A Simple Question

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

“CAN I COME by and borrow a cup of milk?”

It was a simple question. Definitely not rocket science. But it felt so complex, so hard to answer.

On any given day, this should have been easy as pie. But all of a sudden how expensive it was became paramount. Parting with it felt like too big of an ask. I hesitated.

My neighbor wanted to borrow milk. And I had a problem with it.

He was one of our best friends. We worked in ministry together, did life together, and raised our kids together. Sharing tools and space and time was so very normal in our lives. But today, the expensive, grass-fed, whole organic milk we bought for my toddler was at stake. One might have thought he was asking for my firstborn son.

Sometimes I am shocked at how greedy and grabby the human heart can be. How hoarding my heart can be.

This moment exposed so much. It revealed that I couldn’t trust God to provide more milk. It illuminated how much I thought the world revolved around me. It displayed the terrible lockdown inside of me.

This milk situation was more than a decade ago. We laugh about that phone call now, but at the time it was humbling and hard. I told my neighbor yes on the phone, even though I meant no in my heart. And it ate me alive.

Have you been there? You’ve said something, done something, or withheld something in sin, and God presses on your heart to humble yourself and confess?

After my neighbor came down the lane, after I gave him the milk, after he went back home, I called him back.

“I want you to know that I was mean-spirited and greedy when you asked me for the milk, and I am sorry for not wanting to give it to you. Will you forgive me?”

I often want to belittle the small sins and call them silly and trite. As if they don’t matter, don’t do damage, don’t unravel my soul.

But whatever enslaves our hearts, big or small, is serious business.

He could have been asking for a cup of milk or a million dollars, and it wouldn’t matter. My heart needed to be examined, humbled, and healed by confessing and applying the balm of grace to my broken, unwilling places.

Confession is the gift of grace I never think I need. Confession seems like pain, but it’s actually grace. As the apostle James wrote, we are healed through confession. May we practice this and experience a healed soul.

GRACE REFLECTION: Does anything come to mind that you need to confess? If so, confess it vertically to God, and seek forgiveness horizontally from others.