Confess to One Another

We are on a single road across four Sundays - அறிக்கை முதல் சாட்சி வரை, from confession to testimony. Two Sundays back we took step one: we told தேவன் the hidden thing and were forgiven. Last Sunday, step two: when the accuser threw our past at us, we answered with what God has said about us. Today is step three, and it is the one many of us have avoided the longest.

Some of you have prayed about a thing and told God about it, and still it sits on your chest at night. You have never said it aloud to one living person. There is a reason for that weight. Some things God designed to be healed not in the secret place alone, but when one faithful person hears them and prays. So this week the confession moves across: நம்பினவரிடம் அறிக்கையிடுங்கள் - to one trusted brother or sister.

You Were Not Made to Carry It Alone · தனியாய்ச் சுமக்க அல்ல

Solomon already knew this. Read how plainly he says it:

"Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their labor. For if they fall, one will lift up his companion. But woe to him who is alone when he falls, for he has no one to help him up." - Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 (NKJV)

"ஒண்டியாயிருப்பதிலும் இருவர் கூடியிருப்பது நலம், அவர்களுடைய பிரயாசத்தினால் அவர்களுக்கு நல்ல பலன் உண்டாகும். ஒருவன் விழுந்தால் அவன் உடனாளி அவனைத் தூக்கிவிடுவான்; ஒண்டியாயிருந்து விழுகிறவனுக்கு ஐயோ, அவனைத் தூக்கிவிடத் துணையில்லையே." - பிரசங்கி 4:9-10 (TAOVBSI)

When you fall, you do not need a crowd. You need one உடனாளி, one companion who reaches down and lifts. The person who falls alone stays down, because there is no hand near enough to pull him up. That is why God said from the very beginning that it is not good for a person to be alone. He knows what happens to the one who tries to live with no support. We were made to belong to a family and to stand inside it.

Now put James beside Solomon:

"Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much." - James 5:16 (NKJV)

"நீங்கள் சொஸ்தமடையும்படிக்கு, உங்கள் குற்றங்களை ஒருவருக்கொருவர் அறிக்கையிட்டு, ஒருவருக்காக ஒருவர் ஜெபம்பண்ணுங்கள். நீதிமான் செய்யும் ஊக்கமான வேண்டுதல் மிகவும் பெலனுள்ளதாயிருக்கிறது." - யாக்கோபு 5:16 (TAOVBSI)

Read the verse slowly and you notice what it does not say. It does not say confess to one another and be forgiven. It says confess to one another and be healed - சொஸ்தமடைதல். This matters, because people misread it. Only Jesus can forgive sin. No brother, no friend, no parent can wipe away your sin. If you want your sin forgiven, you go to the One who shed His blood. Confessing your fault to another person will never by itself forgive a single sin.

So what does confessing to another person do? It heals. There is a soundness that only arrives when the secret stops being a secret. A thing spoken aloud to a faithful person loses its hidden power. Shame lives in the dark; brought into a safe place, it begins to shrink.

Think of it the way you think about the body. When something is wrong you go to the hospital. The first thing you do in front of the doctor is tell him - you open your mouth and say everything that is wrong. That is confession. Then he tells you what he sees and says, "We can set this right," and you believe him; you receive what he says over you. That is speaking the Word over yourself. But then the treatment begins, and here is the thing we forget: the treatment takes time, and no one goes through it alone. The doctor is not standing beside your bed all day. There are nurses. There are people who clean the ward, who bring the medicine, who sit with you a while, who lift you into the wheelchair. Many hands together carry you back to health. You cannot say, "I will take my treatment entirely by myself, I need no one." Even in a hospital, if there is no one with you, the care does not happen. In the same way, once you have confessed your sin to God and believed His Word over yourself, the healing of your habits and your heart is a road you were never meant to walk alone.

And do not shrink the word "healing" down to the body. When a person is angry every time you look at them, anxious every time you look at them, we now know to say, "This too needs care," and there are doctors for the mind for exactly that reason. It is an ailment like any other, and it also needs சொஸ்தம். A man is not meant to swing to one extreme, thinking he can do anything and everything, and then crash to the other, sinking into "I can do nothing at all." Both extremes need healing, because both come out of a heart and a mind that have to be changed. That is why we read the Word: Paul tells us to be transformed by the renewing of the mind (உரோமர் 12:2). When God's Word goes into you, the mind is made new. But the changing of your ways is slow, and along that slow road you need one person beside you.

Here is where the confession has to be concrete. You read a verse in the morning - husbands, love your wives - and then that same evening you lose your temper at home, you shout, you strike, and you walk out. When you open the Bible again the words are hard to sit under. What do most of us do with that? Nothing. We say it to no one. We push it down and keep it inside. We do not even go and ask our wife's forgiveness. It just passes, and passes again, and the soundness never comes, because a sealed wound does not heal. What James asks is that you take it to one trusted person: "I did wrong. I struck my wife today. By the Word this is sin. I have done this." That person will not forgive your sin - only God does that - but they will pray for you, and when they pray, something is set in motion, and God gives grace for you to go and be reconciled. The same is true of the small hidden faults: the exam you cheated on because you wanted the mark, the homework from church you were told to do and skipped, the morning you would not get up. Whatever it is, there needs to be one faithful person you can say it to, and who will pray you through it.

So the first thing is settled. You do not have to carry it alone. Sit for a moment and ask yourself what you are carrying by yourself right now. You were not built to hold it.

Be a Faithful Listener, Not a Talebearer · புறங்கூறுகிறவராக அல்ல

Many of you stopped confessing years ago, and there is a real reason. You told someone once, in confidence, and it did not stay with them. What you whispered became the whole street's talk, and the leak wounded you more than the sin ever did. So the next time, you thought, "If I tell this one, they will tell everyone," and you told no one at all. That is a real wound, and the Bible does not ignore it. It names two kinds of people:

"A talebearer reveals secrets, but he who is of a faithful spirit conceals a matter." - Proverbs 11:13 (NKJV)

"புறங்கூறித் திரிகிறவன் இரகசியத்தை வெளிப்படுத்துகிறான்; ஆவியில் உண்மையுள்ளவனோ காரியத்தை அடக்குகிறான்." - நீதிமொழிகள் 11:13 (TAOVBSI)

The புறங்கூறி spreads the secret. The உண்மையுள்ளவன் covers the matter - not to hide sin, but to guard a soul. And notice the trick the talebearer uses, because it wears a holy coat. Someone brings you a matter in confidence. You carry them off to a corner and then, later, you tell the next person, "Do you know what he did?" - and you cover the whole thing with, "Let us pray for him." A prayer request is not gossip with a label on it. What is told you in confidence is a trust before தேவன், not news to pass along.

Jesus stood right in the middle of a scene exactly like this. Read it in John:

"Now early in the morning He came again into the temple, and all the people came to Him; and He sat down and taught them. Then the scribes and Pharisees brought to Him a woman caught in adultery. And when they had set her in the midst..." - John 8:1-3 (NKJV)

"விடியற்காலத்தில் அவர் திரும்பத் தேவாலயத்துக்கு வந்தபோது, ஜனங்களெல்லாரும் அவரிடத்தில் வந்தார்கள்; அவர் உட்கார்ந்து அவர்களுக்கு உபதேசம்பண்ணினார். அப்பொழுது விபசாரத்திலே கண்டுபிடிக்கப்பட்ட ஒரு ஸ்திரீயை வேதபாரகரும் பரிசேயரும் அவரிடத்தில் கொண்டுவந்து, அவளை நடுவே நிறுத்தி..." - யோவான் 8:1-3 (TAOVBSI)

It is early morning, the sun barely up, and Jesus is in the temple teaching. A crowd drags in a woman caught in the very act, from the youngest in the group to the oldest, and they stand her in the middle for everyone to see. Then they turn it into a trap: "Moses said stone her. What do You say?" She is standing there, named and shamed, and the stones are already in their hands.

Now understand something before we go on. If you do wrong, there is a punishment for that wrong; that is true. When you sin, it is genuinely sin - and it is sin whether Good Samaritan Mission says so, or the CSI church, or the RC church says so. We do not decide right and wrong by what one church prefers. The Father alone is Judge, and He has given that judgment to the Son, and the Son judges by one thing only: what the Word says. So we do not measure a person by our own opinion. We measure only by Scripture. And by Scripture this woman had sinned, and the crowd was not wrong about that. But watch what Jesus does with it.

"He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first." - John 8:7 (NKJV)

"உங்களில் பாவமில்லாதவன் இவள்மேல் முந்தி கல்லெறியக்கடவன்." - யோவான் 8:7 (TAOVBSI)

He stoops and writes on the ground, says that one sentence, and stoops to write again. When He looks up, the ground is empty. From the oldest to the youngest, not one of them could pick up a stone, because not one of them was without sin. And that is exactly the position you and I are in. When someone comes and confesses a fault to us - "I did this wrong" - we are in no place to accuse them, to condemn them, or to judge them, because we are the same dust they are. I am a sinner too. I have my own weaknesses; I grow tired and fail often enough. Knowing that, the only thing I can do when someone tells me their fault is pray for them. If I say, "I am clean, I have no sin, I will throw the first stone," I have not understood myself at all.

So Jesus is left alone with her, and He does two things at once:

"Woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you?... Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more." - John 8:10-11 (NKJV)

"ஸ்திரீயே, உன்மேல் குற்றஞ்சாட்டினவர்கள் எங்கே?... நானும் உன்னை ஆக்கினைக்குள்ளாகத் தீர்க்கிறதில்லை; நீ போ, இனிப் பாவஞ்செய்யாதே." - யோவான் 8:10-11 (TAOVBSI)

"Neither do I condemn you" covered her. "Go and sin no more" still called her up. He did not broadcast her, He did not condemn her, and He would not pretend the sin was nothing either. Both halves matter. Our task is never to condemn, and never to wash away the sin - that is His work; His blood cleanses, He sets people free from sin, and none of that is ours to do. Our one job is to pray. But being safe to confess to does not mean we say, "Do whatever you like, tell me anything, it's all fine." Where a thing must be named as wrong, we name it plainly. We can offer counsel from the Word - this is where it went wrong, this is the way out, here is how the Word says you can change. We may point out the fault. We may not sit as judge. Be the safe person a soul can confess to, and the church finally becomes a place of confession, because secrets are finally safe in it.

Restore Gently, Carry the Burden · சாந்தமாய்த் திருத்துங்கள்

When a brother trusts you with his fall, Paul is very specific about what you are there to do:

"Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted." - Galatians 6:1 (NKJV)

"சகோதரரே, ஒருவன் யாதொரு குற்றத்தில் அகப்பட்டால், ஆவிக்குரியவர்களாகிய நீங்கள் சாந்தமுள்ள ஆவியோடே அப்படிப்பட்டவனைச் சீர்பொருந்தப்பண்ணுங்கள்; நீயும் சோதிக்கப்படாதபடிக்கு உன்னைக்குறித்து எச்சரிக்கையாயிரு." - கலாத்தியர் 6:1 (TAOVBSI)

The word is சீர்பொருந்தப்பண்ணு, to restore - to bring something back to its right condition. It is what a doctor does setting a broken bone gently straight. Your task is not to condemn the one who has fallen; it is to work for his mending until he is well again. And Paul builds a guardrail right into the sentence: restore in a spirit of gentleness (சாந்தமுள்ள ஆவியோடே), considering yourself lest you also be tempted. The one who hears a confession keeps remembering that he is made of the same dust, and so he stays gentle.

"Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ." - Galatians 6:2 (NKJV)

"ஒருவர் பாரத்தை ஒருவர் சுமந்து, இப்படியே கிறிஸ்துவினுடைய பிரமாணத்தை நிறைவேற்றுங்கள்." - கலாத்தியர் 6:2 (TAOVBSI)

The law of Christ is simple: carry each other's load. Picture two people sharing a room who both have to be up in the morning. Whoever wakes first wakes the other. That is the whole of it. There is a good thing that happens in our house that I noticed only lately. Each of the children is supposed to iron their own uniform. But watching them, I saw that on any given day one of them irons everyone's - one day Ash does it for all of them, another day Jerson, another day Jona, sometimes Cressida irons the whole lot. Not every child can manage it every day; one has a lot of studying, another is unwell. If each of them had said, "You mind your own work, I will only mind mine," nothing would get done. But when one carries the load of the others, the work is finished easily. That is bearing one another's burdens.

It reaches further than ironing. We went once to see a brother who was unwell, and he protested, "Why have you all come so far? I am a trouble to everyone. It is only because I am sick that so many of you have to come and sit with me." And I told him, this is a duty that has fallen on us. When someone in the family of God is sick, of course we go. When a brother or sister is unwell, the duty is ours, and we cannot say it is too much. If someone is alone, no husband, no wife, then their brothers and sisters carry a corner of their weight - a hand of help, a little money, whatever it takes so that they can go on living. This is the law of Christ, and it holds in the spirit as much as in the body: when one of us is weak, low on faith, the ones who are strong slide a shoulder under the weight, pray, walk alongside, and restore.

And if you ever ask why - why should I carry a load that is not mine, when he never helped me, when he is still in his sin - remember who did this first, and for whom:

"But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." - Romans 5:8 (NKJV)

"நாம் பாவிகளாயிருக்கையில் கிறிஸ்து நமக்காக மரித்ததினாலே, தேவன் நம்மேல் வைத்த தமது அன்பை விளங்கப்பண்ணுகிறார்." - ரோமர் 5:8 (TAOVBSI)

We were still sinners. We were sitting in the gutter, far from Him, not even knowing who He was, and He gave His own life to come down and lift us out. He said, come out of the gutter, be washed, come here. He carried us when we had done nothing to deserve it. That is why we bear one another. He carried us first, and it completes James' whole loop: confess, pray, and be healed.

One Faithful Person · ஒரே ஒரு நம்பத்தக்கவர்

Think again about the hospital. You go in thinking your life is over, and the doctor checks you and says, "No, we can put this right." You hold on to that. Then many people together - not the doctor alone - give you the medicine, talk with you, clean and lift you, wheel you along, and restore you to what you were before. And when you come out, what do you say to the next person who is sick? "Go to that hospital. They will look after you well. Go there and you will be made whole." Your healing became your testimony. That is where this road is heading.

"Bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise Your name; the righteous shall surround me, for You shall deal bountifully with me." - Psalm 142:7 (NKJV)

"உமது நாமத்தை நான் துதிக்கும்படி, என் ஆத்துமாவைக் காவலுக்கு நீங்கலாக்கிவிடும்; எனக்கு நீர் தயவு செய்யும்போது நீதிமான்கள் என்னைச் சூழ்ந்துகொள்ளுவார்கள்." - சங்கீதம் 142:7 (TAOVBSI)

Bring my soul out of the prison, David says, and then the righteous will surround me. When the soul is brought out and made whole, you find yourself surrounded by righteous people, and there is more gladness in standing among the righteous in what is right than in sitting among sinners in what is wrong.

We have now climbed three rungs. To தேவன் we confessed and were forgiven. Over ourselves we spoke His Word. And today, to one trusted brother we confess - and there, in the praying and the gentle lifting, healing comes. Do not wait until you have it all sorted. James does not say confess once you are already better; he says confess so that you may be healed. The confessing is part of the healing, not the proof that you are finished.

Carry three things home:

1. You were not made to carry it alone. Confession to God forgives; confession to a faithful brother heals (யாக்கோபு 5:16; பிரசங்கி 4:9-10).
2. Be a faithful listener, not a talebearer. Guard the secret, and neither stone nor flatter (நீதிமொழிகள் 11:13; யோவான் 8:11).
3. Restore gently and carry the burden, because He carried you first (கலாத்தியர் 6:1-2; ரோமர் 5:8).

Declaration Prayer · அறிக்கை ஜெபம்

பிதாவே, நான் தனியாய்ச் சுமந்த சுமையை இனி மறைக்கமாட்டேன். நீர் தந்த நம்பத்தக்க ஒரு சகோதரனிடம் அறிக்கையிட எனக்குத் தைரியம் தாரும்; மற்றவர் என்னிடம் அறிக்கையிடும்போது, குற்றஞ்சாட்டாமலும், புறங்கூறாமலும், சாந்தத்தோடே அவரைச் சீர்பொருந்தப்பண்ணும் உண்மையுள்ளவனாக என்னை மாற்றும். ஒருவர் பாரத்தை ஒருவர் சுமந்து சொஸ்தமடைய எங்களுக்குக் கிருபை செய்யும். இயேசுவின் நாமத்தினாலே, ஆமென்.

Father, I will hide no longer the weight I have carried alone. Give me courage to confess to one trusted brother You have given me; and when another confesses to me, make me a faithful person who will not accuse, will not gossip, but will restore them gently. Give us grace to bear one another's burdens and be made whole. In Jesus' name, Amen.

One Thing This Week · இந்த வாரம் ஒன்று மட்டும்

This week, name one faithful person - not the whole church, one safe brother or sister who will hear you, guard it, and pray. If you cannot think of anyone, then that is your prayer: "Lord, show me the right person. Give me someone I can tell my faults to, someone who will pray for me." Tell them the thing you have carried alone. And become that safe person for someone else, so that when they come to you, you listen, you guard it, you search the Word for them, you encourage them, and you pray.

Next week - Part 4: உலகுக்குச் சாட்சி சொல்லுங்கள் (Testify to the World). What God healed in secret He means to be told out loud as testimony (வெளிப்படுத்தல் 12:11; மாற்கு 5).