Sobriety, Scripture, And Welcome

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Hi everybody, my name is Rhonda Glaser. And in recovery, I am considered a dual diagnosed, which means I'm an alcoholic and I have a mental illness. But tomorrow I will have ten years of sobriety. James 5, 16. Therefore, confess your sins to each other and pray for each so that you may be healed. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

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All right, well, hello. Welcome to Northgate. I'm Mandy. And this summer I'm in the middle of a really fun transition. So for the last three years, I've been our children's ministry director. And now I'm moving over to lead our students' ministry. So as of so exciting. So as of August 1st, I will oversee our middle and our high school students. And I literally just got back from middle school camp yesterday. I have the hair wrapped to prove it. My manicures messed up. But we took 36 middle schoolers to camp for a week. And I already knew this, but it was affirmed that they're wrestling with a lot of the same things that us in this room are wrestling with: faith, identity, purpose, truth. Students are asking really big questions and they don't need perfect answers. Actually, these days we can find those answers through Chat GBT or a really quick Google search. But we all want to know that we are loved. We all carry wounds, regrets, we have questions and struggles that shape the way that we see ourselves and the way that we see God. I've learned that no matter our age, we are all people in process. It's even one of the values that we have here at Northgate. You can see it on our wall as you enter the building. We're all being formed, we're all becoming, and we really do all need people. And that's exactly why this summer series has been so powerful. So if this is your first time today, or you haven't been here in a while, we're in a series called Steps, inspired by a book that was written by John Ortberg. And this book looks at the 12 steps of recovery. And those 12 steps were originally created by Bill W. Throughout the series, we've been looking at the steps through the lens of scripture and asking what God has to say about healing, surrender, confession,

The Steps Series And Step Five

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freedom, and transformation. Because these steps aren't just for addicts, they reveal something about all of us. Because when we're honest, we're all recovering from something. We live in a culture addicted to content, consumption, distraction, and ego. We're all guilty of disconnecting and getting distracted. So for you, maybe it really is addiction. But maybe it's control or anger, people pleasing. Maybe it's staying up too late and scrolling on your phone. Maybe it's the constant need to perform. So here's where we've been the last four weeks. Week one, step one. We admitted we were powerless over our deepest problems and that our lives had become unmanageable. We said, I can't. And week two, step two, we came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. We said, I can't, but God can. And week three, step three, we made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God. We basically said, okay, God, I think I'll let you. And we practiced surrendering. And then last week we tackled step four. We made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. We wrote down our resentments, our fears, things we've done. Scary. Which brings us to today. Step five. We admit to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs. This is the step where what was hidden finally comes to light. And now, some of you heard this and you immediately thought, absolutely not. Why did I come today? You would rather wrestle a bear than tell another human being what's really going on inside of you. And I totally get it. Because we're part of a society where performance matters. We show up looking like we have it all together. We post the perfect family photos. We don't post the photo that our kid took of us passed out on the couch because we don't like to show the imperfect parts of ourselves. We keep those hidden. And honestly, I'm tired of the illusion of perfection because it isn't real. Every one of us is here searching for something that is beyond ourselves. We're people in process trying to find a better way to live. And deep down, we're all craving something real, something authentic, something that goes deeper than appearances and polished versions of ourselves. But the problem is that most of us don't know how to get there. So we hide, we perform, we pretend. And these 12 steps, this summer series, it's literally giving us a list of steps to get there. They're giving us hope. Hope that we don't have to stay stuck where we are. Hope that God is transforming us. Hope that little by little we are becoming more like Jesus, more loving, more patient, more gentle, more healed, more free, more whole, more the fully people that God created us to be. And here's the thing: that kind of transformation doesn't happen by accident. It doesn't happen by sitting on the sidelines just wishing things were different. It happens when we are willing to step into the work, when we're willing to face the truth, when we're willing to let God deal with the places we'd rather keep hidden. Now I love this quote, the way that Theodore Roosevelt says it. He says, it is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strongman stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood. So today, I'm inviting you into the arena. Step five is not for spectators. It's not for people who want to stay comfortable, keep their distance, or keep hiding. It's for people who are willing to be honest. And honesty can feel like a fight, but the best things in life are worth fighting for. Healing is worth fighting for. Freedom is worth fighting for. Now, John puts it this way in the book steps. He says, to come into the light with another person, which is so frightening beforehand, is incredibly liberating after. And that's why Paul writes in the letter to the Galatians and says, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. The person that God is transforming you into is worth fighting for. So today, as we come face to face with ourselves, as we wrestle with the things inside that we would rather hide, and we begin the process of admitting our wrongs to God, to ourselves, and to another human, remember this. We're not stepping into this arena alone. God is already there, and we're going in it together. And when we bring our things into the light, we will not find condemnation waiting for us. We're gonna find grace, we're gonna find freedom. We'll find that God who knows us completely still loves us completely. So let's step into the arena together. Today we're gonna look at three big questions. One, what is confession? Two, why do we practice confession? Three, how do we confess, or what can it look like? So, what is confession? Since I started preparing for the sermon, I've been seeing acts of confession happen all around me, even ridiculous ones. So, for example, I was at the dentist with my kids. I was at my kids' dentist, by the way. I I saw you come

