Proverbs 17 9 He that covereth a transgression Seeketh love But he that repeateth
a matter separateth very friends Now the first thing that struck
me in this verse I believe the Lord showed me here is that covering
a transgression here, it's not that you initiate some kind of
a cover-up, it's not that you're dishonest about it, you don't
lie about it or give a fake alibi or anything dishonest. The clear message of this is
not that you're covering it up in that sense. All you have to
do in the context of both halves
of this verse, is just shut up about it. You see that? Just
shut up about it. He that repeateth the matter,
you see the last part? He that repeateth the matter.
That's the opposite here. That's what covering a transgression
is. It's just shut up about it. Isn't
that simple and beautiful? God has promised his people in the new covenant, in the blood
of our Savior. You remember when the Lord took
that cup, he said, this cup is the new covenant in my blood. He has promised us in that covenant,
which is in his precious blood that he shed for us, that he
will remember our iniquities no more. No more. Your sins and your iniquities
will I remember no more. So what are we doing remembering
them? What are we doing dredging them up? What are we doing talking
about them? It's a good thing that he remembers
them no more because if the Lord should mark iniquities, who shall
stand? Which one of us shall stand?
What a beautiful picture of this when the Lord said, he that is
without sin among you, cast the first stone. And casting stones
is more than just picking up rocks and throwing them at people.
There's the spiritual version of that. That's most important. Now you
and I can't do anything about sin. It talks about covering
up a transgression here. We can't do anything about sin.
We know that. We can't do anything about our
own sin. What are you going to do about your sin? How are you going to cover a
transgression any other way than just being quiet about it? What
else are you going to do about it? We can't do anything about our
own sin. We can't do anything about anyone else's sin. But
if we want to be like our master, and every believer does, we want
to be like him. If we want to imitate him, be
followers of me. That word, we've looked it up
many times, it means imitators. Like a child imitates his father. He can't do anything right, but
he can imitate him. He can act like him. He wants
to be like him. That's us with our Father. If
we want to imitate Him, if we want the Lord Jesus Christ to
be our example and not, what other example are you gonna follow?
The example of our corrupt and vile and spiteful and self-righteous
and proud peers in this world? If we want to be like him and
have him as our example, all we have to do according to this
text is just hush about it. Now what he does about sin, he
can do something about sin. He puts it away. And maybe this
will help us shut up more. when we see what he does about
sin. He puts it away. He comes to
the woman taken in adultery, and he sends all of her accusers
packing, and says, neither will I condemn thee. Go and sin no
more. That's what our Savior does about
sin. He puts it away by his precious
blood. You remember when Balak told
Balaam to curse Israel? Let's look at that together numbers
chapter 23. I want to look at this please Numbers chapter 23 and verse
16 I Numbers 23, 16. And the Lord
met Balaam and put a word in his mouth and said, go again
unto Balak and say thus. Now Balak had told Balaam to
curse Israel. And the Lord spoke to Balaam
and said, here's what you're gonna do. Here's what you're
gonna say. He put a word in his mouth. Thank
God he does that. He puts words in men's mouths.
The message of what? Look at the message. And he said,
you go back to Balak and say this. The Lord told Balaam, you
go back to Balak and say this. And when he came to him, behold,
he stood by his burnt offering and the princes of Moab with
him. And Balak said unto him, what hath the Lord spoken? And
he took up his parable and said, rise up, Balak, and hear. Hearken
unto me, thou son of Zephor. God is not a man that he should
lie, neither the son of man that he should repent. Hath he said,
and shall he not do it? Or hath he spoken, and shall
he not make it good? Behold, I have received commandment
to bless. Balak said, curse. God said, bless. And he hath blessed. What are
we gonna say about it if God hath blessed? What else can we say except God
hath blessed? God hath blessed. And I can't
reverse it. He hath not beheld iniquity in
Jacob. There's a bunch of it, but God
don't say it, because it's washed away in the blood of Christ.
He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither hath he seen perverseness
in Israel. The Lord his God is with him,
and the shout of a king is among them. God hasn't beheld any iniquity
in his people. Think about that. in this matter of just shutting
up about the sins of others. Listen to Romans 4-7. Blessed
are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered. That's what our text talks about.
