Love one another part 2

Introduction

As we are continuing on in our miniseries on God’s attribute of love the difficult thing that we are running into is that the topic keeps expanding the more we study the subject. Not that that’s a bad thing of course. If you remember from last time the sermon as it was written was 1hr and 15min long which was divided in 2. Now as we come to the second part of the proverb the message became just on the second part 1hr long and I can almost hear those silent groans out there. That would be doable I suppose but since it is fellowship Sunday the length of the sermon becomes more problematic. The reason being that probably about 3/4 of the way through many would start to worry if the food would get burnt or stomachs start to complain. Additionally, and the real reason for splitting it up yet again is that the subject matter lends itself better if it is split up, for we do have 3 distinct topics within our proverb this morning. The first topic we covered last time which was the power of forgiveness that comes from and starts with God. The second topic is the power of certain types of sins namely the “repeat a matters” in that they separate and destroy, which all sins do. The third topic that Lord willing we will cover next time is the power of God’s love and forgiveness over those things which separate. Thus, once again we have proved the complete brilliancy of Solomon as God’s chosen servant in writing these proverbs, for he writes in one sentence what has taken us 3 sermons to unpack.

Proverbs 17:9 KJV 1900

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

I’m titling the message this morning with the completely original title of Love One Another part 2; The Second Half of the Verse

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

-created a mini-series starting with looking at love being an attribute of God

-last time we continued with an aspect of love shown through forgiveness

Exegeting the verse

Normally even within a mini-series in which we deal with the same topic we would look at different proverbs. Because we have discovered throughout our series on proverbs many proverbs are related to each other. The nice thing about using a different proverb other than the original proverb that we started the topic with is that it does give us different angles or perspectives on the topic within the mini-series. This morning however we will be looking at the same verse we did last time for the simple reason because we did not finish exegeting the entire verse. Granted it isn’t a hard and fast rule that you have to exegete an entire verse before moving on to another topic. Especially if you are studying topically which is what we have been doing as we have been going through proverbs. However, as we stated last time it is impossible to grasp and understand Solomon’s meaning in each proverb if you only study part of it and not the whole of it. Let us then begin by reading the proverb as a whole so that we can see the context.

King James Version Chapter 17

9  He that covereth a transgression seeketh love;

But he that repeateth a matter separateth very friends.

If you recall from last time we looked at the first part of this verse in which we looked at how love and specifically forgiveness brings together people. Without forgiveness there can be no peace with God, no peace with others, and no peace with yourself. Without peace there can be no coming together. We all understand this through our familial relationships, be it husband and wife, brother and sister and so on and so forth. This morning, we will be looking at the second part of our text which is the negative opposite of the first part of our text 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 proverb that we studied which we began to look at the fact that love is an attribute of God. If you remember going back a couple of months ago the verse that started our whole subseries on love as an attribute of God was Prov 10:12 .

Proverbs 10:12 KJV 1900

Hatred stirreth up strifes: But love covereth all sins.

If you recall from the time that we looked at the proverbs 10:12 verse, we discovered that the “but” is a conjunction word that in this usage as well as our current proverb gives us a change in direction. The reason why this is, is because both of the proverbs that we have looked at in this series on love are considered antithetical parallelism types of proverbs. In both cases the “but” signifies that the new thought that follows is the opposite of the previous thought that proceeded the “but”. In the proverb 10:12 passage the change of direction was from the negative to the positive. As we look at proverb 17:9 we discover that this time the change is from the positive to the negative. In the previous proverb like we stated last time Solomon starts with the human condition then shows us how God in His love ends that strife that man has for his Maker that is caused by hatred when He calls His children to him. Also, that He covers all their sins as He adopts them into His family.

In our passage this morning however, Solomon goes off into another direction by giving us at the beginning of the proverb the most difficult and the most unnatural thing for us to do and the consequence of doing so. He then enters in the word “but” to show that there is an opposite direction is coming. Then he gives us the easiest and the most natural thing that we do and the consequence of doing so. So, what Solomon is telling us as we talked about last time is that forgiveness is very hard because it is completely unnatural to us. It is so unnatural and so foreign to us that it must be installed into us by the grace of God specifically through the actions of the Holy Spirit. With the incision of the word “but” in this case Solomon is showing us the radical change between the God installed grace and its consequences verses the natural man's actions and its consequences. In other words, Solomon starts with God first and His actions towards us as we discussed last time, for forgiveness can only come through the power and might of God. Only through that power can there be reconciliation with God, reconciliation with family, friends, church and even communities as we looked at last time. Then in contrast Solomon proceeds to show us our natural state and our actions towards God and others as we shall see as we go along. The word “but” gives us the transition between these two concepts

Our second word in our proverb this morning or rather a phrase is “repeats a matter” If we separate the words in the phrase what you have is first “repeats” which means to do over, quite often multiple times. Second you have “matter” which has a couple of meanings. The first meaning of matter is basically the physical world. Things that have substance, as opposed to energy which has no substance at least according to classical physics. Your body for instance is made of matter. The pew you’re sitting in is made of matter. This pulpit I’m standing is made of matter and if I slap it or pound my fist on it, I’ll find out just how hard that matter is! Since the words “repeats and matter” are part of the phrase it is necessary to put them together in order ascertain what the correct meaning of the phrase is. Therefore, using the afore mentioned definition of each word what we have then is to do over again physical substance; do over again pew or do over again pulpit. Doesn’t exactly make sense does it. We can therefore chuck this definition since it doesn’t make any sense.

