Falaite Fepueli 13, 2026
NOMIPA 5-6; SAAME 32:1-5
If you seek and celebrate God's forgiving grace, then your life will be shaped by humble, heartfelt confession.
Kapau ‘oku ke fekumi mo katoanga’i ‘a e kelesi fakamolemole ‘a e ‘Otua, te ke mo’ui’aki ‘a e fa’a vete ho’o angahala mei he loto mo’oni mo e angavaivai.
Luella and I had just been introduced to a famous pop singer and his wife. They looked so young to us. They knew we had been married for a long time, and they were newlyweds, so their question was predictable: "What would you say is the key to a good, long-term marriage?" People often ask me this question, and I always give the same practical, biblically supported answer: "Confession and forgiveness." This is true not only of marriage, but it is true also of any other relationship you will ever have. You cannot have a relationship of any quality or longevity between one sinner and another sinner in a fallen world without committing to the humble habit of confession.
If this is true of human relationships, how much more is it true of a relationship between a far-less-than-perfect human being and a perfectly holy God? How can you acknowledge God's holiness and your sin and not be committed to confession? How can you meditate on the impossibly high standards of God's law and not be committed to confession? How can you believe in the presence of real evil and a real evil one and not be committed to confession? How can you confess that your life is not your own and that God has taken you for his own possession and not be committed to confession? Personal holiness and humble confession cannot be separated. As long as God calls us to be holy as he is holy, and as long as sin still lives inside of us, confession must be an essential ingredient in the life of every child of God.
Confession is baked into God's law, as we see in Numbers 5-6. The holy God who gave these wise and holy laws is a God of glorious grace. He knows his people, he knows the condition of the world in which they live, he knows the temptations they will face, and he knows that they will fall short of his commands. So he calls them to a humble life of confession. You cannot grieve what you don't you cannot confess what you haven't grieved. So even this command see, and to confess has redeeming grace built into it. If God doesn't grant his children eyes to see their sin for what it is, then they will never confess it as they should.
These chapters are another reminder that the Old Testament system was not all law and no grace. Embedded in God's holy law are offers of his forgiving and restoring grace. Is it any wonder, then, that the biblical story of God and his people would march toward the coming of the ultimate gift and giver of grace, the Lord Jesus Christ?
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