The Covering

 

He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge.

—Psalm 91:4

Most of us like to have a covering over us. Whether we want our feet warmed with comfy socks, want the warm bedlinens when we snuggle into our beds on a cold night, want to have Grandma’s quilt cover us when we have the chills, or want our ears covered when we walk in the snow, a covering of something soft and insulating gives us a sense of well-being.

Babies, like the one in the photo above, wear a swaddling to cover them and to help them feel the security they have been used to in the womb. When we recall the story of Adam and Eve, we remember that after they sinned against God, they hastened to make coverings for themselves because they realized they were naked.

Coverings comfort us, warm us, or hide us—remember the “tents” you and your siblings would make from blankets hung over chairs in the living room, or thrown over the clotheslines in the yard? Coverings protect us. We don’t want to have our physical, emotional, spiritual, or intellectual “nakedness” exposed, either to the elements, or to the clear view of others.

God has given to us a covering in the protection of His Son’s blood on the cross of Calvary. The Apostle Paul, in Romans 4:7, quotes the psalmist David when he writes:

“Blessed are they whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered.”

In other words, through the gift of the Lord Jesus Christ, God has taken care of the debt we owe for our sinful thoughts, words, and deeds. God lovingly acts toward us like a friend that, when the waitress brings the tab in a restaurant at the end of a meal, “I’ll cover this!”

In the same way that our sins have been covered by Jesus’ shed blood, He expects us to cover the sins of others. He particularly wants us to cover any information we learn about another person that might reflect badly on them.

By cover, I’m not talking about hiding something someone does that breaks the law. Nor am I talking about a behavior that might put another person at serious risk. No, I’m talking about providing a covering of love for what someone may have done in the past or the present that simply reflects badly on them—something that others really do not need to know about that person.

Proverbs 10:12 states:

Love covers over all wrongs.

Similarly, 1 Peter 4:8 instructs us:

Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.

How do we do that? Here are the steps we should take when someone sins against us, or more so when we learn something negative about someone:

• First, we must either absorb any hurt against us by another person, or we must go to that person and talk it out. If that person happens to be a fellow believer, we must follow Jesus’ instructions in Matthew 18:15-17.
  
  
• Secondly, we must never mention the offense, or the sin, or something negative we learn about another person to anyone else until we take the first step listed above.
  
  
• Thirdly, we must pray for the person about whom we know a damaging story, or about the sin that person has committed against us or others. God alone needs to know the sin and the danger of it—and, in fact, He already does. Our enemy the devil loves to expose the sin that he himself has tempted the sinner to commit. We need not help Satan out by re-exposing that sin to others and stirring up more sin.
  
  

God loves us enough to have provided a covering for our sins, and to forgive and forget those sins when we confess them to Him. Following the example of our Lord and Savior, let us love each other enough to provide a covering for the sins that others commit against us, and especially for the negative things we may learn about another person, as well.