who can forgive sin

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rev_kevin said:
I don’t pray to God and ask him for forgiveness. I talk to him, tell him my sins and its up to him to forgive them. It has nothing to do with self piety. I don’t go and make a spectical of my self while I confess. I do that in privite. Its just me and God and nobody needs to know my sins except God. God’s grace has only one condition and that is to believe in him there is no grace through water, bread, wine. Grace comes from God alone and its through his grace that our sins are forgiven.
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The problem is you are seeing the means of grace as a barrier, instead of a vehicle. No one is denying that grace comes from God. That is an argument against a phantom position. Quite frankly, however, I can demonstrate from Scripture where God’s grace comes through water, bread, wine, and word, and you cannot demonstrate that God’s grace comes abstractly in an immediate way through some sort of personal meditation; because it doesn’t.
 
rev kevin;6569407] and nobody needs to know my sins except God.
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Rev. In a previous post you said we are to confess our sins to one another. Aren’t you contradicting yourself?
 
TriuneUnity said:
How do you know your sins are forgiven?
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And more importantly - while you may have power (in some sense) to forgive sins that are against you (although not in God’s name) - what of the power to retain?

As someone hurt by another’s sin, on a personal level I certainly have no power to retain the sins of others who have sinned against me, if they come to me seeking forgiveness. 🤷
 
rev_kevin said:
Jesus died so our sins may be forgiven. When Jesus was baptized did he have sin, no there was no sin in him to be washed away or forgiven. So why was he baptized?
I can baptize because to us baptism is entering a new life with Christ. Before you are baptized you confess your sins to God. Now I can hear confessions all day long but that is all I can do. I nor does anyone have the power to forgive a sin that is not against you presonally.
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You cannot forgive sins because you do not have the Authority to do so. Others cannot forgive your sins because they do not have the Authority either. They may be able to forgive offenses against themselves, but if you have broken a commandment in sinning against them, you must still seek God’s forgiveness. The only true certainty that you have that your sins are forgiven you is by the sacrament of Penance and the absolution of a priest. Or a personal message from the Holy Spirit.
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TriuneUnity said:
For us and for our salvation. In order to be identified with sinners, he needed to be visibly identified with sinners. His Baptism sanctifies our Baptism. Christian Baptism is not the ritual washing of John the Baptist.

How do you know your sins are forgiven?
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Jesus said “It must be done, because we must do everything that is right.” This refers to accomplishing God’s mission. It was an advancing of God’s work. He was inaugurating his public ministry.
If I truly mean it then they are forgiven.
How do you know your sins are forgiven?
How does the priest know you are truly sorry for your sins?
 
rev_kevin said:
If I truly mean it then they are forgiven.
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You are correct.
If you have “perfect contrition” ie: If you are truly sorry for having offended God, rather than just the fear of Hell, your sins ARE forgiven. BUT, because you have also sinned against the Church and your fellow Christians, you must also make a sacramental confession as soon as you can.
You know that your sins are forgiven when the priest pronounces the words of absolution. He speaks in the Name of Christ and of the Church.
If you lie to the priest, If you confess and DO NOT intend reformation, then you have NOT received true forgiveness and have added to your burden of sin.
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rev_kevin said:
If I truly mean it then they are forgiven.
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Go and reread what happened to David after he adultered with Bathsheba (from memory it’s in either 1 or 2 Samuel, chapters 12 and 13).

Certainly David fasted, did penance and prayed for forgiveness. Do you think he meant it? Of course. No-one who reads Psalm 51 ("Have mercy on me, Lord, according to your lovingkindness …’), supposedly written at this time, can doubt his sincerity.

Did he then say to himself ‘I truly meant it, therefore I know my sins are forgiven’ and leave it at that? Not a bit. He confessed to God’s representative - the prophet Nathan - saying ‘I have sinned against the Lord’. He didn’t give details, because on that occasion he didn’t need to, since it was Nathan who had pointed out David’s sin to him.

