Contemporary worship centers on upbeat music and motivational, upbeat sermons. I’ve also observed the gradual disappearance of confession from modern worship. Nowadays, it’s all about grace and love. We cannot appreciate grace if we fail to recognize the carnage caused by sin in the human soul.
Cornelius “Neal” Plantinga, Jr. (1946-) was a professor at Calvin University and later president of Calvin Theological Seminary. He wrote a book in the mid-90s that resonated with me, Not the Way It’s Supposed to be: A Breviary of Sin. Shalom is central to Plantinga’s theology. It’s a Hebrew word meaning wholeness and well-being, most often translated as peace. God created us for harmony with neighbor, self, and God, but sin is a distortion of God’s shalom. Sin creates a rift with peace. God hates sin not only as a violation of holy law but also for its infringement of shalom. After all these years, one quote from Plantinga remains with me: “Sin is like garbage. You don’t want to let it build up.”
The old Scottish proverb, “Open confession is good for the soul, ” gives Plantinga credence. Eugene Peterson translates Psalm 32 in The Message, “When I kept it all inside, my bones turned to powder. Then I let it all out, I said, ‘I’ll come clean about my failures to God.’ Suddenly, the pressure was gone—my guilt dissolved, my sin disappeared” (Ps. 32.3, 5). We confess not to inform God of something he doesn’t already know but to acknowledge what is true about ourselves.
Plantinga’s prayer for the start of a new day is taken from his book Morning and Evening Prayers: