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Comfort in Private Confession
By Vanessa Rasanen That drive to church might have been the hardest I had ever made — and I’ve made plenty of white-knuckled, stress-filled, holy-moly-please-be-quiet-or-I’m-going-to-lose-it Sunday morning drives with my four littles. That particular weekday afternoon, though, I was headed to our near-empty church to meet with my pastor in the sanctuary for private confession and absolution. While I’ve often encouraged friends to seek this out for themselves, and I have openly confessed this pastoral service to be a blessed gift, truth is I was downright scared to do it myself. I had actually been considering making it a regular practice. After all, there’s no reason you need to have…
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When Christian Love Needs to be Tough
By Vanessa Rasanen There is much about this life in faith that seems confusing to those who live outside it. This shouldn’t shock us, of course, since God tells us quite clearly that His word is folly to those who don’t believe. They won’t understand why we give so much of our income to the church — even before putting any into our own savings. They don’t get why we wake up early every Sunday to get to church even when there’s a foot of snow outside. And they certainly cannot fathom why we would dare to share something as personal as our faith with those who have no interest…
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Smalcald Articles– Part III, Article VIII. Of Confession
Part III, Article VIII. Of Confession. 1] Since Absolution or the Power of the Keys is also an aid and consolation against sin and a bad conscience, ordained by Christ [Himself] in the Gospel, Confession or Absolution ought by no means to be abolished in the Church, especially on account of [tender and] timid consciences and on account of the untrained [and capricious] young people, in order that they may be examined, and instructed in the Christian doctrine. 2] But the enumeration of sins ought to be free to every one, as to what he wishes to enumerate or not to enumerate. For as long as we are in the…