Then he waited until NATHAN pronounced absolution - ‘For your part the Lord has forgiven your sin’. But Nathan did more. He also announced the penance God would require of David - that the child he and Bathsheba had adulterously conceived would die.
How do you know your sins are forgiven?
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Because of the COMBINATION, the one David relied on, of my true repentance and the priest’s pronouncement of absolution.
How does the priest know you are truly sorry for your sins?
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God has His ways. He showed Peter that Annias and Sapphira weren’t truly sorry, didn’t He?

Then there’s the fact that I actually went to the effort of either looking up the church timetable and going there at the time scheduled for confessions, or phoning the priest and making an appointment with him in order to confess outside the scheduled times. Then I have to examine my conscience - think individually about and name ALL my serious sins to the priest.

This effort indicates the seriousness with which I view both my sins and the obligation to confess them. It’s something incredibly few people if any would bother doing on a whim or half-heartedly, if they weren’t truly repentant.

What effort really needs to be expended, what serious thought and contemplation needs to be contributed, to a simple prayer of ‘God, I’m sorry’? How often do we say similar things to people we bump against in the street or on whose toes we accidentally tread, or whose phone number we accidentally dial? How seriously do we think about those apologies, mean them wholeheartedly, form real resolutions never to do the like again?

For serious sin we owe God much more than that.
 
Third_Day said:
No it doesn’t. Look at the context of John 5: 14
" Is any among you sick? Let him call for the presbyters of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord and the prayer of faith will save the sick man, and the lord will raise him up and if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to one another, and pray for another, that you may be healed"

Notice that James does not say “confess your sins to God”.
Why doesn’t he say that?
It is the** presbyters that are called, it is the presbyters **that pray over the sick man, it is the presbyters that anoint the man with oil in the name of the Lord and if he has commited sins they are forgiven. By who? THe neighbor that just happened to be there?
The context shows that we are to confess our sins, not to God but to **the presbyter **who will forgive **with the aurthoity given by God **as we see in John 20.

Rev. Kevin, if one of the members of your congregation confess the sin of adultery to you can you say “I forgive you” and that sin is forgiven by God? Can you say “I do not forgive you” and that sin is denied by God.?
How can you say that James is saying we should confess our sins to our neighbor and that sin will either be forgiven or retained by that neighbor or that church member?
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Thank you for posting this. This was the verse that came to mind when Rev Kevin mentioned confessing to one another.
 
hosemonkey said:
You cannot forgive sins because you do not have the Authority to do so. Others cannot forgive your sins because they do not have the Authority either. They may be able to forgive offenses against themselves, but if you have broken a commandment in sinning against them, you must still seek God’s forgiveness. The only true certainty that you have that your sins are forgiven you is by the sacrament of Penance and the absolution of a priest. Or a personal message from the Holy Spirit.
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Then Peter came to him and asked, Lord, how often should I forgive someone who sins against me? Seven times? No! Jesus replied, “seventy times seven!”

Yes I said I do not have the authority to forgive someone who has not sinned against me.
If you sin then yes you should seek God’s forgiveness. That is what I have been saying all along. Where does God say you have to do penence and have the absolution of a priest in order for him to forgive you. How do you get a personal message from the HS?
 
hosemonkey said:
You are correct.
If you have “perfect contrition” ie: If you are truly sorry for having offended God, rather than just the fear of Hell, your sins ARE forgiven. BUT, because you have also sinned against the Church and your fellow Christians, you must also make a sacramental confession as soon as you can.
You know that your sins are forgiven when the priest pronounces the words of absolution. He speaks in the Name of Christ and of the Church.
If you lie to the priest, If you confess and DO NOT intend reformation, then you have NOT received true forgiveness and have added to your burden of sin.
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How did I sin against my fellow Christians and the Church?
 
Third_Day said:
Rev. In a previous post you said we are to confess our sins to one another. Aren’t you contradicting yourself?
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We are not to confess our sins to one another. I don’t go and confess my sin to someone who I have not sinned against. If I sinned against someone then I confess my sin to them and ask them for forgiveness.
 
LilyM said:
Many doesn’t mean all - how do you know you were included among the ‘many’?
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May be it is only meant for the CC and not the rest of his believers.
How do you know your are included among the many? Oh let me guess, you are part of his church, you follow the rules of the CC and you are the chosen ones. So it was meant just for the CC.
 
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