116: David Hermann - Exhortation: Our Hiding and God's Covering

Automatically transcribed. Accuracy is good but not perfect, and words are sometimes wrong. Trust the audio over the text.

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   Welcome to the Good Christadelphian Talks podcast. I'm Levi. And I'm Chris. Thank you so much for joining us this week. On this podcast, we select one talk a week to help each one of us get the Bible in our daily news feed. And we post at the start of each week for you to listen with a short intro beforehand to kind of set the stage for the talk you're about to hear.

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   And now let's hear more about this week's talk. For this week's talk, we're listening to an exhortation that was given by Brother David Herman from the Adelaide Ecclesia. And if you wanted to, he is looking at the reading from Genesis chapter 3. And the topic of his exhortation is our hiding and God's covering.

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   And Brother David is taking a look at the dimensions of sin in this exhortation as part of a larger study that he was giving at the Adelaide Ecclesia when this exhortation was given. And but specifically, he's looking at how our minds work when it comes to sin. It is our human nature to try to hide our faults and to try to present the best face possible to everyone else.

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   And sometimes even to ourselves, it is our mentality to hide ourselves and to put on a mask. And we can at times even convince ourselves that if we can forget about it ourselves, God will also forget about our sin without having to ask for forgiveness or make any changes. And it's a subject that even Brother Dave mentions is one that has been studied many times and it's something that we've looked at.

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   But it's a good reminder of how tricky our minds can be in terms of trying to rationalize and justify sinful behavior or even excusing it to the point that we don't feel we need to face it. But instead, what Brother Dave does a great job at in this exhortation is reminding us that we need to face it and we need to ask for forgiveness and repent because that repentance and forgiveness is a habit that we need to develop every time that we make a mistake to instead rely on God's covering rather than our ability to hide.

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   I just found it to be a really good exhortation. Kristen and I listened to it when we were on a family vacation just this past weekend. And it was enjoyable to listen to. We both really got a lot out of it. It was a good reminder to just remember that it's our nature to want to try to spin things.

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   And our first inclination when we make a mistake is to try to not make it seem as bad as it actually might be. And one of my favorite points that Brother Dave made in his exhortation near the end was that there are two types of grief that we can have. There is worldly grief where you feel bad because of the consequence of what I did will have on me.

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   And then there is godly grief, which is I feel bad because of the pain that this causes God. The first one will lead us to try to hide it, while the second one will lead us to turn to God even more so and to lean on him and ask for his forgiveness to try and do better.

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   This was a recommendation that came in from a couple different people. So thank you again to those that continue to send in recommendations. That is always appreciated. I know both Levi and I have gotten both to the general Good Chris Delphine Talks mailbox and individually have gotten lots of really great recommendations that we've been listening to.

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    And it's been fantastic. And we appreciate all the help and support. It makes a big difference. So thank you again, as always. Hope that you're enjoying it. If you find these talks to be encouraging, please feel free to share that with somebody else that you think might need the encouragement or just a way to get a little bit more positivity.

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    Into their daily life. So thank you again, as always. And with that, we'll turn it over to our brother, David Herman, for his exhortation, Our Hiding and God's Covering. I believe this topic of sin is a really important one because even though it seems basic, it actually is fundamental to our relationship to God and how we learn to respond to him.

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    And I make no apologies that it's one of the basics. I think fundamentals are something we need to constantly renew in our minds. We should never really get past the basics because they are the foundation of everything in our spiritual lives. They are permanently relevant. I'm going to assume that you are already fairly familiar with Genesis chapter 3 and pick up virtually from where I left off on Wednesday night.

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    Let's just very quickly look at the consequences of sin, certainly not thoroughly. The eyes of both Adam and Eve were opened. They knew that they were naked and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths. The innocence of Adam and Eve had been shattered by their sin. Now they saw that they were naked.

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    They felt naked. They always were naked, but now they felt naked. They felt exposed, self-conscious, and they wanted to cover themselves. To put it simply, they now felt guilt and shame. And consequently, they sought to cover themselves with fig leaves.

