He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy.—Proverbs 28:13

 

Heavenly wisdom! It is revealed to fools to make them wise about God, themselves, and their sins.

The question is not whether we are sinners. You and I are sinners. All men are sinners before God. You and I sin in all that we do. We pollute even the good works that God gives us to do and mar them in all sorts of ways because the natures by which we perform those deeds are corrupt. The bodies of death in which we live and by which we must perform all our deeds, even as regenerated children of God, are like large, heavy weights. When as little birds we try to fly and flutter in the good works that God gives us to do, we are weighed down with our sinful natures. So our flights are crooked, and we tumble and fall.

Man, who is a sinner and who sins in all that he does, always does something with his sins. The natural man always covers his sins. That is the folly of the natural man exposed by the wisdom of God. Over against covering one’s sins stands the wisdom of God: confess your sins and forsake them.

Man’s name in the text is sinner. That is the wisdom of God as well. No one can hear any other part of the wisdom of God in this proverb who will not hear this wisdom about himself. Man is a sinner. A mighty stream of foul transgressions prevails from day to day! He commits transgressions because his nature is totally depraved and corrupt. God made man good. Man corrupted himself by his sin. And under the just judgment of God, man was punished with death. He is conceived and born dead in trespasses and sins. And out of that corrupt and dead nature, as a stream from its fountain, flows a torrent of sins.

This is true whether one is regenerated or not. The wisdom of God condemns man, and the whole human race, not only in his actions but also in his nature. Man is a sinner in his nature. And because he is a sinner, he does according to that nature. He sins. So every man has a multitude, an uncountable multitude, of sins. My sins are more than I can count, more than the hairs of my head!

How do you treat your sins?

Man’s folly! He who covers his sins!

Covering his sins is what man has been doing since the garden of Eden. Adam and Eve ran from the presence of God and made themselves aprons of fig leaves to cover their nakedness. Adam, as he stood there before God with his fig leaves, wickedly blamed his wife for his sins. When God called Eve to account for her sins, she did not confess them either but pointed to the snake as the culprit. The snake with the devil inside him had the shrewdness to say nothing at all to God. By this he covered his sins too, and he slithered off to continue his war of rebellion against God. So man has been covering his sins ever since Eden.

You know that the Bible speaks in a good sense of covering sins!

“Hatred stirreth up strifes: but love covereth all sins” (Prov. 10:12).

“He that covereth a transgression seeketh love; but he that repeateth a matter separateth very friends” (Prov. 17:9).

“Let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins” (James 5:20).

“Above all things have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins” (1 Pet. 4:8).

Is that not lovely?

That covering of sins is the fruit of love, love which is the gift of God to his people.

False love covers sins by overlooking sins, minimizing sins, or soothing itself with the pious platitude “We are sinners; so he has his sins, I have mine, and we should not be judgmental.” This is not love but hatred. It is one of the foolish attempts of man to cover sins, which is exposed by the wisdom of God.

Love covers sins because love does not go about spreading the sin of the poor brother to everyone who will listen. Love covers sins because if the brother sins against someone in private, love will go to that person in private in order to gain him. Love covers the multitude of transgressions because if you sin against a brother, in love you will seek him out and confess your sin to him. Love covers the multitude of sins because in love we easily forgive one another the trespasses that we multiply against one another on a daily basis. Love covers a multitude of sins because if the brother sins, love does not let him go on in that sin unrebuked and unaddressed. Love seeks his repentance and thus his salvation. Love will do that at great expense to itself, over many obstacles, and patiently. Love brings to the brother the love of God in Christ Jesus at the cross, where sin was covered, and love comforts the brother with Christ’s blood and so covers sin.

Against that covering there is no law. Divine wisdom!

But to cover sins! Man’s folly!

He covers those sins before man, if he can. But more importantly, he covers those sins before God. The man who covers his sins hardens his heart against God. Like Pharaoh, that man says in his heart, “Who is Jehovah?” Secure in his sins, he vaunts himself against God and proudly maintains himself in his heart over against Jehovah God. Taking that stance against God in his heart, man covers his sins before God.

