The Heavyweight Emotion

Frank Warren was one of the volunteers at a suicide prevention hotline in the year 2004. And in call after call that year as a volunteer, he listened to dozens and dozens of people who called up desperate, hopeless, ready to take their own lives. And he found that much of the time those conversations went exactly the same direction. The people on the other end of the line would reveal to him, a total stranger, their secrets. Secrets that they had never admitted to anybody else. And often, in fact most of the time, once they had unburdened themselves of their secret, they were no longer suicidal. They felt much better.

And so Frank started to think, what if there was a way that people could simply share their secrets anonymously before they got to the point where they were willing to take their own lives? And Frank started something that he calls post-secret. He said on his blog, "If you have a secret that haunts you, I want to encourage you to make it into a homemade postcard, make it into an arts and crafts project, and then mail it in." And then he said, "I will post them all anonymously on my blog, and that is going to raise funds for organizations that focus on suicide prevention."

Well, Frank came up with this idea in 2004 and wondered if anybody would send in any cards because it was kind of a strange idea. So far over one million people have sent in their secrets on handmade postcards. When I was in San Diego just a couple of months ago, I went to a museum exhibit of hundreds of these postcards that he has received, and I took some pictures of them. Would you like to see them? On some of these postcards, they confessed to some really, really heavy sins that they've been feeling guilty about, but others are almost humorous. And yet these are secrets that have haunted these people.

For example, "Grandma sent you a card too. I just made it look like she forgot about you so I could have the money inside." How about this one? "I work in a government office, and when I get work I don't want to do, I shred it." Show of hands how many of you are thinking, "Just as I suspect it. Can I see that?" I'm a teacher. I made a student repeat a grade so that I could flirt with his father for one more year. And how many of you are going, "That's why I was held back. There was no other clear reason. I hate doing dishes so much that sometimes I just throw them in the garbage and buy new ones." This year for Valentine's Day, I'm giving my sweetheart a box of chocolate that I bought on clearance last year. I think that's kind of clever. I work at the Apple Store and judge you by which color iPod you pick. I knew it. And look at this last one. I just want to find someone who will still love me after I've shared all of my secrets.

Well, good morning and happy new year. My name's René. I'm one of the pastors here. Let's talk about secrets today. Grab the message notes that look like this. They're in the bulletins that I hope you received when you came in. These will help you follow along with the message. Last weekend, we started our new series for the new year, Habits of the Heart. That's based on the book, Enemies of the Heart by Andy Stanley. We have copies of this at our little bookstore in the lobby. If you want to study along with us, maybe use it in a small group. You can do it as kind of a book club. In fact, does anybody want a copy of this right now that you don't have? Okay, I'm just going to give you a copy because it's kind of like Oprah. You get a copy, but only she gets one and not every single person here.

Now, last weekend, by the way, did Adrian just do a phenomenal job kicking this off last weekend? I love that guy. Quick review. He talked about how millions of Americans make New Year's resolutions this time of year, but 45% of those who make resolutions have broken them by the end of this month, and the vast majority of us give up before the end of April. The question is, why is change changing habits so hard? Well, part of the reason is that we tend to focus on external symptoms instead of going to deeper root causes. Adrian pointed out this wonderful verse from Jesus. He said, "For out of the," what? "Out of the heart come evil thoughts and murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander, et cetera." Look at what Solomon said. Let me hear you. "Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it."

So you and I, according to the Bible, need to get down into our hearts and find out the root of our behavior in order to change our habits for the better. So each week in this series, we're going to be talking about a heart habit that is going to help you have a great New Year and a great life, how to guard your heart. Now guarding your heart involves cleaning out toxins in your heart as well as getting good stuff in, and one of the biggest toxins in my heart is guilt. Guilt, that emotion that we have when we feel we've done something wrong. Now there's two kinds of guilt. There's false guilt, feeling guilty for some, maybe some legalistic reason, and you're feeling guilty about something that really you shouldn't feel guilty about, or maybe you feel guilty because somebody else is making you feel guilty. That's false guilt. We're not going to talk about that today. Today we're talking about actual guilt. When you feel guilty because you are guilty and you have a secret.

And whenever that happens, what we try to do, we feel guilty. Most of us do the same thing. We stuff it down, right? We keep it a secret like those million postcard writers. And then once in a while it comes looming back up, something triggers that memory, and when that guilty feeling starts, we tend to retreat to the same narrative. Whether our narrative is some kind of rationalization or denial. It wasn't just me, a lot of other people were doing it. I was young, I didn't know anybody, but my whole family is like that, so it's all genetic. It was a long time ago, I was lonely, I was being mistreated. That's called denial. Or we go the other direction, "You're right! I'm so stupid, I'm so stupid, I'm so stupid, I don't deserve to live, I'm such a fraud!" Allowing myself to be defined by the thing I feel guilty about. And neither one of those reactions does any good.

In fact, both denying guilt or being defined by guilt empowers guilt. Both denying guilt and allowing myself to be defined by whatever I'm guilty about, it empowers guilt to the point that guilt becomes the boss of you. It controls you. I call guilt the heavyweight emotion because we feel it as a weight that makes us burdened in so many ways. You say, "What are you talking about? Guilt controls you." It can control you emotionally, personally, relationally, professionally, spiritually, behaviorally. For example, emotionally, guilt makes you feel insecure because you're always worried, "If they really knew the truth about me, they wouldn't like me." Personally, guilt makes me bench myself from blessings, from ministry opportunities, from joy, because I think I'm not worthy to experience joy and fruitfulness in my life.

Relationally, guilt damages your relationship in so many ways it can cause you to spoil people, indulge people, not call people on bad behavior. Some of your parents, you are either over strict or over permissive because you feel guilty about something. Guilt evolves into anger, where subconsciously you think, "I didn't live up to my expectations. Now no one's going to live up to my expectations." You're inexplicably always angry at everybody. I've noticed that guilty people rarely make the connection between their guilt and their anger. Rarely are they able to see the source of their fury, but it's there. Behaviorally, many of your self-destructive behaviors are because you feel so guilty you feel like, "I don't deserve to live a clean and sober and joyful life." Or you're trying to stuff down that emotion of guilt by self-medicating and just making yourself forget about everything in your past.

And that's the problem. Guilt spiritually, guilt keeps you stuck in your past because it replays in your mind over and over and over the things you wish you could change but you're unable to change because you can't go into the past. You can't ever undo. You can't ever unsay. You can't ever be un-unfaithful or un-drink too much. Unless somebody invents a time machine one day, you can't do anything about that. And so we often say to ourselves things like, "Well, I guess I just got to forget about it and move on." Except you can't really do that. And you know why? Your past isn't designed to be left alone. Your past is part of your story that you need to deal with in a healthy way. And if you don't resolve it in a healthy way, it travels with you and has all kinds of those negative effects I just talked about.

Now the good news is this. Now that I've told you all the bad news and you're going, "Why don't I come to church today?" Here's the good news. You don't have to be defined by your past. And you don't have to deny your past. There is a third option that God gives. And someone who experienced this third option in ways we may not even be able to imagine put it into words best. I'm going to show you the words of a man who probably carried more guilt and more regret than you will ever carry, maybe than all of us in this whole room combined. This is a man whose life experience left him so broken and so ashamed and so guilty that at first he tried everything he could do to just cover up his sin. And he experienced all of those negative effects I just talked about.

The person I'm referring to is King David of the Bible. If you were here with us this fall during our study on David's life, you know all of the terrible things that he did in his life. Well one day he wrote a song designed to be part of congregational worship. So this is very public. And he says, "When I refused to confess my sin, my body wasted away and I groaned all day long. He was being killed by his secrets. Finally I confessed all my sins to you, to God, and stopped trying to hide my guilt. I said to myself, 'I will confess my rebellion to the Lord and you forgave me.'" And you know what? King David went on to write more of the Bible, just in terms of page count, than any other single author. That means your worst moments ever can become a pivot point for you to move in God's direction and have a wonderful effective life.