Another definition of the word “matter” is a subject or situation under consideration. For example, if someone were to say “there is a matter we need to discuss” the word “matter” here means a subject or situation. Now if someone were to actually say that to you, you would likely be concerned and have a certain sense of chagrin. Simply because often when someone says “matter” it can mean something weighty possibly even in a negative sense. Now if we put the phrase back together with this second definition what we have is: to do over possibly multiple times a subject or situation under consideration. In other words, things that have happened or ideas that have come up that are being talked about, are said or done over again by implication multiple times. This definition then makes a great deal more sense and at least gives us a start as to what the phrase itself means. We add to that the fact that this is proceeded by the word “but” which we previously talked about as a change iin direction. As we stated earlier, the phrase before the word “but” is a positive phrase therefore what comes after the word “but” must be negative especially in light of the fact that the proverb is an antithetical parallelism proverb that we also discussed. Therefore, the subject or situation under consideration that is being repeated must be a negative one.

So, then what does a negative subject or situation under consideration that is repeated or as Solomon more simply put “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 and continue to remind that person of that wrong. 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 someone keeps repeating to you something that you have done to them over and over again. In both cases I’m sure you can picture someone shaking their finger at you as they repeat to you the matter that you need to repent properly of, at least their definition of properly repenting. We’ve all been on the receiving end of this one and it isn’t pleasant to say the least. On the other hand, it is a very easy one to fall into. It’s very easy to point the finger at someone else for what they have done. Remember though before you point the finger (I know I’m sounding like I’m pointing the finger) that God has forgiven you of your faults so be gracious which we looked at a little bit last time and Lord willing we will look further into this next time. Remember also that we are talking about repentance here, not penance and there is a big difference between the two which is a subject for another day.

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 your past. This includes sins that you have committed 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, protected you and had mercy upon 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 this in greater depth in a minute.

The third way and probably the most common way to interpret the “repeat a matter” is gossip. What then 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. To further our discussion on gossip let us look at a definition of the word gossip. Gossip can be defined as casual or unconstrained conversation or reports about other people, typically involving details that are not confirmed as being true. These reports more often than not are complete fabrications yet often feel like they are true. The difficulty with gossip and why the term “repeat a matter” is often defined as gossip in our text this morning is because it is never confined to one or two people. It keeps going on and on as the matter is repeated from one person to the next and often the matter is changed as it goes from person to person so that what may have started out as truth by the time it gets to the last person the matter becomes a complete fabrication.

The bible also gives us a definition of what gossip is by way of example. This is found in 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 and therefore was the only one qualified to say what is truth whether it is the truth or not. 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. Gossip tells us it has the inside story. A superior knowledge because it is preeminent or comes from preeminent source.

John continues on by telling us what else Diotrephes does. He also spreads false rumors, malicious attacks and outright lies against John to hold his position as self-willed pope. In other words, Diotrephes not only shows us the posture of gossip by his actions saying that he has superior knowledge but also he starts gossip in order to maintain his position. 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 and/or gossip.

Understand that in some ways this is an extreme case, but unfortunately extreme cases do occur for 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. The interesting thing about this particular extreme case is that it not only makes us aware of cult-like behavior it also gives us a prime example as to what exactly gossip is and what it does.

Let’s step back and consider the situation for a moment. For us who are living 2000yrs after the events we have the 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 to 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. If ever there was a man that could rightfully claim that he had superior knowledge it would be John. John does not do this, however. John in this letter never mentions his credentials even in his diatribe against Diotrephes. The reason why he does not mention them is because first everyone knows them. Everyone knew his credentials then and everyone knows them now. Secondly because it is a case study in humility. To speak of his credentials at this juncture would be a prideful thing to do thus escalating the situation.

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 and since in our present day we have the advantage of hindsight. However, in our imaginations we are not in the present, but we are back 2000 yrs ago in the center of all this eavesdropping at the door of Diotrephes church having perfected the time machine. This means we don’t have the benefit of hindsight, so we have to employ other means to determine what is going on. We do know this that there must be something in Diotrephes 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. Granted it is speculation, but it is an educated one. 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 of the one who is propagating the gossip. If a person is not qualified to speak on a subject yet does so, then it is likely that the words he speaks will not be truth and therefore would fall under the category of gossip.

