Danny’s conversations with prison inmates were an eye opener. In dialogue, each inmate denied any wrongdoing and claimed to be a victim of an overzealous police force and an incompetent judiciary. If Danny could believe what he heard, the prison was full of innocent people! It was very disillusioning. Was the legal system totally messed up?
The inmates were in denial. But those inmates were not the only ones. We all are. God is a God of truth, and he refuses to play games. Our journey to God is also a journey to the self; a movement into self-knowledge.
As people who give into moral wayward living; we tend to be out of touch with our true selves. It is too painful, to be honest about who we are (Rom. 3:23). Only when we have first grasped God’s assurance through Christ of unconditional love and forgiveness, the hope that we will be accepted anyway, because of the sacrifice of Christ for our karma, that we find the courage to face the truth about ourselves (Rom.6:23). Honesty grows best where grace is celebrated.
Assessment is the first step to treatment and correction. Confession is important to conversion for the same reason. If we confess our sins, the Bible says, God is faithful and just and will forgive and cleanse us (1 John 1:9). So why is confession a non-negotiable element in conversion and the ongoing process of sanctification? It is essential because we need to agree to God’s assessment of our hearts and minds. We must drop our rationalizations and come clean. We need to agree with God in our hearts.
The breakthrough to truthfulness requires that we come out of our warped self-justification and confess our sins to others (James 5:16). Agreeing with God’s assessment and being honest before God and others is the first step that brings us into the light.