Sin Covered and Sin Confessed
•’ He that covereth his sins -hall not prosper: but whoso confesaeth and forsuketh them shall have mercy.” — xxviiL 13.
THIS verse is divided to our hand. The separating lines are very distinctly drawn: they mark at once the appropriate place of each portion, and the mutual relations of all. Two persons are introduced; two opposite courses are ascribed to them; and two correspondingly opposite results are predicted. The one covers his sins, and therefore shall not prosper: the other confesses and forsakes his sins, and therefore shall have mercy.
The two distinct yet closely related subjects are the covering and the confession of sin, with the consequences that follow either course. Two kinds of seed are sown in spring, and two kinds of fruit are gathered in harvest. As a man sows, so shall he reap.
1. “He that covereth his sins shall not prosper.” Few people know what sin is; and those few do not know it well. Both the name and the thing which it signifies are common; and yet neither is well or widely understood. Men cover their sins because they know a little of them, and then the covering prevents them from learning more. They suspect that the knowledge would not be pleasant, and therefore keep it out of the way. They would call that prophet willingly, if they could be assured that he would prophesy good conceniing themselves.
Sin is in a man at once the most familiar inmate and the greatest stranger. There is nothing which he practises more, or knows less. Although he lives in it — because he lives in it, he is ignorant of it. Nothing is more widely diffused or more constantly near us than atmospheric air; yet few ever notice its existence, and fewer consider its nature. Dust and chaff and feathers, that sometimes move up and down in it, attract our regard more than the air in which they float; yet these are trifles which scarcely concern us, and in this we live and move and have our being. The air which we breathe every day and all day affects our life and happiness more than those occasional meteoric phenomena which excite the wonder of the world. The air exerts a predominating power on life, independently of the thought or thoughtlessness of those who breathe it. Such, in this respect, is sin. It pervades humanity, but in proportion to its profusion men are blind to its presence. Because it is everywhere, we do not observe it anywhere: because we never want it, we are not aware that we ever have it. But to ignore its existence does not change its nature, or remove its effects. Sin decisively affects the time and eternity of men, although they neither observe its presence nor dread its power. Our ignorance or indolence cannot change the law of God and the nature of things. Sin is sin in its character and consequences — in its present guilt and future doom — although the sinner die without discovering the element in which he lived. “Behold, I knew not,” will neither arrest nor annul the sentence, “Depart from me.” The true reason of the sinner’s ignorance is the greatness of his sin. If it had been some brilliant feather floating in the air, he would have followed it with his eye, and inquired into its origin: but the air itself — he lived in it, and therefore never became aware that there was such a thing.
Beware of the old, stolid, atheistic blunder, of counting that nothing exists which cannot be seen. Moral evil is invisible as the human soul, or God its maker; yet it exists, and its effects are great. God unseen rewards the search of those who seek him; sin unseen punishes the neglect of those who seek it not. If you diligently seek for God your friend, he will be your rewarder; if you diligently seek for sin your foe, it will not be your destroyer. The acute and learned Saul of Tarsus, did not discover his own sin until his journey to Damascus, although it wrought constantly as a law in his members. It was because it lay so near that he failed to observe it. A scratch on the skin is more easily discovered than a poison circulating in the blood. Alas! we know better every trifling accident that occurs in the world, than the enmity to God which reigns at first in all, and troubles even disciples to the last.
But the knowledge of sin, difficult by the nature of the thing, is rendered still more difficult by positive efforts to conceal it. Life has three sides like tablets, on which moral character, good or evil, is graven and displayed — an aspect inward, an aspect outward, and an aspect upward. The corresponding departments of duty, as expressed in Scripture, are, “to live soberly and righteously and godly;” but when in any or all of these directions a man comes short, an evil heart of unbelief makes an effort to conceal the sin. Watchers and witnesses stand round the man on all the three sides: himself, his neighbour, and God, observe and condemn the various forms of transgression.
