“Love covers a multitude of sins”

BIBLE READING:  1 Peter 4- 2 Peter 3

Every day we hear stories of offenders who have tried to cover their own offenses with lies. And every day we hear (sometimes from our own lips) people repeating a matter. We call this gossip and it fuels whole media industries. All around us are shattered relationships that exploded in the “repeating.”

But how many examples can you think of where a friendship was preserved because someone did not repeat — gossip about — an offense? Not many, I’ll wager. Why is this so rare?

While it’s true that lovingly covering a matter is rarer in our sinful world than repeating a matter, this is not the only reason we know so few examples of covering. A significant reason is that covering hides others’ offenses from our view and therefore even the covering is concealed from our view. We don’t know about offenses or their covering because loving people haven’t talked about them.  The kind of love that “covers a multitude of sins” is a costly love (1 Peter 4:8). It is a humble love that “looks not only to [our] own interests but also to the interests of others” (Philippians 2:4). The kind of love that “covers a multitude of sins” is a costly love. This love, even when it is exercised by unbelievers, is a gospel-like love because it is a reflection of the way God so loved the world that he gave his only son (John 3:16) to cover our sins (Romans 4:7). God, the offended party, justly covered the penalty of our offenses on the cross so that he could righteously “cast all our sins into the depths of the sea” (Micah 7:19) and “remember [our] sins no more” (Hebrews 8:12).

And to us, Jesus says, “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you” (John 15:12). So, seek to love like Jesus today. Love in a way that few will ever know about. Cover an offense.

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