Confession

Keeping a Short Account With God

What does it mean when Christians say that they keep their account with God on a “short basis?”

To answer this, let’s consider the phrase as it is used in accounting acumen. To keep your accounts payable on a “short basis” simply means to keep them “paid up”, or rather, not to let them become extended. An example of this would be to pay off your credit card balance every month.

In the spiritual sense, when looking at the theology that prescribes this practice, it always refers to confession of sin(s) (the equivalent of a liability or debt in accounting terms), and requesting to be forgiven of sins on a daily basis.¹ When you hear believers say that they are “prayed up,” this invariably means that they’ve got all their sins “confessed up.”

The most oft sited scriptures backing up this practice would be Matthew 3:5,6², 6:12, and 1 John 1:9

Then went out to him (John the Baptist) Jerusalem, and all Judaea, and all the region round about Jordan, And were baptized of him in Jordan, confessing their sins.”

Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.”

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

If we use these passages as the basis for the practice of confession, the reasoning for doing this, according to the last verse, would be to gain forgiveness of our sin(s), and to be “cleansed…from all unrighteousness.”

While no one can question the unequivocal bluntness of these commandments, the question should be asked; who is this written to for “the obedience of faith”? Is this written to anyone in the world today?

The phrase, “for the obedience of faith”, appears one time in scripture at the end of Paul’s letter to the Romans:

Now to him that is of power to stablish you according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began,

But now is made manifest, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all nations for the obedience of faith: Rom 16:25-26

All of those three passages in Matthew and 1 John, in addition to addressing the sin issue, have one thing in common; they are all written to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Matt. 10:6; 15:24), concerning something called “the kingdom of heaven”(Matt. 3:2, and 31 more times in the gospel of Matthew).

On the contrary, Paul’s epistles are written to a Gentile church he referred to as “the body of

Christ” (Romans 7:4; 1 Cor. 10:16; 12:27; Eph. 4:12), “the body” (Eph. 1:23; 3:6; 5:23; Col. 1:18; 2:17,19), “one body” (Rom. 12:4,5; 1 Cor. 12:13; Eph. 2:16; 4:4; Col. 3:15;), and “his body” (Eph. 5:30), concerning something he called “the dispensation fo the grace of God” (Eph. 3:2), viz., “the mystery” referred to in the Romans passage above.

The next question is, is “the lost sheep of the house of Israel” and “the body of Christ” the same thing?

Hardly. The “gospels” and the Hebrew epistles, of which John’s letters are a part, are written exclusively to these lost sheep, issuing instructions to them, and foretelling of their prophesied re-gathering under the New Covenant.³

Majority opinion notwithstanding, no present believer in Jesus Christ is or can be a part of this program, because it ended 2000 years ago with the advent of Paul’s revelation of the mystery. This mystery, which encompasses everything written in his 13 epistles, rightly divided ((2 Tim. 2:15)), is where the present believer’s instructions are to be found. This being the case, let’s look at the doctrine presented in Paul’s gospel concerning sin and how the believer is to deal with it.

God is not presently holding anyone’s sins against them

First, and foremost, every believer must grasp this foundational truth in dealing with their sin(s): God has already dealt with them! He put them all on his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, 2000 years ago! As far as He is concerned, they don’t exist!

To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God. For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. 2 Cor 5:19-6:1

Three things in this passage need to be noted: 1. Christ, “who knew no sin”, was “made to be (became) sin for us”; therefore, 2. God is not, indeed cannot, holding anyone’s sins against them; therefore, anyone can be “made the righteousness of God in him”.

This is not to say that everyone is made the righteousness of God in him, but rather that the offer of this is made to everyone, and possessed by those who accept it, that is, “all them that believe”(Romans 3:22) his sacrifice was sufficient to cover their sin debt.

Those who have done this have God’s righteousness imputed to their heavenly account (Romans 4:6,24), and are in possession of the forgiveness of their sins (Eph. 1:7).

Reckoning as opposed to confessing

Second, there is therefore no command to the body of Christ to confess sins, as in the passages from Matthew and 1 John. Think about this; if God’s righteousness has been imputed to you, what would be the point of doing something to be “cleansed from all unrighteousness?”

I’ve accepted Christ as my Savior, but I still sin. What do I do about my sins?⁴

Thank God every day, through Christ, for having paid for them, and “Reckon ye also yourselves to be

dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God, through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom. 6:11)

Know what was wrong with the religious folks in Paul’s day (his “kinsman according to the flesh”)? He said that they were “going about to establish their own righteousness,” rather than simply believing and trusting that “Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth.”⁵

This, in effect, is the very same thing believers today do by engaging in the vain practice of confessing sins, with the idea in mind that this is going to restore their lost or impaired standing with God. If you have to do this, then you never had any standing with God to begin with.

There is only one place where Paul speaks of any kind of confession, and this is the confession of the sinner unto salvation:

If thou shalt confess with they mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved, For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed. For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek: for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him.For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” ((Rom 10:9-13))

If you have made this confession (from your heart), at that moment in time, God imputes his righteousness to your account, and your standing with him is perfect. This standing is eternally secure, and therefore cannot be affected by your behavior, no matter how bad you perceive it to be.

Mike Schroeder

Please feel free to reprint or publish this article. All Scripture references are taken from the King James Bible.

Related articles: Sin: Where The Rubber Meets The Road

Are you saved? Jesus Christ—“who knew no sin”—and his sacrificial death on the Cross, has made the way for “everyone that believeth…to be reconciled to God. History has shown that whatever peace man has achieved in the world can only be temporary. The Bible says that individual men and women can know, beyond a doubt, that they are saved and bound for heaven, and therefore have absolute and permanent peace, regardless of what is going on in the world, by trusting Jesus Christ and his death on the cross for their eternal salvation. “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved…Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.”⁶ Have you done this? If not, why not now?