March 13, 2024

Wednesday Word:  Secret Faults

Who can tell how often he offends? * cleanse me from my secret faults. – Ps. 19:12

Ps. 19 was the appointed psalm for Lent III.  It’s a good one for Lent, as it offers a variety of verses that can be meditated on and prayed with during this season of self-examination.  If you are still looking for a Lenten discipline, or if your original discipline went by the wayside and you want to pick something up, may I suggest reading and meditating on Psalm 19?

As I was sitting in church that Sunday reciting this psalm, I began to think:  How often have I/do I offend God or others?  Sure, the big ones are easy to identify:  being short-tempered with my family or coworkers; being discourteous or impatient with another person without knowing their story; using God as a weapon; excusing my behavior while blaming others for theirs.

But what are my secret faults?  What are those offensive things I do so often that I can’t keep count?  And are my secret faults faults that I commit when I’m alone so nobody else can see or know about?  Or are they faults I commit that are so concealed to me that only God knows?

One way to cleanse ourselves from secret faults is to get them out in the open, to bring them into the light so that we can address it and say, “I repent of this sin and will work to not commit it again.”  It may be that we do commit that sin again, but by bringing it to light we can deal with it in such a way that those sins will not get dominion over us (Ps. 19 again, verse 13).

Holy Week begins on March 24, and I will be offering time for personal confessions during that week.  What secret faults are troubling you?  What sins do you need to be cleansed from?

Lent is a time for us to make a right beginning.  I pray that you are finding this season prayerful, hopeful, and a time of cleansing so that you may, indeed, make a right beginning as we head into the Easter season.

Blessings,