Youtube Video

MP3 Podcast

Summary

In this conversation, Forest Antemesaris emphasizes the critical role of confession in the plan of salvation, discussing its often-overlooked importance in evangelism. He outlines five biblical facts about confession, illustrating how it expresses true faith, must precede baptism, serves as a pledge of allegiance, acts as a vow before witnesses, and is essential for a relationship with God. Antemesaris encourages listeners to recognize confession as a vital component of their faith journey, urging them to teach and practice it earnestly.

Chapters

00:00 Opening Prayer and Introduction
00:10 The Importance of Confession in Salvation
03:09 Confession as Expression of Faith
09:10 Confession Preceding Baptism
12:09 Confession as a Pledge of Allegiance
19:16 Confession as a Vow Before Witnesses
25:23 Confession and Relationship with God
28:55 Conclusion and Call to Action

Transcript

Forest Antemesaris (00:00)
It’s a blessing to be here this evening to open God’s Word, to sing praises to Him, to go to Him in prayer. And the topic I was assigned this evening is teaching confession and evangelism.

I’m afraid that of all the steps in the plan of salvation, as we usually call it, confession might be the one that’s the easiest to skip over or the one that’s the easiest to under-emphasize. You know, in a context where atheism and skepticism are on the increase, we very often emphasize how important faith is, how without faith it’s impossible to please God, and how absolutely fundamental faith is. And in the context of many who believe in faith alone, oftentimes when we are in Bible studies with people

especially

if they come from a denominational background, faith will be something that’s discussed quite a bit. Repentance is another thing that’s often emphasized in evangelism and for good reason. Many of us, I could speak for myself included, our life outside of Christ looks very different from what Christ would have us to do. And we understand that even Jesus’ first sermon was pretty short, recorded for us in the book of Matthew, Repent.

for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Baptism, of course baptism with its biblical significance and importance.

⁓ Appropriately, gets a lot of attention when we are in Bible studies with people, when we’re trying to be evangelistic, demonstrating from the scriptures that baptism is that point according to the New Testament, that a person goes from lost to saved. Living faithfully, hopefully gets some attention, at least in my experience, it gets quite a bit of attention. The people know when we are evangelizing, when we’re studying, that you’re not just dipped and done, that we do expect you to grow, that God expects you to grow

to mature and in the context again of a denominational landscape where perseverance of the saints and once saved always saved is so popular it’s oftentimes in my experience that living faithfully gets a lot of attention. But sometimes unfortunately confession if we’re not careful, I’m not accusing anybody of this, but confession perhaps of all those steps on the plan of salvation is the easiest to maybe fall by the wayside or be under emphasized.

Maybe it’s even the case that sometimes people don’t even know that they’re supposed to give a confession until they’re already standing in the water. I hope that that’s not the case, but sometimes it is under emphasized in our evangelism. In fact, sometimes the plan of salvation looks kind of like this, where confession kind of gets shrunk down kind of just as like ⁓ an add-on. It’s kind of like a speed bump on your way to the baptistry, right? wait, there’s one more thing before we baptize you. I’m gonna ask you if you believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God.

But when we turn to the Scriptures, when we turn to the New Testament, we see that confession really is vital and important. And I want us to, as we consider the idea of teaching confession and evangelism, I want us this evening together simply to look at five biblical facts about confession from the Scriptures. And the first one we’re gonna look at is from the book of Romans chapter 10. I hope you’ll turn there with me. Romans chapter 10.

And specifically when we look at verses nine and 10 of Romans chapter 10, what we find is that confession expresses true faith. That when we confess Christ as Lord, when we confess that Jesus Christ is the Son of the living God, just like Peter did in Matthew chapter 16, that we are to do so expressing something that’s already in our heart, a faith that’s already in our heart about the reality of who Jesus is.

In Romans chapter 10, really this idea begins.

all the way at the beginning of the chapter where Paul expresses that it is his heart’s desire and prayer for Israel that they may be saved, Romans 10 verse one. And he talks about how Israel, unbelieving Israel and those Jews who had not yet obeyed the gospel, how they, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, seek to establish their own righteousness. And Paul says in verse four of Romans 10 that Christ is the end of the law for all those who believe.

