Let Us Love One another

Introduction

How many of you remember what happened in Rwanda in the 1990’s? Yes I know I’m dating myself here but for those who don’t know there was an extremely brutal war between the Hutu and the Tutsi African tribes in which whole villages and communities were completely wiped out by senseless killings. Many of the war leaders were later charged and convicted of genocide.

Here is a tougher question for you. How many of you know what happened after the genocide ceased? I’m not surprised if you don’t know as the mainstream media probably doesn’t want you to know what happened. What they don’t want you to know is that God was at work in that area of the world for indeed He was. After the war, there was a great revival that swept through the country and many people were saved in both of the warring tribes. But now the 2 tribes had something in common, namely Christ, and thus the 2 sides began to rebuild their lives together. The once warring tribes who absolutely hated each other now are at peace with one another. Because of the work of God throughout the warring tribes each side has been able to forgive each other and able to love each other. This is a perfect illustration of what Solomon was talking about in our proverb of last time which was Prov 10:12

Proverbs 10:12 KJV 1900

Hatred stirreth up strifes: But love covereth all sins.

Yet the situation also helps to illustrate our passage today which is Proverbs 17:9

Proverbs 17:9 KJV 1900

He that covereth a transgression seeketh love; But he that repeateth a matter separateth very friends.

The title of this message is Let us Love One Another or the Outworking of God’s Attribute of Love.

Review

-looking at the attributes of God in proverbs

-sovereignty,holiness, the 3 omni’s omnipresent omnipotent omniscience -mercy, righteousness and justice.

-work and its necessity,

-rest and its necessity

-looked at an outworking of joy

-looked at that Christ is the source of all Joy

-looked at hate vs love and how the nature of hate cannot change nor can it ask or receive for mercy or forgiveness. Only Love which God is can shatter hate in order for mercy or forgiveness to be received

Since this study is piggybacked off of last time we will be referring to it from time to time so we won’t be spending much time on review of it.

Verse Overview

Let us look once again at our text this morning Prov 17:9

Proverbs 17:9 KJV 1900

He that covereth a transgression seeketh love; But he that repeateth a matter separateth very friends

As you can see once again we have another one of Solomon’s antithetical parallelism type of proverbs just like we had last time. However if you notice the order is different. Our proverb from last time starts with the negative then gives us the positive. In our proverb today we start with the positive and then we have the negative.

When preaching on our proverb today, the temptation is to reverse the order of the proverb so that we end on a positive note. After all isn’t that how we would like all of our sermons to end? But there is a reason why Solomon was the wisest man in the world and why he set up the proverb the way he did. In other words the proverb is so interconnected it becomes impossible to understand and explain it if you try to mess around with the order of things. Therefore let that which is set in stone be not meddled with.

As we just stated there is some significance to the order of proverbs which we find is particularly the case in both the last proverb we studied and this mornings proverb. In our previous proverb Solomon starts with hate because it is the human condition. We are all haters of God and haters of each other as we explained last time. Hate cannot change because of the nature of what it is so therefore love which is what God is must make the first move in salvation. Love must eradicate the hate that is in the heart thus changing the heart. This must take place in order for the heart to accept the things of God namely mercy and forgiveness.

In our proverb text this morning we have a different situation however. Solomon starts out with showing us a method of bringing people together which is accomplished through the bonds of love. Solomon concludes with the opposite namely the scattering of those bonds; even the bonds of close friendships. As we can see this is where the antithesis is placed in our proverb today. Last time the antithesis was between the actual natures of love and hate whereas today we have the antithesis of in the actions of bringing together and separating.

Exegeting the Verse

Now that we have a background into the proverb let us look further into it by looking at each word as we have done in the past.

Our first word is the word “he”. “He” is a generic term that simply means somebody, or a person. It can be male or female. Notice however that the word “he” appears in this mornings text but not in the previous text. As is usually the case, there is a reason why there is a “he” in this mornings text and not in the proverb that we looked at last time. The reason is this. Our previous text is more universal than our morning’s text. All humans hate and will continue to hate unless they are regenerated by God’s love thus making it a vertical text. In our text this morning we have a more personal touch in that it is phrased in an individual basis which makes it more on a horizontal plane. That does not mean that there isn’t an element of the vertical in it. There is and we will see this as we go along.

Our second word is or rather words are the words “that covereth”. The word “that” is a helper word for covereth to give it the correct grammar. It is interesting to note the word “covereth is the exact same word that was in our previous study’s text. This gives us a continuity between the 2 texts that we are studying. If you recall from the last proverb message “”covereth” meant to form a cover or to provide a cover. The word also means as we discussed last time to forgive or to cover an offense. Considering our context of our proverb this morning the meaning to forgive or to cover an offense is the best way to describe the words “that covereth”

The next word is “a transgression”. So what then is a transgression. Some suggest that it is different than a sin in that transgression is the explicit breaking of God’s commandment. Sin includes transgression but it also includes the implicit breaking of God’s commandments. In other words if you have never heard of God’s law you are not guilty of transgressing the law of God. You are however still condemned as a sinner. Rom 5:13 explains this

Romans 5:13 KJV 1900

(For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law.

In a way of illustration, suppose you go to a foreign country and out of ignorance you violate one of their laws. You are still guilty of violating that law even though you didn’t know of it but technically you haven’t trespassed it. Zack could probably correct me on this but often times when you violate a law out of ignorance the authorities likely will go easier on you because of that fact. In reality though the difference between the 2 is just a hairs width and applies more to those who were before Moses for the law had not yet been given to man. Therefore, for our purposes this morning we will say that transgressions are sins and sins are transgressions.

If you recall from our previous study we looked at the definition of sin. Just to refresh your memories we defined sin as missing the mark in the very slightest degree the full intent of God’s Law. Not just the outward appearance of the law but the inward intent of God’s law. Our definition of sin must also include shortchanging God in the honor and glory that are due unto Him, to disregard the Authority of God, and to not walk humbly before Him.

So far then what we have is a very similar situation of what we discussed last time in that we have a situation of covering sins. Thus, similarly, we have “he” a person covering sin.

Our next word is “seeketh” The idea behind the word “seek” is more than just looking for something. It is more like an earnest desire to obtain or to be united to. It’s more than just I’m looking for a tool that I misplaced but rather the idea of a man seeking for a wife or like someone seeking reconciliation.

Our final word on the first part of our proverb today is love which if you remember we covered extensively in the previous study. We looked at the fact that God is love and how that love covers sins and especially our sin of hate. This morning we are going to take a different approach in our definition of love. We will look at it in terms of an outworking of the attribute of love in us who are to reflect the attribute of God. In other words since God first loved us we therefore will love one another which we will take a closer look at in a little bit.

To put the first part of our proverb back together what we have is the man who covers or forgives a transgression or a sin seeks love or reconciliation. By forgiving your transgression he shows that he loves you in a Christ centered way because he himself has been shown that love by Christ who forgave him.

Now let us look into the second part. As we stated before the second part is the negative opposite of the first part as it focuses on what scatters relationships rather than what draws them together. Just like we did for the first part let us therefore look at the meaning of each of the individual words in order to grasp the meaning of the text as a whole.

Our first word is “but” which is the same “but” that we looked at in our previous study’s text. We won’t spend much time here so just to refresh our memory a little the “but” is a conjunction word that gives us a change in direction which is what we have here in our text

Our second word or rather a phrase is “repeats a matter” Granted we could look at those words individually but by doing so you will miss out on the over all meaning that these words have together. Separating the words you will have a different meaning to the words than if you keep them together. In fact the first word “repeats” is a helper word for “matter”. In other words the word “repeats” helps us to understand the meaning of the word “matter”.

So then what do the words “repeat a matter” mean? There are a couple of ways to look at it. First would be to remind someone of something wrong they had done a long time ago. Something like Do you remember what you did to so and so twenty years ago? Well I don’t think you ever asked for forgiveness. Or worse yet if it was directed towards you. Kind of like I forgive you but I will never forget what you did.

Another way in which to think of “repeating a matter” is to relive your past; to go over in your mind over and over again things that happened in you past. This includes sins that you have commited in the past. Now I’m not saying that you shouldn’t learn from your past or even to look at your past in light of how God has been with you and protected you but rather looking at you past and wishing you had done things differently. Wishing that you had done this or that so that your life would be different than what it is now. This particular rendering of the words “repeat a matter” gives us a more vertical meaning to the proverb but not necessarily exclusively. We will look at the implications of this in a minute.

The third way and probably the most common way to interpret the “repeat a matter” is gossip. So what is gossip? That is a hard question because it is often very difficult to distinguish between what should be said and what is actually gossip. Everybody struggles with this, for it is often hard to know the difference. We touched upon gossip a little bit in our table talk discussions concerning what we should say of our rulers even though we didn’t come right out and say the word gossip. We could, as we often have done in the past, look at a dictionary definition of our word but for the sake of time we will skip it. Besides the bible gives us, as it usually does a much better definition of what gossip is. 3 John 9-10

3 John 9–10 KJV 1900

I wrote unto the church: but Diotrephes, who loveth to have the preeminence among them, receiveth us not. Wherefore, if I come, I will remember his deeds which he doeth, prating against us with malicious words: and not content therewith, neither doth he himself receive the brethren, and forbiddeth them that would, and casteth them out of the church.

What John is doing here is that he is giving us by a real life example what gossip looks like for he tells us what this Diotrephes is doing and by extension the very definition of gossip. So how does John accomplish this? First off by telling us the attitude of gossip starting at Verse 9. John says this: “loveth to have the preeminence among them” In other words Diotrephes was a self-appointed pope. As such then would stop at nothing to keep that position to the point of not acknowledging any other authority. We know this because John tells us that he would not even acknowledge the existence of John, let alone John’s authority as an apostle of Christ. This is the attitude and posture of gossip. John continues on by telling us what else Diotrephes does. He also spreads false rumours, malicious attacks and outright lies against John to hold his position as self-willed pope. Furthermore he won’t even allow any friends of John into his church and excommunicates any who are associated with John for the simple reason that those who are associated with John would challenge Diotrephes in his authority and show that what he was doing was spreading lies.

Understand that in some ways this is an extreme case. We will never face this particular case because none of us are writing holy writ for which I am very thankful for. Yet there are some people who do have to face a very similar situation. Those who are in cults deal with similar scenarios since often those who are leaders of cults behave in a similar fashion as Diotrephes did.

Consider the situation for a moment. For us who are living 2000yrs after the events have hindsight to judge who was right not to mention we have scripture to show who was right. But lets place ourselves in the shoes of the early church for a moment and take a look at the controversy through their eyes so as to see the principles that are taking place here.

So here we are in the middle of the controversy trying ascertain who is right and who isn’t. Both men have some sort of credentials behind their names. We of course know the credentials of John since we have been studying him in our series on the book of Acts that Bro Jeremy has been preaching on. Also included in that list of credentials is that he was handpicked by Jesus Himself, had his head on the bosom of Christ and I’m sure you can come up with a whole host of other credentials. One thing to take note of however is that John in this letter never mentions his credentials.

So what of Diotrephes? what are his credentials? Looking back 2000 yrs we have very little to go on which tells us something doesn’t it. Again hindsight is always 20/20. However, in our imaginations we are back 2000 yrs ago in the center of all this eavesdropping at the door of his church. There must be something in his credentials, some sort of resume that he can show in order to claim a self-styled pope or he wouldn’t have a following. It is possible that he was one of the 120 that were in the upper room but it is highly unlikely. His name is Greek which means it is highly likely that he was Greek and therefore not likely to have been in the upper room as all of those were Jews. What is more likely is that he claimed to have some sort of special revelation from God which he alone witnessed. After all that’s what a lot of false teachers claim from Mahomet to Joe Smith and I’m sure you can come up with many others. Much more can be said on this as this starts to get into the topic of apologetics but for now suffice it to say that the multiple witnesses of John and his credentials lend itself to a much higher credibility than one witness. Therefore one of the elements of gossip can be but not always is false credentials. In other words if you hear it said “I heard it through the grapevine” or words to that effect or worse yet I heard it from a credible source without naming that source. If you hear those words be very cautious for it may be what you are hearing is gossip. It is not a hard and fast rule but at least if you hear these words be on your guard.

The second way in which our passage shows us what gossip is what is the message itself? This, by far is the most important way in which to tell what is gossip.Just to put it briefly here, we all know Johns message is one of love, togetherness, truth and most importantly the centrality of Christ in all things. Diotrephes message was one of maliciousness, hate and most importantly the centrality of himself in all things which we get from our text. Diotrephes message causes separation within the body of Christ which leads us to our next group of words in proverbs.

Yes we are still in proverbs and if you remember the very last phrase in our text is “separateth very friends. This phrase is a very simple one so we won’t spend a lot of time looking at it. The concept though is that which repeats the matter will separate even the very closest of friends. It can cause even the separation between husband and wife and even cause a separation between God and man.

A clear case of causing separation between God and man or the vertical relationship is the afore mentioned case of dwelling in the past that we talked about in the different definitions of repeating a matter. Now admittedly we all do it from time to time and it isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Especially when you are reminding yourself of God’s mercy and faithfulness to you. Those things are always a good thing to remind yourself of. Especially in a difficult situation. That isn’t what we’re referring to here. Rather it’s wishing the circumstances had been different. Wishing you had chosen something different over what you had chosen so that your life would be different and often perceived as being easier and better. In reality what you are doing is doubting the kind providence of God. You are doubting the goodness and omniscience of God and this will separate you from God for you will not trust Him fully. The more this happens the wider the breach becomes.

Another view of this separation is to dwell on past sins that you wish you hadn’t commited and keep beating yourself about having commited those sins. Granted we need to repent of sin but that isn’t what we are referring to here either. It’s the I shouldn’t have done this and go over that situation time and time again. What essentially you are doing here is to doubt God’s compassion and mercy and therefore miss out on the joy that God would otherwise be giving you. Thus again creating a separation between you and God.

At this point we have thus successfully divided up the passage into its constituent parts and have explored the meaning of each. Now it’s time bring each part back together so that we can understand it as a whole so we aren’t lost in the details. Again our proverb this morning reads Prov 17:9

Proverbs 17:9 KJV 1900

He that covereth a transgression seeketh love; But he that repeateth a matter separateth very friends.

Once again we can play the game of where have we heard this before? just like we did last time. Some of you might know on the top of your heads though if you’re like me you’re probable scratching your head again trying to remember where it came from. I’ll give you a hint. It’s in the law. Well the law is pretty lengthy. Ok I’ll be nice and tell you exactly where it came from. It’s Lev 19:16-18

Leviticus 19:16–18 KJV 1900

Thou shalt not go up and down as a talebearer among thy people: neither shalt thou stand against the blood of thy neighbour: I am the Lord. Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart: thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour, and not suffer sin upon him. Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the Lord.

Solomon must have had this very law in mind when he wrote proverb 17:9 for everything that is in the proverb is in the law. In the law you have not being a gossip, not hating your brother by repeating old wounds to him but rather seek love with your neighbor.

You may be thinking to yourself. That wasn’t the verse I had in mind. Isn’t it found somewhere in the NT somewhere. Well you would be right. It is found in 3 places in the NT namely the 3 gospels of Matt, Mark and Luke. It is alluded to in John and we may take a closer look at that in a little bit. It is interesting to note that each time it is quoted it has a slightly different perspective each time. In Matt it’s to correct the religious leaders. In Mark we are seeing a man who is knocking on heaven’s door so to speak and in Luke which is the one we will briefly look at today is the one where the famous Good Samaritan parable is mentioned.

Luke differs from the other gospels in that he sights a parable after the law’s citation. The reason why Luke mentions the parable of the good Samaritan is because Luke is showing us who is your neighbor and what it means to love your neighbor as yourself.

The interesting thing is is that Solomon in his proverb does the same thing Luke does in that Solomon shows us methods of loving our neighbor as ourselves just without the parable to illustrate it. Jesus would also give us a new commandment which is the same as the old after he gives us an illustration of how it works. In John 13:34-35

John 13:34–35 KJV 1900

A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.

How does Solomon show us methods of loving our neighbor or as Jesus puts it loving one another? He does this by showing us in his proverb the various actions that love does towards other people. Remember from last time? God is love so therefore He shows us how to love by loving us first. Really that is the theme of the entire proverb the phrase seeketh love. So yes God seeks you! All who are saved or who are going to be saved have been sought by the Lord. You’ve heard it said by people that they found God but that is not correct. God was never lost; you were. So then those whom He chose, He loves.

The proverb goes on to tell us how God loves. First and foremost by covering our transgressions; forgiving our sins. Christ by His death and resurrection made it so that justice would be answered and that mercy would be revealed thereby forgiveness takes place. Therefore, since we are the recipients of so great a love we too must forgive each other whenever the need arises. We must be quick with the I forgive you with each other because God has been so quick with the I forgive you for us.

As if that wasn’t enough God says. But wait, There’s more., since the rest of the proverbs deals with the “there’s more”. These are found in each one of those “repeat-a-matters” that we previously discussed. In His love,God does not remind us of our past sins. Consider for a moment if God were to remember your sins. Can you imagine being told by God of that sin you did last Tues or Thurs and it’s repeated over and over again? Aren’t you thankful that He doesn’t do that! For it is written in Ps 103:12

Psalm 103:12 KJV 1900

As far as the east is from the west, So far hath he removed our transgressions from us.

Not only that, it is further written in Isaiah 43:25

Isaiah 43:25 KJV 1900

I, even I, (that is God)am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, And will not remember thy sins.

There you have it folks! God does not recall to His mind your past sins and therefore we who are to be His ambassadors, as a reflection of Him should not recall to remembrance the past sins of others. This is hard to do though. Especially if the sin was against you. It is hard to let it go yet God lets your sin go. So keep that in mind and be grateful that God does remember your sins no more.

