What does First B Jackson teach about self-examination?

At First Baptist Jackson, the teaching on self-examination is grounded in a conviction that honest inward looking is not optional for the Christian life, it is the ongoing work of it. Pastor Carl has returned to this theme across several series, most directly in a walk through the twelve steps of recovery as a framework for understanding sin and repentance. Step four, making a searching and fearless moral inventory of yourself, and step ten, continuing to take personal inventory and promptly admitting when you are wrong, together form the biblical picture the church has been working through. The point Carl keeps pressing is the same one Nathan made to David: a person can clearly identify sin in someone else's story and miss it entirely in their own life. Real self-examination has to be pointed inward, not outward.

Pastor Brian has taught the same ground from a different angle. In his treatment of steps four and five, he was candid that sitting in self-examination without moving to confession is a dangerous place to be. He described what he called the rattle, the window when a person knows something is wrong and knows they should act but has not yet moved, and he spoke personally about the cost of staying there too long. Step five, admitting to God, to yourself, and to another person the exact nature of your wrongs, is where the inventory becomes real. Brian spent time on the Greek word for confession, meaning to say the same thing, to agree with God about what God already sees. The biblical warrant he pointed to for confessing to another person was James 5:16, and his argument was not that another person can forgive sin but that confessing to someone a step ahead of you and asking for their prayer is powerful and effective.

The practical shape this takes in Carl's teaching is less like an annual tax filing and more like weekly bookkeeping. He used the image of someone who dumps a trash bag of receipts on an accountant once a year versus someone who files things in a folder every week, keeping a short account with God works the same way. The rhythm he described is morning reflection, awareness through the day, and an evening review that brings both failures and successes before God. He pointed to Lamentations on mercies being new every morning, and to Jesus telling the disciples in the garden to keep watching and praying so they would not come into temptation. The call is not to morbid introspection but to the kind of honest, regular attention to your own heart that keeps the account short and the conscience clear.

Taught from Psalm 139:23-24 · James 5:16 · Lamentations 3 · Psalm 51 · 1 John 1:9