How? How do I remove the toxin of guilt from my heart? The heart habit of confession. Confession means bringing out the secret. It's what those people were doing with those postcards. It means saying, "This is what I did and it's been haunting me and it was wrong and I know it." This is what experts in behavioral change call a keystone habit, a keystone habit, because it's foundational to change in your life. Every single expert on changing human behavior talks about confession. They might talk about it in other words. They might say transparency. They might say accountability. But the Bible has a word for it, confession.

Twelve step groups phrase it this way. I admit to God, to myself, and to at least one other person the exact nature of my wrongs. That's a keystone. It's a foundation to really changing and growing. Now there's two dimensions to confession in the Bible. First I confess to God like David does in several Psalms he wrote. I already read you part of Psalm 32. Here's Psalm 38. My guilt has overwhelmed me like a burden too heavy to bear, but I confess my sins. I'm deeply sorry for what I have done. I confess my sin to God. Now there is a common way that this is misunderstood. When I was a teenager I misunderstood this whole idea of confession to God.

My favorite Bible verse, I still love this Bible verse, was 1 John 1:9 in the King James Version. If I confess my sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. I still know it by heart. But the way I thought of confessing my sin to God, the way I envisioned it, and also the way Andy Stanley in his book describes the way he thought of it, so this must be pretty common, is this. I feel bad inside because I know I sinned in some way or another something I said, something I did, some act I did, something I thought was a sin and I feel terrible about it. So I confess my sin to God and I feel better.

The idea was kind of like this. My soul is like a bucket. And every time I sin, water goes into this bucket. The sin represents, is represented by the water. And it's heavy. So my soul is weighted down by the weight of my guilt. So every night what I did was I confessed my sin to God, so far so good. But the way I envisioned it was I'm pouring out the weight of my sin into God, kind of like I'm emptying my sin bucket. And it's wonderful because now I feel so light and free and my conscience is cleansed. And that's wonderful. The problem was the next day I would often just sin again the exact same way. Why? Because I knew at the end of the day I could just pour the sin out of my sin bucket into God and then I'd be light and breezy and wouldn't be burdened by the weight of sin again.

In other words, my habit of confession didn't really lead to personal change. Thinking of personal confession that way just enabled me to continue in the cycle of sin confession, sin confession, sin confession and I never really changed in my life. But that is not the way the Bible talks about confession. The purpose of confession is not just conscience relief. The purpose of confession is growth. It's not just feeling better about yourself. It's transformation. And this is why the Bible talks about not just confessing sins to God, but it says also confess to others.

Now stay on page one for just a second because I want to talk about this verse, James 5:16. Real key verse in the Bible. Confess your sins, in fact let's read this out loud together. Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. Confession is about bringing a real healing. Now stay on page one for just a second because this is such an under emphasized part of the Christian life these days. In researching these messages I went online and I looked up all the books I could find, all the Christian books, all of the secular books that I could find on the topic of forgiveness. And there are dozens, in fact I found about a hundred books that are on the Amazon best seller chart right now on forgiveness. And every single one of those books, every last one was all about how to forgive other people who have hurt you.

You know how many books I found about how to ask forgiveness of people that you have hurt? Zero. I thought to myself mathematically shouldn't it be at least 50/50? You know like 50% I'm going to forgive people who have hurt me but 50% I'm going to apologize to people I've hurt. No, I thought apparently there's one person out there in the world harming all the rest of us poor victims. And this is such a lopsided emphasis. I went back during my research and I thought what did the early Christians think about confession? And I looked at the earliest possible Christian writings just to compare them to all the books that are in our bookstores now on forgiveness. So the earliest two Christian writings that are not included in the Bible are the Didache and the Epistle of Barnabas. These were both written within 100 years, less than 100 years after Christ. So they're very, very early. And both of them talk a ton about confession.

In fact, they both say that when Christians are thinking about going to worship, pardon me, on Sunday morning, before they go they should confess their sins to God and if they've offended somebody else they should go and confess their sin to that person. Both of them say that. And then they say for this is the way. This is the way. This is like what Christians do. This is how Christians roll. How have we completely lost that emphasis? The truth is for all of us we're not just victims. We are also culprits. And this is where the power of confession comes in.

