The very heart of the gospel is reconciliation. Paul said the whole point of the gospel is God reconciling the world to Himself, then giving us the message of reconciliation, and we reconcile people to Him (2 Cor. 5:19). In the context of that, we also reconcile with one another under His leadership, in His family, for His pleasure. In reconciliation, there is this simple act of confessing, which means admitting. You go to the brother, and you are admitting and apologizing for even a minor injustice that happened in the relationship. It is not just a confession to God. There is more than just confessing to God when you commit a private sin. There is confession to a brother of an injustice, even a minor injustice that happened in the relationship (James 5:16). The command to confess is confess to God, but there is also a horizontal dimension as well of confessing to the brother with whom you actually are in conflict. James is talking about the simple act of verbalizing your sin to your brother and apologizing. That means committing not to continue in that pattern of speech or behavior or in that attitude or mindset. This actually has a tremendous impact on the healing of the relationship.
Posted on: Fri, 02 May 2014 16:36:39 +0000
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