Have you ever watched the sun rise over the ocean? The loveliness of such a sight needs to be experi­enced to be appreciated. They say a picture is worth 1000 words. Seeing the sun rise over the ocean, actually experiencing it firsthand in real life, this is worth more than 1000 pictures.

Think back to when you’ve experienced beauty so lovely, that it stirred your heart to wonder. Remembering that loveliness, you can almost taste what it was like when you first experienced it.

Philippians 4:8 tells us to meditate on whatever things are lovely. Is this verse telling us to contemplate those times when we’ve experienced loveliness, remembering how our hearts have been elevated by beauty?

Well, that can be part of it. But what Paul tells us to do in Philippians 4:8 is more than just about bringing to mind pleasant visual experiences. There’s something much deeper going on here.

True Loveliness⤒🔗

The Greek word translated here as ‘lovely’ is talking about something that lends itself toward love. It’s pleasing, it’s lovely, because it stirs up a sense of love.

So it’s not just about reflecting on things that look nice. Rather, it’s about contemplating that which lends itself toward the positive moral quality of love.

In this sense, something could be visually pleasing, but if it does not promote biblical love, it is not truly lovely. Loveliness in this sense goes beyond the surface appearance.

To illustrate this, consider pornography. You have a woman who is very beautiful by worldly standards. But remove her clothing, force her into seductive poses, photograph her, violate her by turning her into an object of lust, then her picture is not at all lovely in the sense that Philippians 4:8 is talking about.

But put her clothes back on, get her out of that destructive lifestyle, work towards forgiveness and resto­ration, and get to love her as a sister in Christ: that’s when she can truly become lovely in a much deeper sense.

Looking at it this way, think back to the idea of watching the sun rise over the ocean. You could have a Christian and non-Christian side-by-side experiencing the beauty of that scene. They can both have an appreciation for the visual feast before their eyes. But the Christian will have a deeper sense of the loveliness of what he is seeing.

For him, it’s more than just an experience of the senses. Rather, the beauty before him stirs in him a rich love for the God who made all things, who set the stars and the planets on their courses, whose providential care keeps the sun burning.

The Christian knows his heavenly Father loves him, and he loves his heavenly Father. And that makes the beauty of the sun rising on the ocean that much more lovely.

Loveliness and Love←⤒🔗

Let’s connect all of this to 1 Peter 4:8 — “And above all things have fervent love for one another, for love will cover a multitude of sins.”

We are to have a fervent love for one another. Well, thinking about that which is lovely in other people can certainly increase the fervency of our love.

Meditating on that which is lovely in our brothers and sisters in Christ, focusing on the beauty of Christ in them, focusing on how God works in and through them, should help us to love them more and more, right?

So, we are to have a fervent love for one another, and we are helped in this by meditating on that which is lovely in others.

That means we should avoid thinking about that which is not so lovely about them, right? If we truly love them, we will close our eyes to those ways in which their think­ing and actions are not consistent with what God tells us in His Word. We will sweep all such matters under the rug. Out of sight, out of mind.

Isn’t this what 1 Peter 4:8 tells us to do? Have fervent love for one another, for love will cover a multitude of sins. Love will allow us to put those sins out of our minds and not think about them.

Well, not exactly.

For sure, there will be times when love means simply ignoring those weaknesses and imperfec­tions in others that annoy us. Love will mean that we don’t respond to every single slight. Love keeps no record of wrongs. Love doesn’t constantly record in a personal diary every single instance where another person hasn’t acted perfectly, keeping a running tally.

But say you took this to an extreme. Say, for instance, you had a husband who commits adultery numerous times, and in addition, he regularly beats his wife. Does the wife’s love for her husband mean that she has to ignore what he does? Does the wife’s love for her husband mean that there don’t have to be any consequences for his wickedness? Just sweep it all under the rug, because after all, we love each other? Absolutely not.

The Loveliness of Covered Sin←⤒🔗

We have to understand what is meant by love covering a multitude of sins. It’s not about sweeping those sins under a rug, covering those sins so that they are no longer visible.

Nor is the idea here that we are able to ignore minor sins, but the major ones that can’t be swept under the carpet still need to be dealt with. “Multitude of sins” is not saying, okay, there are lots of sins that can be dealt with by ignoring them, but there are going to be a few sins that can’t be a part of that multitude. They can’t be covered, so they must be dealt with. That’s a misunderstanding of what 1 Peter 4:8 is saying.

