Individual Confession & Forgiveness

Calling All Sinners! (yes, that includes you)

As the ELW (that’s our hymnal, Evangelical Lutheran Worship) says,
Washed in water and marked with the cross, the baptized children of God are united with Christ and, through him, with other believers who together form a living community of faith. Although we are set free to live in love and faithfulness, we continue to turn away from God and from one another. Confessing our sin involves a continuing return to our baptism where our sinful self is drowned and dies; in the gift of forgiveness God raises us up again and again to new life in Jesus Christ.

Individual Confession and Forgiveness is a ministry of the church through which a person may confess sin and receive the assurance of God’s forgiveness. There is a confidential nature to this order, in keeping with the discipline and practice of the Lutheran church.

Do you HAVE to come for Individual Confession and Forgiveness? No. But at different times in your life, you might find it a great comfort and blessing to do so.

While we practice Corporate Confession and Forgiveness during worship most Sundays, and confess our sins to God all together in general (and specifically during the time of silence), sometimes an individual’s particular life circumstances, and yes, sinful action or inaction, make more personal, individual confession desirable. It can be easy to gloss over the “hard stuff” on Sunday morning, or to think that the words of forgiveness “don’t apply to me.” Just about every pastor I know has had the experience of someone saying, “Oh pastor, if you REALLY knew me, you wouldn’t say that God loves and forgives me.”

If that could be YOU, then maybe the time is right for Individual Confession and Forgiveness. Pastor Grant and I are offering three opportunities for Individual Confession and Forgiveness during Holy Week: Tuesday, March 31, 5:00-7:00pm; Wednesday, April 1, 7:00-9:00am and Thursday, April 2, 11:00am-1:00pm. We will meet with individuals in the sanctuary. When you arrive, if the sanctuary doors are open, come on in. If they are closed, please wait.

In The Large Catechism, Martin Luther wrote, “Note, then, as I have often said, that confession consists of two parts. The first is our work and act, when I lament my sin and desire comfort and restoration for my soul. The second is a work that God does, when he absolves me of my sins through the Word placed on the lips of another person. This is the surpassingly grand and noble thing that makes confession so wonderful and comforting.”

Sometimes we each need to hear the words of God’s mercy and forgiveness spoken directly to us. It is our privilege to proclaim them to you.

If you do not wish to make personal confession, but would like to come and pray with a pastor, or have one of us pray for you, that is just fine, too.

If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 1 John 1:8-9

Therefore confess your sins to one another, so that you may be healed. The prayer of the righteous is powerful and effective. James 5:16