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    These points we're talking about now are some of the most profound, important things ever written to explain human behaviour. Let's just read. They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day. And the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.

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    But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, Where are you? And he said, I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself. Those few words, I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself, is the most profound thing you will ever find written anywhere to explain human behaviour.

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    If you understand that, you'll understand, I would say, 90% of human behaviour. It's the basis of our psychology and even our sociology. We are all naturally afraid because we feel exposed. So we hide. This is the permanent state of human beings. We are afraid of what others will see in us. And because of that, we are all hiding to some extent from one another, from ourselves and from God.

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    That's why the way the world is the way it is. Most of the time, we're not conscious of it. But look carefully into your behaviour and even in the behaviour of others, and you will see it's the underlying basis. It's something we all need to recognise if we're going to understand our motives and why we act the way we do.

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    Adam and Eve were not thinking clearly. In Jeremiah, it says, God says, Do you really think anyone can hide himself where I cannot see him? The Lord asked. Do you not know that I am everywhere? The Lord asks.

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    And it reminded me too of Hagar. Hagar, after she ran away into the wilderness, feeling utterly hopeless and with no one caring. And there she met God. And she called God the one who sees me. Even though she's out in the desert with no one around, she learnt that day that God always sees.

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    And for her, that was a wonderful encouragement. Life is just so much better if we do not hide from God. But we naturally tend to do so as though we can hide from God.

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    It seems to be automatic for us to feel that God cannot accept us or love us now that we've sinned. And so we feel we have to hide. God, even then, gave an initial covering for sin for Adam and Eve. The Lord God made for Adam and his wife garments of skin and clothed them, it said.

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    Why? Because fig leaves just don't work. Human coverings are inadequate for the task. God still loved Adam and Eve. God's love doesn't change when we sin.

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    God was still providing for their needs. No parent stops loving their children when they sin, when they do wrong. They continue to care for them. They want them, of course, to learn to behave in the right way. And God is exactly the same. God's love didn't stop. He continued to provide for Adam and Eve and for all of creation in a long-term plan to overcome that problem.

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    He had already prepared a solution for sin. But our sins continue to separate us from God until we genuinely and fully confess our sins. We tend to think that if we leave it long enough, that when we've forgotten about it, then hopefully God has too. But God is above time and no sin is ever removed from his sight until we have repented, until we've acknowledged our sin.

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    Unwillingness to repent means that we are lying to God. We're refusing to tell the truth. And John has some very black and white statements about that. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

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    If we say we have not sin, we make him a liar and his word is not in us. If we confess our sins, we are promised that we will be forgiven and made holy, free from unrighteousness, given a fresh start every time. But if we hide our sins, not only do we not have the truth in us, but we make God to be a liar.

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    And therefore we remain separated from him. So our hiding is the result of fear. Fear is always self-focused or it hinders us in both growing in faith and love. Fear is almost the opposite to faith. And fear prevents us loving because we are focused inwards and not outwards. Fear is always self-centeredness. Fear drives us to somehow or other seek lasting significance.

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    We all crave love, acceptance and to feel that we have mattered in some important way. I remember a conversation about five years ago with one of my students. And I was asking her in her final year what she was hoping to do when she finished school. And she said she wanted to be a doctor.

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    And I said, why do you want to be a doctor? And she said, I really want to be remembered for something. I want to find a cure for cancer. And she has actually completed her medical degree now.

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    We all have a built-in desire to be fully known and fully loved. Most people try to find acceptance and love from other people. Sometimes from our pets. Even cats, which I think is strange because cats only love themselves. I'm a dog man myself. But we find it hard to believe that others will love us and accept us if they know us fully.

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    It's a real problem. That's why we hide even from the ones we love to some extent. We find it hard to believe if people really could see us deep down inside, they wouldn't love us. They couldn't accept us. Because we know there's something wrong with us. We know we are flawed. And we've done terrible things.

