Turning there, if you have a
bulletin, there were two significant typos. If I don't watch Lynn
like a hawk, it happens every time. But nobody believes that,
do they? Look on the back page, the article
by Dave Edmondson, it says a dead friend of mine works in the medical
field. It should be a dear friend. of mine, works in the medical
field. Got some dead ones too. And then on the inside page,
the Bible conference is not December 9th through 11th, but December
8th through 10th this year. So much for the typos. Also tonight,
we're going to observe the Lord's table together. And next Saturday,
we normally do this on the first Saturday, but we're resuming
the preacher's class now that summer's over. Next Saturday,
we will have the preacher's class. All men are invited. And Clay
Curtis is going to preach for us tonight. He's been at the
conference in Danville and he's been here before. Most of you
know him, but he's going to be preaching for us tonight. Proverbs
chapter 10, verse 12. Hatred stirreth up strifes. We all know that, don't we? Hatred
stirreth up strifes. But love covereth all sins. I've entitled this message Love
covers all sins. Love covers all sins. Now my view of sin and sins is totally dependent
upon how I see God. You know, there are people who
have a very low view of themselves, and they have all kinds of problems,
and they know it, and their life is a wreck, and they've had so
much trouble, and yet they have no true conviction of Sinfulness. Problems, yes. Inadequacies,
yes. Insecurities, yes. But they don't
really see themselves, as Paul said in Romans chapter 7, exceeding
sinful. Now, the only way you or I will
ever see ourselves as exceeding sinful is if we see who God is. if we believe the gospel. That's
the only way. Now with that statement made,
I've got to say that my sin and my sins are a present reality. I'm not talking about the past.
I'm talking about right now. I'm talking about whatever day
this is, September 3rd, 2017. And when I say that, that's scriptural. Paul said, Christ Jesus came
into the world to save sinners, not of whom I used to be the
chief before I was saved, but who I am chief. Right now, present tense. In Romans chapter seven, verse
25, he didn't say, oh, wretched man that I used to be before
I was saved. Thank God I'm not like that now. Oh, wretched man that I am right now. I think of that passage of scripture
that has made my heart to dance for joy. When we were yet without
strength in due time, Christ died for the ungodly. You know,
that verse would be meaningless to me if I'm not without strength
anymore and if I'm not ungodly anymore. But oh, how powerfully
that comes to me when I see myself as one without strength and ungodly. How glorious those words are
when we were yet without strength in due time, Christ died. for the ungodly. When David said,
my sins are ever before me. Me too, David. I know exactly
what you're saying. The sins of my nature, the sinfulness of my deeds, sins
of omission not doing what I know I should do. Sins of commission,
breaking God's holy law. Secret sins. Moses spoke of his secret sins. You said our secret sins before
your face. Daily sins. repeated sins that I confess
and even in my confession I'm thinking of committing them again.
Isn't that awful? Isn't that evil? Sin. Sins. Hypocritical sins that I judge
others for and condemn others for when I'm doing the same thing. Let me tell you something about
my sins and my sin. I desire for them to be covered in several ways. First, so that
no one sees them so that I will not bring reproach on the gospel.
I don't want to bring reproach on the gospel to you. Yeah, there's one of those grace
believers. Look what he's doing. I don't see where grace has done
anything for him. Oh Lord, cover my sins. So that nobody will say that. Somebody's thinking if you wouldn't
commit them, you wouldn't need to worry about that. That's true.
That's true. All the more reason I need to
be covered. But an even greater desire than
that was for my sins to be covered so that God doesn't see them. I don't want you to see them.
I'll be embarrassed. You would too. But I'll get over it. I'll get
over it. But here is who I truly want
to not see my sins is God. Is that possible? Yes, it is. The scripture speaks of those
whom Christ presents as holy and unblameable and unreprovable
in His sight. Do you find that attractive?
To think of God looking at you and seeing someone who is holy
and unblameable and unapprovable. And remember, his sight is the
only sight that counts and he sees things as they really are.
You and I don't. Everything we see is skewed. Everything. Not him. I love that passage of scripture
in Jeremiah Chapter 50, would you turn there for a moment? Jeremiah chapter 50 verse 20.
In those days and in that time, saith the Lord, the iniquity
of Israel shall be sought for. Who's going to be seeking for
it? God. And what's it say? And there
shall be none. When God looks for something,
it's not like me looking for something. You can ask Lynn about
how inadequate I am to find things when I'm looking for them. I
can be looking right at it and I don't see it. Lynn can find
everything. But the Lord's looking is not
like that. There's nothing that can be hid
from his sight. And it says here when he looks for the iniquity
of Judah and Israel, there shall be none. Proverbs chapter 10. Hatred, verse 12, stirreth up
strifes, but love covereth all sins. Love covereth all sins. Proverbs chapter 17, verse nine,
once again. He that covereth a transgression. seeketh or the word is actually
he procures love. If somebody covers your transgression
aren't you going to love them for it? You surely will. But he that repeateth a matter
separateth very friends. Now if I cover your transgression
you're going to love me for it. If you cover my transgression,
I'm gonna love you for it. Love covers all sin. And where transgression is covered,
love is procured. And do you wanna be loved? Cover
somebody's transgression. Don't expose it, cover it. Love
covers all transgressions. Do you really want to love somebody?
Cover their sins. Hatred, the opposite of love,
is always stirring something up, strife and discord. Instead
of covering sin, it repeats it to others and brings on separation. I love what Peter says, charity
shall cover the multitude of sins. And Paul tells us that
charity keeps no records of wrongs, and covers with silence all things. Love covereth all sins. You know that stuff that goes
on in institutions they call churches where people are brought
before the church to have their sins disciplined and exposed
and everybody is made to, do you think God's in any of that?
I guarantee he's not. That's evil. Love covers all
sins. It doesn't bring them before
disciplinary boards to try to punish them and humiliate them
and shame them. Love covereth all sins. This is speaking of people who
love each other. That will be their conduct. But primarily,
this is speaking of the love of God to His people. Love covereth all sins. Psalm 85 too, thou
hast forgiven the iniquity of thy people, thou hast covered
all their sins. Love, the love of God in Christ
Jesus. covers all sins. Now let me speak for a few moments
about the love of God. The love of God to his people. Thou has forgiven the iniquity
of thy people. He hadn't forgiven everybody.
but he's forgiven the iniquity of his people. He's covered all
their sins. God's love is not a generic love. That's how most people view the
love of God. Well, God loves everybody. John
3.16 means that God so loved the world, every individual in
the world, that he gave his only begotten son. If you'll just
believe and make his love work, then you'll have eternal life.
Kind of a generic love. God loves everybody. Well, that's something the scripture
won't support because God said, Esau, have I hated. If anybody has a problem with
that, you've got a problem. You've got a real problem. You've got
a real problem with yourself. You don't see who God is, and
you don't see who you are. If you saw who God is, you would
certainly know why he would hate you. Someone says, I just can't see
that. Then you're blind. Scripture says in Psalm 55, thou
hatest all workers of iniquity. Now that It's a bunch of people,
isn't it? Thou hatest all workers of iniquity. I'm not gonna apologize to God
for that. He's God. Whatever he does is
right, holy, just, and true. If he hates all workers of iniquity,
it's right that he should hate all workers of iniquity. They're
workers of iniquity. God's holy. His love is a holy
love, and to have his love as some kind of generic love where
he loves you, but you wind up in hell anyway if you don't do
your part, makes his love powerless and meaningless. God's love is saving love, always. 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, given us life together with
Christ. By grace are you saved. Here's two things that can't
be separated, the love of God and the grace of God. The love
of God is saving love. The grace of God is saving grace. The love of God in Christ Jesus. Now, God loves Christ. He loves his Son, doesn't he?
Oh, the Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into
his hand. Oh, how the Father loves his
Son, and the Father loves everybody in his Son. This is my Son, my
well-beloved Son, in whom, not just with whom, but in whom.
If you're in Christ, God loves you and he loves you with the
same love he loves his son with. I wouldn't dare say that if scripture
didn't say it. God loves sinners. Now, chew on that for a moment.
God loves sinners. Every sinner God loves. You know the only ones who are
sinners are the ones that Christ died for. Nobody else really
believes themselves to be sinners. They might take the term, sure
I'm a sinner, I make mistakes, I do wrong things, I've done
bad things, sure I'm a sinner, but they believe they have the
potential to be good. I may be a wreck right now, I
might be a wicked person now, but I can turn things around
if the opportunity presents itself. And one of these days I'm, no,
you don't believe you're a sinner? Not at all. God loves sinners. People who are nothing but sin. God loves those for whom Christ
died. That's who he loves. He loves
those for whom Christ died. He loves his people, having loved
his own, which were in the world. He loved them to the end. I pray
for them, the Lord said. I pray not for the world, but
for them which thou hast given me. They are thine. He says regarding every one,
his people behold Jeremiah 31 3 behold I have loved you with
an everlasting love a love that never had a beginning God's love
never had a starting point with any of his people I've loved
you with an everlasting love Therefore with loving kindness
have I drawn thee. God loves those who love him.
Do you love God? Now, when I say that, do you
love the God who is holy? Do you love the God who is sovereign?
Do you love the God who's absolutely just? Do you love the God who
loves his son? Every believer says, yes, I do.
Well, you know this. We love him because he first
loved us. You see, God's love never goes
unreciprocated. We love him. But it's because
he first loved us. Now, how is it? I'm talking about
God's love. Love covereth all sins. How can that be? If you think of the enormity
of sin, we don't much understand it, I realize that. But you think
of the enormity of sin, and I said this a couple of weeks ago, and
let me give this illustration again. If someone brutally murdered your
child, and that person is apprehended by the law, and brought before
the judge, And the judge says to that murderer who brutally
murdered your child, I'm a loving judge. I'm going to forgive you
and set you free. What would you think of that
judge? That judge would be a monster, wouldn't he? That judge would
be evil. He wouldn't have any business
being a judge. Shall not the judge of the earth
do right? Yes, he shall. So how is it that
love covers sins when sins are so enormous and so grievous and
so evil in God's sight? Well, turn with me to 1 John
4. 1 John 4. Verse 9. And this was manifested, the
love of God toward us. Because that God sent his only
begotten son into the world that we might live through him. 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 I'm going or when even
when John is speaking of love here in his love, I'm not going
to talk about my love to him and neither would John. I do
love him. I can say, Lord, you know, all
things, you know, that I love you. I do love him. But I feel so ashamed of my love.
It's nothing to where it should be. If I loved him the way I
ought to love him, I'd never sin again. See, sin's against
him. And if I loved him as I ought
to love him, I'd never sin again. But that's sure not my experience.
My love is just not, if I'm gonna talk about love, I'm not gonna
say, well, look how much I love the Lord. No! I love the way
John called himself that disciple that Jesus loved. Not the disciple
that loved Jesus, but that disciple that Jesus loved. Truly, it will
be my joy through the ages to sing of his love for me. I stand amazed in the presence
of Jesus the Nazarene and wonder how he could love me, the sinner
condemned unclean. I'm not going to talk about my
love. You know, somebody is described
as a believer say, oh, they really love the Lord. Well, I trust
they do, but that's not a very good way to describe somebody.
Let's get that out of our vocabulary. Let's talk about them. The Lord
really loves them. That's, that's the way to speak. That's the
way John spoke. So 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. Now, I think of his love for
me, for all of his people. I don't wanna just think of me.
Yeah, I like thinking of me. I'm number one, I realize that.
It ought not be that way, but it is. And you're the same way,
so don't anybody think, well, he's self-centered, you are too.
Right? Before time began, when he stood
as a surety for His people. He loved them and bore the complete responsibility
for our salvation. When He became flesh, He did
so because He loved us. When he kept the law, I love
it when he said to John the Baptist, when John the Baptist said, why
are you coming to me to be baptized? I didn't need to be baptized
today. He said, suffer to be so now for thus it becometh us
to fulfill all righteousness. And when Jesus Christ fulfilled
all righteousness, he did so as an us out of love to his people. When he died, he died out of
love to his people. when he was raised from the dead,
how he loved his people. As he sits right now at the right
hand of the Father making intercession for them, how he loves his people. Will it be your joy through the
ages to sing of his love to you? covereth all sins how he sent
his son to be a propitiation now the reason for his love let
me say this real clearly the reason for his love is not because
of our loveliness now that person sitting beside
you that you married you didn't marry
them because of an unconditional love did you There's something
about them that you found lovely and attractive and beautiful. That is why you love them. Now, when God loved me, when
Christ loved me, two things are true. He didn't do it because
of some kind of loveliness in me. Deuteronomy chapter 7 verses
7 and 8 says, The Lord did not set his love
upon you nor choose you because you were more in number than
any people, for you were the fewest of all people, but because
the Lord loved you. That's why the Lord loved you,
because he did. The reason is found in himself. He does not
have to find a reason in you to love you. But get this, if
you're in Christ, He has every reason to love you. It's not
an unconditional love. There's no such thing as unconditional
love. When I heard that song on the
radio came out, unconditional love, I just want to scream.
There's no such thing. No such thing. You love somebody because
they're lovely. There's something about them that you love. Well,
in Christ, every believer is lovely to God. Behold, there's
no spot in thee. That's what he says to every
believer. Thou art all fair, my love. And that's how Christ
sees every one of his children, all of his brethren, all of his
bride, perfect in Christ Jesus. And the reason he can do this
is because God sent his son to be the propitiation That's a
word that's not used much in our language, is it? God sent
his son to be the propitiation for our sins. I dare say, I dare
say that in Lexington, Kentucky, in Central Kentucky, in Kentucky,
in the United States of America, in Europe, in Asia, in Africa,
there are very few religious institutions that deal
with this thing of propitiation. What do you think about propitiation?
