Your Sin Will Find You Out--1 Timothy 5:24-25 (February 2, 2025)

Sin That Is Clearly Evident and Sin That Follows Later

Well you can run on for a long time. Run on for a long time. You can run on for a long time. Sooner or later God will cut you down. Johnny Cash may not have been a theologian or a preacher when he sang that song, but that'll preach.

It's a message that we need to hear that you can keep on keeping on in your sins for a long time even, but eventually it will catch up with each and every one of us. Sooner or later God will cut you down.

This is going to be a a fairly short but sobering sermon. Short because we're only gonna look at two verses this morning. Sobering because it'll be a reminder that that nothing done in darkness ever stays there.

I'm turning your Bibles to 1st Timothy chapter 5. We're continuing our series through the book of 1st Timothy and this week we come to verses 24 and 25 of chapter 5 and God's Word reads, Some men's sins are clearly evident, preceding them to judgment, but those of some men follow later.

Likewise, the good works of some are clearly evident and those that are otherwise cannot be hidden. Amen, this is God's Word to us. What I want to do this morning is give a brief explanation of these two verses and then I want to make one overarching specific application of these two verses.

So first the explanation. It says that some men's sins are clearly evident. That's how this verse 24 begins. Some men are very brash in their sins. It's very obvious to everyone what their sins are. Drunkards, revilers, womanizers, loud and proud homosexuals, blasphemers, idolaters, and so on.

You can see this. When people are involved in this type of sin it is evident, clearly evident, to everybody. They're fairly easy to spot because the sins are often committed right there in the open. There is no shame for them so everyone knows who they're dealing with.

Now in context 1st Timothy 5, if you remember from last week, there's a focus in the preceding verses about selecting elders in the church. Remember this is again, the whole book's about ordering the church for godliness and in this section of 1st Timothy 5, if you go back to last week, it's talking about honoring elders and how do you receive accusations or potentially discipline elders or pastors who sin and then talking about selecting elders and doing that carefully.

So what we can see here, he puts this right after that, is it ought to be a fairly easy call for the church to not select such a man whose sins are clearly evident. It ought to be a fairly easy call not to select him for church office.

These men are hastening along to judgment for their evil deeds and everybody's paying attention knows it. But there's another class of men. They're also knee-deep, neck-deep in sin, but nobody else, nobody else really knows it.

Paul here is urging Timothy and the church to ordain elders or pastors slowly, giving time and space to test a man because of the truth that while some men's sins are clearly evident, some men's sins are not.

And so the church must do their due diligence and be discerning. Otherwise, Paul is saying you, Timothy, and the church may share in their sin. It goes back to verse 22. And then also in the context of 1st Timothy 5, where Paul has been given these instructions on how to receive a charge of wrongdoing against an elder or a pastor, there could be a situation where one is convinced of a man's sin, but he cannot produce the required two to three witnesses or the two to three lines of evidence.

Perhaps the church refuses to believe the witnesses and evidence and therefore refuses to take action. And when the Lord gives a comfort here in this situation that where some men's sins are clearly evident and some men's sins follow later, and he's telling Timothy, just be patient and God will bring it out.

Just be patient and God will bring it out. There are times and situations where there are things that need to be corrected. There are times and situations where there are people who need to be removed for one reason or another.

It can't be done immediately. And so Paul here is urging patience, saying it will come out. Some men's sins are clearly evident. Others, their sins follow later. Likewise, with good works, verse 25, there are those who do good works and their good works are apparent to everyone.

They are clearly evident. People see and they notice their good works, but also there are good works that are done in secret that you don't get credit for, but they won't forever be hidden. You can imagine a situation where no matter the good one does, the person always gets blamed instead.

And again, Paul urges patience. In due time, their good works will be made known. They, likewise, cannot be hidden. Calvin summarized this passage saying this, we must bear what we cannot, what cannot be immediately corrected.

We must sigh and groan while the time for the remedy is not fully come. And we must not apply force to diseases till they are either ripened or laid open. On the other hand, when virtue does not receive the honor which it deserves, we must wait for the full time of revelation and endure the stupidity of the world and wait quietly in darkness till the day dawn.

