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Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.

James 5:16, ESV

When I have spoken about confession, the most common response that I hear is, “I don’t have to confess to anyone but Jesus.” There is a truth in this, but the little lie that is hidden there is revealed to us in James. The gift of confession is the freedom that can come from hearing the audible words, “You are forgiven!” Sin likes to bind us up, and the deceiver likes to do all that he can to keep us bound in it. It weakens us and keeps us uncertain, “Am I truly forgiven?” This is an uncertainty that our Lord desires to remove from us. That is what John writes in 1 John chapter 1, “If we confess our sins, God who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and restore us to righteousness.” These words are important, and when we pray together with another faithful brother in Christ, he can hear the words of confession and offer us the freedom of knowing the forgiveness God desires for us to be certain about and proclaim to help us in our proclamation of Christ’s love as we may walk in the newness of our Lord’s peace.

Let us pray. I thank you, my heavenly Father, through Jesus Christ, your dear Son, that you have kept me this night from all harm and danger, and I ask you to protect me this day also from sin and every evil, that in all I do today, I may please you. For into your hands, I commend myself, my body and soul, and all that is mine. Let your holy angel watch over me, that the wicked foe have no power over me. Amen.