What? What's that mean? Good question. Let me tell you. By the grace of God, let me tell
you. Here is love, not that we love
God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation. the mercy seat for our sins. A propitiation is a sin removing
sacrifice. A sin removing. Get this definition. That's what it is. It's a sin
removing sacrifice because the sin has been removed by the sacrifice. The reason for God's anger has
been removed. God doesn't have a reason to
be mad at me. How often do you think of the
Lord being angry with you because of some sin, some thought, some
whatever? My sin was removed from me. And believe me, it's not out
in cyberspace somewhere, you know, floating around somewhere
where we can get back. My sin was removed from me and placed
in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what he was doing on the
cross. He was a propitiation. He was a sin-removing sacrifice. My sin became his sin. Now let me say this as plainly
as I know how. May God give us the grace to
receive what's being said. When Christ died on Calvary's
tree, he wasn't dying for Todd's sins. He was dying for his own sins.
Explain that. My sin became his sin. It would be unjust for God to
punish somebody for somebody else's sin. That's not the way
imputation works. It's not changing papers, you
know, you go from guilt to, no, my sin, my sin. Christ never
sinned. Don't anybody dare think or suspect
that I mean that Christ sinned in his own person. He knew no
sin. Holy. undefiled, separate from
sinners, made higher than the heavens. That's the Son of God.
He never sinned. But when my sin became His sin,
it was His sin. That's what this perpetuatory
sacrifice is. My sin became His sin. It was
removed from me and became His sin. and He put it away. It is now gone. Just as truly as His sin became
my sin without Him ever committing it, His righteousness, His perfect
obedience, becomes my perfect obedience without me doing one
work of righteousness. How do you like this? I like it a lot. I will be propitious to their
unrighteousness and their sins and iniquities Will I remember
no more? Now, that's propitiation, not
simply removal of the guilt, but removal of the sin. It is
gone. It's not floating out there somewhere
where it might come back. It is put away. Now, once in
the end of the world, hath he appeared to put away sin by the
sacrifice of himself. That's what love does. Love covers
transgression. And when God covers sin, it's
unlike me covering something. If I cover something, it's a
cover-up. It's still there. That's all you can call it. It's
a cover-up. A cover-up's not a good thing, is it? A cover-up's
a dishonest thing. It's a cover-up. But when he
covers something, it's no longer there. Blessed is he whose transgression
is forgiven, whose sin is covered. When he covers something, it
is no longer there. He that covereth a transgression
seeketh or procureth love, but he that repeateth the matter.
That's Proverbs 17, 9. He that covereth a transgression
procureth love. If he covers your transgression,
don't you love him? I tell you, you can't have your
transgressions covered and not love him who did this. Covered. But he that repeateth a matter. He that repeateth a matter. Every one of us, number one,
had been guilty of repeating matters. It's ungodly. It's hypocritical. It's wrong as it can be. And
every one of us has suffered from someone who repeated a matter
about us, which was true, which was true. Anything anybody
says about me, make it a little bit more vile and it's closer
to the truth. You believe that about yourself?
Anybody that says anything about me, they've understated it. But
remember, love covers. Absence of love repeats a matter. Absence of love repeats a matter
and separateth very friends. Now what I thought about when
I was thinking about this repeater of the matter, I thought about
the accuser of the brethren. How many times has he accused? He's called the accuser of the
brethren. And every accusation he makes is true. But here's
the deal. Those accusations have already
been answered, paid for, and covered, and they are no more. That's why Paul said, who shall
lay anything to the charge of God's elect? Satan can't do it
because they've all been blotted out and paid for. Now concerning
this thing of covering and repeating. Do you remember what Noah did
after he got off the ark? Well, for one thing, he offered
a sacrifice. He knew Christ was his only hope.
You know what the next thing he did? He planted a vineyard
and got drunk. believer do something like that?"
Well, that's a really stupid response, isn't it? I know Lynn
says I should never use the word stupid, but stupid is appropriate
for that. Could a believer do that? What
couldn't you do, apart from the grace of God? Now, he passed
out, and his son Ham saw his nakedness. He went out and told his brothers
about it. Can you believe dad did that? He told his brothers
about it. But his brothers, Shem and Japheth,
you know what they did? They walked in backwards and
covered their father. Oh, Ham, he uncovered him. Shem
and Japheth covered their father. Ham was cursed. Shimon Japheth
weren't. Now, I want the Lord to cover
my sin so my nakedness is not exposed, don't you? I greatly
desire that. And I want you to cover for me. And I want to cover for you. Love covereth all sins. He that covereth the transgression
seeketh love, but he that repeateth the matter separate it. Very friends, may God in Christ
cover us and may we cover each other. for the glory of Christ. Let's pray. Lord, how we thank you for the
covering of the blood, the propitiation, the sin removing sacrifice of
our Redeemer. Lord, we confess here in his
love, not that we loved you, but that you loved us and sent
your son to be the propitiation for our sin. How we thank you
for his covering. Lord, may we be covered. In all ways,
for Christ's sake, in his name we pray, amen. You got Duane? Okay, that's good.