Do I need to confess my sin in person?

In the first session or two of counseling I usually give watching my video, “How To Confess Your Sin,” as homework. I also tell the folks that they need to do what I say to do in the video, which is to confess their sin to God and to anyone they have sinned against.

If I suspect that there is a lot of sin, I’ll tell them to confess to God this week and think about sins they will need to confess to others. We’ll talk about those when they come back next week. So, they go off to do their homework, all excited to be moving forward with their relationship with God.

The next week they come back with a new spring in their step. Often, they have also confessed to people they have sinned against, but there is one particular situation where they wonder about going to the person to confess.

I thought it might be helpful here to tell give a few of these situations and what I tell folks.

“The person I sinned against was screaming at me when struck him with a stick. I don’t like him and think talking with him would likely just bring us back to where we were before.”

My answer: If you are likely to fall back into old habits, simply write your “friend” a letter explaining what you did, ask him to forgive you and move on. Be specific about your sin, what you did, why you did it, and that it was sin and you’re very sorry for having done it. Be careful not to blame him for your sinful thoughts or actions. Just confess what you did. Be sure to ask for forgiveness.

Because confession of sin is about restoring relationship or perhaps creating a relationship, pray for your friend, asking that God would open his heart to the Gospel and that your relationship with him might be restored/created in Christ. 

“The person I sinned against is a mean nasty ugly person and very dangerous to me. My sin had to do with a sinful reaction on my part, but it was precipitated by my being dangerous in the situation. I’m afraid for my safety if I were to go back and try to confess my sin.”

My answer: In the previous situation, you were in danger of committing the same sin again. In this situation, you are afraid that the person you sinned against will be dangerous to you. Again, I suggest that you write them a letter, explaining what you did/thought/felt that was sinful and ask them to forgive you. Don’t blame them for your sin, just tell them about your sin and about God’s forgiveness. Call it sin and use the word, forgive.

“The person I sinned against lives in another city. Do I need to drive to them and confess my sin? There isn’t any danger and I’m pretty sure I won’t sin like that again, but it’s really embarrassing to see them and to remember what I did.”

My answer: It depends. If you sinned against them 10 years ago and you’ve moved in the meantime and they may have also moved, then just write them a letter along the lines that I’ve outlined above.

On the other hand, is the reason you’re asking is because you’re embarrassed rather than because you’re concerned about the distance? If so, you get to drive back and confess the sin in person.

Here’s the thing, confession of sin is not a box to check kind of thing. It is a restoration of fellowship with God and the body of Christ kind of thing. The point is not your embarrassment, it is the health of the body. Yes, you sinned. You embarrassed yourself when you sinned, and it will be humbling to confess it to the person you sinned against. But the body needs this relationship restored and you need to humble yourself and make that happen (at least as far as you’re concerned).

Part of this is that confessing sin, especially when it is humbling, helps ensure that you won’t do that particular sin again. So, the good thing about sinning, the only good things about it is that when you restore the relationship, you learn humility in a way you wouldn’t have otherwise.

Another reason it is important to confess sin in person, is that when you confess, ask for forgiveness and it is granted, hugs can happen. When you own your sinfulness and the other person acknowledges your sinfulness and pledges to you that they will not remember your sin ever again, you can have real palpable fellowship after that.

If you only send a letter, especially if it is something you’re doing because someone told you to do it, it’s likely that if you were to run into the person again, you would feel like things still weren’t right. This would be because they aren’t right. Writing a letter, when you could have gone in person isn’t really owning your sin and therefore isn’t really confessing the sin (sinning is about pride and not confessing in person is about pride).

So, if there isn’t any danger and you are close enough to do it, you get to confess your sin in person.

Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay