CONFESS YOUR SINS ONE TO ANOTHER, AND BE HEALED
Mitch McPherson

I used to say that I lost my virginity when I was 16 years old. That’s not exactly true. I gave it away. I was a very rebellious kid. My family life was pretty volatile when I was young. I started drinking when I was about 14 and experimenting with drugs when I was 15. Then, when I was 15, while I was drunk and high, I gave myself away in the back room of a party house. Right afterwards, everyone I knew flooded into the room. My clothes were stolen, I was exposed, and I was left alone and broken to resolve what had just happened.

I was so bitter, so hurt and so angry. I thought, “Well, it’s done now. I can’t go back and change it. I can’t be good. I can’t be pure any longer, so why even try?” My way of resolution was to adopt the life motto, “I’ll try anything once. If it kills me, okay. If it doesn’t kill me and I like it, I can keep doing it.” So, I spent the next 11 years falling deeper and deeper into the bondage of sin and deception, sex, drugs, addiction, and lies.

I went from person to person and bed to bed trying to fill the empty space that was growing within me. I lived in a fantasy world. I built an insulated world around me that was nothing more than a house of lies. I was a pathological liar. I would say anything just to cover up the truth of my life. A large portion of the fantasy world I lived in was an intense addiction to hardcore porn. Movies, magazines, internet… you name it. My life was spinning more and more wildly out-of-control with each passing year, and I couldn’t stop the ride. Actually, I wasn’t really sure I wanted to.

At the age of 27, I came to know the Lord. But the majority of my past life and continuing present issues remained deep dark secrets that I refused to share with anyone. I entered a Student Intern Program at my church, walked closely with friends for the first time in my life, and began to learn what it was to submit under my pastors and mentors. But still, my secrets remained locked tight.

I learned to white knuckle my way through many temptations. I had stopped using drugs and drinking. But, the addiction to pornography continued to grow. I was desperately afraid to tell anyone. I thought that if I even told anyone what I struggled with, if they really knew the real me and all that my life contained, they wouldn’t want to be my friends. They wouldn’t want to be around me. I truly believed that people didn’t like people like me. People didn’t want to be around people who deal with sins like I dealt with because that’s the “really bad stuff.” I believed that if my leaders knew of my struggles, they would say that I am not called of God to minister to other people – I couldn’t even deal with my own life. I would never be seen as a fit vessel to carry the gospel of the Lord. Deep down, I saw myself as a lost cause, waiting to be abandoned and forgotten.

For the first two years that I walked with the Lord, I would fall over and over again. I would feel like I was growing in strength and ability to contain my sin, but it was only a matter of time until I fell. The lies began to take a toll on me. I believed that I would have to deal with it for the rest of my life. My marriage would suffer from it. I would pass it on to my kids and they would struggle with the same issues I did. I would never be free. I was so tired, and I was hopeless and afraid.

I kept hearing the voice of the Lord. “Confess. Confess. Confess your sins one to another… and be healed.” God sets the lonely in families, and I was definitely alone and afraid. But, I finally took that step of faith. I thought, “What else do I have to loose? Nothing. I am in bondage. I can’t stop and I can’t change.” I walked into my mentor’s office and I broke down. All I could get out of my mouth through the sobs was “Help me. Please, help me. I don’t know what to do. I can’t change. I need you.”

At that moment, my life changed forever. God’s hand of redemption, restoration, and recovery began to sweep through my life. I faced a challenging road ahead to see the victory Christ won for me made real in my life, but God poured out abundant grace and lavished love upon me. God set me free. Totally free! The Lord completely and radically transformed my life and my perspective. I am today a living epistle of God’s graciousness and His restoring power and His redemptive hand to restore what I had been neglectful to give away and destroy in my life. He has set me in a place of divinely imparted purity that I never imagined I could walk in, and He brought me to a place of restoration where I am totally set free!

Mitch McPherson
LIFE School of Ministry Administrative Coordinator
New Song Christian Fellowship Cool Springs