I did choose thee, Lord, for,
Lord, that Todd's Road Grace Church would
like to invite you to listen to a sermon by our pastor, Todd
Neidert. We are located at 4137 Todd's
Road, two miles outside of Manowar Boulevard. Sunday services are
at 1030 a.m. and 6 p.m. Bible study is at
945 a.m. Wednesday services are at 7 p.m. Nursery is provided for all services.
For more information, visit our website at toddsroadgracechurch.com. Now here's our pastor, Todd Nyvert. I want to read two verses of
scripture from the Proverbs. I've entitled this message, Love
Covereth All Sin. The first passage is found in
Proverbs 10, verse 12. Hatred stirreth up strifes. but love covereth all sins. Next, verse of scriptures found
in Proverbs chapter 17, verse nine. He that covereth a transgression
seeketh love. Or as my marginal reading says,
procureth love. But he that repeateth a matter
separateth very friends. Love covers all sins. My sin and my sins are a present
reality to me, a great source of grief to me. The Lord said, blessed are they
that mourn. And he's talking about mourning
over sin. And my sin causes me to mourn. And I'm not talking about the
sins of my past. I'm not talking about the sins
of my youth. I'm talking about my present sin. And this is a scriptural way
of thinking. The Apostle Paul said in 1 Timothy
1.15, Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of
whom I am the chief. Not whom I was the chief, not
that's the way I used to be, but I'm better now. But in his
own mind, he saw himself present tense as the very chief of sinners. In Romans chapter seven, verse
24, he said, O wretched man that I am, not that I was, but that
I am. Who shall deliver me from the
body of this death? Romans chapter 5 verse 6 says,
For when we were yet without strength, In due time, Christ
died for the ungodly. Now, I can't look at that verse
and say, well, that's the way I used to be, but I'm not that way now.
I feel the same way, without strength and ungodly, but the
only hope that I have that I'll be saved is that Christ died
for those kind of people, those kind of people who are without
strength and ungodly. When David said, my sins are
ever before me, and that's the man after God's own heart speaking,
You know, somebody says, I've never heard a preacher talk about
his sins like that. Well, if he's not talking about
his sins like that, he's not being honest. David said, my
sins are ever before me. And David, mine are too, the
sins of my nature, the sin of my nature. the sinfulness of
my deeds, my sins of omission, not doing what I know I should
do, my sins of commission, doing what I know I shouldn't do, my
secret sins, my daily sins, my oft-repeated sins, my hypocritical
sins that I judge others for while I'm doing the same thing.
My sin. And let me tell you something
I want about my sin and my sins. I want my sin covered so that
you don't see them. You know, people are very adept
at hiding their sins. Well, I want my sins covered,
covered so that you don't see them. But most especially, I
want my sins covered so that God doesn't see them. And when he covers sin, he makes
sin to where it is no more, and it is not seen. Now, do you find that attractive,
this thing of having your sins covered so that God does not
see your sin? In Jeremiah chapter 50, verse
20, we read these words, and this is the promise to every
believer. In those days, in that time, saith the Lord, the iniquity
of Israel shall be sought for. Now I've read a whole lot about
the iniquity of Israel. A wicked bunch of people, the
children of Israel. How idolatrous, how fleshly,
how sinful, how unbelieving. But yet he says, in those days
and that time, saith the Lord, that the iniquity of Israel,
that's talking about the true Israel, the true Israel is every
believer, the church of God. In those days and at that time,
saith the Lord, the iniquity of Israel shall be sought for
and there shall be none. When God looks for my sin, There
shall be none. Now that's how he covers. When
he covers, there shall be none. And we're going to consider in
a few moments how that is. How God covers, and there shall
be none. Now I'm so thankful for these
scriptures that I just read from Proverbs chapter 10. Hatred stirreth
up strifes, but love covereth. all sins, not most sins, but
all sins. And he that covereth the transgression,
Proverbs 17, 9, he that covereth the transgression procureth love,
but he that repeateth the matter separateth very friends. Now, if I cover your transgression,
you'll love me for it. If you cover my transgression,
I'll love you for it. Do you want to love somebody?
