Thought for the Day 04/06/21 - Cover-up?

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This week President Biden seems to have given fresh legs to the allegation of a COVID cover-up by China.

Now, I really have no idea about this.

There are clever people who have said that the virus has features that indicate it is definitely an engineered virus, and there are also experts who have reported that it does not.

There are apparently knowledgeable insider-accounts saying that the Wuhan lab was operating without due care and there are WHO reports saying this wasn't a problem.

If you are having problems filling your time, just pop 'COVID cover-up' into Google and you won't find yourself short of reading material!

What's going on?

As far as the origin of the virus is concerned, I really don't know!

But there seems to be a popular awareness that people tend to want cover up their mistakes ... removing any mention of them from public space ... and nothing seems to feed conspiracy theories more effectively than that!

From that first time when Adam took the forbidden fruit in the Garden right up to the present, humanity seems to display an absolute gift for finding strategies to avoid being blamed, while avoiding the simplest solution of just owning up!

But we all have this same tendency within us and know it's what happens.

We're aware of it ... which seems to defeat the object of the attempt before it even takes off!

So how do we deal with this?

Well, obviously, covering things up 

- our natural instinct - 

isn't really going to solve any problem.

How can we effectively deal with this, then?

What it takes - honesty

The wise one who wrote Proverbs puts it plainly for us:

"When the righteous triumph, there is great elation, 

but when the wicked rise to power, people go into hiding.      

but whoever hardens their heart falls into trouble.

Whoever conceals their sins does not prosper, 

but the one who confesses and renounces them finds mercy.

Blessed is the one who always trembles before God,

    but whoever hardens their heart falls into trouble."

                                                      Proverbs 28:12-14

'Not me, boss!'?

Fundamentally, Jesus Christ came into the world to save people from their sins with the very clear message that those who think they are not sick don't need a doctor and therefore won't get one: 

" On hearing this, Jesus said to them, 

‘It is not the healthy who need a doctor, 

but those who are ill. 

I have not come to call the righteous, 

but sinners.’" 

                                          Mark 2:17

But the trouble with such honesty and openness is that it is only safe if there is also honest mercy to accompany it!

Who is going to be keen to subject themselves to what the self-righteous and the pharisees of our modern world will do to you if you ARE that open with them?

What it takes - honest mercy

The child who knows they are loved is much more likely to be honest with their parents than the one who is used to being treated harshly, and the same holds true in any human relationship.

You're not going to cope psychologically with coming to terms with your failures wiithout grace being shown to you by the person you've wronged and been honest with.

Some people are not going to grant that to you.

But Biblically (as the psalmist writes in Psalm 51:4), whilst our sin does affect other people it is fundamentally against God, and He stands ready to totally deal with our sin and our failures, one way or the other.

What it takes from us - a commitment to integrity

In the words of our Verse for the Day:

So ... to fight the good fight Paul teaches Timothy he must:

• hold firmly to faith and 
  
  
• a good conscience

The Point

It's by means of God's grace shown to faith that Timothy (like all believers) was put right with God.

But what does Paul mean by keeping a good conscience?

Biblically there is no WAY that can mean putting on an outward facade to hide sin behind.

No ... the person who conceals their sin like that will NOT prosper!

But the person who confesses and renounces it finds mercy. 

Aha!

There y'go!

The way to keep a good conscience is to keep opening up about our failures, renouncing our sin and finding mercy FROM GOD!

The Takeaway

A quote from J.D. Greear came to me today by a roundabout route on social media:

"If you expose your sin, Jesus will cover it.

If you cover your sin, He will expose it."

It's wise to keep short accounts with God ... no '90-day invoices'!

Keeping short accounts with God will mean that I am daily confessing my known sins to my merciful Father, but it also means that I will be daily bathing in the glories of His grace!