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a necessary condition of forgiveness. But in how many cases is this confession altogether unreal! Many are prepared to say, "We are miserable transgressors; Lord, have mercy upon us." They are ready to class themselves with the multitude, and confess sin in common with others. There is, however, no real confession, in their case, of particular, definite sins. One says,

"No doubt I am a sinner; but I am not worse than my neighbours." Another says, "I am a good deal better than some that I know." Another, "I only wish that every one had as few faults as I have."

what sin really is.

Such persons have very little perception of They do not see how it affects their relation to God, how it excites His displeasure, how it defiles the whole man, how grievous, hateful, and vile it is. Their confession of it is of no worth in God's sight, and of no profit to themselves. What, then, is a true confession of sin?

1. Every sin must be confessed. There must be no reserve in our confession. No sin must be kept back. No hiding of any sin can be allowed. We must deal honestly with God. We must be open and straightforward, frank and unreserved, when we confess our sins to Him. We must tell Him all that is in our hearts. He knows our hearts. He searches us through and through. All things are naked and open before the eyes of Him to whom we must give account. "Be not deceived, God is not mocked." He would have us pour out our hearts before Him. He requires us to tell Him all, and to keep silence with regard to nothing. Doubtless we shall be unable, even when most desirous to tell Him every one of our sins, for some of these are hidden even from ourselves. We have secret sins;-not only sins which others know not and suspect not in us, but sins of which we ourselves are almost unconscious, which are scarcely perceived by us, and almost immediately forgotten. With regard to these, we can only throw ourselves on the mercy of Him who knoweth all, and pray, with the Psalmist," Cleanse thou me from secret sins." But this will not relieve us of our duty, which is, to search our hearts and lives, that we may discover and confess every sin. Here it is that many err. They will not subject themselves to a rigid self-scrutiny. They will not review their past life. They do not strive to recollect their sins. Strict selfexamination is distasteful to them. And so they never confess all their sins to God-even those that they might easily know.

Again, there are many who confess only some of their sins, and keep silence about the rest. They may even confess all

their sins, with the exception of one. They have some darling lust or pleasure, which they cannot find it in their hearts to forsake, and they keep silence about it. But even one sin remaining unconfessed will vitiate the whole confession,-will render it worthless in the sight of God, and profitless to the man himself. Such a one is dealing deceitfully with God-he is hiding what he most needs to confess. There is guile in his spirit.

2. No sin must be excused. Not only must every sin be confessed, but it must be confessed precisely as it is. Nothing must be added to it, nothing must be taken from it; there must be no false or affected exaggeration, and still less must there be any attempt at palliation. The sin confessed must not be explained away; it must be acknowledged in all its heinousness, in all its enormity. Here, too, many err. They may confess every sin which they know that they have committed, but they do not simply confess. They make excuses for themselves. They plead what they call extenuating circumstances. They palliate, tone down, and explain away. They are ashamed and afraid to confess their sins just as they are. They wish to make them out to be better than they seem. They are startled and affrighted when they contemplate them in all their native vileness and nakedness. They shrink from the thought of placing them before God without any explanation or apology. Their natural temperament, the place where they live, the tone of the society with which they mingle, the sort of training they have had, the kind of business which they transact, the various and strong temptations by which they are assailed, these, and such like, are put forward by them as palliations and excuses when they sin. Now, this is not to deal honestly, either with themselves or with God. To make excuses for ourselves, and on this account to refrain from confessing our sins in all their proper enormity, cannot but be displeasing to Him who searcheth the hearts, and trieth the reins of the children of men. He who excuses any sin is covering that sin, and is not free from guile.

3. Sin when confessed must be at once forsaken. No confession of sin can be real, where there is not a firm purpose of heart to renounce and abandon the sin confessed. Indeed, the confession of sin implies that it has been inwardly forsaken, that an inward separation from it has already taken place. As out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh, so the confession of sin with the mouth must spring from the renunciation of sin with the heart,-otherwise, the confession is a mockery

and pretence. But joined with this inward abandonment of sin, there must of necessity be the outward abandonment also. We must forsake our sins, both in disposition and in action. We must amend our ways and our doings. We must cease to do evil, and learn to do well. We must forsake sin and follow righteousness. We must cleanse ourselves from every defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. In our inward life of thought, and feeling, and will, and in our outward life of word and deed, every sin must be forsaken, otherwise our confession of it is not pleasing to God, and is of no advantage to ourselves.

