My friend Carolyn tells all my friends that nobody will ever be able to blackmail me because I've already told you all my faults.  That's probably true.  What is the good of having a fault or committing a sin unless you recognize it as sin, stop doing it, and warn others using your experience as an example of what not to do.  And why.  Your sins are going to find you out anyway, why not use them for the good of others.  You may save a life.

James 5: 16  "Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that you may be healed.  The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much."

Pride is probably my biggest  downfall.  When I am good, righteous, etc.etc. I am very proud of myself.  That said, it makes it much easier to look around me and feel superior.  Which is horrible.  I recognize it and when I get like that, I immediately confess to God that I am neither good or righteous.  He always agrees with me.

We all like to feel superior.  It makes our sins fade into the background where we don't have to deal with them.

If ever there was a man who desired to be good, to be righteous, it was Paul.  He was so deeply into his religion (Judaism) that he felt he had to defend it at all cost.  So he began to hunt down Christians to silence them from perverting the truth.  He justified their death because they were a threat to what he thought the truth was.  We are seeing the same thing going on in the middle east today.

But Paul met the resurrected Jesus. Paul was on his way to Damascus to kill Christians.  Jesus appeared to him and Paul was forever changed.  He became the greatest Christian writer that we have.  His words just ring with truth because Paul confessed his faults to us.

Romans 7: 24-25a "O wretched man that I am!  Who shall deliver me from the body of this death (sin)?  I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord…"  Paul couldn't achieve righteousness on his own.  We can't either.