Cover their transgressions. Don't bring them up. Don't expose
them, but cover them. Do you want somebody to love
you? then you cover their transgressions. Do you want to be loved by others? Cover their transgressions. But
most especially, this is talking about God covering transgressions. Now, if I love you. I'm not going to try to expose
your sins to other people. I know that's what religion does.
They have church discipline committees try to bring down people before
the front of the church to shame them because of their sins and
expose their sins and bring them under discipline. That's pure
foolishness. That's not what the scripture
teaches. That's just an absence of love. That's an exercise of
self-righteousness. If that's what I'm participating
in, I'm participating in something that God despises. This thing
of trying to expose people and try to bring them to shame and
trying to make myself look better at their expense is what that
is. If you want somebody to hate you, treat them like that. If
you judge somebody and expose their sin, they're going to despise
you and you ought to be despised. But don't you want your sin to
be covered by people, not exposed, but covered. He that covereth
a transgression procureth love. But hatred, the opposite of love,
is always stirring something up, strife and discord. Instead
of covering sin, he repeats it to others. Now, I love what Peter
said. Peter said, charity shall cover
the multitude of sins. If I love you, I want your sins
covered. I don't want them exposed. I
want them covered. And Paul tells us that charity
keeps no records of wrongs and covers in silence all things. Now, love covers all sins. And this is specifically speaking
of the love of God toward his people. Because of His love,
He covers all sins. Psalm 85, too, says, Thou hast
forgiven the iniquity of thy people. Thou hast covered all
their sins. Now, let's speak for a moment
about the love of God for His people. And most people look
at the love of God as kind of generic. He loves all men the
same. They hear scriptures like John
3.16, For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten
Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but
have eternal life. And I love that verse of Scripture,
but that verse of Scripture does not say that love is what God
has for all men with that exception. God loves all men the same because
you can't read the scriptures and come up with that conclusion
because the scripture says he hated Esau, Romans 9 and 11,
and Esau deserved his hatred. Psalm 5.5 says, Thou hatest all
workers of iniquity. Now that's a big demographic.
Thou hatest all workers of iniquity. God's love is not for all men
the same. You see, if it is for all men
the same, and some of those people he loves end up being damned
and not being saved, what good did his love do them? That would
make his love meaningless. So when a preacher talks about
the love of God being for all men the same, and it's offered
to you, and it's up to you to accept it and receive it and
so on, that man doesn't know anything about the love of God.
You see, the love of God is always saving love. Everybody he loves,
he saves. But God, who is rich in mercy,
for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were
dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ. Now, God's love is in Christ. Nothing shall separate us from
the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Let me
tell you who God loves. God loves Christ. Oh, the Father
loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hand. God
loves those who are in Christ. Not everybody's in Christ, but
everybody who is in Christ, every believer, God loves. God loves the elect. He says, concerning them, behold,
I've loved you with an everlasting love. Therefore, with loving
kindness have I drawn thee. God loves all who believe. Here's my favorite. God loves
sinners. God commended His love toward us, and that while we
were yet sinners, Christ died for us. God loves sinners. God loves His people. Matthew 121, Thou shalt call
His name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins. He says to every one of them,
I've loved you with an everlasting love, a love that had no beginning. That blows my mind. I don't understand
it. But God's love is eternal. It never had a beginning. God
loves his people. And if you're asking yourself,
am I one of his people? Are you a sinner? If you're a
real sinner, you're one of His people because God loves all
sinners. The problem is most people don't
really believe they're sinners. Oh, they make mistakes. They do wrong
things from time to time. Maybe they make many mistakes,
but they don't really believe themselves as being nothing but
sin. They have something to recommend them. Well, you disqualify yourself
if that's the case. God's love is for sinners. Love, everybody God loves, He
covers all their sins. He loves us, but we love Him
because He first loved us. That's why we love Him, because
He first loved us. Now, how is it, here's my next
question, and God's love is first people. And His love covers all
their sins. Not most of them, not some of
them, but all their sins. When I stand before God in judgment,
I'm not having any sin to give an account for. I'll stand before
God perfect and complete and righteous and without sin. How
is that? My sins deserve to be punished. They really do. I stand before
you really believing I deserve to go to hell. That's what I
deserve. My sins deserve hell. And God is the judge of the earth.