So how do you do it? Page two. How do you develop the healthy heart habit of confession? There's four components to it. Number one, take a personal inventory. In 12-step groups they call this taking a fearless moral inventory with rigorous honesty. And you need God's help or you end up justifying so much of your bad behavior. Like David again said, "Search me, O God. Know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts." You get alone with God by yourself and you prayerfully ask deep down what are the secrets in my past that I still feel guilt over and what are the faults in my character now that need changing. And this isn't just once, this is a regular heart habit.

I would suggest starting every day with gratitude but ending every day with this kind of introspection because it keeps your soul in tune. The point is if I want to stop defeating myself I've got to stop deceiving myself. With rigorous honesty look at where I still need to grow. Now maybe you say, "René, I don't have to do this because I've done nothing wrong lately." Figured you'd say that so I provided a handy list for you. Some inventory questions there in your notes. Simply ask God, "Where do I need to grow in these areas?" You know it's not just vaguely saying, "God, you know, I'm a sinner. We've all blown it in life." Everybody knows that. Be specific. This helps you face reality and it helps you actually grow. But this is not about staying there, wallowing in guilt.

Quickly go to number two, accept God's forgiveness. See God already forgives you in Christ. You know what I used to do when I confessed my sins? You don't have to do this. You don't have to beg God to forgive you. So many of my prayers, especially when I was younger, was, "Oh God, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry. Please forgive me," but you don't have to beg. And you don't have to bargain. I used to say, "God, if you'll just forgive me, I'll never do it again." If that is an area of weakness for you, you're probably just kidding yourself. You don't have to beg. You don't have to bargain. The Bible says you just have to believe this. The Bible says, "For everyone has sinned." We all fall short of God's glorious standard. Everyone pastors too, this message applies to me just as much as it does to anybody here. Yet God in His grace freely, you don't have to earn it, you can't work for it, you don't have to beg or bargain for it, makes us right in His sight.

Now think of what that means, right in His sight. Excuse me, that means when God looks at you regarding whatever you feel guilty about, He is saying, "When I see you, I don't see that." Isn't that beautiful? Isn't that freeing? But how is this possible? It came at a price. It says He did this through Jesus Christ when He freed us from the penalty of our sin. Ephesians 3:23–24, this is why Jesus died on the cross, to take the penalty for that sin, that one, that still comes back to haunt you sometimes. He says, "No, you don't understand. When I see you, I don't see that anymore because I've washed that away because of what Jesus Christ did on the cross."

You know the effects of just these first two steps? First of all, you become so much more grateful. I've noticed that when I have, as I did this morning, because I knew what I was going to be preaching about, I didn't want to be a hypocrite, so I had a time of confession before God, and when I was singing, you know, even that first song, "This is amazing grace," that you would take my place, and I find I get choked up, and like I can't hardly sing, and my voice is cracking, and tears are coming down my face because I have just been aware of how much I have to be forgiven of, and then I am forgiven, and it empowers your gratitude and your worship, and something else happens, you become less judgmental.

Because how can I judge anybody else when I've just made myself aware of all the ways that I need to be forgiven by God and am forgiven by God? You want to be more grateful and less judgmental in your life, would you like to get there? Well confession is a key. You accept God's forgiveness. You really dwell in that. You soak in that, and then you're in a very healthy place for step three, admit my faults to others. Because now I'm not looking for their forgiveness, I'm already forgiven by God, but I'm admitting my faults to others because that's a key to growth.

Now others does not mean any random person. Getting back to James 5:16, after he says, "Confess your sins to each other," he says, "The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and produces wonderful results." A righteous person, that means someone who can keep a confidence, you know, who's not a gossip, someone who's mature enough not to be shocked. "What?" Somebody knows the Lord well enough so that they can reflect his grace to you. Now some of you are going, "Yeah, where can I find somebody like that?" Well here's a suggestion. Every single service after we're done, there's Stephen ministers just lining the front of the stage, and they go through months of training to learn how to be this kind of a righteous person to whom you can reveal any kind of a secret, and they can pray for you.

