First Peter 4:8, “charity shall cover the multitude of sins,” is given to us to show what characterizes divine love and to show us how we are to act towards our fellow believers. Actually, the words are largely quoted from the Old Testament, from Proverbs 10:12: “Hatred stirreth up strifes; but love covereth all transgressions” (JND). God was the same morally in the Old Testament as He is in the New Testament days; He wants those who belong to Him to show forth His love in covering the transgressions of others. Of course, the love of God, while it certainly existed just as much in the Old Testament as in the New, was not revealed in the same way. The full character of God did not come out until the Lord Jesus, as a man, came into this world to reveal fully the character of God.
Another has described the action of divine love very well, in covering sins that need not be harbored in the soul or broadcast to others:
“If the assembly is at variance, if there is little love, if fellowship among Christians is restricted and difficult, all such evils and wrongs exist before God. But if there is love, which neither commits nor resents any wrongs, but pardons such things, finding in those very sins occasion for its own exercise, the eye of God then rests upon the love rather than the evil; the multitude of sins is covered.
“Where there are sins, love occupies itself about them, the offender is brought back, is restored by the love of the assembly, and the sins are removed from the eye of God; they are covered.”
J. N. Darby
Life in Christ
When God brings souls into blessing through the work of Christ, they have a new life in Him — a life that cannot sin. But we also have our old sinful self too — the flesh, which never improves. When saints are thus brought together in the church, and they walk in love and grace, in communion with the Lord, all goes well. They have found a higher calling — that which raises them above individual idiosyncrasies, bents of mind, habits, social standing, and other things that might spoil their happy communion together. They have found an object that transcends all that is in this world — Christ, and all that He is. Christian fellowship is indeed a wonderful thing. But the potential for irritation and roots of bitterness is always there. If these things are allowed to fester in our hearts, they can cause bad feelings and strife which, perhaps more than anything else, spoil the peace of the local assembly. Often the things that bring all this on are rather small, yet the irritation becomes such that it may erupt into open resentment.
Divine Love
It is here that divine love ought to be demonstrated, which covers those transgressions and does not react to them in the wrong way. The flesh in you and me cannot answer the flesh in another. Rather, the love and grace that brought us to Christ ought to take over and cover the sin in my brother. If necessary, we may act on Matthew 18:15-17, going to our brother (or sister!) personally and seeking to remove the difficulty. But often we do not need even to go this far; if it is a personal slight or perhaps some inadvertent snub or rebuff that has occurred, we can forget it.
God’s Character as Light
Yes, there are times when light is called for and when, in faithfulness to the Lord, we must remember that “God is light.” It is most important to understand that the exercise of divine love in covering “the multitude of sins” is not at all contrary to God’s character as light. It is not honoring to the Lord, in the name of love, to “sweep under the rug” that which is a serious dishonor to the One who is in the midst of the assembly. True love desires the blessing of the one who has sinned, and this may mean addressing the issue in the light of God’s Word. But if this can be done privately, how much better it is than to broadcast it publicly, or worse still, to speak about it behind the back of the one who has sinned. Sadly, we all know how often this happens. Instead of forgetting the matter, or perhaps going directly to the one who has offended us, we tend to gossip about the problem to others. In doing this, as well as spreading the evil, we are apt to tell a “one-sided story,” emphasizing the wrong done to us, and perhaps forgetting that we may have contributed to the problem.
An older brother, long since with the Lord, used to remind us, “If someone says something unkind about you, do not look at the one who said it. Ask the Lord why He allowed it.” This was good advice, for if the Lord allows something that hurts us, we must remember that it was carefully weighed in His sanctuary before it was allowed in our life. Let us seek to learn what He has for us in it all before addressing the wrong of the other who said it.
Release From Debt
In the Mosaic law, there was to be a release from debt every seven years, and a poor man who had borrowed from a wealthier man was freed from the debt he might have owed. What would be the result of this? A reward from the Lord: “For this thing the Lord thy God shall bless thee in all thy works, and in all that thou puttest thine hand unto” (Deut. 15:10). The question for an Israelite was this: Was he wealthy enough and with enough faith in the Lord’s goodness to forgive his poor brother? In New Testament terms, Are you and I wealthy enough spiritually to forgive one another and to rise above petty wrongs? Sadly, there are often many poor Christians who seem unable to do this, yet if we do so, the Lord’s promise is that we will be greatly blessed in our Christian life.
The enjoyment of the love of God in our own souls, coupled with the realization of how much we have been forgiven, will give us the needed grace to overlook many things that might otherwise irritate and trouble us. What peace it gives to be able to do this, not only for our own sakes, but for the Lord, whose eye then rests on the love, instead of on the sin.
However, let us not forget the proper balance in divine things. “God is light,” and while love covers, light exposes. Solomon reminds us that “open rebuke is better than secret love. Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful” (Prov. 27:5-6). What is due to the Lord, in faithfulness to Him, must never be passed over. But let us be careful that we do not attach the Lord’s glory to that which may be merely wounded pride on our part.
W. J. Prost