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    Many people avoid looking within because they don't want to face up to the pain of recognizing their flaws and the things they've done wrong. Instead, we look for ways to escape through work, through entertainment, through drugs and through all sorts of other things. So, we naturally tend to hide. We hide by trying to show the best of ourselves and hiding the weaknesses, magnifying our strengths and covering up things that we've done wrong to try and protect our reputation, to maintain an image.

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    According to surveys, almost everybody embellishes their resumes. Most people admit that they make statements that aren't true. If they go to an interview, they're often asked difficult questions like, can you just identify a weakness for me? And even then, we are still hiding. We say things like, oh, I focus too much on the details.

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    Because that sounds as though it's a good thing. Or, I have trouble saying no. Or, I can be intolerant of lazy colleagues who aren't thorough in their work. See, even when we're asked for a weakness, we tend to just twist it so that we look good, even when we admit a weakness. So, we see people at work volunteering for things, if they know that the boss is going to find out about it.

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    We're all into image protection. People lie to cover up their wrongdoing. We all remember the example of Sarah. When the angel was telling Abraham that they were going to have a child, Sarah laughed in the tent a little away. And the angel said, Sarah laughed and Sarah denied it. But he knew. The worst example is King David.

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    After his terrible sins, he killed Uriah. He had him set up to be killed so that no one would know what he had done. terrible sins that he tried to cover up. A lot of our behaviour in publica are all about maintaining our image or gaining attention. We have the jokers who are the life of the party who like to be seen to be the happy person and always fun because people like fun people.

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    While we have others who are shy and try to avoid attention. But underneath, both are trying to protect or build a reputation. They're really hiding.

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    One of the common problems I have with my students is their unwillingness to ask questions. Students who ask the questions are the brightest students. The ones who need to ask time and time again are too afraid. They don't want to look bad. They're more concerned about their reputation than there are about succeeding.

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    This hiding drives peer pressure. People are afraid to not be part of the accepted group. It drives plastic surgery. The cosmetics industry. Whole industries are built on this hiding that's the automatic in us. We're all trying to create the right image. Some more than others, of course. And it's the basis of most of our, or at least a big proportion of our advertising, playing on people's fears that they won't be accepted.

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    If they don't fit in, they don't look the same as everybody else. I've read a number of examples of people who actually, when they lose their jobs, continue to go to work or look as though they're going to work and come home at the same time and take a long time before they admit it to their partners.

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    There are even people who have committed suicide because they've lost their job because they could not face telling the truth to their family. And how many wars have resulted from leaders' desires to improve or protect their reputation? One important element in our hiding is the sense of competing with one another. We all feel as though we are fighting for attention.

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    We're fighting for acceptance as though if I have it, someone else can't. And you have the rich and the famous and the powerful and the clever and beautiful who seem to be popular and successful and those who are not strive to become like them. And so we hide so we can be seen in the best possible light.

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    And I believe that a big proportion of the evil in the world all descends from that. Murders, wars, the whole lot. So much because we are hiding and protecting our image.

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    Proverbs says, Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy. The psalm says, Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.

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    Human attempts to hide our flaws and wrongdoing without confessoring are cover-ups. They're like the attempts of Adam and Eve to cover themselves with fig leaves. They don't work.

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    Only God can provide a genuine covering for sin. God will not accept any human attempt to cover sin because it is only a cover-up. It doesn't remove the underlying problem. Take, for example, doing good works to gain acceptance with God. There are some people who do all sorts of right things, religious behaviour, that they think makes them acceptable to God, but are not themselves changed.

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    They're just cover-ups. They don't change the heart. And so our relationship with God is not restored and the sins continue. That's the difference between a cover-up and God's covering. It's all about genuine repentance. If we have not acknowledged what is wrong, then we haven't been covered and we remain in our sin.

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    The Lord is patient towards you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. Confession of sin is absolutely crucial. Repentance means a change of mind so that we now agree with God's condemnation of our sin. Repentance is meant to be as frequent as our sins. Think about that. Have you repented as soon as you've become aware of your sins?