There is a brazen and bold covering of sins. We see today as part of the development of wickedness that man is worse than Adam and Eve, who at least made aprons of fig leaves and ran away from God. Man, developed in his wickedness, is as brazen as the men of Sodom and Gomorrah were in their sins. “The shew of their countenance doth witness against them; and they declare their sin as Sodom, they hide it not. Woe unto their soul! for they have rewarded evil unto themselves” (Isa. 3:9). So when man is really wicked and truly hardened in his sins, then as Sodom he shouts his sins from the housetops and displays them openly for all to see and to speak of how good they are. He is like the brazen-foreheaded whore of Proverbs, who, after she had made her bed and defiled it with another man, got up to eat as though nothing had happened, and she wiped her mouth and said, “I have done no wickedness” (Prov. 30:20). So we see that what man formerly hid in his closet and behind euphemisms, he now flaunts before the world, and he declares before the God of judgment and before all men that he has no sins! Divorce and remarriage, sodomy, lesbianism, bestiality, and whatever else can come from the dark mind of man he makes an acceptable and a normal part of society. By that brazenness he declares loudly and stubbornly that he has no sins. That is a special kind of covering of sins that is far advanced down the way of God’s judgment against sin, in which a man declares his shame before all and says that what God declares to be sin is not sin at all and that there will be no judgment. Indeed, man, so hardened in his sins and given over to a reprobate mind, does not fear the God of judgment at all. And men, knowing the judgment of God that they who commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same but have pleasure in those who do them.

But when the proverbist says that a man must confess and forsake his sins, he points out that one of the cunning ways in which man covers his sins is by a false and superficial confession that pleases men but in which he designs to preserve his sins. He says that he is sorry and repeatedly says that he is sorry. But in spite of all those confessions, he continues impenitently in his sin. His confessions are nothing more than artfully contrived lies.

Or a man says that he is sorry that you were offended at what he did. He says that he is sorry if he hurt you. He says that he is sorry you misunderstood him. He is sorry for the consequences of his sins. He will not bear the consequences of his sins but chafes and rebels and complains against the consequences, as did Cain, who said that his punishment was more than he could bear, or as did Judas, who hung himself in his wicked remorse.

Man covers his sins with a hypocritical life. He appears one way in church and before the people of God, but he lives in a completely different way in his home and on the job. So he covers his sins by a pretense and a show.

Man covers his sins by a total failure to confess and forsake his sins. He covers them by sinning away from the prying eyes of man and supposing that God does not see and will not judge.

Man covers his sins by the folly of indulging his sins, minimizing them, excusing them, denying or extenuating them, diminishing them, dissembling about them, or throwing the blame of them upon others. So he does not confess his real misery or the depth and terribleness of sin.

And does not man seek to cover his sins by a trifle? Perhaps he says, “I have sinned,” and perhaps he even says, “I have sinned before God.” Even Pharaoh could say that. So could Judas and Saul. But when man says that, he seeks to cover his sins by making a deal with God, by a show of works, or by making up for his sins to God with other deeds. So he seeks to make his own atonement for his sins, to offset his sins by good deeds, or to repay God for the damage of the sins committed.

Is not this perhaps the cleverest of all? A man says, “I have confessed.”

And all of that he does before God. He does that first in his heart. Such a man shows that his heart is against God. And in that heart man seeks to cover his sins from the all-seeing eye of God. Man shows that in his heart he loves sin and darkness and that he hates God, who is the light. That is done always by the wicked. The unregenerated man is incapable of confessing his sins, and he always covers his sins in a multitude of ingenious and disgusting ways.

Do not cover but confess your sins! Yes, I am a sinner. I am a sinner. I am a sinner in all my nature and in all that I do. It is a full confession of all your sins. Must you enumerate them? Is that even possible? Do we not seek to enumerate our sins and then simply say with the publican, “I am the sinner”? And do we not confess them to God and finally say with David, “My iniquities are more than the hairs of my head”? So dark and secret are the recesses of the heart that we cry out, “Search my heart, O God, and cleanse me from hidden faults!” Oh, yes, cleanse me with the blood of Christ for the sins that I do not even know and recognize in my life.