And so, when dealing with the wicked deeds of others that are not yet publicly known or recognized, or when dealing with one's own good deeds that have gone unrecognized and unhonored, the Bible commends patience.

For neither good works nor wicked will remain hidden. And that brings us back to the Johnny Cash song I quoted at the beginning of the sermon. And the main biblical principle that I want to apply broadly yet specifically this morning, that principle is sin never stays hidden.

Verse 24 states the principle like this, but those, being sins, those of some men follow later. Numbers 32 verse 23 says it like this, but if you do not do so then take note you have sinned against the Lord and be sure your sin will find you out.

Luke 12 verses 2 and 3, Jesus restates the principle saying this, for there is nothing covered that will not be revealed nor hidden that will not be known. Therefore, whatever you have spoken in the dark will be heard in the light and what you have spoken in the ear in inner rooms will be proclaimed on the housetops.

The teaching of the Bible from the Old Testament to the Gospels to the through the epistles is that sin never stays hidden. It follows after later, meaning it becomes clearly evident later. It will be found out.

It will be brought to the light. So I want you to do this one. I want you to think of some of the sins that ensnare people. Sins that people think are private, conveniently hidden from public view and knowledge.

Sins like pornography and adultery or emotional affairs and you know texting relationships with someone who's not your spouse, embezzlement, addiction to harmful substances, misuse of alcohol, vile online rantings, whisper campaigns of slander and gossip.

We could go on. These are all things that people think that they can keep cordoned off in some private sphere of their lives. Never to be discovered, never to cause them shame, never to cause them pain.

I want to tell you clearly this morning that's a lie. The devil is the father of lies and one of the lies he tells most often is that you can keep your sin hidden. You can't. Your sin, God tells you, Numbers chapter 32, will find you out.

I want to give you four reasons that your sin can never stay hidden. Four reasons your sin can never stay hidden. The first is your sin never stays hidden because sin grows. Sin grows. We often think of our sin kind of like this, like a stuffed animal.

We kind of like having it around. It's cute and comforting and it's just there. It'll stay just like it is. It won't grow. It won't need to be fed. It won't demand anything else. We think of it as kind of harmless, like this stuffed animal that a kid may have, but in fact sin is more like a rabid dog.

It's alive. It grows. It gets bigger. It makes demands upon you. It needs to be fed and it's poisonous and dangerous and it'll bite you when you least expect it and it will be detrimental when it does.

Sin grows and requires more from you as it grows. So for example, here's the thing about a pornography addiction. It never starts there and it never ends there. It started with an earlier, seemingly smaller compromise or poor decision and outside of repentance it never stops with just pixels on the screen.

Sin is not so easily satisfied. Rarely does someone just wake up and have an affair. It starts with secret conversations and grows from there. Sin is alive. Sin is hungry. Sin is ravenous. As the saying goes, sin will take you farther than you want to go.

It'll keep you longer than you want to stay and it'll cost you much more than you want to pay. You see, you think you can keep your sin hidden but eventually it grows to the point that it just doesn't fit under that rug that you think you're sweeping it under.

Eventually it gets to the point that you can't keep it hidden any longer and I want you to hear from the Bible that you won't keep it hidden. Sin grows. James 1 15 says it like this, then when sin, excuse me, then when desire is conceived it gives birth to sin and sin when it is full-grown brings forth death.

From desire to death it's all sin. It's all dangerous and it grows and because it grows you'll never be able to keep it hidden. That's the first reason. The next three reasons are all rooted in in our doctrine or drawn from our doctrine of God and so the first reason is that sin grows.

The second is that your sin never stays hidden because God is all present and all-knowing. God is all present, God is all-knowing. He is omnipresent and omniscient. There's no place in all of creation that you can go where God is not there.

This is the omnipresence of God. God is everywhere. You cannot escape God. You cannot hide from God. You cannot find a spot where God is not present. God is there and God knows what you're doing. In fact, God is all-knowing.

God knows everything you've ever done and everything you will do. He knows what you're doing right now, what you're thinking right now. God knows because He is all-knowing and so your sin cannot remain hidden because it was never actually hidden in the first place because God saw it.

