Close Menu X
Navigate

Pastor Jay's Blog

A Simple Case for Corporate Confession

One of the key axioms for the seeker-sensitive church is as follows: “Do nothing offensive, boring, or unpolished.” This means that prayer is always hovering at the edge of the chopping block. Unless you make prayer really bouncy and really quick, people don’t have much tolerance for it in a service that is geared for short attention spans. Yet, the problem for seeker churches that it is difficult to claim to have genuine spirituality without some praying. This is the same problem they have with the Bible. There has to be some Bible, but the sermons better be topical, short, and Bible-lite lest the gods of relevancy be offended.

So prayer is on thin ice in seeker services, and this is all demonstrably evident by the shallowness of prayer and lack of prayer that is happening there. Christians should recognize this and chaff at it. If we are to be a people of God, where God is moving among us and through us, we must be a praying people. So let’s rack up the seeker-sensitive approach to praying as glaringly unfaithful. A worship service isn’t a show, it is a gathering for the worship of God and the equipping of his people. But let’s say you are in a church that values prayer and incorporates it into the life of the body. That is good. Yet, is it possible that the seeker-sensitive virus has still infected some of our thinking and behavior? Here is where I want to show that this is probably the case for many churches, even the ones that value prayer.

The Types Of Prayer

Most people recognize that there are different types of praying. There is no definitive list of categories, and therefore one could easily create a substantial list of nuanced kinds of praying. But there are some unmistakable types of prayer that lay the basic framework for normal faithful praying. That list is as follows: praise, confession, intercession, supplication, and thanksgiving. These types are well known and well-traveled prayers. Praise glories in the attributes and works of God. Confession lays forth our sin as we say about it what God says about it and then repent of it. Intercession brings the needs of others before God. Supplication brings our own needs to God. And thanksgiving worships God for the work and provision he has done and will do.

What Is Missing In Our Service?

With that list of prayer categories, the question is this: are any of them missing in our corporate gatherings? Surely in your corporate praying you are praising God and thanking God; these two usually go hand in hand. And there will surely be intercession and supplication. This normally fills most of our praying because we are very sensitive to our needs and the needs around us. This is the heart of pastoral praying, which is not uncommon in a worship service. So which one is missing? There is a conspicuous absence of confession. I assume that there will be some very generic and ambiguous references to being sinners and failing in our obedience. But is that all that is needed in confession? No. Confession should be as full and impactful as the other four.

Why would there be this kind of imbalance? I think the simple answer is that confession is the most uncomfortable. No one likes talking about failure. In a self-esteem culture, the last thing we want is to detail our unworthiness, our blindness, our selfishness, and our worldliness even at the corporate level. And so even if we are fighting against the seeker-sensitive virus, chances are that this is still a way that we are unwittingly infected.

So let’s fight against our fleshly tendencies and strive for the blessings that come when we take up all that we find in scripture. As Jesus said in John 13:10, we are clean, but we still need our feet regularly cleaned. As we come to a thrice holy God, may we corporately (and at times individually) acknowledge our sin, embrace the cleansing that is ours in Christ, and bring a pure worship to him who is infinitely worthy.