Listen to the words of Psalm 32:1 2 — “Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is cov­ered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord does not impute iniquity.” Plus, Psalm 85:2-3, “You have for­given the iniquity of Your people; you have covered all their sin. You have taken away all Your wrath; You have turned from the fierceness of Your anger.”

Covering sin is not about putting it out of sight, like you cover a gift with wrapping paper. No, covering sin is about dealing with that sin properly.

Say you’ve talked about something over and over. When the matter comes up again, you say, “we’ve covered that.” We’ve dealt with it. It’s behind us. It doesn’t need to be brought up again.

Love covering a sin means that love deals with that sin. And yes, sometimes sin can be dealt with by ignoring it. Sometimes the best thing to do is to simply let a matter drop. A person says something rather insensitive, and you know it’s not worth getting into a big argument about it.

But that’s not always going to be the way you should deal with sin. Sometimes dealing with sin means confronting it head on, letting the person know that what he or she has done is not acceptable, letting them know that what they have done re­quires repentance. And you do this out of love, not because of how that person’s actions affected you, but because you are concerned for them. You don’t want them to con­tinue walking down a destructive path. You know that what they are doing is only going to hurt them in the long run. So you deal with that sin by helping them to see their need for forgiveness, their need to turn away from that sin, and their need to walk down a better path.

What makes it easier to do is meditating on what is lovely in that person. You know that that person is a child of God, whom God has loved and called. You know that, when it comes right down to it, God is continuing to work out his purpose in the life of this person that you love.

Meditating on what is lovely in that person is not about saying that this person can do whatever he or she feels like, that you’re going to support him no matter what he does, right or wrong. It’s not about saying that you will defend every sinful behaviour, you will come up with any sort of excuse to justify every wicked action.

Rather, meditating about what is lovely in that person is about seeing Christ in that person, and wanting that person to reflect Christ more and more. It’s about wanting to work together to help one another shine the light of Christ more and more.

In that sense, meditating on what is lovely, and loving one another fer­vently as a result: that’s when sin can be covered, dealt with. That’s the context in which there can in­deed be forgiveness and moving for­ward together in love.

The Loveliness of Ultimate Forgiveness←⤒🔗

Of course, in all of this we have to remember that the most important forgiveness we need is forgiveness from God. We know that we need him to cover our sins, turn his wrath away from us, turn the fierceness of his just anger away from us, forgiving our iniquities. And we know that he has done this in Christ. We know that because Christ took the fierceness of God’s anger upon himself on the cross, because he bore the con­sequences for our iniquity. Because of this, we can be forgiven. We are forgiven. God has dealt with our sins. God has covered them with the precious blood of Jesus Christ.

And having this forgiveness, we can then go on to be forgiving in our lives. We pray, “forgive us our tres­passes, just as we are fully determined to forgive the trespasses of others against us.” We want sin to be covered, dealt with.

Having major sin swept under the carpet, having it be a festering sore that never gets dealt with, having it be a divisive obstacle that gets in the way of our relationships, is not true love. And that is not how sin gets covered.

But by dealing with sin, working together to overcome sin, working together to fight against sin, fleeing from sin and pursuing that which is good, we know that there can be forgiveness. We know that with true repentance, sin can be dealt with.

There may continue to be long term consequences for previous sin. A pastor who runs away with a woman who is not his wife can’t expect that forgiveness will mean that he can jump on the pulpit and start preaching right away again.

But there can be restoration where brothers and sisters move forward together in love, and long to strengthen one another in the mutual battle against sin.

Think about how lovely this is. Think about how moving forward together in love points to the loveliness of Jesus Christ. That’s where true beauty can be found.

You know, if we could say that all of us were perfect, and none of us have committed sins that need forgiving, where would the loveliness of Christ be? Where would we be able to find his beauty? How would we truly be able to focus on the majesty and wonder of our gracious heavenly Father?

But knowing that we are sinners saved by grace proves his true loveliness. And it wouldn’t ulti­mately matter what we have done in our past, because the beauty of Christ will shine much more brightly, dispelling the darkness of who we’ve been.

My friends, meditate on what is lovely. Have fervent love for your brothers and sisters in Christ. Have the kind of love that covers a multitude of sins, a forgiving love that wants sin to be dealt with, so that we can move forward together as those who rejoice together in the love and mercy of our forgiving heavenly Father. Know his love, know he has covered all of your sins, and he has forgiven every one of them, because he has loved you fervently.