Introduction

Do believers in Christ need to confess their sins? If yes, how should it be done and what is the importance of it? If they don’t need to confess their sins, why not? Can genuine born-again believers ever lose their salvation? In this series, we will have an extended discussion about the practice of confession of sins, conscience, righteousness, eternal security, and about overcoming temptations and living in holiness. Now, I have to admit and provide a little warning to my listeners that some of the things that I am going to share here are usually challenging and difficult to accept for a vast majority of Christians. However, I still encourage you to listen to the end and as you listen, put aside the things that you don’t understand temporarily, or things that you are not ready to accept yet. The Holy Spirit will teach you all things (John 14:26), He will guide you into all truth (John 16:13), and He will give you peace. The challenges of these topics don’t derive from the fact that I am looking to share something new, out of the ordinary, and shocking. The challenges come from the fact that these topics are quite different from the way they have been approached and practiced by the mainstream Christianity in general, especially when it comes to confession of sins, righteousness, and eternal security. However, they are things that I was convinced of by the Holy Spirit from the Word of God, and about which I cannot stay silent. 

What is presented in this book is what  the Holy Spirit has revealed directly to my wife and I, ‘precept upon precept,’ over a period of about thirteen years. These revelations were also shaped, refined, and confirmed by the teachings of various pastors and teachers from the body of Christ like Joseph Prince, Chris Oyakhilome, Curry Blake, Andrew Wommack, and Ryan Rufus. I am eternally grateful and thankful for these people through which God has worked so mightily in our lives and brought so much revelation, freedom, and peace. I want to give God and them the credit they so much deserve, as well as to attempt to pass on to others this powerful message of grace and righteousness to the best of my ability.

As a general principle, a lie does not become truth just because it has been propagated for hundreds of years throughout history, or because the majority of people has accepted it as truth. From time to time, people of God need to re-evaluate some of the existing doctrines in Christendom to see if they are really in line with the Word of God. 

A good friend of mine shared with me a funny story from his family when he got married and used to go to his wife’s family for different holiday dinners. He noticed that while this family was preparing to do some roasted pork legs they would always cut and throw away a good part of the pork legs. My friend started asking the ladies who were cooking why did they do that. The answer that he got was that they always did it that way, because that’s what the recipe called for. So he began a little investigation on his own in his wife’s family to find out why they did it that way and threw away such good meat. He asked his wife, his sisters-in-law, and his mother-in-law, until he found out the reason behind it: his wife’s great-grandmother first cut that part of the pork legs because they didn’t fit in her cooking tray. Wow! That is quite a reason, isn’t it? It’s hilarious, I know, how a silly habit can be passed down from generation to generation without ever being questioned. But it’s true, it happens a lot of times and in many areas of our lives. I am sure you have your own examples of the kind. 

Some of the beliefs that you hold today as a Christian might have been simply taken from your parents, pastors, friends, and teachers without ever being challenged or questioned in a constructive way. You’re probably not even aware of this. You don’t need to believe everything I say here or take my word for it, but consider this time while you read, a season of re-evaluation of some of your beliefs, and check again for yourself from the Scripture and with an open mind if what I am saying is according to the Scripture or not. 

I would like to begin creating the context for the discussion about confession of sins and righteousness by first talking about the human conscience and its purpose.

The Human Conscience

The Origin of Conscience

Genesis 2:15–17 (NKJV) 

15 Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. 

16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; 

17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” 

God gives here a command to Adam not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for in the day that he would eat, he would surely die. Then Satan comes and tempts Eve with deception, by bringing doubt about the word of God that was spoken to them. As we all know, Adam and Eve ate from the forbidden tree and something interesting happened to them when they did, besides the fact that their spirit died instantly and was separated from God. Let’s read it in Genesis 3:6-7:

Genesis 3:6–7 (NKJV) 

6 So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate. 

7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings. 

This passage tells us that the moment they ate from the fruit, their eyes were opened. What eyes? Didn’t they see before? Of course, they have been seeing perfectly before, but they have been walking and seeing by faith. They were dominated more by the spiritual world in their inner vision and perception. The spiritual things were more real to them than the physical things. However, when they ate of that fruit, their perception of spiritual things diminished, and their perception of the physical things became dominant. We consider it to be normal today the way you and I see, feel, and think right now, but it’s actually abnormal compared to the way God created us initially. And through the new birth, we receive a new spirit inside of us that is capable again to walk by faith and not by sight. Apostle Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5:7, 17 the following:

2 Corinthians 5:7 (NKJV) 

7 For we walk by faith, not by sight. 

2 Corinthians 5:17 (NKJV) 

17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. 

We are called to walk by faith in what the Word says about our new identity and not walk by what we see with our physical eyes. We can behold and perceive that all things have become new for us through the eyes of the new spirit. We, as New Testament believers, should go back to the way Adam and Eve were intended to be. The spiritual realm together with what the new spirit holds inside of us should be more real to us than anything else. That has to become more real to us than this natural, physical...