I am a very sound sleeper, and almost nothing wakes me up when I am sleeping. But one night in 1988, I was awakened by an audible voice that said, “He who hides his sin will not prosper. You need to go to Keith and confess everything you have ever done.” I woke up immediately upon hearing this, but didn’t see anyone in the room. I didn’t know what it meant at first.

The next day I called Keith (who was my pastor at the time) and told him about what I heard. He was a principal of a Christian School not far from where I worked. He said it was a message from the Lord to me and that I should come to meet with him that day. I went on my lunch break. We prayed before we started and asked the Lord to bring to my remembrance all the sins I had committed in my past that I needed to repent of (and there were many) and as we prayed, I confessed and repented of each one. I have to say it was embarrassing. About a year prior to that I had prayed to rededicate my life to the Lord after living for most of the prior 15 years as a practicing alcoholic in a very sinful and debauched lifestyle.

At the time this happened I did not know that the first part of the message was a scripture verse from the Book of Proverbs:

He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy.

Proverbs 28:13 King James Version

After this happened, I still didn’t clearly understand why it happened. I knew that repentance is key in Christian life, but really didn’t know the significance of what I had done, so I asked the Lord to show me. Basically, He revealed that over those 15 years when I was in rebellion and had walked away from my faith, I had tried at different times to go back to church, back to serving the Lord, but I was always dragged back into that sinful lifestyle. I would stay for a while, but eventually the pull of that lifestyle was greater than my desire to live for the Lord.

Eventually I received the full explanation. When we sin, we give an open door to the enemy into our lives. That is one of the reasons for repentance: to repent, receive forgiveness and cleansing, and close the door to the enemy, so that temptation can never control us again. Also, as a believer, we need to be accountable to someone in authority in our lives. So the fact that I had not truly repented and turned away from those sins, essentially keeping them hidden, I left that door open and the enemy could come back with that temptation. And that happened time and time again over those years. By making myself accountable to someone in spiritual authority, and in true repentance, it helped me to stay on the right path.

That decision was one of the best I have ever made. And I have stayed on the right path ever since. That has made all the difference in my life.