Confession Defined As Truth Telling

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in. Uh, not my dentist, my kids. And my six-year-old, um, they asked my six-year-old if he'd been flossing. And his response was, what's that? And I had to confess that I don't floss my kids' teeth. But the admins of step five is a little different. I didn't write down never flosses kids' teeth on my moral inventory. Not flossing my kids' teeth isn't a sin. Sin isn't simply breaking a rule that we should do, it's deeper than that. Sin is choosing our way over God's way. It's the thoughts, the actions, the attitudes, the habits that pull us away. It's the things that make us hurt people that keep us from becoming who He created us to be. Now, James, Jesus' brother, he puts it this way: He says, if anyone then knows the good they ought to do and doesn't do it, it is a sin for them. So sin is you doing you. It's putting yourself first and turning away from God instead of following Jesus and doing as he says. So if that, if that is what sin is, what's confession? Admitting the nature of our wrongs is not just saying that we made a mistake. It's not simply venting, it's not getting something off of our chest. Confession literally means to say the same thing. It's the moment we stop telling ourselves our version of the story and we begin to say what God says is true about our hearts. We stop managing our image, we stop rewriting the story, we stop minimizing, we stop blaming, and we become truth tellers. Confession isn't a new idea. It's actually been a part of God's story from the very beginning. Since the moment Adam and Eve ate the fruit in the garden and God was asking them where they were. He knew where they were. He asked so that they had the opportunity to confess in order for him to then heal and restore. Because confession opens the door to restoration. And in the Old Testament, people confessed their sins before God. King David wrote entire prayers of confession. So many of them are in the

Confession Through The Bible Story

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Psalms. We can read them. Here's an example of one of them. He says, When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity, and you forgave the guilt of my sin. David describes secrecy making him physically and spiritually unwell. He knew that those things wrought us from the inside out, that secrets make us sick. And this was before Jesus even came. Now, back in this day, there was this day called the Day of Atonement, and the high priest would confess the sins of people before God. There was a whole very detailed prop process that God laid out with sacrifices and goats. And then Jesus came, God in human form, his ultimate plan to restore us and connect us back to Him. And after Jesus' resurrection, the early church continued the practice of confession. In the book of Acts, believers openly confessed their sins. Same James, Jesus' brother, says this confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. For the first Christians, confession wasn't about punishment or shame. It was about healing. It was about bringing what was hidden into the light so God's grace could do its work. And over the centuries, the way confession has practiced has changed, but the purpose has remained the same. Honesty before God and others so that healing and freedom can happen. So step five isn't some modern recovery invention. It's an ancient Christian practice. Where for thousands of years God's people have discovered the same truth that freedom begins when we stop hiding and start telling the truth. But now, have people also warped and taken advantage of others through the act of confession? Yes. And are there people walking around today carrying wounds because someone misused what God intended for healing? Absolutely. But that's what people do. We take good things from God and we break them. We take gifts from Him and we twist them. We take what's meant for good and to bring us freedom and we turn these things into tools of control, shame, and power. But the failure of people does not invalidate the goodness of God. Just because people have gotten confession wrong doesn't mean that God has gotten confession wrong. God's heart has always been about restoration. From the Garden of Eden to King David to the early church to today, God has been inviting people out of hiding and into healing. Because God is not trying to expose you so he can condemn you. He's inviting you into the light so he can restore you. And what people break, God has a way of redeeming. And what people wound, God has a way of healing. What sin destroys, God has a way of restoring. And that's the hope of the gospel. Not that people are perfect, but that God is, and he is still in the business of bringing dead things back to life. So why do we confess? Now confession only makes sense in light of the cross now. Paul writes in Romans 5, 8, but God demonstrates his own love for us in this. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. If there was no cross, confession would only lead to guilt. If there was no resurrection, confession would only end in shame. But Jesus changed everything. Every