And as the judge of the earth, like Abraham said, shall not
the judge of the earth do right, he must punish sin and be just
or he would cease to be God. If he failed to punish sin, He
would fail to be just. He would fail to be holy. He
would fail to be true. Now, what if someone murdered,
brutally murdered your child? Oh, you would want justice to
be done with that person. Now, what if that murder of your child was
apprehended and brought before the judge, and the judge says,
I'm a loving judge. I'm going to forgive you of murdering
that person's child if you'll just accept my forgiveness. What
would you say of a judge like that? why he would be an unjust
judge. You couldn't tolerate such action
in a judge because he would be wrong. That sin must be punished. You can't just up and arbitrarily
forgive that sin and say, I'm a loving judge, I'm gonna let
it go. It does not work like that. Now, how is it that God covers
sins and still is just. That's the question of the ages,
isn't it? How can God be just and still cover sins that deserve
his judgment and condemnation? Well, we read in 1 John 4, verse
10, herein is love. Now remember, we're talking about
God's love, that love that covers all sins, herein is love, not
that we love God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to
be the propitiation for our sins. Now when we talk about love,
we're not going to talk about our love. Now I do love God,
I love Christ, I love His people, but Not near as much as I should. Not with the strength I should.
Not with the earnestness and passion I should. I love him,
but I'm not proud of my love. I'm ashamed of my love. I don't
love him the way I ought to. So when I'm going to talk about
love, I'm not going to talk about my love to him. You know, people
are described, he really loved the Lord. But you know, that's
not really the way John described himself. He didn't call himself
the disciple that loved Jesus, but the disciple that Jesus loved.
He was aware that there was defections in his love and problems, and
he wanted to think of the love of the Lord Jesus Christ. When
with the ransomed in glory, his face I at last shall see, it
will be my joy through the ages to sing of his love for me. Now herein is love, not that
we love God, but that he loved us. Now, the us is the same us as
if God be for us who can be against us. The us is those he foreknew,
whom he did foreknow, love beforehand. Then he also did predestinate
to be conformed to the image of his son that he might be the
firstborn among many brethren. Moreover, whom he did predestinate,
them he also called. And whom he called, them he also
justified. And whom he justified, them he
also glorified. Now what shall we say to these
things if God be for us? Those he foreknew, those he predestinated,
those he called, those he justified, those he glorified. If God be
for us, who can be against us? Now herein is love, not that
we love God, but that he loved us. The us is every believer. The us is all of the elect of
God. The us is everybody for whom Christ died. The us is every
sinner. Now, I love to think about this.
Before time began, Christ stood as my surety, and he loved me. He knew me before I ever knew
him. When He came to this earth and became flesh, the God-man
was manifested in the flesh. He did so because He loved me.
When He kept the law, He did it for me because He loved me.
And this is true of all of God's people. This is not just some
special privilege that I have that all of God's children don't
have. They all have this. When he died
on Calvary's tree, he did so because he loved me. He was going
to put away my sins. When he was raised from the dead,
for my justification, he loved me. Right now, as he's seated
at the right hand of the Father, making intercession for me, he
loves me. When he comes again, he's coming
for me so that I can be with him and behold his glory eternally. Oh, the love of God for his people. Love covers the transgression. And the reason for His love is
His love. Not because of any loveliness
in me, not because of any loveliness in you, but because God is love.
God must love because God is love, and He doesn't have to
find a reason in you to love you. You know, preachers talk
about unconditional love. God loves you unconditionally.
You know, that's really not true. He loves us as we're in Christ.