Pouring out our hearts before God and to God about our sins, we certainly are able to confess to those against whom we have sinned and those whom we have hurt and injured and to humble ourselves before them.

As common as it is for man to cover his sins and as natural as it is for man to hide his sins, so rare and unnatural to man is the true confession of sins. Confession from the lips of a man is simply a wonder of grace. Confession is astounding, and it astounds.

And forsake your sins! A confession without forsaking is a lie. A confession is confirmed by forsaking. Forsake means to break with or, better, to be free from. The man who covers his sins does so because he loves them and indulges them at every turn and because he is in bondage to them. The one who confesses his sins does so because he hates them and because he is free from them. He is free from the condemnation of those sins, and he is free from their dominion.

That is the inmost desire of the heart of the believer. To be free from sin. To be free from his sins. That is the promise of the gospel: the truth shall set you free. That is the perfection of heaven. The believer will be free from all sin in the highest sense of the word. God made Adam free. Adam was free not to sin. Now the unregenerated sinner is not free at all, but he is in bondage to sin and Satan. So he cannot not sin. The highest freedom is the impossibility of sin. That is the freedom of the heart that fears God: freedom from the condemnation of sin and freedom from the pollution and domination of sin through Jesus Christ, the Lord. In his new man the regenerated believer cannot sin. Yet he sins. Daily he sins. He sins daily in all that he does. He is a sinner.

And the question is, what does the one who is free from sin do with his sins? He confesses them, and he forsakes them. He hates sin in his inmost being as that which is offensive to God, and he flees more and more from sin. He desires more and more to be free from sin. So daily he lays sin aside. And daily in the face of sin, in the face of his own sins, he sighs for the perfection of heaven, where there will be perfect freedom from sin.

Because he agrees in his heart with who God says man is. That is what the natural man will not become. He will not become nothing but a sinner. Natural man will be something. He will be anything but a sinner. Oh, yes, he may say, “I am a sinner,” but he is not impressed with what this means. A sinner is a transgressor, who in his sin expresses his deliberate rebellion against God by transgressing his law. A sinner assaults the sovereignty and most high majesty of God and seeks to bring God down from his throne.

Man knows himself not of himself, out of his own wisdom and according to his own investigation. Then he will say, “I am something.” Then he will say, “But I try my best to love God and the neighbor!” Then he will call himself anything but the sinner; and so also he will cover his sins, trifle with them before the tribunal of God, excuse them, extenuate them, cast the blame for them on others, or give a hypocritical show of sorrow that works death.

Man must assess himself not according to his own standard but in light of the revelation of God about man. Man must assess himself and his life and all that he does in light of God’s word about man. And God’s word is that man is a sinner. He may be an unregenerated sinner, or he may be a regenerated sinner, but he is a sinner.

And he must agree not only with God’s assessment of who he is but also with God’s word about what the sinner deserves. Because of his assault on the sovereignty and most high majesty of God, the sinner is worthy of temporal and eternal punishment.

If I sin against another man, there might be some remedy that I can give. If I steal from someone, then I can pay back fourfold or sevenfold. If I speak evil of a man, then I can go to all those to whom I have spoken evil and repair a man’s name and reputation that I ruined and confess myself to be a liar and a slanderer. If I have been cruel to others, then I can confess to them and make that right with them by kind words. If I have played the fool and acted the clod and the boor, then I might repay for my foolishness. That is also what confession of sin involves: making right the wrong with men.

But sins, transgressions against men or transgressions against God, are all transgressions of the law of God. So the sinner must say, “Against thee and thee only have I sinned.” There is with that confession also then no remedy for man in man for his sins. One sin is so terrible an offense against the holy, righteous, and glorious God that it deserves a lifetime of misery and afterward that the sinner be cast into outer darkness, where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched and where there is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth.

With that confession, then, the covering can only come from God. God in mercy must forgive the sinner because in mercy he covered the sinner’s sins. You may not cover, but God does cover. He does not cover sins after the unrighteous fashion of men, but he covers sins by the precious blood of Jesus Christ. There is the heavenly wisdom of the text: Jesus Christ and him crucified! God calls to foolish men to get wisdom.

