Isaiah's vision of seeing the Lord "high and exalted, seated on a throne" (6:1-6) fits well with the discussion in our previous session of the primarily God-focused posture of worship. It's enlightening to see the similarities between Isaiah's vision of God and John's in Revelation 4 and 5. Both authors make it clear that entering the presence of God is a tremendously awesome and deeply unsettling experience. And the primary reason for both feelings is the unfathomable holiness of God.

What does it mean that God is holy? Holiness can have several meanings. Primarily it means to be set apart, completely different. God's holiness means that he is of a completely different order of beings than we are. But it also points to God's utter purity. God is completely good, with no shadow side, no hint of evil or corruption. As John says, "God is light; in him there is no darkness at all" (1 John 1:5). It's hard for us even to imagine such purity, but when we get near it, as Isaiah does in this vision, we are both attracted by its beauty and repelled by its dazzling power.

Isaiah's reaction was to cry out, "Woe to me! I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips" (v. 5).

That's the fundamental reason why worship includes confession and assurance. When we gather before the holy God, we become aware of who God really is, and in doing so, we become deeply aware of our sin and unworthiness. It's not because God is scolding us; we don't need to be scolded. All it takes is an awareness of God's true holiness. So the praise of God with which we begin our worship leads us naturally to look at ourselves and our lives in contrast to God: "Woe to me! I am ruined!"

However, it's important to remember that the purpose of confession is not to cower before the holiness of God, but to seek God's mercy. The psalms give us wonderful guidance as to how and why we confess.

Psalm 32 focuses on what happens to us when we refuse to confess, when we refuse to see ourselves as we are before the holy God: "When I kept silent, my bones wasted away. . . . For day and night your hand was heavy on me" (vv. 3-4). In other words, the failure to acknowledge our sins and shortcomings makes us unhappy and unhealthy. We are not being truthful with ourselves, and we are certainly not being truthful with God. It's only in confession that we find relief from the long-hidden truth deep within us: we are sick with sin.

But there is no way we can be honest with ourselves and with the holy God about our sinfulness unless we know that within God's holiness there burns a heart of love. "Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions" (Ps. 51:1). The psalmist dares to confess because he knows there is mercy with God. Without that, we would not dare risk this honesty. As Psalm 130 puts it, "If you, Lord , kept a record of sins, Lord, who could stand? But with you there is forgiveness, so that we can, with reverence, serve you" (vv. 3-4).

So when we gather for worship we come to a time of bowing in honest confession. One of the church's oldest prayers is Kyrie, eleison ("Lord, have mercy")---a prayer of confession. Sometimes we may spend our time of confession in silence, sometimes we may read a prayer together, and sometimes we may sing a song. But it's important that together we acknowledge that we are broken and sinful people, so that together we may receive the sure word of God's mercy and grace in Jesus Christ.