Criminals are not the only class who strive to hide their deeds from the sight of men: reputable citizens occupy much of their time, and expend much of their energy, in the task of making themselves seem better than they are. But after covering his sin from his neighbour the hypocrite must take up the more difficult task of concealing it from himself. A busy court is constantly in session within a human heart. Opposing parties are ever wrangling there. Nowhere is special pleading more cunningly employed to make the worse appear the better reason. No effort is spared to hide the ugly side of sin, and set off its more seemly parts as virtue. The imaginations of man’s heart, evil themselves, are constantly employed like clouds of artisans in weaving webs to cover other evils.
But the chief effort of the alienated must ever be to cover his sins from the sight of God. The arts are manifold; and they are practised in secret: it is not easy to detect and expose them. The strong man armed who maintains possession of the citadel puts forth all his strength to prevent the entrance of a stronger one. As long as a human heart is held by the prince of darkness, the human faculties enslaved are compelled to guard the gates against the Light of Life. The key-note of the carnal is given by the possessing spirit: “What have we to do with thee, thou Jesus? art thou come to torment us?” All the wiles of the tempter and all the faculties of his slave are devoted to the work of weaving a curtain thick enough to cover an unclean conscience from the eye of God. Anything and everything may go as a thread into the web; houses and lands, business and pleasure, family and friends, virtues and vices, blessings and cursings — a hideous miscellany of good and evil — constitute the material of the curtain: and the woven web is waulked over and over again with love and hatred, joys and sorrows, hopes and fear, to thicken the wall without and deepen the darkness within, that the fool may be able with some measure of comfort to say “in his heart, No God!”
But “he shall not prosper” in this effort to cover his sin. God cannot so be mocked: his laws cannot so be evaded. Although sin in its spiritual nature cannot be seen by human eyes and weighed in material balances, it is as real as the objects of sense. Although its essence is not palpable, its power is great. If it be not destroyed, it will become the destroyer. If it be not through grace cast out of a man in time, it will in judgment cast the man out from God and the good at last.
Certain great iron castings have been ordered for a railway - bridge. The thickness has been calculated according to the extent of the span and the weight of the load. The contractor constructs his moulds according to the specifications, and when all is ready pours in the molten metal. In the process of casting, through some defect in the mould, portions of air lurk in the heart of the iron, and cavities like those of a honey-comb are formed in the interior of the beam; but a whole skin covers all the surface, and the flaws are effectually concealed. The artisan has covered his fault, but he will not prosper: as soon as it is subjected to a strain the beam gives way.
The catastrophe, you reply, is due to the violation of physical laws, and we all know that they inexorably and impartially chastise transgressors. For that very reason has the example been taken from the domain of the natural laws. You know that it is foolish to hide a sin in the heart of the iron. It shall not prosper: laws which you see in operation will avenge the trick. The case belongs to matter and its essentiaf properties; the senses take cognizance of the fact. We believe it, because we see it.
Well; sin covered becomes a rotten hollow in a human soul, .and when the strain comes, the false gives way. If the hypocrite, through the merciful arrangements of Providence, be tried and tested in this life, the fair appearance will collapse, and a deceived heart, taught by terrible things in righteousness to know itself, may yet find God a Saviour. It is thus that the trial of faith “is much more precious than of gold that perisheth” (1 Peter i 7). The fall which reveals a fatal defect, before it is too late to obtain a remedy, is in form a calamity, but in essence and effect the best of blessings. If no severe pressure come to test the spurious goodness within the limits of this life, it may hold together until it be out of sight in the grave. But it is appointed unto men once to die, and after death the judgment. The strain which will try every man’s work is put on there: the unsoundness caused by covered sin will be detected then. The assize and the condemnation are not visible; if men refuse to believe what they cannot see, they must even wait until they get their own kind of evidence. If a material generation in a material age will make sure that there is no flaw in the iron which spans the river and bears their goods, and go with the hollow which covered sin has left in their souls to meet the final judgment, they must even be left in unbelief to take in conviction when it can no longer lead to life. “Seeing is believing.” That curt proverb will receive a terrible fulfilment. When the Lord comes the second time, “Every eye shall see him:” but they who are first convinced then shall “believe and tremble.”
