In Christ, There is no Inventory to Take

The AA Program teaches people to take their inventory massively, the Fourth Step, followed by daily Tenth Step inventories.

No matter how often one takes his inventory, a sense of wrongdoing cannot be taken away.

First, let's dispel the nonsensical notion that a man can confess all of his sins:

"Who can understand his errors? cleanse thou me from secret faults." (Psalm 19: 12)

As a child, and even into adulthood, I was convinced that I could keep a close-enough eye on  myself, that I could catch my sins before they would catch me. Yet the truth remains: "who can understand errors?" The original does not specify even "whose" errors precisely, because this sad limitation is true for all of us.

David also writes about this:

"Thou hast set our iniquities before thee, our secret sins in the light of thy countenance." (Psalm 90: 8)

The light of God does not expose our sins, though, because in Christ His blood cleanses, even now, all of our sins:

"But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin." (1 John 1: 7)

Even if we wanted to confess our sins, we mistake who we are in, because we are now sons of Light (1 Thessalonians 5: 5)

In Christ, there is no iventory to take, in the sense that we do not confess our sins in order to be forgiven. Instead of looking at ourselves, Paul calls us to set our eye on what is above:

"1If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. 2Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. 3For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. 4When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory." (Colossians 3: 1-4)

 Rejoice instead in the following blessing, which David craved but at the time God could not give, because Jesus had not yet died on the Cross:

"If thou, LORD, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand?

"But there is forgiveness with thee, that thou mayest be feared." (Psalm 130: 3-4)

Stop looking at yourself! Stop taking your inventory! In Christ, there is no inventory to take!