God knows. It was never just your little secret. It was always known by God. Third reason your sin can never stay hidden is because God is just. God is just. God knows your sin and God is just and because God is just He must call you to account for your sins and when we do not confess our sins and we do not repent of our sins on our own that necessitates Him revealing our sins before others.

Because God is just God will deal with our sins. He will not let them alone. Because He is just God will judge our sins and the judgment He often brings upon sinners is bringing their dark deeds into the light so they can bear the consequences of their actions.

God is just. God is all-knowing and God is all-present. And then the fourth reason that your sin can never stay hidden is because God is merciful. God is merciful. Now we often think that the mercy of God means He would keep that hidden but often if we were if we remain unrepentant, if we remain not confessing our sin, it is the mercy of God that will reveal it.

I want to read to you from Hebrews chapter 12 verses 5 through 11. God's Word says,. And you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as to sons. My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord, nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by him.

For whom the Lord loves, He chastens and scourges every son whom He receives. If you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons. For what son is there whom a father does not chasten? But if you are without chastening, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate, not sons.

Furthermore, we have had human fathers who corrected us and we paid them respect. Shall we not much more readily be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live? For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed best to them.

But he for our profit that we may be partakers of his holiness. Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful. Nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.".

The discipline of the Lord often includes making our private sins public, our private sins known, and bringing the natural consequences of our actions upon our heads. And in that, I don't want you to miss the mercy of the Lord.

The passage in Hebrews is an exhortation that God speaks to us as to sons, verse 5 says, as to sons, those who are of the family and household of God whom He loves. He disciplines, Hebrews tells us, those He loves.

And so it is the love of God that leads Him to chasten us, the love of God that leads Him to discipline us, the love of God that brings things into the light. Because here's the thing, sin will destroy you.

It always does. Sin leads to death. It will consume you. It will ruin you. And because God is merciful then, He will not let you keep on doing indefinitely that which will kill you and kill your soul, that which will ruin you.

He won't let you keep going on in that. He is merciful and because He is merciful, He will expose you in your sin so that it leads to your repentance, even if it is incredibly painful in the moment. Going back to Hebrews, no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful.

Nevertheless, afterward, it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. It's like when you go to the doctor with a broken bone. They got to set that bone in order for it to heal right.

It hurts when he does it, but it's the only way it's going to heal right. Or it's like you go into the doctor for chemotherapy for cancer. It is incredibly unpleasant for those months of treatment, all kinds of side effects, but it's the way for healing.

Well, it's the same with God's chastening revelation of your sin. Painful, maybe embarrassing in the moment, but the only way to have long-term health of your soul. You must rid your soul. You must rid your heart of the cancer of sin and God will deal with it.

He would not be merciful if he didn't. He would not be loving to leave you in your sin. That's what the devil does. The devil wants to leave you in your sin, to keep you there, because that's what will destroy you, but God in his mercy does not.

Our holy and loving God does not leave us in our sins. He delivers you out of them, and so your sin can never stay hidden, because sin grows, because God is all-present and all-knowing, because he's just, and because he's merciful.

Therefore, your sin will find you out, and what's done in the dark will be brought to the light. Or as 1 Timothy says it, your sin will follow later. So I want you to hear me well. You cannot keep your secret sins secret forever.

You are not the exception. How many times must someone else fall into moral disaster, making a shipwreck of their lives, being a public scandal, before you realize that you won't get away with it either?

Just a few months ago, there was a famous preacher, widely sought-out conference speaker, author, published, man in his 70s, he calls public scandal, when it was revealed that he had had an affair with a 20-something year old lady.

Last couple weeks or so, there's this Anglican theologian and writer, I really enjoyed reading his stuff, turns out, came out that he had faked his PhD credentials and had previously been arrested for some sort of sex crime.

Go back a few years, you can find the scandal of one of Billy Graham's grandsons, famous preacher in his own right, caught in an affair. I bring up these that are in ministry because of the context of 1 Timothy 5, where elders are caught in sin or to be publicly rebuked so that the rest of the church learns to fear.