2. “Whoso confesseth and forsaketh his sins shall have mercy.” The subject in the second member of the proverb is that genuine confession which stands opposed to the covering of sin. It tells us what such confession is, and what it obtains. Reformation is the test of its character, and pardon its blessed result. There in a relation of a close and interesting kind between confessing and forsaking sin. Confession is false, unless the confessed sin be also forsaken; and actual amendment is unsound at heart, unless the forsaken sin be also confessed. Neither can stand alone; they must lean on each other.
Confession is made to Him against whom the sin has been committed. All sin is sin against God; to God therefore confession of all sin should be made. Some acts offend also a brother; and in these cases confession should be made also to him.
The confessional system of Rome is false from the foundation. It blasphemously puts a man in the place of God. Its roots are rotten, and its branches cannot bear fruits of righteousness. Instead of securing that the sin confessed shall be forsaken, its natural tendency and common effect is to prepare the way for repetition. It is like a merchant’s monthly clearance, leaving the room empty for another set of accommodation bills to be cleared <7> 35 out in turn when the next month is done. So violently did this abuse outrage even men’s natural sense of right, that it became the hinge on which, in its earliest stage, the Lutheran Reformation turned.
True confession is made to God. The human spirit must come into direct contact with the Divine. The Father of our spirits permits the child to approach himself on such an errand: and the offspring man has faculties fitted for converse with God a spirit.
When confession is real, it is complete. The same conviction which shows a sinner that he ought to confess, shows him that he ought to confess all. If it is not a confession of all, it is not confession; it is the old trick of covering the sin. When the spirit of adoption is attained, the confesser, with the simplicity of a little child, gives the keys of his heart to God, and welcomes the Omniscient Searcher into all its secret chambers.
True confession will produce actual forsaking of sin, as a living root sends up branches, spreads out blossoms, and nourishes fruit. If a son, far separated in residence, and long alienated in heart, relent at length and humbly invite his father to forgive and visit him: and if evil men and evil works find harbour still in the son’s dwelling, before the father’s visit the place will be purged of its disreputable occupants. If the son is still wedded to these companions and these pursuits, he will not sincerely invite his father to come in; if he really desires that his father should come in, he will at the same moment and under the same impulse drive out the offenders. It is thus that true confession to God, in the nature of the thing, carries with it an abandonment of the sins confessed; and if the sins confessed are not effectively abandoned, the confession has been a lie. If the persons and things that displeased the father are not dismissed, the son, whatever he may have said, did not actually desire that the father should visit and inspect his dwelling.
There is also a relation between making confession of sin and obtaining mercy from God. Sin is confessed, forsaken, forgiven; so lie the links of this short chain. When sin is cast out of the heart, it neither works any more as a ruling power in the man & members, nor lies as condemning guilt in the book of God. It is sin hidden, and so made still the object of your choice, that has power either to pollute or destroy. Sin cast forth from the heart is harmless. It cannot then pollute the life; and it will not then remain an element of treasured wrath. Similar facts and laws may be found in nature. Some substances which on the surface of the earth cannot hurt a child, may, if pent up within the earth, rend the mountains or engulf a city.
If any one fear lest this representation should rob God of his glory, and ascribe the initiative to man, let him look again, and look more narrowly into the process.
First of all, the confession of the sinner did not provide the mercy of God: that mercy was complete before he confessed his sins, before he committed the sins which he confesses. First and last the mercy is divine. It is the Father’s love; Christ’s sacrifice; the Spirit’s ministry. It was finished when Messiah died. Bought by the blood of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, it was waiting in full free offer when first man’s need began. The penitence of sinners did not make God gracious. His mercy is all his own, and his glory he will not give to another.
Further: the confession and reformation of sinners did not open in the treasured fountain of mercy a channel which was formerly shut. Before the man confessed, not only was the fountain full, but the stream was flowing. It was beating on the door of his closed heart. It ran waste because he shut it out; but all the work of grace was done by God, and all the glory of grace due to God, before that callous nature opened to receive it. When at last the barrier gave way, mercy flowed in; but the man’s confession neither made the mercy in its upper spring, nor charged therewith the channels which unite the earth to heaven.