He that covereth, covereth iniquity. God's the one that covered it.
And the way we imitate Him in that is just by not talking about
it, not repeating it, not dredging it up, not accusing others, not
thinking, looking down on others. I believe it was Todd Neibert
that said one time, being a sinner means that you can never look
down on anybody else ever for anything. Blessed are they. And think about what we just
read there in Numbers. Blessed are they. God has blessed. What are you gonna do? What are you gonna do, accuse?
Resent? The Lord hath removed our sins,
the scripture says, as far as the east is from the west. It says that he's cast them into
the depths of the sea. Is that the ones you're talking
about? Is that the sin that you're bringing up and dredging up?
Did you swim the depths of the sea and dredge up one so that
we could examine it and feel better about ourselves? Do we want ours dredged up? I don't want mine dredged up.
God has cast him into the depths of the sea. And if he remembers
him no more, I don't want to either. I want to look to him. I want to look to him. This is how we deal with other people's
sins. Turn with me to Galatians 6.1. And you know this as well as
I do, it's a whole lot easier to see other people's sins than
it is ours. We can see them, we know. Somebody
stumbles a little bit, we're all over that. But here's what
the scripture says about that, Galatians 6.1. Brethren, if a
man be overtaken in a fault, and we will, You're thinking about somebody
else and how you deal with somebody else, it's gonna be you next. It's gonna be me. If a man be overtaken in a fault,
you which are spiritual, not perfect, not God, but by God's
grace, you look at things a little differently than this world does.
This world loves to just look for something to hate people for. You which are spiritual restore
such in one, not in a spirit of self-righteousness, Not like,
you know, you've got some kind of, you know, high and mighty
position, you're like, I pardon you, you know, I forgive you.
No, not like that. In the spirit of meekness, considering
yourself, considering how wretched you are, considering how badly you deserve
hell, considering all the things that
could be dredged up about you and resented and you look down
on for and considering thyself, lest thou
also be tried. Bear ye one another's burdens. Bear ye one another's burdens. And look at the context of this
now. The burdens, our burdens are our sinfulness, our wretchedness,
our failure, all the time. Bear one another up in that because
we're all a bunch of wretched sinners gathering together, rejoicing
in the mercy of our Savior. Every one of us, that's what
this church is. A bunch of wretches getting together and thanking
God for his mercy. And so fulfill the law of Christ. And look at the context of this
verse three. Think about what we're talking
about here. You know why you'd look down on somebody else? You
know why you'd dredge up somebody else's sins? You know why you
wouldn't restore somebody but rather accuse them and think
badly of them and separate yourself from them You know why you would
do that? Because you think you're something
you're not. That's why you would do that. And you're not. You're not. You're not better. You have no right to judge, none. You're judging somebody with
a splinter in their eye when you've got a beam in your own
eye. That's every one of us now, every one of us. For if a man thinketh himself
to be something, that doesn't leave a lot of room, does it?
If you think yourself to be anything, anything, it's not talking about thinking
of yourself a little too highly, it's thinking of yourself as
anything. When you're nothing, you're deceiving yourself. And there's one word in our texts
that I deliberately saved till last, love. Love, instead of delighting, in the downfall of others as
we are so prone to do. It makes us feel so good about
ourselves, doesn't it, when somebody else is the bad person. Instead of delighting as we're
so prone to do in such a horrible thing as that,
let's delight in this. Delight in this, here in this
life. It's love that'll keep you in
the right place. It's love that'll put you in
the dust where you belong. It's love that'll keep you from
thinking too highly of yourself or thinking anything of yourself.
It's love. And the definition of love, here it is now. God said, here
it is. Not that we loved God. but that
he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our
sins. And do you know what the next
verse is? You don't, because I wouldn't have remembered it
either, but you listen to this now. Think about what I just
read. Herein is love. This is the definition
of love. This is what love is. Not that
we loved God. but that he loved us and sent
his son to be the propitiation for our sins. Christ crucified
is the definition of love. The love in our text and any
love that's worth talking about. And here's the next verse. Beloved,
if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another. That's
the key to our text right there. May God give us grace to be more
like Him. Well, that's grace, isn't it?
May He make us imitators of Himself. Let's pray.