Sin separates us from God. David says in Psalm 32: "Oh the happiness of a man, to whom Jehovah imputeth not iniquity. And in whose spirit there is no deceit.
When I have kept silence, become old have my bones, Through my roaring all the day."
When we roar against others, the plank in our own eye too great to see our own sin; when we are sharp to look for fault in an other, yet are silent about our own sin, then our bones become old. And the roaring is also in us, convicting us by the Holy Spirit of sin and of judgement and of righteousness, but as we keep silent before God, our bones become old, we dry up inside as in a summer drought when the land dries and cracks. No one is persuaded by roaring.
But we do not have to live like this. We have a way to forgiveness.
In times past, we could bring a sacrifice which we gave to the priest, recognising and acknowledging our sin openly and with sorrow, seeking God's forgiveness. " Oh the happiness of him whose transgression is forgiven , whose sin is covered."
These sacrifices were fulfilled in Jesus, once and for all, for we have a great high priest, Jesus Christ the righteous, who, when we confess our sin, is righteous and just to forgive us our sin and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Through Him, we are forgiven by God, we have reconciliation and peace with God. We are in a restored relationship with Him and the roaring within us ceases and we do not roar at the world or at any other or at ourselves any more.
We should not roar in telling others and ourselves our wrong - we must pray and persuade and reason and present truth to bring others and ourselves to a knowledge of the truth, so that we are convicted from within and call out, 'What must we do?'
Korah, and the company of people who followed him, challenges Moses as the leader of God's people, accusing Moses of setting himself up and giving himself the position of prominence among the people of Israel, but Moses, as Paul and the disciples called by Jesus, and Jesus facing the same accusation, is one called, appointed and set apart by God to be an apostle, one sent by God to do as God commands.
The accusers bring censers, the words which go up to God, which should be the sweet fragrance of prayer, but, as Aaron's eldest two sons, bearing this strange fire, which will not be accepted, they and the censers they bring are destroyed. There is terrible judgement, the earth opens up and takes Korah and all he has alive into Sheol, a place of permanent separation from God.
The sacrifice we bring to God is a sweet fragrance to God, for our sin separates us from God but our acknowledging and being sorry for our sin, brings us into sweet friendship with Him once again.
We can readily misunderstand why the sacrifice we bring should be a sweet fragrance to God, but restored friendship is sweet, to go forward together instead of apart, 'Can two go together except they agree ?' as Amos in the spirit says (Amos 3:3)
Confess literally means to agree with someone. In the Greek 'homologeo' meaning literally 'same word".
If God points out your sin to you, you can rail against this and keep silent and roar within against it, but when we accept that God is right, that we are in the wrong and can agree with God about that, then we can be sorry, agree with Him, come back to Him and do as He asks instead.
"My sin I have caused you to know and mine iniquity I have not covered. I have said, 'I confess concerning my transgressions to Jehovah' and Thou - Thou hast taken away, the iniquity of my sin. Selah."