And then he begins to talk about Moses in verse number five and how Moses writing about the righteousness which is of the law. And he quotes Leviticus 18 verse five saying the man who does those things shall live by them.

But then Paul pivots and he wants to demonstrate that the righteousness by faith in Jesus Christ is something that Moses prophesied about back in Deuteronomy chapter 30 verses 12 through 14. So in verse five he begins to say, sorry verse six, but the righteousness of faith speaks in this way, quoting Deuteronomy 30 verse 12 here, do not say in your heart who will ascend into heaven, that is to bring Christ down from above.

And then quoting in verse seven, Deuteronomy 30 verse 13, or who will descend into the abyss, that is to bring Christ up from the dead. But what does it say? Here, pointing out what Deuteronomy chapter 30 verse 14 says, the apostle Paul writes by inspiration, the word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart. That is the word of faith which we preach.

And then picking up in verse number nine, we read that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes under righteousness and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

Now that context, it’s important to understand why does Paul single out these two things maybe we would say from the steps of the plan of salvation, right? Sometimes the Romans rode to salvation. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard that. It’s very popular in the denominational world, kind of like how to be saved. Of course it skips right over, Romans chapter six verses three through seven, but it does land here in Romans 10 verses nine through 10. And look, all you gotta do is confess and believe. And sometimes people will press you. Why doesn’t Paul mention baptism here? Well in part because

he is quoting from Deuteronomy chapter 30 verse number 14 which mentions your mouth and your heart.

And Paul’s point is that this righteousness that comes by faith that Moses foresaw in Deuteronomy chapter 30 is fulfilled in what Paul calls the word of faith, what we would call the gospel, in which when a person obeys the gospel, part of that obedience is you must believe in your heart and you must confess with your mouth. That is not to say that those things are sufficient for salvation in and of themselves, but they are necessary for salvation. That’s what we find here in Romans 10 verses nine through 10.

We know that confession is not sufficient for salvation, that in of itself it can save you for a number of reasons. One, the Bible doesn’t teach that. The Bible teaches the importance of repentance, baptism, et cetera. But also there’s some false things that would be true if it were true that all you had to do was confess. For example, universalism would be true.

The Bible tells us in Philippians chapter 2 that every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of the Father. But the Bible is very clear that not everybody is going to be saved. So we know that it’s more than confession that must save a man. If it were true that all you had to do was confess, then the demons would be saved.

You know, the demons know who Jesus is, and oftentimes in Jesus’ ministry, when he’s interacting with the demons, they confess maybe more earnestly than some Christians do. They are crying out, Jesus, son of God, why are you here? What do you have to do with us? Why are you tormenting us before our time? So we know that confession in and of itself is not enough to save a man, but we do know that it is necessary. And Romans 10, verses nine through 10 teaches us that fact.

that confession is necessary, not in and of itself, but because it expresses, at least it is supposed to express, what’s really in our heart. Confession without faith, it’s vain. It profits nothing. But faith without confession is dubious. You can’t trust it. If you really believe it, why wouldn’t you say it publicly? And so we see both of these things working together. You know, you really don’t know what somebody believes until they tell you.

Sometimes when you’re preaching, you see people nodding. You assume that means that they are agreeing with what you’re saying. They could be nodding off. They could have a heavy head and a weak neck. You never know. You never know why people nod. You can’t just assume, right? That’s what the Bible places an emphasis. What is in your heart should come out of your mouth. So confession in the first place, the first biblical fact.

Confession expresses true faith. Number two, the second biblical fact, confession must precede, that is, be before, baptism. In Acts chapter eight, you have Philip, the evangelist, speaking to this Ethiopian eunuch in the chariot. And as Philip is ushered by the Holy Spirit up to this eunuch, the eunuch has the scroll of Isaiah out.

and he had just come from worship in Jerusalem, or at least what he could participate in, in worship in Jerusalem as a eunuch. And he’s reading this prophecy about Christ, what we know as Isaiah chapter 53. And Philip asks him a question, do you understand what you’re reading? And the eunuch answers, a very good answer, he says, how can I unless somebody guide me? I need some teaching, I need some understanding. And the Bible tells us that from that scripture, Philip preaches Christ to him.