Why Confession Works After The Cross

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sin, failure, secret, act of rebellion, Jesus took it upon himself. He carried the weight of it to the cross. The sin we try to hide is the very thing that Christ came to die for. And when he died, sin died right there with him. And when he rose, he made a way for us to live free. We live on the other side of the resurrection. What a gift. So we don't confess hoping that God will love us. We confess because he already does. We don't confess trying to earn forgiveness. We confess because Jesus already paid for it. Confession is simply bringing into light what Jesus has already covered with his grace. It's letting go of our own crap so it can die. That's why step five matters. Because healing begins when honesty enters the room. Healing begins when we stop trying to hide and we trust God and another person enough to tell the truth. What is hidden in darkness loses its power when it's brought to light. And honestly, that's not just theology for me. That's my story. So now I want to confess something to all of you. Now when Pastor Lawrence asked me to teach on step five, I was shocked. I think I even laughed and I asked, why me? Because he knew my story. He knew I was in recovery. He knew that the veins that I once pumped full of poison are now pumping full of the grace of Jesus. I'm filled with the Holy Spirit and God is in me, but it wasn't always that way. I didn't grow up knowing Jesus. I didn't

Mandy’s Story From Addiction To Grace

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believe in anything bigger than myself. I was my own lowercase G God. I did whatever I wanted, whatever felt good in the moment. I was promiscuous. And at 18, I became a teen mom. And the dad wasn't the boyfriend that I had at that time. I hurt a lot of people. And the shame and the guilt of my choices sent me spiraling. I learned how to numb it all out with alcohol and then drugs. And that led to a heroin addiction. I was so lost. I didn't know how to get out of the dark place that I was in. And then a family member invited me to church. And she told me that she would babysit my son for free if I came to her church. And I really needed a free babysitter so I could go to work and get that money and then spend it on drugs and not a babysitter. So I went. And it was the first time that I really heard about Jesus. Not religion, not rules, but Jesus. I heard about a God who chases people down in love, a savior who comes so close that he came in human form, who doesn't wait for us to clean ourselves up before coming to him. And I learned that when Jesus went to the cross, he carried all of it with him. My shame, my guilt, my addiction, my failures, my mess, the things that I spent years trying to hide, he took them to the grave where they belonged so that they could die. And then he came back resurrected and fully alive to prove that death doesn't get the final word, that sin doesn't get the final word, that shame doesn't get the final word, that freedom is possible and that there is a new way to live. So I went to my first recovery meeting that was held at that church, and I started going to more. Started working the steps. I made it all the way to step four. And then I stopped. I never officially completed step five. So when Pastor Lawrence asked me to teach this message, I honestly didn't feel worthy. Who was I to teach on confession when I never formally completed the step myself? But God's funny and awesome. And he's been showing me something through this entire process. Maybe I never sat in a recovery room and completed step five the exact way that it's written on paper, but I've lived it. I've confessed my failures to God. I've admitted hard truths about myself to myself. I've sat across the room from trusted people and said things out loud that I never thought I would. I've experienced forgiveness, healing, freedom. And then I've had to do it all over again. Because admitting step five, admitting the nature of our wrongs, the core of this step, it's not a one-time event. It's a way of life. So how did God begin bringing healing into my life? It wasn't all at once. It wasn't a one-time magical prayer moment. Those are important, but that wasn't it. He walked me through exactly what step five describes. First, I admitted it to him and then to myself and to others. And it didn't happen overnight. It's been a process. And I'm standing here today to tell you that this is why we confess. This is why we admit the nature of our wrongs. It's to experience this freedom, the freedom that God created you to experience, the freedom that Christ has gifted you. There's no need for shame or guilt. Those things belong in hell. And we're at war. It's not a physical one, it's a spiritual war out there. And Jesus says it this way: He says, the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy, but I have come that they, you, me, may have life and have it to the full. So by confessing our sins, by admitting the nature of our wrongs, by laying these things down and bringing them into the light, we are essentially sending that enemy to the place he belongs while also freeing ourselves from the bondage that he's had on us, and Jesus wins. So how do we confess? I'll tell you a story of how I saw this played out recently. Now I love horses and I grew up riding and showing them. And last month I was helping out at a therapeutic riding center, and it was during a program for veterans. And there is a therapist who was orchestr orchestrating this, and she was guiding the session and sent the group. Out to go spend time observing horses and to just be with them. And then the participants were guided

A Real World Picture Of Confession

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back to come into a circle and share what they had experienced. And as people spoke, something stood out to me. They stopped talking about the horses and they started talking about themselves. They started talking about their fears, their struggles, the masks they wear, the things that they were carrying. And one by one, they stopped giving surface-level answers and started telling the truth. One person shared how she was approaching the horses, the way that she thought the horses wanted her to approach. And they kept turning away. And it wasn't until she just stood there in her own self, her own being, her own authenticity that the horses finally came to her. And she realized that that's how she often presents herself in society. I was no longer watching a lesson about horses. I was watching confession happen in real life. Not the dramatic kind, not standing in front of a church, kind, not sitting in a box with a priest on the other side of a window, kind. It was just ordinary people being honest about what was really going on inside of them. And I watched them walk away a little lighter, a little brighter, and laughing way more than they did when they first showed up. And that's the promise of confession. It's not humiliation, it's not punishment, it's freedom. Freedom doesn't simply come from talking about our problems. Now, step five gives us a very specific pathway to the healing. It tells us exactly where confession begins and who it involves. The step is actually three smaller steps. It says admit to God, admit to ourselves, and admit to another human being. So let's spend just a moment in part one. Admit to God. Now, John Orpberg writes it like this: first, it's important to recognize that God is in the forgiveness business directly, face to face, no middleman. Which means before you confess, God already knows. He sees your resentment, the fear, the addiction,

Admit It To God First

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the pride, the shame. Nothing about your struggle surprises him. And that's why David prayed, Search me, God, and know my heart. See if there's any offensive way in me and lead me to the way everlasting. Now, notice God doesn't, or not God, David doesn't say, Let me figure myself out. He says, Search me, because God sees deeper than we even see ourselves. He sees the root of us while we're usually distracted by the bad fruit. So what can step five A look like? Now, maybe it's prayer or journaling. Maybe you sit down and write a letter to God and you finally put words to something that you've carried for years. The point isn't actually the method, the point is your honesty. Because confession begins when we stop hiding and we start telling God the truth about what's already there. Now, the second part of step five, I call it five B to ourselves, which sounds easy enough until we realize how skilled we are at lying to ourselves. Had an ex-boyfriend, and he would say all the time, you can't deny the power of denial. 100% accurate, because we minimize, we justify, we compare, we blame, we say, at least I'm not as bad as blah,

Admit It To Yourself Without Denial

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blah, blah, or I could stop anytime. Everybody does it. I'm not hurting anybody. We become experts at avoiding the truth, but healing can't begin until honesty reaches us, too. Now, some of us have confessed things to God for years, but we still haven't fully admitted them to ourselves. And that was me. When I was struggling with addiction, I knew my life wasn't going well. I knew I was making bad choices. I knew I was hurting people. But for a long time, I wouldn't admit the bad things were actually real. I told myself I was in control. I told myself I could quit whenever I wanted. I told myself that it wasn't that serious. I told myself that everybody else was overreacting. I could rationalize anything. But none of those things were actually true. The truth was that my addiction was controlling me. The truth was that my life had become unmanageable. The truth was that I needed help. And healing didn't begin when I figured out how to fix myself. It actually began when I stopped arguing with myself. When I stopped pretending, when I admitted the truth to God and to myself. And that's often how God works. We admit it to him, and then he helps us admit it to ourselves. So what can this look like? This is really weird. But try staring yourself in the mirror and have a conversation while you're locked into your own eyes. Or not. Maybe it can just look like a letter and you just write a letter to yourself. Or maybe you just sit in your own truth. Now, some people never get to step 5C because they get stuck in this 5B area. They spend years blaming everyone else, years explaining, years justifying, years of rewriting their story. But healing begins when we tell ourselves the truth. So the third part of this, 5C, to another human being, which is the most uncomfortable part, in my opinion. Probably yours too. Because admitting it to God is one thing. Admitting it to ourselves is hard enough. But admitting it to another human being, that's where most of us are ready to tap out. Because the moment another person knows, we lose control of the image that we've worked so hard to maintain.

Admit It To Someone Safe

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We can't hide, we can't edit, we can't pretend. And yet James expands his thoughts on confession and says this confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and produces wonderful results. It doesn't say confess your sins so God can embarrass you. You will not find that in scripture because it's not true. It says confess and pray for each other so that you may be healed. Shame says hide. Jesus says, bring it into the light. So that what can this wait, what can this look like in real life? Now I have another story. Believe it or not, I have a lot of stories. I was recently training for a Decca Fit. And I was preparing for it. Decca Fit is a fitness program. So I was working out, eating well, lots of preparation. I wanted to do well. And as the competition got closer, something strange started happening. And I began self-sabotaging myself. I started making choices that were pulling me away from the very goal that I'd been working towards. I knew where that led that road led me before. No, I wasn't slipping back into a heroin addiction. That is years beyond where I am now. But I knew my triggers. I know my triggers. I know better. But I kept giving in to desires of my flesh, anyways. I kept turning away from God and getting distracted. I was giving the enemy a foothold. And that behavior was starting to lead me into sin and turn away. I was showing up with secrets hidden. And the day before that competition, I finally told a trusted friend what had been going on. You know what happened? She responded to me with grace and with love, and she reminded me that I was human. And in this book, John talks about the need of what he calls a witness. He writes it this way: a witness is not a therapist, a mentor, or a life coach or a personal consultant. A witness does not advise, instruct, or explain. A witness simply hears your story. A witness gives you the gift of being known. And somehow being known is necessary for being healed. So my friend was my witness. I didn't need advice. I already knew what I needed to do. I didn't need someone to fix me. I just needed someone to see me. And I could have admitted it just to God. I could have admitted it just to myself. But there was and is something so powerful about speaking it out loud to another person when another flawed human looked at me in the eyes and essentially said, I see you. You're not alone, you're gonna be okay. And it was in that moment. It wasn't a change in my circumstances, it was in that moment. Now the competition was still the next day, but I had changed. That secret I was holding, it lost its power. The shame started losing its grip. That's why step five includes another human being. Not because God needs a witness, but because we do. And it was mostly out of desperation. I needed a fresh start. The life I'd been living, told you about, and it was sending me straight to my own grave, and I knew it. And God led me here to Northgate. And now back then, this building didn't even exist, wasn't built yet. Uh at that time, the family building was our main worship space. And I was actually baptized right in front of the stage where I now stand and teach kids

Find Community And Step Into Freedom

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and students about Jesus. Pastor Ken, who spoke last week, was the one that baptized me. And it is wild to sit there and reflect on where God has taken me since then. I started serving in the kids' ministry while God worked on my heart. I didn't know it then, but God was already doing his transformative work in me. I joined groups, I learned how to read my Bible, I went through rooted, and then I facilitated rooted, and then I facilitated it again and again because I couldn't get enough of watching God change people's lives the same way he was changing mine. And looking back now, I realized something that I may not have formally completed step five in a recovery room. Somewhere along my journey, I think it was in step three, I stopped chasing sobriety and I started running after Jesus. And I encourage you today to chase him, to focus on him, to do what he says, to let him flip your world upside down, let him reveal the things that are buried so deep in your heart that you don't even know that they're there yet. And when he does, confess it. Bring it into the light. Find people who you can be honest with. Find community. We have so many here at Northgate. We even have a recovery group that meets on Monday nights because healing happens when we stop hiding. Jesus is waiting. And he says it this way: Ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be open to you. For everyone who asks receives. The one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks, the door will be open. So I started today by inviting you into this arena. And I told you that it would feel like a fight. And that the best things in life are worth fighting for. That you are worth fighting for. And here's what I want you to remember as we move into a song. And now this isn't the end of the sermon, friends. I'll be back up to wrap it up. But as we get into this song, remember when we finally bring our sin,

Grace Is Deeper Than Shame

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our failures, our fears, and our shame into the light, we don't find a disappointed God waiting for us. We find a savior whose grace is deeper than our sin, whose arms are wider than our shame, whose love is greater than our guilt. And that's the gospel. That's the story of my life. And maybe today it's the story that God wants to write in yours. So as we sing, you can stay seated and just listen as these words walk wash over you. Your sin may be deep, but his grace is so much deeper.