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    Do you spend any time looking back over your day, thinking about what you've done wrong and acknowledging it before God? We need a lifestyle of repentance, a regular pattern of getting close to God and exposing our sins to him.

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    Paul talks about two kinds of grief. Godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death. Notice he calls both of them grief or sorrow, depending on which version you're reading it from. Godly sorrow produces real change and leads to salvation. Worldly sorrow produces death. No salvation and no change.

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    What I'm about to try and talk about now is the core of what I'm trying to get across. It's the most crucial thing I think we ever need to learn in our lives. Worldly grief is what most people feel. It's the pain of how this is going to affect me. I will feel ashamed, disgraced, sorry that I've lost my job, sorry that I'm going to be punished.

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    And a classic example is Cain. Cain said to the Lord, my punishment is greater than I can bear. The trouble is, if that's all that's bothering us, we get used to the consequences and we eventually get on with life and our hearts are not changed. So we continue to sin.

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    Godly sorrow is when we recognise the pain that God feels because of our actions. Godly sorrow is when we recognise we have hurt God.

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    You see, all sin is deeply personal to God. It's always against Him, regardless of others that are hurt. God said in the garden, did you eat from the tree that I commanded you not to eat? You see, they had shattered the perfection that He had created. It's harmony. He'd given them everything so that they had absolute paradise, the world perfect, and they had so easily disobeyed Him.

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    It hurts all the more because He cared so much. It doesn't hurt acquaintances so much that haven't invested in us. But if we turn around and sin against a loving parent, then the pain is so much the greater. The greater a person's investment in caring for us, the deeper the pain we cause them when we wrong them.

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    Each time we sin, we are saying to our Creator, I don't love you enough to do what you want. If I have to make a choice, I choose me, not you. Real conversion starts when we begin to care about how God feels, when we recognise that God loves us and has given us everything, and yet we have despised His love, His kindness, and His generosity.

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    worldly sorrow says, I'm sorry I did that. But godly sorrow says, I'm sorry I did it to you. All sin is against God. Joseph said to Potiphar's wife when she tempted him, how then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God? He knew that it would hurt God. And once David's adultery and murder had been exposed through Nathan the prophet, he said to God, against you, you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight.

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    Can we hurt God? Yes. The Lord regretted that He had made man on the earth and it grieved Him to His heart. And in Ephesians it says, do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. It seems hard to understand that the eternal God who is so great has made Himself vulnerable to our hurting Him.

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    But it's true. Let me contrast an example of godly sorrow versus worldly sorrow. Judas and Peter both, in a sense, betrayed Christ. Judas regretted his choice. He acknowledged that he did wrong. He acknowledged his sin. But that's where it stopped. He didn't love God. He didn't think of God's love. He didn't think of the love of Christ.

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    He was in it for the money. He regretted his choice. He was sorry that Christ was going to be killed because of his actions. But he went out and hanged himself. Worldly sorrow, Paul says, brings death. And here's a clear illustration.

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    Peter, on the other hand, was immediately pained by his triple denial of Jesus. He went out and wept bitterly. He immediately felt the pain that he had caused his Saviour. and he endured the humiliation of having to admit to Christ that he didn't love him as much as he had boasted. He had said that he had loved more than all of the others and would never leave him.

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    And yet, that's exactly what he had done. And so, Jesus gently brought him back. But it was so painful for him to acknowledge to Jesus, yes, he had failed him in that way. But, Peter went on and he continued to remain faithful even though he knew he had done wrong because he loved Christ and he believed that he could be forgiven.

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    And he was forgiven and became a leader even though he had sinned so badly against his Lord. so, he went on to serve his master with no regrets knowing that he was fully accepted having confessed and acknowledged his betrayal.

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    This is the power of repentance. God's forgiveness gives us a deeper gratitude for God's love and strengthens our desire to please him. when we recognise that we cause God pain with every sin that we commit and we care about that pain then we will begin to recoil from the choice to sin.

