Confessing our sins to one another

Apr 252012
 

2_men_talking_silouette-300x231In my last blog I talked about the importance of accountability questions in Discipleship. We looked at a number of honest questions we could ask each other regularly to become accountable to one another.

Last time I looked briefly at James 5:16 which says “Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.” In this blog I want to look at what it means to confess our sins to one another.

When we talk about confession you might, if you have a Roman Catholic background, think of the confessional booth and having to recount the weeks’ wrongdoings to the priest. Should we do this? Do we confess to each other and then to God, or the other way round? It can all get very confusing. We can sometimes come to some wrong conclusions which I will address later. Continue reading »

 April 25, 2012  Posted by at 9:58 pm Accountability, Confession, Discipleship 1 Response »

Discipleship and accountability

Apr 162012
 

AccountabilityDiscipleship is hard work, there are no shortcuts. We cannot just complete a course or read a book on the subject. It’s not knowledge, its action.

Discipleship is true community, getting into each others lives, no skirting around issues or disagreements. If someone asks, “How are you?” do you say fine” quickly asking back “how are you?” to deflect the focus back onto them so you don’t have to tell them what a rotten week you’ve had? (They didn’t REALLY want to know anyway, did they?).

It’s about digging a little deeper and going beneath the surface and getting behind the mask.

Last time we looked at 7 pointers that will help us to get closer to and be disciples of Jesus, things such as; understanding grace and salvation, prayer, bible study, witnessing etc. These are all excellent, but is anyone close enough to you to check you are doing these things? Somebody that, as proverbs 18 v 24 says “sticks closer than a brother”? Someone you can count on to be honest with you? Continue reading »

 April 16, 2012  Posted by at 9:39 pm Discipleship 12 Responses »