Lent this year began with the usual ashes and list of "things to give up." But added to that, on February 19, the first Friday after Ash Wednesday, we saw an act of public confession and repentance that still has people talking.

Tiger Woods came out of hiding three months after his ill-fated, late-night trip to the end of his driveway to apologize for the whole sordid affair — or more accurately for the assorted sordid affairs.

While Woods always projected the image of a disciplined, affectionate, husband and father, he was living a double life. On the other side of the squeaky-clean image smoldered a sleazy assortment of adulteries.

"I want to say to each of you simply and directly," Woods told the small live audience and all of us watching, "I am deeply sorry for the irresponsible and selfish behavior I engaged in."

The responses to Woods' mea culpa speech (he took no questions) ranged from high praise to condemnation.

Former Clinton White House aide George Stephanopoulos now on ABC's "Good Morning America" called it, "One of the most remarkable public apologies ever by a public figure.... He left nothing on the table. This is a man who has thought a lot about what he did."

Meanwhile sportswriter Sally Jenkins in the Washington Post wrote, "Sorry, but I didn't buy it. The public Tiger Woods has always been artificial, but never has he seemed more waxen than in his so-called public apology."

What struck me about the commentaries — pro and con — was that the judgments were entirely subjective. "He tried very hard to sound humble," said golf writer John Feinstein, "He didn't pull it off."

Everyone showed a desire to judge motives and sincerity, things that are opaque to everyone except God. That being said, we can think objectively about confession and repentance — Tiger's and our own.

First, real confession and repentance are rooted in sorrow for specific sins. Given fallen human nature, this is not easy. I can be sorry for the results of my sin, I can be sorry that I got caught, I can be sorry for my humiliation, but never actually be sorry for my wrongdoing.

In Hosea 6:1-3 the people "repented":

Come, let us return to the LORD.
He has torn us to pieces, but he will heal us;
He has injured us but he will bind up our wounds.

It sounds repentant and sorrowful enough, but God replied, "Your love is like the morning mist, like the early dew that disappears." Their sorrow was over being torn to pieces and injured, not over their sin. Sorrow for sin doesn't appear until Hosea 14:1-3 when Hosea instructs the people:

Take words with you and return to the LORD. Say to him:
"Forgive all our sins and receive us graciously,
that we may offer the fruit of our lips.
Assyria cannot save us; we will not mount war-horses.
We will never again say 'Our gods' to what our own hands have made,
for in you the fatherless find compassion."

Woods expressed sorrow over what he did:

I was unfaithful. I had affairs. I cheated. What I did is not acceptable, and I am the only person to blame. I stopped living by the core values that I was taught to believe in. I knew my actions were wrong, but I convinced myself that normal rules didn't apply. I never thought about who I was hurting. Instead, I thought only about myself.

In addition to sorrow, humility marks confession and repentance. It is especially humbling, even humiliating, to follow the command in James 5:16 to "confess your sins to each other." Having to speak our sins aloud makes those sins much more real and much more odious. It delivers a harsh blow to our pride.

Tiger Woods does not strike me as a humble man. John Feinstein wrote, "One of the things that make an athlete great is extraordinary arrogance." That is, an unwavering belief in oneself and one's abilities. "No one," he went on, "has defined that arrogance more clearly over the past 14 years than Tiger Woods."

Yet while Woods did not shed his highly controlled, super-star persona, he stood in front of family, friends, and the cameras admitting, "I was wrong. I was foolish. I don't get to play by different rules. The same boundaries that apply to everyone apply to me. I brought this shame on myself."

Perhaps, as some have suggested, this was little more than a carefully orchestrated attempt to save his career. Perhaps, but it seems to me that if Tiger's goal were simply to preserve his fan base, the better course would have been to shut up and play golf. As many celebrities and politicians can attest, these things have a way of blowing over. Something else seems to be at work for Woods to humble himself.

"I have a lot to atone for," he said. That was an interesting verb to use given his profession of Buddhism. I think he meant, as he said later, "It is now up to me to make amends." And it is. The damage he has done to his wife, his marriage, and his family are incalculable. A simple, "Sorry 'bout that," will not make it all better (it never does). Making amends to those we have hurt because of our sin is part of confession and repentance.

And amends must include change. Saint James wrote, "What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? ... In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action is dead."

Woods' wife, Elin told him that his "real apology to her will come not in the form of words. It will come from my behavior over time." Insofar as repentance means turning around and going a different direction this is true for us all.

Sadly Tiger Woods' apology lacked one critical item, the critical element that distinguishes Christian confession and repentance.

King David committed adultery with Bathsheba and subsequently had her husband, Uriah, murdered (2 Samuel 11). And yet in confession and repentance David prayed to God:

Against you, you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you are proved right when you speak
and justified when you judge. (Psalm 51:4)

He went on to beg for God's mercy and forgiveness setting a pattern for us to follow. Our sins are crimes against those people we hurt, but more important, they are crimes against God.

Some might argue that confession and repentance are unnecessary after the cross. All has been atoned for and all is forgiven. Why dwell on it? But just the opposite is true. The cross casts a spotlight on the wickedness of our sin and our need to confess. As John Kane has written:

Sin in its deadly evil is the great enemy of the Cross of Christ, opposing the designs of His eternal pity, robbing the soul of the fruit of His sufferings, and trampling underfoot His Precious Blood.

Sin takes God's kindness and throws it in His face. Christian confession and repentance begin with this hard fact. Only once we have faced our offense against God can we look to Christ crucified to restore what sin has broken.

Tiger Woods' apology was not a Christian apology. He made it clear, after all, that he was a Buddhist. At the same time, his sorrow, humility, willingness to make amends, and desire to change are lessons from which everyone can benefit — particularly during the season of Lent.