“Lord, I confess to thee sadly my sin. All I am tell I thee, all I have been.”

Hymn: “No, Not Despairingly” – Horatius Bonar (1808-1899)
Tune: KEDRON


To borrow a word from this hymnline, “sadly” not many evangelical churches sing this hymn any more. That is sad for me because there may be no other complete hymn in all of church history with more profound one-liners than this one. Those “ruminating” texts are why I am committed to hymns – congregational and devotional.

Two of the most introspective sentences in all hymndom are spoken here. Nothing frivolous or superficial. “Sadly, righteous Christ, I admit there are some darknesses in my life that I cannot express out loud to any human. You know about all this already, of course, but I need to tell you the whole truth of who I am and what I’ve done… who I’ve been. Here goes…” A chill should have come across you as you pondered that. If not, go back and read it again!

In the hymn, Bonar goes on to ask for purging, washing and cleansing; it is a true confession.

For me, the great mercy of this text is that I can lay it all out there – expose myself, so to speak – and my relationship with Christ will not be affected. Do you realize that? Do you really? This ability of the Savior to continue loving me in spite of the sad shape my life may have been in – I am blown away by that. Absolutely blown away.

Like any good friend, in all likelihood the response of Christ is, “I know. I know. It’s okay. We’re still okay.”

Though too often omitted from public worship, confession is still good for the soul… for THIS poor soul at least.

[First published 11/20/2014]