Well here's another suggestion. Any one of our 12-step groups, I put info about them on the back of your notes. This week I sat down with a woman from TLC who wanted to share her 12-step story with me. She was, at is, very involved in women's Bible studies, a youth group sponsor, hosting small groups, grew up in a Christian home, went to Biola University, a Christian college down in the south, just kind of the standard classic church-going mom of four kids. But eight months ago she came to the realization she is an alcoholic. And her alcoholism had contributed to some other very destructive choices in her life that no one knew about. And she didn't know what to do with all these secrets.

And then she remembered kind of vaguely hearing here about the Christian 12-step group that meets here on Monday nights. She went for the first time eight months ago, and she found what they call a sponsor, a mature Christian woman to whom she revealed all those secrets. And she said the first thing that woman told her was, "You know I love you, and God loves you." This week if you subscribe to our daily video Devos, you're going to see part of my conversation with this woman. We go into more depth there. And listen to this, she told me, "René, I didn't realize all the negative effects of bottling up these secrets." She said, "I was full of anxiety, full of self-doubt, but the moment I began the process of confession, those negative symptoms began to fade. Because as they say, I am only as sick as my secrets."

When you hide a secret, it can seem worse than it really is, but when you risk honesty, which is one mature person, all of a sudden it's much more manageable. You realize everybody has problems. You realize you're not alone. You realize there's hope. You admit it to one other person. And then you also need to consider going to those you've hurt. Jesus said, "Therefore, if you're offering your gift at the altar, and there remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar." Now, he's talking about the temple in those days. We don't have that anymore, but this principle applies to fellowshipping in church. He says, "First, go and be reconciled to them, and then come and offer your gift."

I'll tell you a story. When our youngest, our oldest son, Jonathan, rather, was just about three and a half years old, I had to do this with him for the very first time. I had yelled at him for really no reason at all. Something else was bothering me, and I lost my temper with him, and his lower lip trembled, and he started to cry, and he ran off to his room where he was just crying. And I thought, "What have I done?" And so I went in, and I sat down, and I put his arm around him, and I said, "I have to say, I am really sorry for yelling at you. Will you please forgive me?" And at three and a half years old, I'll never forget it, he gave me a hug, and he said, "Yes, Daddy." And then he said, "You know, Daddy, I get like that sometimes, too. And often when I do, it's because I need a nap. Daddy, maybe you just need to take a nap." And I said, "I think I do." And we both ended up taking a nap this afternoon, and that was wonderful. Those -- that's such a beautiful memory. Those are such beautiful moments.

And let me tell you, that's not the last time I've had to apologize to Jonathan or Elizabeth or David or to my wife, Lori. And every time we have a conversation like that, we are knitted closer together. Friendship is rekindled. Now, of course, your main goal isn't to make friends through this, because you may be disappointed by somebody's response, but that's often a side benefit. Your main goal is simply obedience to God. Friendship is an ancient part, a necessary part of Christian discipleship. And finally, that gets us to point four, make amends where possible.

What's making amends or restitution? It's buying a friend a book after you borrowed the book and lost it. And I'm speaking from personal experience here more than once. Making amends is paying for the company tools that somehow find their way into your garage or the company software that somehow found its way onto your laptop. Making amends is asking your spouse for forgiveness for the way you treated them. Now, you might be going, "Man, I'm willing to do everything up to this point, confess my sins to God and find a mature person that I can talk to, but this going to somebody I've heard, this is hard. I confess my sins already to these people and to God. Isn't that enough?"

Look at what God says in Isaiah 58, specifically in this case to the aristocrats of Jerusalem. You humble yourselves by going through the motions of penance, bowing your heads like reeds bending in the wind. Do you really think this will please the Lord? No, this is the kind of fasting I want. Free those who are wrongly imprisoned. Lighten the burden of those who work for you. Let the oppressed go free and remove the chains that bind people. Let me tell you what Christianity is not based on these verses. Christianity is not, "I hurt somebody and I confess that to God and now it's all resolved." Christianity is, "I hurt you. I know I have received God's forgiveness. And now I'm going to make restitution to you as best I can." It says, "Remove the chains that bind people."

Often as a pastor I've heard adult children say to me things like, "If only my dad or if only my mom would say these words, I'm sorry, please forgive me, but they never have." And these adult children are in chains. You might be able to set someone free with an apology. Now I realize this runs counter to every instinct. I love the old Calvin and Hobbes comics. Is anybody else a Calvin and Hobbes fan here by the way? This is a great one. Calvin says, "I feel bad that I called Susie names and hurt her feelings. I'm sorry I did it." And Hobbes says, "Well maybe you should apologize to her." And Calvin says, "I keep hoping there's a less obvious solution." But there's not. So let me ask you a question. Who is waiting for you to make the first move? Who is still bearing the shrapnel of something you did or said or didn't do and they're hoping that you'll say something? Is your pride keeping you from making that first move or fear?

Now before we close, I have to say there are three crucial questions about asking somebody else for forgiveness on page three of your notes. First, is this the right time? The Bible says, "For there is a proper time and procedure for every matter." Watch this. "Though a person may be weighed down by misery." Your misery is no reason to drop a bomb on somebody, not just when they're running out the door, when they're falling asleep. "By the way, I've got some stuff to deal with." Boom. You do it when the timing is best for them, not for you. Second, do I have the right attitude? The Bible says, "Speak the truth in love." Don't be manipulative. Don't be passive aggressive about it. And then the third question, maybe the most important, is this wise? The Bible says, "Thoughtless words can wound as deeply as any sword, but wisely spoken words can heal." Be careful about this.

Somebody came up to me one time and said, "I'm going to have to confess something to you that's been on my heart." Really what? "Yeah, for years I really hated you, just hated you. I hated your guts, but I think I'm over it now." And I said, "Well, thanks for sharing." And I said, "Is there something that I did I want to know? Is there something I should be apologizing for?" They go, "No, it was just like, just you, like the way you stand and the way you talk. But I think I'm past it now. Now every time I see this person, I want to like stand a different way and talk a different way so that they don't hate me, you know? You got to ask yourself, "Is it wise? Does it make sense for me to ask forgiveness for this thing?" Right?

So there's one more thing I want to emphasize before we close. These steps are not about earning forgiveness from God. Confession is not about doing penance. Do you get that? It's not, "God, look how I'm punishing myself by doing the work of fearless moral inventory. And now look how I'm humiliating myself with confession to atone for my sin." No, Jesus already atoned for your sin on the cross. He already forgave you when you trusted Him for the very first time. Remember this verse, "Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." Now means now. The moment you receive Christ. Isn't that beautiful?

You remember we started with those postcard secrets. One said, "I want to find someone who will still love me after I've shared all of my secrets." Well, God will always love you. You don't ever need to worry about that. You don't confess to earn God's forgiveness. He already knows your secret anyway. He's already forgiven you by Christ's work on the cross completely and finally. He already loves you unconditionally. Confession is not penance. Confession is simply a core heart habit that helps me to grow. There's so many other things in our lives that we try to change. We need to get to the root issue, which sometimes is underlying guilt. So let's pray about that right now. Would you bow your heads and your hearts with me?

With everyone's head bowed, I just want to speak to you for a moment. Because today for some of you here or maybe watching online, God is inviting you to experience His forgiveness for the very first time, to simply receive His grace. And I want to pray with you for that. But many, many others right now, God's moving in your heart and God is bringing to your mind someone that He wants you to go and ask forgiveness of. And right now, you're scared. Well, I want to pray for you too. Lord, we thank you that when we confess our sins, there's no condemnation. And there's the power of the Holy Spirit to be set free from guilt. And so I pray for anyone here now consumed by a secret. Lord right now, we come to you and confess. And we receive your forgiveness in Christ Jesus. Now give us the strength to confess to others, both for prayer and also for amends. Give us strength. Let us go in the confidence that this is both your will and that we are already forgiven in Christ. And for those of us who will be asked to forgive, Lord, help us to respond with grace, the kind of grace you show us. And we pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen.