CONFESSIONALISM = DEFEATISM
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Do you believe in Grace or not?
Failing to appreciate the sufficiency of God’s grace
, Christians who are attempting to overcome sin and live righteously by self-effort often develop an over-emphasized sin-consciousness. Oftentimes their attention is drawn to their sinfulness, rather than to the Savior. Their focus is on what they regard to be their “problem,” rather than on the Person of Jesus Christ Who is their righteousness (I Cor. 1:30).
Whenever our focus is on sinfulness, we will be more inclined to sin.
Our focus becomes a fixation and we are drawn like a moth to the fire. When our focus is on Jesus, we are drawn to Him and His sufficiency. “Fix your eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith” (Heb. 12:2).
The apostle John wrote
, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (I John 1:9). Christians are not without sin (I John 1:8), and need to agree and concur with God that their misrepresentative behaviors do not exhibit the character of God. Legitimate personal confession should not become an inordinate and obsessive confessionalism, however, that fails to experience the “cleansing from all unrighteousness” as Christ overcomes our sin-patterns with His righteous character.
Some religious communities encourage repetitive confessionalism by their adherents. Susceptible believers are encouraged to engage in introspective expeditions into their psyche to attempt to discover and dredge up sin, which only serves to verify their false identity of being a “sinner,” rather than a regenerated “saint.” The consequent feelings of worthlessness foster dependency on the priest or pastor.
When people rush
to the altar each week, these “altar athletes” provide visible justification of the alleged effectiveness of the preacher’s ministry. Some groups almost glorify sinfulness as members compete to see who can give the greatest “testimony” of their past sinfulness.
Such focus on sin and its confession also produces judgmentalism, for when one is always looking for sin in his own life, you can be sure he will be looking for sin in the lives of others also.
Undue preoccupation with sin
in one’s life is but an exercise of the “flesh.” It is a self-concern based on the self-reliance that falsely believes that their self- generative “independent self” can overcome their sinfulness with self-effort, resulting in self- righteousness.
Only the Savior can overcome sin, and only the Righteous One can express His righteousness in our behavior.
Defeatism
Eventually, Christians who are aware of their sinful propensities, and frustrated at their inability to conquer their shortcomings, begin to feel defeated. They may doubt their “salvation,” whether they were really spiritually regenerated, since they have not been able to behave according to expected standards of Christian living. Others may revert to hypocrisy, willing to play- act as if they were successfully living the Christian life.
Some dismiss their defeat by falling back on human depravity and claiming, “I can’t help but sin; I’m only human. I’m just a sinner saved by grace.” Often quoting a verse that is only true of the unregenerate, they repeat, “ ‘The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked’ (Jere. 17:9). What else can you expect of me other than failure?”
The more conscientious types
who retain their expectations of self-perfection may beat themselves up in masochistic self-castigation for their failures. They berate themselves in self-condemnation and self- contempt, are critical of themselves in self-denigration and self-deprecation, and sometimes even engage in self-flagellation.
Since religion is codependent on the self- aspirations and failures of their followers, the continued sense of defeatism in their midst necessitated theological explanation and rationalization. This was accomplished in evangelical circles by devising a dual nature in the Christian individual and dual categories of Christians.
To explain the behavioral conflict
in the Christian that often resulted in personal defeat, it was proposed that every Christian has “two natures.” The old, fallen, depraved, selfish, sinful, Adamic, human nature of our unregenerate condition is alleged to exist alongside of a new, divine, Christ nature.
How can an individual have two inherent and essential constitutions or beings? Impossible! Since the real issue is life and death, it is impossible to have life and death simultaneously on the same plane. They are mutually exclusive.
The Greek word for “nature” is phusis, and the New Testament is clear that when we were unregenerate we “were by nature (phusis) children of wrath” (Eph. 2:3). As Christians, we “have become partakers of the divine nature (phusis)” (II Peter 1:4). These natures do not exist simultaneously.
The nature of man is
the nature of the spiritual personage that indwells him – God or Satan.
The “two natures” doctrine incorrectly translates the Greek word sarx, the word for “flesh,” as “old nature.” In so doing they facilitate a schizophrenic duality of identity in the Christian, a paranoid uncertainty of motivation, and antinomian excuses for Christian failure. The fallacious “two natures” theory allows a Christian to blame his sin on the alleged “old nature” that inhabits him.
Another explanation
that excuses sin in Christians is the dividing of Christians into two categories. “Spiritual Christians” are those who allegedly are making the Christian life work by their active and moral endeavors to live in accordance with the Christian commandments. Those who have failed to overcome the “flesh” are designated as “carnal Christians,” or “fleshly Christians.”
To posit two types of Christian is entirely illegitimate. This separate “carnal Christian” category, popularized by the Scofield Reference Bible, Dallas Theological Seminary, and the Campus Crusade for Christ organization, is a misinterpretation of the second and third chapters of Paul’s first epistle to the Corinthians.
Paul identifies only two categories
of people, the unregenerate and the regenerate, non-Christians and Christians, the “natural man” and the “spiritual man” (cf. I Cor. 2:14,15). There were some Christians in Corinth who were misrepresenting who they were in Christ by allowing fleshly patterns of selfishness to be expressed in their behavior, but this was not to be considered as inevitable or acceptable as a separate category of Christians in the Christian community.
The “carnal Christian” category has been used as a cop-out by many Christians to dismiss their sinful misrepresentation of Christ.
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Denying the Need to Deal with Sin...
Dr. James Fowler | IOM Staff Writer
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