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 actually gossip. Just to put it briefly here, we all know John’s message is one of love, drawing together, truth and most importantly the centrality of Christ in all things. Christ is the very center of John’s message in every book that he writes. Diotrephes message was one of maliciousness, hate and most importantly the centrality of himself in all things which we get from our text. Christ does not seem to appear in Diotrephes message at all. Diotrephes message causes separation within the body of Christ which we can see in the actions that John records. This 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. Separate simply means to divide, to cause a riff, to grow apart often with angry or hurt feelings that often become difficult to heal. The term “very friends” simply means close friends or best friends or spouses. 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. We have looked extensively at the omniscience of God in our proverb series and also the goodness of God in both our proverb series and also the short series of sermons on ps 23. One of the things that we came away with from those messages is that God in His omniscience and His goodness designed you to be exactly where you are at this point in time. You are a cog in the great wheel of the universe that could not operate well without you. Therefore, you can trust Him fully that He knows exactly what He is doing. Not to do so separates yourself from Him

Another view of this separation is to dwell on past sins that you wish you hadn’t committed and keep beating yourself about having committed 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 in the Lord that God gives you. It is true that David in Ps 51:12 asks God to restore to him joy where he states

Psalm 51:12 KJV 1900

Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; And uphold me with thy free spirit.

but David did not continually beat himself up about his sin but rather asked God to restore his joy through Him. David was at this juncture when he wrote this psalm was repenting of his sin, not continually beating himself up about it. Yes, there were consequences to his sin but through Basheba many generations later was Christ born. Much, much more could be said on this topic. In fact a sermon or 2 could be done on this but for the sake time we will leave it stew right there. Sufice it to say however that we have looked extensively at joy in a previous sermon so we won’t dwell on it too much. Yet doubting God’s mercy does cause a separation between you and God.

The third way in which separation occurs is through gossip. Obviously, this isn’t a vertical separation since you can’t gossip to God. You can’t say to God “psst. Did you hear what so and so did?” God knows all things and there is nothing you can hide from him nor can you say a falsehood to Him and get away with it. Nor can you add to God’s knowledge which the gossiper presupposes he can do. Gossip then is more a horizontal separation as it separates man from man. We’ve all been in this situation. We hear some gossip about us that just makes us cringe because it is so obviously false. We would really like to shake them or something to make the matter straight. Not exactly a recipe for togetherness!

Sad to say gossip is probably one of the most prevalent sins in the church often under the guise of purity. While it is true we need to keep purity in the church we must be very careful how we do those things. Our scripture example is one such occasion showing us how quickly it can invade the church. Paul tells us of another such situation in the Corinthian church 2 Cor 12:20

2 Corinthians 12:20 KJV 1900

For I fear, lest, when I come, I shall not find you such as I would, and that I shall be found unto you such as ye would not: lest there be debates, envyings, wraths, strifes, backbitings, whisperings, (what a great name for gossip!) swellings, tumults:

Plus the fact Paul warns in his pastoral letter to Timothy warning him of gossipers 1Tim5:13

1 Timothy 5:13 KJV 1900

And withal they learn to be idle, wandering about from house to house; and not only idle, but tattlers also and busybodies, speaking things which they ought not.

In the context Paul is speaking of young widows that have nothing to do. In reality that could refer to anyone who doesn’t have anything to do or even enough to do. Gossip and busybodies are the end result.

Gossip is the greatest cause of separation in the list of causes of separation that we have covered here this morning. Gossip has been known to split up families. It has been known to split up friends numerous times and it has been the cause of many a church split. The problem is gossip can take on many forms. It doesn’t just do character assassinations in which you tare down the reputation of someone but can even go into the realm of ideas. If an idea is misrepresented, strawmaning as it has often been called in which you start with a misconception and then argue against it. A good example of this was what the romans thought of christians. One of the misconceptions that they had of christians is that the pagan romans thought that christians were canabals in that they had human sacrifices and ate flesh and drank blood. To the pagan Roman this was a total abomination to the gods and therefore the christians must be exterminated. The pagans had a number of other misconceptions about christians but this illustration will help us understand what a strawman is and does. To bring us back to our point strawmen in their essence is a starting point for gossip for it starts with a faulty premise. Where it becomes gossip is when the misconception or faulty premise is proplegated to others as the truth just as the pagan Romans spread this idea throughout the empire.

Not sure if any of you noticed this or not but there is a word that was missed in our exegeting of the text and that is the word “he”. We did cover the word “he rather extensively in the previous sermon so there isn’t any need to expound upon it further just in case you were wondering why it was missed.

To put the second half of the verse back together again what we have is Prv17:9

Proverbs 17:9 KJV 1900

But he that repeateth a matter separateth very friends.

In other words repeat a matters which are gossip, the continuous dwelling on the past that we wish we had done differently and the continuous dwelling on the sins that God has clearly forgiven us of within the context of what we discussed are natural things for us to do. These things separate everything. They separate you from God, you from your family, friends, church and communities. These “repeat a matters” are the source of many a heart ache. They have been the source of much pain, much misery and much depression in our history and in our society. BUT and we’ll use “but” the same way Solomon did BUT there is hope through Christ Jesus our Lord for through Him can the natural things be replaced with the unnatural. Through Christ can the things of separation be overcome with reconciliation. We will take a close look at how this is accomplished next time when we put back together the entire verse and look at it as a whole.