You see, it's impossible to love someone unconditionally. God
doesn't love anyone unconditionally. If you're in Christ, you actually
deserve God's love because Christ deserves God's love. 1 John 4,
17 says, As He is, so are we in this world. Does Christ deserve
the love of God? Yes. If I'm in Him, so do I. That's the way His love works. The only reason for the Lord's
love is found in Himself, and herein is love. Not that we love
God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation
for our sin. Now somebody says, what in the
world does that mean? What's that word mean, propitiation? The word propitiation means a
sin removing sacrifice. a sin removing sacrifice. Now would you listen to me very
carefully. Because my sin has been removed
by the sacrifice, God has no reason to be angry with me. He sees me as perfect without
sin because my sin has truly been removed. Well, where did
it go if it was removed from you? My sin became his sin. He never committed that sin,
but it truly became his sin. The scripture says in second
Corinthians 521, for he hath made him to be sin for us who
knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God
in him. My sin became his sin so that
he became guilty of that sin and just as truly as my sin became
his sin so that he became guilty of it he owned it as his own
and the reason God killed him was because he's guilty he was
guilty my sin became his sin he actually became guilty of
that sin and took on the judgment of God as my substitute And just
as truly as my sin became his sin, his righteousness becomes
my personal righteousness. And my sin became his sin without
him sinning? Well, his righteousness became
my righteousness without me doing anything to make it my righteousness.
It's what God did in Christ. Now, when he became here in his
love, not that we love God, but that he loved us, and sent his
son to be the propitiation for our sins, the sin-removing sacrifice,
and that's exactly what he did. When he cried, it is finished,
my sin was removed. It was made not to be. And now, as David said in Psalm
32 one, blessed is the man whose iniquity is forgiven, whose sin
is covered. Blessed is the man to whom the
Lord will not impute iniquity, and in whose spirit there is
no guile. Now, the reason God doesn't impute
iniquity to me is because there's nothing to impute. Christ took
it away. You know, I was talking about
my sins that are ever before me. They're not before God. They're
put away, and I stand before God holy and unblameable and
unreprovable in His sight. Now, when God covers sin, it's
not like me trying to cover my sin. Me trying to cover my sin
is a cover-up. It's a cover-up. And you know,
most people, as I said earlier, are adept at covering their sins.
They can hide them very well. And it's nothing but a cover-up.
But when God covers my sins, He makes it to where they are
no more. They're gone. There's nothing
that can come back up in the future to expose me and haunt
me. They are gone. And he that covereth
the transgression seeketh love. He procureth love. The fact that
the Lord has covered my transgressions makes me love him. Why did he
do it for me? I stand amazed in the presence
of Jesus the Nazarene and wonder how he could love me, a sinner,
condemned, unclean. Oh, how I love him for covering
my transgressions. But he that repeateth the matter. You know who I thought of? That passage of scripture in
Revelation 12, 10, where Satan is called the accuser of the
brethren. He accuses to God all the things
that they've done. Here's what this person who claims
to be yours did. They did this, this, this, this,
and this. And all those accusations no doubt would be true. How many
times though have you had somebody repeat something about you that
was true But, oh, it caused such pain that it was exposed. But
it was a lack of love on that person's part that did that,
that repeated the matter concerning you. You wouldn't say it's not
true, but, oh, you'd a whole lot rather uncover it, wouldn't
you? Well, Satan repeats these matters before God, and you know
what the answer to him is? Who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? It's God that justifieth. Who
is he that condemned? It's Christ that died, yea rather
that's risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who
also maketh intercession for us. Now I want God to cover my
transgressions. So you don't see them, yes, but
more importantly, so that he doesn't see them. And the only
way he can't see them is not for him to pretend that they're
not there, but for them to not be there. And that's what Christ
accomplished by his perpetuatory sacrifice, the removal of the
sin itself. He bore our sins in his own body
on the tree and he put them away. I want God to cover my transgressions. And I sure want to be someone
who covers others' transgressions. The example I thought of was
after Noah got off the ark, he planted a vineyard and he got
drunk. Somebody would say, could a Christian
do something like that? Why would you ask such a silly
question? A Christian could commit any
sin. And his son Shen came in and saw his father's nakedness,
and he went and told his brothers about it. But his brothers, after
they heard that, they came in backwards and covered their father's
nakedness. I'd a whole lot rather be somebody
who covers nakedness than repeats it, because I want to be someone
who is covered. Hatred stirreth up strife, but
love covereth all sin. Now we have this message on CD
and DVD. If you call the church, write
or email, we'll send you a copy. This is Todd Kniper praying God
will be pleased to make Himself known.