Now this doesn’t mean we just throw caution to the wind and just pretend that nothing happened for remember God does not absolve you of the consequences of your sins in this life. The murderer on death row still has to be executed even though he has come to faith and so on and so forth. Rather what it means is how you treat that person who has wronged you and has come for forgiveness. You are to treat them with open arms just as Barnabas did with Paul which Jeremy will look at in the coming weeks. But we also must be prudent as well.

The final repeat-a-matter that shows the love of God in action is in the fact that God doesn’t gossip. Admittedly it is hard to imagine God gossiping but there is a reason for this. Isaiah 40:13

Isaiah 40:13 KJV 1900

Who hath directed the Spirit of the Lord, Or being his counseller hath taught him?

In other words there is no one that God goes to for advice, to share His plans with, or to try and make sense out of things for the simple reason because God is God who is omnipotent and omniscient and there is none greater so it is not needful for Him to ask advice etc. Understand that there is nothing wrong with asking for advice, or to share plans or to try and make sense out of things but gossip will often disguise itself in those very things.

Earlier we discussed the fact that gossip is rooted in hate and malice, the result of which lies are often introduced in order for the one being gossiped about to be held in lesser regard. Again we should not gossip because it is often filled with lies. God is truth which we look at another day. Therefore, we also must reflect that truth so then we should speak truth to one another. As Eph 4:25

Ephesians 4:25 KJV 1900

Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour: for we are members one of another.

But ya know it’s tough! Situations arise that are not ideal and the lines between what is gossip and what isn’t often get blurred. So then the question arises. How do we combat gossip? How do we not participate in gossip? There are a couple of questions that you need to ask yourself which will help combat gossip. First and this isn’t in any particular order. Does what I am hearing tear down the person or does it lift them up? The christian is in the business in edifying one another as God edifies us. The second question is, is what I am hearing true or is it false. This obviously is going to take some leg work and time so as such then don’t be too hasty in accepting the news until it has been verified. Lastly how does what I am hearing follow the guideline that is in our proverb? Does what I am hearing seek love or does it separate? Once again a word of caution here for sometimes it is necessary to separate especially when it comes to false teachers or obstinate people. Those you need to separate from but only when no reconciliation is possible. The goal of the christian is always reconciliation for in reconciliation is where the fruit of love is found.

One more thought before we close and its a thought that we encountered in our previous study. This thought is love covers all sins which is somewhat repeated today in the one who covers transgressions seeks love. Therefore if love covers all sins then love covers all of the sins of the repeat-a-matters. It covers the sins of not letting go of past wrongs or hurts. Seeking to love the one who hurt you, or wronged you will heal the hurts and wrongs that you incurred. This is not easy! It is probably one of the hardest things you will ever have to do and the longer you have had to live with the pain the harder it will be to do it. Notice I said love and not forgive. Yes we need to forgive but that is only part of the story. We must go further and truly love them. We can find so many examples of this, of people loving those who hurt them and it is inspiring to hear them. The case of Rwanda that we mentioned in the intro is a clear case of this and I’m sure you can think of many many others

Another repeat-a-matter sin that love covers is gossip and the best way to stop gossip is to love the one who is gossiping about you. Again this is very counterintuitive for our first reaction is to seek justice and to endeavor to right the wrong that has been done to us. Yet to love such a one is precisely the best method of stopping gossip. Not only for the one who is gossiping against you but also to stop gossip from continuing. Think about it in this manor. If you hear a juicy little word of gossip about someone else show that person love by not only not repeating it but also think about how you would feel if someone did the same to you. Put yourself in their shoes and walk a mile in them. Then perhaps you will understand better. Think then on what Christ has to say in Matt 5:44

Matthew 5:44 KJV 1900

But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;

Think or say things that would uplift the person that is being gossiped about rather than tear them down. Finally forgive, truly forgive that person who gossiped against you. Again a word of caution here. Don’t try this on your own strength for it is impossible to do. It can only be done through Christ so your first and foremost defence against gossip and its effect is by going to God for strength and understanding.

As we close this morning let us look again at the situation that happened in Rwanda and apply it to our own lives. They became Christ followers and as such then forgave each other even the most devastating of wrongs were commited. Not only did they forgave each other but learned to love each other. If they can do that then we can forgive each other of the 2 bit wrongs that we have done to each other and learn to love each other better. Forgive and love rather than remembering wrongs commited. Forgive and love rather than gossiping, for love covers all sins and the one who seeks love seeks to cover all sins. Let me reiterate what was stated earlier. This cannot be done on your own strength as the Rwandan’s found out. It can only be done through Christ alone. Only through Christ can love be sought and by the seeking of love can sins be covered.