And in Acts chapter eight, verse number 36, we read that the chariot comes upon some water and the eunuch says, look, here’s water, what hinders me from being baptized? Of course he understood, even after just this short little interaction with Philip, that baptism was necessary and important and he wants to do it right now. And in verse number 37, we find Philip say to him, if you believe with all your heart, you may. So he asks, what’s hindering me? And Philip says, look, if you believe with all your heart,

You may do that and notice what the eunuch says. He answers and says, I believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God.

Now there in Acts chapter eight verse 37, if you have a new King James, a King James, you’re gonna see it, some newer translations. It might be in a footnote, it might be in brackets, something like that. It is not within the scope of this lesson to talk about textual criticism.

But if you look up why it is the case that sometimes it’s in a footnote, sometimes it’s in a bracket, what you’ll find is that scholars concede, even if they don’t think it’s in the original text for one reason or the other, they’ll concede that this idea of confessing before you’re baptized is an ancient practice of the early church. So either it’s in the original text or it represents what the first Christians were doing. Either way, we understand.

that it is important that somebody confesses before they’re baptized. Why is that? We just talked a moment ago. You don’t really know what somebody believes until you hear it come out of their mouth. Could you imagine baptizing somebody? Maybe you just had a Bible study with them. Maybe they come up to you. If you’re a preacher, you’ve probably had this situation. I know I have. Maybe somebody comes up to you and says, you know what, I believe. I want to get my life right with God. I don’t want to live the way I used to live. Won’t you baptize me?

And maybe you have a Bible study and you say, know what, it’s important that you know what you’re getting into. Let’s talk about baptism and see what the scriptures say. And maybe you have a Bible study about baptism and the person says, OK, awesome, I’m ready to go. I want to be added to the Lord’s Church. I want to be baptized for the forgiveness of my sins. I want one those blessings that the New Testament talks about.

And so you baptize that individual. Could you imagine if you baptize that individual, you bring them up out of the water, they’re still dripping wet, and you say, wait a second, I forgot. Do you believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God? And could you imagine if they looked at you and said, no, I don’t? You would realize that all that energy and effort you put in just to that little episode right there and baptizing that individual, all of it, all they did was get wet.

And so we understand it’s from a practical perspective, the necessity of confession preceding baptism. That we know that a person, in order to be baptized, scripturally speaking, must have faith. And we know that you don’t know if somebody has faith until they tell you. And so we see the second biblical fact about baptism, that baptism precedes, sorry, that confession precedes baptism. Number three.

The third biblical fact about confession we’ll look at this evening is that confession is a pledge of allegiance. Now when I was in high school, I’m not gonna tell you when that was because I don’t wanna tempt you to, ⁓ know, ⁓ what does Paul tell Timothy about his youth? ⁓ Yeah, exactly, I don’t want you to despise me for my youth, you know, so I’m not gonna tell you when I was in high school. But when I was in high school, at least in Auburn, Florida,

We still said the Pledge of Allegiance every morning. And when I was a senior in high school, Lori, my wife can attest to this, we had the same first period, senior year in high school. We sat by each other. I don’t think that was good for my grade in that class, but we were there and it was first period and the pledge was going on over the speaker and our teacher that we had first period our senior year took the Pledge of Allegiance so seriously that if you did not stand up when you said it, he would kick you out of the classroom.

That was rare, even back then, whenever that was. Not a lot of teachers took it that seriously. Now, maybe some people in here take it that seriously. I don’t know. However seriously you take the Pledge of Allegiance, the point is, of all the pledges of allegiance that we should take seriously, our Pledge of Allegiance to Jesus Christ is the most serious. And I know that in part because it is possible to go to heaven without ever having pledged allegiance to the United States of America.

It is not possible to go to heaven without ever having pledged allegiance to Jesus Christ. It is an absolute 100 % necessity. And here in Matthew chapter 10, verses 32 through 33, Jesus pretty much says as much. He says that not only that.

Confession is a pledge of allegiance. He says that confession is, this is what it is in the book, I couldn’t fit it on the slide. Confession is a divinely reciprocated pledge of allegiance. In other words, if you pledge allegiance to Jesus, Jesus will pledge allegiance to you. If you deny Jesus, refuse to pledge allegiance to Jesus, Jesus is gonna deny you. Look at what he says there Matthew chapter 10, verses 32 through 33. Therefore,

Whoever confesses me before men, him I will also confess before my Father who is in heaven. But whoever denies me before men, him I will also deny before my Father who is in heaven. Now again, some translations translate that word confess as acknowledge, but it’s the same Greek word that’s translated confess in all these other instances. But look at what Jesus is saying. I especially wanna take note to this. What does Jesus say?

He does not say, whoever confesses me in his heart, him I will also confess before my father who is in heaven. Notice what he says, whoever confesses me before men, I will confess to my father in heaven. What is he saying? He’s saying Jesus is looking for us to publicly acknowledge this truth about him. He’s looking for us to not be ashamed of him, to not be embarrassed of our affiliation with him.

no matter what the price might be. even when Jesus was on earth, the price to confess Christ was high. We read in John 19, 23, John chapter 12 that some people were thrown out of the synagogues if they confessed Christ. If you believe Jesus was the Messiah in the first century, in Israel in the first century, you can get kicked out of the synagogue. Hey, you’re not welcome here. You can’t be here. You’re not one of us.

So this confession is not just empty words on the lips. This confession really is, I’m pledging my allegiance to King Jesus. What he says to do, I will do. How he says to live, I will live. The commands that he give, that is how I shape my entire life. He’s looking for that kind of dedication out of us. And notice, again, it’s reciprocated that Jesus gives that back to us. Hey, if you’re not ashamed of me, Jesus says, I’m not going to be ashamed of you.

And now I think once you know who Jesus is, once you understand him and appreciate him and see who he is and believe the truth about him that he is the son of the living God. I think it’s a lot easier to confess him before men, to acknowledge him before men, to be proud and say, look, Jesus, he rose from the dead, he conquered death, he’s the son of God. What he says goes, I’m gonna shape my life after him. That makes sense, it’s logical. The part that I can’t wrap my head around.

is that Jesus.

would have the name of a worm like me on his lips before his father in heaven.

And of all the places, my name doesn’t deserve to be spoken. Because of God’s grace and the blood of Jesus Christ, if I’m unashamed of my Lord, He’s unashamed of me. And that’s not just true for me, that’s true for every single person in this room and beyond. That’s the Savior we serve. So if we want Jesus to pledge allegiance to us, he says very simply, we have to pledge allegiance to him.

to acknowledge him, to acknowledge who he is, and not just in her heart, not just privately, but before men, to make it real. know, something becomes more real when you go public with it. Back when I was in high school, we had this thing called Facebook official. You ever heard of that? Where, you know, a young man and young lady might be talking or dating, but until it’s on Facebook, it’s not real, right?

Because you’re putting out there publicly for everybody to see, hey, I affiliate with this person, right? This is my boo, this is my baby, whatever. Whatever the kids say these days, I don’t know. We understand that once you go public with something, hey, that’s hard to take back. Of course we know the internet’s forever, but if you confess something before witnesses, that’s what it’s talking about here, confess me before men.

These people, at least one of them, they’re not gonna have a super short memory. They’re gonna remember what you said. You said that you owned Jesus Christ and he was your Lord and he was your Savior. And when you step out of line, hopefully they’re willing to hold you accountable for it, which is something we’ll get to in a future point. So that’s point number three. Fact number three, confession is a pledge of allegiance, which leads us to this fourth one, this fourth fact, that confession is a vow before witnesses.

Confession is a vow before witnesses. You so many of our important civil institutions revolve around confessing something with your speech. Think about marriage. When you were married to your beautiful, wonderful spouse, you were all there gathered probably before some witnesses, and you exchanged rings or poured sand into a glass or I don’t know, whatever you might have done. You probably exchanged some vows.

But you said some things with your speech that were very serious. You made some promises. You said, do. Right? So death do you part, for better or for worse, richer or poorer, health, sickness, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. You know what it is. But even the institution of marriage, at least in our culture, it involves confessing something with your mouth.

Think about if you are a politician or you are a service member or you become a citizen of this country. There’s a ceremony called a swearing in ceremony. And in that ceremony, you know, all your paperwork has to be in, all your ducks in a row, all that stuff, all the bureaucratic stuff. But the ceremony is, you know, you might swear, put your hand on your heart or put your hand on the Bible and you will confess with your speech that you vow to do this, that and the other.

before you’re sworn in to give testimony in the courtroom. They’re gonna ask you to confess with your mouth that you’re gonna tell the truth. We understand that saying something in front of witnesses carries a certain amount of weight to it. And that’s why in 1 Timothy chapter six, verse number 12, as Timothy is maybe struggling, as Timothy needs that encouragement to fulfill his ministry and be the man that God has called him to be,

Paul calls on him to remember his confession. To think about how he made that good confession in front of many witnesses. Look at what the text says there in 1 Timothy chapter six verse number 12. He says, the good fight of faith. Lay hold on eternal life to which you were also called and have confessed the good confession and the presence of many witnesses. And here, Paul is using Timothy’s past confession at his baptism.

to spur him on to future commitment. He’s reminding him, hey, do you remember what you said in front of those witnesses? Do you remember what you said out loud? Do you remember when you said that you believe with all your heart that Jesus Christ is the Son of God? Don’t forget to act like it. That’s why in the book of Hebrews, again and again, we read this encouragement from the Hebrews author to those Christians there who are struggling to go back to Judaism, where he tells them to hold fast onto their confession.

He’s telling them, wait a second, you made a vow, you made a promise, you said Jesus is Lord, you said Jesus is the Son of God. You can’t go back to where you used to be. You’ve crossed really a line of no return. Your only choice now is to be faithful to Jesus or to be a liar. That’s how serious confession is. If you said that before men, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.

And there are witnesses who heard you say that. The church should be the kind of place that if I start living like I don’t believe Jesus Christ is the Son of God, one of those people who heard me make my confession should come up to me and say, hey, what happened? I was there when you said you believe Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Why aren’t you living like it?

And so it’s in this context that Paul reminds Timothy of his confession, that the Hebrews author reminds those Christians who are struggling of their confession. You made a vow, you made a promise. Now it’s time to live up to it. In every covenant, every contract, every agreement, there are responsibilities for both parties. The new covenant’s no different. God has made promises under the new covenant to forgive us of our sins.

to remember our sins and iniquities no more, to adopt us into his family, to give us all the spiritual blessings in Christ Jesus. But you know that we have to hold up our end of the bargain as well. That there’s some conditions to that covenant. We have to live faithfully. We have to meet those conditions. We have to walk in the light. We have to be an obedient child of God. But the question is, when do you sign on the dotted line?

When do you make that confession that ushers you into that new covenant, that acknowledgement that ushers you into that new covenant? We know that it’s after having believed and repented, when you make that confession and are baptized, you are signing on the dotted line for your portion of the new covenant. You’re saying I’m making a commitment to Jesus to live for him from now until the day that I die.

And when we are studying confession with people and evangelism, when we think about it ourselves, we shouldn’t under emphasize it, but speak to it as, you are about to make a promise in front of a lot of people. You’re about to confess in front of a lot of people that you believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Maybe it’s a lot of people, not a lot of people, but there will be some witnesses there. I think we understand that confession, confessing in front of people, making a vow in front of witnesses,

That’s a powerful thing. Sometimes we just need to be reminded of it. When I was in taking some classes in grad school at Fried-Hardeman, I had a fellow student who was from Nigeria. And he was a preacher for a congregation in Nigeria, but he was also a lawyer in Nigeria. And he told me that in Nigeria, it was often the practice in modern day that when a couple seeks to get divorced,

that the divorce judge will go and find the video of their wedding ceremony. But if there’s a videotape of their wedding ceremony or recorded on a phone, whatever it is, he’ll go and he’ll find it and he’ll play it in front of the couple who wishes to be divorced. And he’ll sit there and have them watch the entire thing and then when it’s over, he’ll ask them, why don’t you feel that way anymore? Or he’ll ask them, you made a vow, we have it on tape, what happened, what changed, are you sure that this is something you wanna do?

And I wonder if we shouldn’t think about our confession that way, that we made that promise, we acknowledged that truth, we acknowledged that fact, the faith that was in our heart came out of our mouths and other people heard us. Now it’s time to live according to it. Don’t forget the good confession you made in the presence of many witnesses. Lastly, this evening, fifth biblical fact about confession. Confession is needed to have the Father.

If you want to have a relationship with God, a saving relationship with God, you’re going to have to confess the truth about who Jesus Christ is. That’s not my opinion, that’s not my idea. That’s what the Bible tells us in 1 John chapter two verse 23, chapter four verse 15.

1 John is writing to an audience of Christians who are struggling. Sometimes it’s called Gnosticism, struggling with these false doctrines, these false heresies about how all flesh is evil and Jesus couldn’t have come in the flesh and Jesus really isn’t or wasn’t who the apostles said that he is. And it’s in this context that we hear this very strong language in the New Testament about the importance of what we confess about Jesus. And there were individuals who thought that they could have a relationship with God

without confessing the truth about his son. And the Apostle John, inspired by the Holy Spirit, corrects this mistaken view, but it is a reminder for us about how important confession is in the context of our relationship with God. Look at 1 John chapter two verse 23.

Whoever denies the son does not have the father either. He who acknowledges the son has the father also. Again, that word acknowledge is the same Greek word usually translated as confess. But notice what John’s saying. You cannot have the father without the son.

Our relationship with God the Father is mediated through Jesus Christ. He is the one mediator. 1st Timothy chapter 2 verse number 5. is the way, the truth, the life. John chapter 14 verse number 6. You cannot get to the Father without the Son. And if you believe something or confess something about the Son that is not true, not only have you lost the Son, but you’ve lost the Father as well. That’s how important this confession is.

Look at 1 John 4, verse number 15, whoever confesses that Jesus is the son of God, God abides in him and he in God. Again, a necessary condition, not a sufficient one. We know that from the rest of the scriptures, but again, notice how important confession is. That confession that Jesus is the son of God, that good confession, notice the result.

God abides in him and he in God. This relationship with God that you cannot have anywhere else, that you cannot have any other way. Brothers and sisters, confession is important. I think that is an understatement. Just like we would say, somebody can’t be baptized if they don’t believe, or if they don’t repent, or if they haven’t heard the gospel. Somebody shouldn’t be baptized if they don’t confess.

Just like we would say, somebody’s salvation is in jeopardy if they don’t have faith, if they don’t repent of their sins, if they’re not baptized, if they don’t stay faithful, a person’s salvation is in jeopardy if they don’t confess. We should not only emphasize this to individuals we are evangelizing with, but more than that, we should remember it for ourselves. Because confession in the New Testament is not meant to be a one-time thing.

Sure, we do it initially, right before our baptism, but it should be the case that our lives demonstrate our confession day in and day out. Paul talks about in Titus chapter one verse 16, those who profess to know God, it’s the Greek word and all these verses that was translated confession. There are those who profess to know God, but deny Him with their works. So our challenge as Christians and to teach others is,

Don’t just confess the Lord with your speech, confess Him with your actions, confess Him with your life. Pledge allegiance to Him truly and faithfully and He will pledge allegiance to you. So hope that we will remember that confession is more than a speed bump on the way to the baptistry. It’s necessary, the Bible says, for a relationship, a saving relationship with God the Father.

It expresses our true faith. It’s part of what makes our faith not be abstract, but be concrete. It’s part of that vow that we make in front of witnesses to live for God. It’s something that we cannot get to heaven without. May we strive to confess our Lord and Savior, not just in word, but in deed. And may we treat and teach others to do likewise. Thank you.