What then shall we say to this? If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, will he not also give us all things with him? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies; who is to condemn? Is it Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised from the dead, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us? Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, “For thy sake we are being killed all the day long;
we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 8:31-39
Confession is one of the sacraments of the church, and perhaps it is the one we are least familiar with. I never heard of confession until I was in college and didn’t go for confession until I was 19. Confession is a very daunting prospect for many people. To go for confession is not something I particularly look forward to. I’m always glad when it’s over, but I am also always glad that I went. Imagine your life is like a book. And at the end of your life you take that book to God and He reads it and judges your life, and whether you go to heaven or hell based on the pages of that book. I’m sure there are pages that we all wish were not in our books, things we’ve done that we know were not right, or not Christian, or that we think might threaten our eternal standing. There are certainly things we’d probably rather not die with on our souls, or speak to God about at His awesome judgment seat. This is one of the reasons we have confession, to be able to purge all of the things we don’t want on our record out of our book of life. In John 10:10, Jesus says, “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” Guilt and shame steal from our abundance. The other reason we have confession is for spiritual direction. The sacrament of confession looks both backwards and forwards in our lives. It makes us look backward to address the sins we have committed. It makes us look forward as we develop a plan for repentance, for how to not repeat the same pattern of sin. It helps us also to examine the root causes of sin, which usually manifest in sins that would be eliminated if the roots could be destroyed.
In Romans 8:31, St. Paul writes If God is for us, who is against us? It is important here to note that God IS FOR US. He’s rooting for us. This is critical. God is like the teacher who wants each student to get an “A” in the class. He is very clear about the requirements to do well. The good grade is there for each of us, but we have to want it. This is one of the reasons why He instituted the sacrament of confession in John 20:22-23, when He told the disciples, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven. If you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” God, in His love and mercy, does not want us to walk through life weighed down by guilt and shame. He wants us to be able to correct our course (repentance) while also being able to be unburdened by past failure (forgiveness). Of course, forgiveness and repentance go hand in hand. We don’t come to confession to be absolved from sin with no plan for future effort. If we believe that God is for us, then we shouldn’t be afraid to come to confession and make it right with Him. Confession should be done ideally with a priest with whom we have some kind of relationship. This way, there is a sense of comfort and ability to be vulnerable, knowing that we will be embraced with kindness and not judgment. I find myself starting every confession with the words “This is a safe space, there is no judgment here,” in order to assure people of these two things and relax nervousness.
God is with us, to the point that He did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all. (Romans 8:32) Thus, God does not just say He is for us, but demonstrated that as well. In Romans 8:35, St. Paul poses the question Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? How about our own sinfulness? Even our own lack of faith? We can try to separate ourselves from the love of Christ by not loving Him. Yet, when we come back to Christ, we will find that He still loves us. The Prayer of Absolution, which ends each confession, says “Have no further anxiety about the things you have confessed, depart in peace. The grace of the Holy Spirit has loosed and forgiven your sins.” It reassures us of God’s love, when we have come back to Christ in humility and repentance. At the awesome judgment seat we will all stand and God will stand before us as judge. Those who are deemed worthy of Paradise will be placed there as an act of love and mercy. Those who are sent away to condemnation will not be sent there because God does not love them, but because they do not love God, they have never repented. In the moments that we sin, we are not loving God, but in repentance, love is restored. When we fail to repent, we are not loving God, and it is lack of repentance that leads to condemnation. This is why repentance and confession are crucial parts of the Christian life and our journey to salvation. So that we can eliminate the things that separate us from God, because nothing can separate God from us.
St. Paul concludes this chapter of his Epistle by writing For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. The only thing that can separate us from God is our choice to go away from Him. When we come to God in repentance, and with a contrite heart, nothing can separate us from Him.
No one is beyond the reach of God’s love. All that is needed to experience God’s love is to turn back to Him and accept it. It is we who turn our back on God when we sin. He never turns His back on us.
Lord, thank You for the gift of Your love, thank You that You are rooting for us, that You are rooting for me. Help me to have the desire to repent of sinful habits, to come to You in repentance and confession, confessing sin and working towards repentance. Help to lighten the load of sin and guilt that I carry and to replace that with abundance of mercy and grace that come from You, and an abundance of effort and discipline that must come from me. Help me to love You as You love me, and to be as committed to You, as You are to me. Amen.
If you haven’t been to confession ever, or it’s been a while, consider making an appointment soon!