Let me tell you of this wisdom of God hid in Jesus Christ that none of the princes of this world knew; and had they known it, they never would have crucified the Lord of glory. Yes, that is right. So wicked is man in his own covering of sins that he refuses God’s covering of sins. But from among all the sinful sons of Adam, who would naturally cover their sins and perish, God in his mercy appointed some of those sinful sons of Adam to salvation in Jesus Christ and forgave all their sins from before the foundation of the world. Then, in order to make known his will for their salvation, God in his mercy sent Jesus Christ into the world as the head and mediator of that elect people. God came in the flesh and was made in the likeness of sinful men. God imputed to Jesus Christ all the sins of his elect people. God uncovered all his divine and just wrath against the sins of his people to the uncovered Jesus Christ at Calvary.

There God covered all the sins of all his elect people with the blood of Jesus Christ. That covering is the only covering of sins there is. It is the only covering that God accepts because that covering satisfies God’s justice. In that covering alone there is perfect righteousness; holiness; satisfaction; obedience; victory over sin, death, hell, and the grave; and the promise of eternal life beyond the possibility of sin. And God raised Jesus Christ from the dead. God sent the gospel of the cross and the resurrection of Jesus Christ into the world to declare to his people that his wrath is finished, satisfaction has been made, forgiveness was in the cross, and he has reconciled his people to himself in his Son, Jesus Christ.

And God calls all to this wisdom of confessing and forsaking sin. If a man confesses and forsakes sin, that is the fruit of faith in Christ, the fruit of the cross, and the fruit of God’s eternal decree for that man’s salvation. A man does not hide his sins, because he believes that God hid those sins in the cross of Christ. A man does not cover his sins, because he believes that God covered those sins by the only covering that takes away sins, the blood of Jesus Christ.

The sinner who covers his sins shall not prosper in this life. If he is reprobate and unregenerated, then the wrath of God abides on him, and he goes from hardness to hardness. Perhaps there was in the beginning a twinge of conscience, for all men have to do with the living God, who is angry with the wicked every day. But hardening himself against the judgments of God, he sears his conscience with a hot iron. Where he at first was satisfied with a little of his sin, soon sin devours him until he exhausts himself in his sins and awakens in outer darkness.

If he is God’s own, who has fallen into so terrible a state, God’s hand will be heavy on him until he confesses his sins. God never lets his people prosper in their sins. He will dismantle their lives to bring them to confess. For such is God’s will for their salvation.

But surely the thought of Proverbs 28:13 means more. All creation must pass through a great process to arrive at the goal that God appointed in the perfect kingdom of Jesus Christ in the new heavens and new earth. Then all the elect church and all the creation with all the angels and all the creatures will be to the praise of God’s glory in Jesus Christ, through whom God will rule all things forever.

The sinner who covers his sins will never arrive in that celestial city. Oh, he will go to God. For it is appointed unto men once to die and afterward the judgment. But the sinner who covers his sins will not prosper there in the judgment, but he will hear the words of God, “Depart from me, you wicked evildoer; I never knew you.” And such a one will not prosper everlastingly in hell.

There is a promise of God also to the one who confesses his sins: he shall receive mercy. Mercy is the tender pity of Jehovah God toward his elect people in their misery and his powerful will to deliver them from that misery.

In his mercy God elected his people. In his mercy he sent Christ to die for the elect and forgave all their sins at the cross. In his mercy he comes to them with the gospel of Christ.

In God’s mercy he calls them to stop covering their sins, to confess and forsake those sins.

In his mercy he works the knowledge of sin. In his mercy he arrests his people. In his mercy he turns them, and they are turned.

And heaping mercy upon mercy, God causes them to taste his mercy yet still more. He receives the repentant sinner in mercy and lifts him up through the covering of his sins in the blood of Jesus Christ his Lord. 

To receive mercy means that God will testify to you of the pardon of all your sins for Christ’s sake; it means that God will not turn away the confessing sinner but will bless him with everlasting peace.

Oh, yes. That is the promise of the gospel to all who confess their sins. The promise is that you will receive mercy, mercy upon mercy.