Objections to One-Time Confession

Some might say, “But what about what Isaiah said in chapter 59 verse 2 that our sins put a separation wall between us and God, that they hide His face from us and that He will not hear us? Doesn’t that mean that we come out of fellowship with God and that we need to confess our sins to Him in order for Him to hear us again?” No, it doesn’t. Isaiah lived before the cross, Jesus had not paid for his sins yet, and Isaiah was not a new creation in Christ. Indeed, during his time and during the Old Covenant period, people’s sins created a separation wall between them and God, and God didn’t hear them until they humbled themselves before God, and brought the animal sacrifices for atonement. However, Christ is our eternal sacrifice that has cleansed us from all sin once and for all. So, in the New Testament, our sinful deeds don’t put a separation wall between us and God anymore. God doesn’t hide His face from us, and He always hears us, no matter what we did wrong. 

”But what about Proverbs 28:13 , where King Solomon says:

Proverbs 28:13 (NKJV) 

13 He who covers his sins will not prosper, but whoever confesses and forsakes them will have mercy.”?

The same explanation given for Isaiah’s case is relevant here as well. King Solomon needed the mercy of God and his prosperity depended on his obedience to the Law, because he was walking in darkness. His sins had not been removed yet. All the people of the Old Testament relied on the mercy of God for their blessing and prosperity. Until Christ would come, God overlooked temporarily their sins when they obeyed the Law or brought the animal sacrifices. However, in the New Testament, the new creation has become prosperity (2 Corinthians 8:9) without any qualification, because of Christ’s righteousness, and believers have been blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places (Ephesians 1:3). Believers in Christ don’t have sins to cover or confess anymore, because they were all taken away at the cross. 

“But what about King David when he lamented in Psalm 32:1-5 and Psalm 38:18 about his sins and confessed them? Shouldn’t we follow his example?” Let’s read those passages. 

Psalm 32:1–5 (NKJV) 

1 Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. 

2 Blessed is the man to whom the Lord doesn’t impute iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. 

3 When I kept silent, my bones grew old through my groaning all the day long. 

4 For day and night Your hand was heavy upon me; My vitality was turned into the drought of summer. 

5 I acknowledged my sin to You, and my iniquity I haven’t hidden. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,” and You forgave the iniquity of my sin. 

Psalm 38:18 (NASB95) 

18 For I confess my iniquity; I am full of anxiety because of my sin. 

If we look carefully at the first two verses of Psalm 32, we will notice that King David prophesied by the Spirit about the time when people’s transgressions will be forgiven and the Lord will not impute iniquity to them anymore. He rejoiced looking ahead at the days we are living now. However, in his time, he had to confess his sins to the Lord to receive mercy and he probably confessed more in the hope of saving his son from the death punishment. And even though King David confessed his sins many times and asked for forgiveness from God, his confession and tears were not the ones which atoned for his sin. David still had to bring sacrifices to atone for his sins according to the Law. 

Finally, “what about the Lord’s prayer from Luke 11:2-4 or Matthew 6:9-13, where Jesus tells us to ask the Father to forgive our sins? Isn’t He telling us to confess our sins to God?” Let’s read the Lord’s prayer passage in Luke:

Luke 11:2–4 (NKJV) 

2 So He said to them, “When you pray, say: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. 

3 Give us day by day our daily bread. 

4 And forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who is indebted to us. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.” 

If we take a close look at the Lord’s prayer in the light of the Gospel, we will quickly notice that the Lord’s prayer is an Old Testament prayer and not a New Testament one. First, we need to realize that the disciples who asked Jesus to teach them how to pray were Jews, accustomed with the Law and the Torah. Second, Jesus hadn’t died yet on the cross in order to establish a prayer model according to the new creation era and He couldn’t disclose yet the plan God had through the cross, otherwise the devil would have never crucified Him. At that moment in time, Jesus was still in the Old Testament period. The transition from the Old Covenant to the New Covenant had not been made yet. For example, He said in verse 2 to pray that God’s Kingdom would come on earth. That was the longing and the prayer of all Old Testament prophets, that the Kingdom of God would come. This was supposed to happen when Messiah would come. At that point in time, this kind of prayer made sense because the Kingdom had not come yet. However, we see later in Romans 14:17 , as well as in other places, that Jesus brought the Kingdom on earth, especially after the cross, although not in its full visible manifestation yet: 

Mark 1:14 –15 (NKJV) 

14 Now after John was put in prison, Jesus came to Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God, 

15 and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel.” 

Luke 17:20 –21 (NKJV) 

20 Now when He was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, He answered them and said, “The kingdom of God does not come with observation; 

21 nor will they say, ‘See here!’ or ‘See there!’ For indeed, the kingdom of God is within you.” 

Romans 14:17 (NKJV) 

17 for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. 

Then in Luke 11:3, Jesus told His disciples to ask the Father for the daily bread. However, we see later in Ephesians 1:3 and 2 Peter 1:3 that God has already blessed believers with all spiritual blessings in the heavenly places and everything pertaining to life and godliness. At the end of the prayer, Jesus instructs the disciples to ask the Father to deliver them from the evil one. That made sense before the cross, because all people were in the domain of darkness and under the authority of the devil and they needed God to intervene and help them. However, later, Colossians 1:13 says that believers have been transferred from the domain of darkness into the Kingdom of H...