But, once more and chiefly, confession, so far from being the cause, is the effect of divine mercy. You see on the surface of the word here that confession obtained mercy; but you must look beneath and learn what produced confession. It was mercy. The promise is, “Whoso confesseth and forsaketh his sins shall have mercy.” That promise was in substance made before any sinner -confessed, otherwise there never would have been on earth any confession of sin. That promise has power. It touches a sinner while he is dead, and hard, and still as a stone — it touches and moves him. It touches his heart, and makes it flow down like water in confession; it touches his life, and leads him into the paths of righteousness. Had there been no such gracious offer from God, there would have been no such submissive surrender by man.
This is a circle, you say. The sinner who confessed obtained mercy, and that very mercy caused the sinner to confess. It is; and therein it is like God. All the worlds are globes, and all their paths are circles. His dispensations circulate. All good comes forth from himself, and all glory returns to himself. His mercy displayed, broke the stony heart, and caused the confession to flow; the confession flowing, opened the way for mercy to enter. If I have not a broken, contrite heart, God’s mercy will never be mine; but if God had not manifested his mercy in Christ, infinite and free, I could never have a broken, contrite heart.
This principle may be seen reflected from the darkest event which has yet sprung from the war in India. Some hundreds of British men and women with their children were shut up within a hastily reared and imperfect fortification at Cawnpore. A numerous enemy swept round their crazy fort, and cut off all hope of escape. When heat and hunger had well-nigh done his work for him, the insurgent chief approached and offered terms to the enfeebled garrison. They surrendered on the heathen’s promise, confirmed by his oath, that they should all be permitted to depart in safety to their friends. The promise was cruelly broken, and the broken promise has wrung the nation’s heart and nerved her soldiers’ arms; but the promise produced the surrender. The promise of life, when trusted, had power to open those gates, which the enemy could not have forced, as long as a living defendent stood within. Another garrison in a neighbouring city were surrounded afterwards in a similar manner by the same faithless foe; but they have not opened their gates, and certainly never will. No promise is held out to them, at least no promise in which they will confide. They will trust no white flag held up by those bloody hands. They will fight in hope as long as they can, and when hope dies, they will fight in despair; but fight they will to the uttermost and to the end.*
* When this page was first committed to the press, the whole nation was listening with bated breath for the next intelligence from India regarding the fate of a feeble garrison •unrounded in the Residency of Lucknow by a savage and triumphant enemy. They held »ut within their frail fort until they were relieved by a British army.
So would sinners fight against an angry God, if he did not promise free pardon, or if they did not trust the promise made. It is the promise of life that makes the dying open their gates.
When we were unjustly suspecting the true God, as our countrymen.^ justly suspect the heathen chiefs, — when we, like stupid children, were refusing to trust in redeeming love, — Jesus, who came to show us the Father, taught us, as they teach little children, by a picture. The picture is the prodigal son. We are all familiar with the scene. Its features, great and small, are graven on our memories from our earliest childhood, and maintain their place even to old age.
In upon the callous heart of the worn-out and weary profligate, when his pleasures were palling and his flesh was pining away from his bones, — in upon his dry, desolate heart darted the memory of a father’s love; down into the depths of that long alienated spirit sank the conviction that his father’s fondness was still unchanged. That power overcame: he said, “I will arise and go to my father:” he arose and went. These are the objects that loom dimly in the back-ground; but look! — hush! These figures full in the fore-ground, — who are these 1 Many false and foolish things are said of canvas paintings; but this picture, which Jesus gave in his word, of the Father’s mercy winning a wanderer back, — of a wanderer so won, making full, frank confession of his sin, and getting instant free forgiveness, — this is the picture for me. See the figures! They move! they move! The Father ran and fell upon his neck and kissed him; and he, the worthless, lay upon the Father’s bosom. It is all over: on this side there is no upbraiding, on that side no distrust.
A simple-minded disciple once said to Jesus, “Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us.” What that good man desired to see, surely our eyes have seen. God, as Jesus shows him to us,- — “God is love.”