"What is it with you Lutherans and sin?" That was a question asked of me by a dear friend who had very little experience in attending worship services, apart from the occasional wedding or funeral. "Why do you have to start every service with that 'bondage to sin' stuff?" She was referring to the Brief Order for Confession and Forgiveness, often used at the beginning of Lutheran services, which quotes the Bible text for today's reading. "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." It would be so easy to read this as beating up on ourselves, indulging in some good old-fashioned religious guilt.
But that ignores a couple of realities. One is, of course, what comes right after: "If we confess our sins, he…will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness." This isn't wallowing in the mud, it's coming clean in the shower! Confession isn't self-torture; it is simply one step on the road of forgiveness and freedom. Denying our imperfection is delusional. It means hiding our blots and blemishes from the cleansing love of God. It's pretty hard to experience forgiveness when we won't admit having done anything wrong.
There's something more fundamental, though. I treasure starting off our worship services with these words. I serve in a suburban community. The housing developments are filled with perfectly-manicured lawns, with big hi-def TV sets inside the houses. Every minivan seems to have a "My child is an honor student at…" bumper sticker. Everyone has a great job, a perfect marriage, and terrific relationships with their kids and their parents.
At least, that's the appearance. That's what we tell each other. It's often what we tell ourselves. It isn't really true, though. How could it be? And how healthy can it be to pretend? "If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves." Why can't we come together, once a week, in each other's company and the presence of God, and come right out and say, "I don't have it all together. I'm not perfect. I've got a lot more questions than answers, a lot more foul-ups than highlights. I need some help!"? Wouldn't it be amazing to have a community where we can gather as real people, with imperfections, flaws, and weaknesses, and know that because Christ accepts us, we can accept each other?
We can have just such a community: the church. We miss out on that kind of connection, though, when we deceive ourselves about our need for forgiveness. We become a bunch of plastic people, fake and superficial, if we can't admit our faults. Hypocrisy and judgmentalism will soon follow. Introspection, confession, and trusting that God not only accepts us as we are, but loves us too much to leave us just as we are: these are the antidotes to superficial, judgmental community. They are Lenten disciplines that lead us out of our isolated self-deception and into the embrace of both Christ and fellow Christ-followers.
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