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    I know that I have never really been tempted to be unfaithful to my wife because I could never stand to see how much it would hurt her. But that's not a problem for a lot of people who don't really care. it's all about how much we love someone.

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    When we care about hurting God then we recoil from sin more and more because we know that it cost God his son. Every sin made necessary the death of his son. The greater our sense of betrayal of God's love then the deeper our awareness of our need for forgiveness and our gratitude for his grace.

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    But when we come through that then we know we can live in the security of God's love and we are able to confess our sins to one another and heal our relationships. And when we appreciate the goodness of God and his grace to us then it becomes easier for us to extend the same grace to others who need our forgiveness.

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    It all starts with us acknowledging our need for God's grace. And personally I believe that before baptism we should bring people to godly sorrow that leads to repentance so that real change can happen. God makes all this clear in the new covenant. This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days declares the Lord.

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    I'll put my laws on their hearts and write them on their minds. Then he adds I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more. Where there is forgiveness of these there is no longer any offering for sin. Therefore brothers we have confidence to enter the most holy place by the blood of Jesus by the new and living way that he opened for us.

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    So genuine repentance has a lasting effect. It restores our relationship with God which can't happen with worldly sorrow. We're accepted by God and drawn close to him and so we're more motivated to please him having seen the pain we cause and we've seen the love he has in forgiving us even though it cost him his son.

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    And so we begin a cycle if we have this lifestyle of repentance. The more we repent the more grateful to God we become. The more grateful we are the more we love God. the more we love God the more we avoid sin and so we continue in that cycle all our life as we grow in holiness.

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    We all want to be fully known and fully loved but so does God. Is this how you love God? You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind. love. We know that's what God wants. God wants our love. When Adam and Eve sinned they chose to value what God gave them more than God himself.

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    And I want to try and think about what kind of love we have. Do you remember Satan's accusation of Job? He inferred that Job only obeyed God for all the blessings God had given him.

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    Why could he make such an accusation? Because for most people it's true. Many people complain to God as soon as their lives get hard or they just give up serving God when they don't feel like they're getting anything out of it. Almost as like serving God is a transaction. God I'll serve you and love you so long as I get what I want.

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    But we hate it when people love us just for what they get from us. And God is the same. We need to love God for himself because of who he is and the kind of person that he is to us. Not for what we want. We need to have a love for God that will last even if life gets enormously difficult and we have nothing pleasant around us.

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    When we're persecuted and when all the blessings are gone think about Moses in Mount Horeb in Mount Sinai. Just after the people of Israel had sinned in worshipping the golden calf they made at Mount Sinai God said God said he'd send an angel with the Israelites to the promised land but his presence would not go with them because he would end up consuming them because they were a proud and stubborn people.

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    In other words God was saying Moses take the people to the promised land ! You can have all of the blessings there but my presence will not go with you.

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    Would you accept an offer like that? Think about it. Would you want to be part of the kingdom of God if Christ and God were not there? It would still be magnificent.

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    Moses chose for the nation particularly for himself he said no we will not leave this place if you do not go with us. Why? Because for Moses it was all about God. He loved God for him. Do we? Do we continue to worship even if we lose everything?

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    God wants more than obedience of his laws. He wants our heart. He wants us to love him. And I want to conclude with this verse, this wonderful encouraging verse about God's covering. I will greatly rejoice in the Lord. My soul shall exult in my God for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation.

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    He has covered me with the robe of righteousness. As a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. God wants us to stop hiding, to come to him to cover our sins so we can have fellowship with him. There was no price too great for him since he gave us what is more valuable to us than anything else in the universe, the life of his son.

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    He didn't wait for us to get our lives in order until we were good people. He did this while we were still his enemies.

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    How can we not be anything less than overwhelmed by his love and transformed by his grace? Thank you for listening to the Good Christodolvian Talks podcast. Please subscribe for new episodes and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or whichever service you are listening from to help people find the show when they search for it.

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    or message us on any of our social media platforms. Thank you for listening. God bless and talk to you next week.