21/Psalm 51
before the Lord and acknowledge our failure. It's true, He's seen them before, but if we want to be relieved, to get rid of our guilt, we'll have to say exactly the same thing about our sins as God says about them. Now, this is exactly what the word "confess" means. We are to say the same thing about sin that God says about it. We Need To Acknowledge Our Sins Individually Missionary statesman Dick Hillis once related about how the people over in China wash their clothes. He was referring to the many poor people living out in the country without electricity or any modern devices. He said that the women would take their clothing down to the riverside, placing each article on the rocks and there pound out the dirt and wash them in the stream. He used an illustration when I was a Biola student about 25 years ago. He spoke of an imaginary Chinese woman who brought her bundle of clothes, all tied up in a handy knapsack, about her neck. She simply took them in that state and, without opening the bundle, doused them in the water up and down a few times. Then she carried them home. Dr. Hillis asked the Biola students, "Do you think her clothes would be clean?" The answer was obvious. His apt point was that, when we come to God with our sins, we often present them all to Him as a neatly wrapped package, asking for His forgiveness on them all. What we really need to do is to acknowledge them individually. We are to lay them all out before Him. This is what confession really means. And you know, quite frankly, one of the greatest things for mental help and positive therapy is just this. The first thing required is to present our sins in this very fashion to the Lord. I'm sure we're all amazed with the scandals which have rocked our government. We still recall how certain public of– ficials steadfastly avowed that they were innocent- that is until their backs were against the wall. Only then did they
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