But you can think of others, not famous at all, not in ministry at all, but just people in your families, your neighborhoods, your workplaces, your schools, your circle of friends, something awful in their life came out and it caused a local scandal.

And the point is, from small to great and great to small, no one keeps their secret sin secret forever. You can't do it. You can't, you can't manage your sin. You can't negotiate with your sin. You can't ignore it and it just hope it all goes away.

The only solution to secret sin is the only solution for all sin. Repent of it, confess it, and repent of it. Confess it and turn from it and let it be washed away by the blood of Jesus. Here's the thing about the blood of Jesus, there's not one sin that it can't wash away.

There's nothing you've done that's too far that Christ won't forgive you. He went to the cross to pay for that sin. So the encouragement to you is to confess it, to bring it to the light yourself. Name your sin as the Bible names it.

Own your sin, confess your sin, turn from your sin, and yes, it will be embarrassing at first, and yes, it may cause you to feel shame, but who cares? You already feel shame inside. Yes, it will be hard, but here's the thing, you will be free.

It's amazing, the sin loses its power in the light. Chains break, prison doors swing open, and men walk free in the light. Women walk free in the light. The Bible says, we read it earlier in our service, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

And so I want you to know this morning that you can be free, you can be forgiven, you can be cleansed by confessing your sins and trusting in the blood of Christ poured out for you. The alternative is to hold on to your sin, to refuse to confess it and hold on to it, to be eaten up with guilt and shame for an indefinite period of time before eventually it is all exposed anyway and you are laid bare before the world in a more damaging way when the sincerity of your repentance is then questioned and life is much more difficult.

Here's the thing, it will be made known. Your sin will find you out. You can confess on your own or you can wait for the Lord to reveal it. But either way, it will be revealed. Some men's sins follow later.

So the time to come clean is now. After the service, if you want to talk, I'm available to speak with you if you need help walking through what confession or repentance should look like. You can come by my office one day this week or I'll come to you.

Depending on the nature of the sin, you might likely need to confess to your spouse, to your children, to your parents, someone else. I can help you in that. I can walk with you in that. If you are hiding anything, if you are living a secret life of any sort, if you're harboring secret sins, involved with pornography or inappropriate relationship, lies, stealing, addiction, whatever it is, the time to confess those sins is now.

Nail it to the cross, bury it in the grave. The one thing you can't do is hang on to it. Now I have no idea who, if anyone here, needs to hear this message. I don't know of anything going on. I'm not trying to coerce anything out of anybody.

These are just the next two verses in 1 Timothy. So if you're feeling the conviction of this sermon, I want you to know that's the Holy Spirit working through His Word. In the Father's providence, we opened up to these two verses today because they were the next two verses in the book that we started months ago.

I want you to notice the Holy Spirit drawing you toward mercy and forgiveness that comes through the Son. The Trinity is at work in your heart to bring you to repentance. So do not let this moment pass.

Be sure your sin will find you out. You can run on for a long time, run on for a long time, but sooner or later, God will cut you down. Let's pray. And Father in heaven, again, I don't know the hearts of everyone in this room.

I don't know the situations of everyone in this room, but you do, and they do. Lord, I pray that you will lead anyone in here who needs to repent of secret sin that they're holding on to, to lead them to confess it, name it, own it, turn from it, be washed and forgiven by the blood of Jesus.

I pray that no one would leave today without dealing with their sin through the gospel of Jesus Christ, who offers free and full forgiveness. Lord, I pray that no one would say, I'll deal with that one later.

I'll deal with that one tomorrow. May they deal with it now. The time is now. Father, we thank you that Jesus Christ came and lived in our place, perfectly obeying your law and your word, that he died in our place as a perfect sacrifice, as paying the punishment, paying the penalty, the sin debt for our sin, taking upon him what was due us.

And Father, we thank you that Jesus Christ walked out of the grave on the third day, so that we too could walk in newness of life, so that we too could have eternal life. Newness of life, putting away the old man and the old sin and walking in righteousness, bearing the fruit of the spirit.

Lord, I pray that that would be true for us this day and forevermore. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.