Well, we Protestants don't use confessionals, and apparently Martin Luther thought the

confessional booth was a good idea, but of course he was careful to make the practice

voluntary and never binding.

More recently John Stott commended the practice of regularly confessing sins to a trusted

pastor.

So maybe a rare Anglican church here or there has a confessional, but on the whole, Protestants

don't practice our regular confession of our sins to a minister.

So the question is what place should private confession of our personal sins to others

play when we're talking about, you know, confessing our sins to fellow Christians.

It's the question that comes from Nathan who asked this, Pastor John, thank you for enriching

my walk with Christ by your obedience to the truth faithfully serving the body of Christ

with your gift of preaching.

For the past few years, I have been struggling with the text and a drum beat sounding in

the campus ministry I work for in the church I attend.

James 516 is the drum beat that we need to confess our sins to each other.

Now I'm thankfully aware of Psalm 514 and for John 1.9 as I have preached on for John

1.9 many times.

There is one mediator between God and man, Jesus Christ the righteous.

Here are my main questions.

What exactly is James commanding us to do in James 516?

What does it mean that you may be healed and could you give us a brief theology of relational

confession practices on the whole?

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