These, then, are the elements which enter into every true confession of sin. Every sin must be confessed without any attempt at excuse, and must be both inwardly and outwardly forsaken. And so it is written, "He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy." And with this agrees the testimony of David, who says, "Blessed is the man whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile." Once David had guile in his spirit. He kept silence about his sins; he did not confess his transgressions; he hid his iniquity; he covered his sin. And verily he did not prosper. His experience was indeed bitter. He thus describes it:-"When I kept silence, my bones waxed old, through my roaring all the day long. For day and night Thy hand was heavy upon me: my moisture is turned into the drought of summer.' But, O what a blessed change took place whenever he ceased to cover his sins! He says, "[ acknowledged my sin unto Thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord; and Thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin." How true it is, that if we cover our sins, God will not cover them. them, to our utter confusion and shame. only if we do not cover them ourselves. He will absolve us; if we judge ourselves, He will not judge us; if we condemn ourselves, He will justify us. "If we confess our sins," He will "forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness." Moreover, let us not fail to observe, that the recognition and confession of which we speak must have reference, not to sinfulness in general, but to the individual sinful actions of which we are conscious to ourselves. We master sin, only by fixing our eyes keenly upon its particular outbursts, and

Nay, He will uncover God will cover our sins, If we accuse ourselves,

by warring against individual transgressions. If we are walking in the Light, we are striving against sin and overcoming it. Accordingly, only particular acts of sin committed by us can be in question here. And every one of these is detected and revealed by the Light in which we live, and move, and are. Every one of them must thereupon be confessed, that it may be taken away, and that we may continue in the Light. This kind of acknowledgment of sins cannot fail of its benefit; as a response to it, God, for the sake of his faithfulness and righteousness puts every one of our sins away.

II. Forgiveness of sins, and cleansing from unrighteousness.

God bestows this double blessing on those who confess their sins. Two benefits are spoken of; yet, though separable in idea, they are not divided in fact. One is never given without the other. They are inseparably united in their bestowal. Wherever God forgives sin, He likewise cleanses from unrighteousness. It is, indeed, morally impossible that it should be otherwise. What then are these benefits?

1. Forgiveness of sins. To understand what this is, we must consider what effects sin produces on those who commit it in their relations towards God. (a.) It calls forth the anger of God. "The anger of God is revealed from heaven against all impiety and unrighteousness of men." The wrath of God abides on him who sins. His anger is kindled against every soul of man that worketh evil. He is a consuming fire, burning with fierce indignation against all workers of iniquity. And it cannot be otherwise, so long as God is God and sin is sin. The sinner must necessarily be an object of God's displeasure. He is estranged from God's favour, and God's hostility is aroused against him. (b.) Sin not only calls forth the anger of Godit also condemns the sinner to the punishment of death. "The soul that sineth, it shall die." "The wages of sin is death." The judicial sentence of God dooms the transgressor to the infliction of death. The evil doer is accursed of God, and must be destroyed from His presence.

Now, the forgiveness of sins is just the reversal, the undoing of all this. When a man's sins are forgiven, God ceases to be angry with him; he is no longer an object of God's displeasure. Moreover, the sentence of death under which he lay is repealed; he is no longer accursed; he ceases to be condemned. He is now absolved, acquitted, justified. He is cleared of every charge.

Sin is no longer imputed to him. He now sustains to God the relation of one who has never sinned at all,-yea, has ever done the will of God and fulfilled all righteousness. His sins will never be mentioned unto him; they are clean gone, blotted out from the book of God's remembrance, done away for ever. God speaks of Himself as having forgotten them. "I will be merciful to their unrighteousnesses; their sins and iniquities I will remember no more." When I forgive my brother, I forget the wrong or injury he has done me; I banish from my mind all recollection that he has wronged or injured me at all; I feel and act towards him, as if he had never tresspassed against me. I do all this, if my forgiveness is real; and in doing it, I am only an imitator of God, who has cast all our sins behind His back. As a cloud vanishes from the face of the sky and leaves no trace of its presence, so it is with our sins when they are forgiven. "I have blotted out as a thick cloud thy transgressions, and as a cloud thy sins; return unto Me, for I have redeemed thee." Our sins, if sought for, cannot be found. They have been cast into

the depths of the sea. God, in His merciful love, hath removed them from us, as far as the east is from the west.

2. Cleansing from unrighteousness is the second benefit which God bestows on those who confess their sins. What is unrighteousness? It is the opposite of righteousness. And what is righteousness? It is the determination of the conduct in accordance with the will of God. It is the conformity of the inner and the outer life, with the eternal and unchangeable law of right,—that is, with the moral perfection of God Himself. And all sin is unrighteousness,-i.e., the determination of the conduct in antagonism to the will of God; it is the violation of the Divine law of righteousness. Every sin, then, being unrighteousness, defiles. It pollutes the mind and heart; it leaves a stain upon the soul; it renders the whole man unclean; it makes the inward and outward man impure and foul in the sight of God. Now, when we confess it to God, it is not only forgiven, it is also cleansed away. It not only ceases to condemn, it likewise ceases to defile. Its stain is washed out, its filthiness is removed. We are no longer polluted and unclean. In mind and conscience, in heart and life, in disposition and action, we are purified and clean. And this is God's doing. It is the operation of His grace. He not only places us in a right relation to Himself; He also makes us like Himself. He cleanses us without and within. He makes us righteous even as He is righteous. Every unrighteousness is

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