confession

  • Anxiety,  Bathsheba,  confession,  David,  freedom,  hope,  Nathan,  regret,  relationship,  Shame & Guilt

    Release from Regret: Recapture your Hope

    There is no regret in the kingdom of God, but that doesn’t mean we don’t struggle mightily with it.  I imagine David after the prophet, Nathan, informs him that his son from Bathsheba will die because of his sins of murder and adultery.  His chief regret, I assume, is that the consequences of his actions have affected more than just himself.  I cannot imagine David’s horror as he watches his son die, knowing that his sin caused it.  But after the child passes, David leaves his grief and goes to resume his duties on behalf of Israel.  To the heart of some, this may seem callous, but David’s own words…

  • confession,  Forgiveness,  freedom,  Heart,  Self Awareness,  Self-forgiveness,  Shame & Guilt

    Three Questions That Lead to Self Forgiveness

    After a decade of no contact, my sixteen year old daughter lived with her father for about six months.  While I didn’t sleep a full night during that time, she seemed happy for the first three.  After that, things began to go south rather quickly, and soon, she came home, to both of our relief.  One day soon after, while we were at the grocery store, she mentioned that her whole life she had assumed that our divorce was her fault.  She had never mentioned this to me, the idea that somehow my divorce from an abuser could be laid at her feet.  But before I could begin my strenuous objections…

  • confession,  freedom,  Imaginative Prayer,  mindfulness,  prayer,  relationship,  Self Awareness,  Shame & Guilt

    Mindfulness and Confession: Reflections in the Mirror

    Mindfulness, in the early stages of my Christianity, did not exist, though I sure knew about confession.  I believed the truest thing about me was a list of all my sins.  And as a person for whom shame was a way of being, the idea of confessing my sins to someone else besides God seemed impossible. To begin with, I couldn’t even share my feelings with others, much less those faults and weaknesses I perceived in myself.  I could barely admit my feelings to myself, much less others.  I remember at one point listing out all of my transgressions on a sheet of paper and presenting them to God.  I…