the baptizer, citing their individual sins as a means of forgiveness as Bible teachers today tell us it is.
In this passage Jews came to be water baptized by Gods prophet in “agreement with God,” acknowledging publicly that they were a wayward people who failed their national calling to be a blessing to the world and they needed God’s cleansing to come back to him.
If we are to believe each Israelite enumerated his personal sins to John as those who would have us believe every time we see the word “confess” in our bible it means to verbalize our sins in order to be forgiven, those many Jews would still be standing in the water two millennia later and John the baptizer’s beard would be wrapped around the earth a 1000 times!
John the apostle wrote this passage because there were infiltrators in the believer’s meetings who said, we have no sin. They did not agree with God regarding their sin. John wanted everyone believers and unbelievers reading his letter to know without any doubt you can’t have a savior who cleanses you from all unrighteousness if you are not first in agreement with God that you have sins to be cleansed from.
Thank God Christ died for all sins ONCE and we are forgiven all sins ONCE! See Ephesians 4:32 and Colossians 2:13.
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Eric Rukin
