Covering?

[stello]

Hello everyone,

Anyone have any information on what it means for me to say "cover" my wife or "cover" children? I was chatting with a friend who brought this up but i didn't want to get into a detailed discussion with her about it. She is fully persuaded that there is a hell so....

My thought on this was i believe and trust God to protect  my wife and i, and if anything happens to either of us, i believe it's all according to God's will.

Thanks for any input, have a blessed day!!!

stello

[lareli]

Hi stello

I was going to reply to your question when you first posted it but I thought someone else may be able to better answer your question using scripture or rays material as a basis for their answer. Since no ones replied by now I can give a thought or two as to what I think of when someone says 'covering'

I think when church people say it, they mean like the spiritual leader of the house. The husband is the man of the house and the head over the wife and kids and should provide the spiritual guidance or covering for that house. You know, pray over his wife/kids... Maybe even drag them to church even if they don't want to because their eternal destiny depends on you, the covering and it may be impied that the husband will have to answer to God for his wife and kids failures or success as a Christian... *according to the church* I can't speak for every church but I'm sure this description of covering applies to some churches.

I know scripture says the husband is the head and the wife is the body so that, I guess, gives a picture of a husband (head) covering the wife (body). I know scripture says love 'covers' a multitude of sin (I think). So loving and forgiving your wife/kids and extending mercy towards them would be part of 'covering' them I guess.

Again I only know from church what 'covering' implies so I don't know what that's worth. Is the term 'covering' as in a husband 'covering' his wife or anyone 'covering' anyone in scripture?

Aside from what the church may define a 'covering' as, I personally don't mind hijacking the term 'covering' to describe being a loving and supportive husband and father to whatever description one understands his duties and obligations to be. However I do know that their eternal destiny is in Gods hands and not mine.

I get the picture in my mind of a war movie or something, where one of your fellow soldiers or what have you, runs out of the trenches toward an objective and shouts 'cover me!' then his fellow soldiers lay down cover fire to protect him.

I guess I think about covering my wife and kids as having their back, supporting them any way necessary.

[John from Kentucky]

In 1 Cor 11:13-16, a woman's covering is her long hair.

[Kat]

I forgot about this question, but searched and found a few things.

http://bible-truths.com/lake12.html ----------------------

JESUS CHRIST IS OUR COVERING

We just read where the Apostles were on a boat on the sea of Galilee and were, "...COVERED with waves..." I see another type here. What do the "raging waves of the sea" symbolize?

Jude tells us that, "filthy dreamers," who "defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities," "brute beasts," those who have "gone the way of Can," and are after "the error of Balaam," and those who "perished in the gainsaying of core," these are "spots in your feasts of charity ... RAGING WAVES OF THE SEA..." (Jude 8-13).

Say, did you notice where these "filthy dreamers, brute beasts, raging waves of the sea" are located. That's right—IN THE CHURCH. These evil people are eating right along with the rest in the Church's "feasts of charity." These are those who, "say they are apostles [of Christ], and are not," and those who, "say they are Jews [spiritual Jews -- converted Christians], and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan."

The disciples were literally "covered with waves" of the sea, but they were also covered with the "raging waves of the sea" spoken of in Jude, because they were, as yet, unconverted.

Actually, the Sea of Galilee is really a lake, also called, The Lake of Gennesar [et] and Lake Tiberias. Jesus Himself called Galilee a "lake" (Luke 8:22). Notice that the carnality of man symbolized in "covered with waves" (raging waves of the sea) needed salvation—"Lord save us, WE PERISH." What did Jesus become to His disciples at that very instant? Answer: "a covering shelter." Whereas they were covered by the raging waves of the sea, Jesus now became their "covering."

Jesus SAVED His disciples from the "raging waves of the sea that covered them," in the middle of the Sea [lake] of Galilee. But this was a literal physical event. They were not spiritually converted as yet, but this event pointed to just such a conversion of the spirit. Will not Jesus also become a "covering shelter" for others? If so, for whom, and for how many?

JESUS CHRIST IS THE COVERING SHELTER OF THE WHOLE WORLD

"And He [Jesus] is the propitiation [Greek: hilasmos, signifies "an expiation, a means whereby sin is COVERED and remitted" Strong', p. 121] for our sins: and not for ours only, but also FOR THE SINS OF THE WHOLE WORLD" (1 John 2:2).

It may come as a surprise to realize that Jesus started His work of propitiation in a "lake"—the Lake of Galilee, and He will finish His work of propitiation in another lake, "the Lake of Fire."

In Romans 3:25 we read:

"Whom God has set forth to be a PROPITIATION through faith in His blood to declare His righteousness for the remission [passing over of] sins that are past, through the forbearance of God."

In Heb. 9:5 this same word hilcsterion (propitiatory) is used for the COVERING LID OF THE ARK. Jesus Christ IS the ark. When the disciples were "covered by the raging waves of the sea" Jesus Christ became their "covering," and (physically) SAVED THEM!

In Hebrew, "haven" comes from cowph, and it means "to COVER; a cove (as a sheltered bay, Strong's Hebrew Dictionary p. 32).

Jesus not only "propitiates—COVERS," He IS the Covering, "...IS the Propitiation..." (I John 2:2). Likewise, "Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and for ever," does not just "cover" IN the lake of fire: HE IS THE LAKE OF FIRE! Jesus Christ IS the Judge of the world, and the world is Judged not only BY Jesus Christ, but IN Jesus Christ.

These words and their meanings that God chooses for our understanding are not accidental coincidences. Every word of God is purified to perfectly fit its application:

"The WORDS of the Lord are PURE WORDS: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times" (Psalm 12:6).

Do any really believe that God wants to play just one more insane cruel joke on the majority of humanity which are supposedly destined to an eternity of torture in fire, by telling us that this insane pit of torture is going to take place in a SHELTERED PLACE OF SAFETY? Is God Almighty going to torture the majority of humanity in a place He jeeringly calls: a pond, a lake, a "SHELTERED PLACE OF SAFETY?"

It is true that, "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the Living God" (Heb. 10:31), but that does not negate the fact that there is also "safety, shelter, and covering" in God's Divine Pond of Spiritual purifying FIRE.


http://bible-truths.com/lake16-D4.htm ---------------

PROPITIATION: "And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world" (I John 2:2). Now there's a word you don't see every day. Strong's #2434, "hilasmos, atonement, an expiator [one or makes amends, reparations], atones, propitiation." It means to bring in harmony with and appease. Jesus sacrificed Himself as a atonement, as a covering for our sins so that we are no longer spiritually naked before God. And not only has He done this for His chosen Elect, but also "for the sins of the whole world." The change that God is making in us he will extend to the entire human race. "Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him" (Rom. 5:9).


http://bible-truths.com/email10.htm#covering -------------------------

[Ray Replies]

Dear Marie:

Thank you for your email and question.

I know NOTHING about a Christian doctrine of "covering." There is no such teaching in the Scriptures.
 
However, let me state that there is absolutely nothing one has [obtained] by being in a church, belonging to a church or attending a church, that he does not have IN CHRIST ALONE!

Paul stated that we are "COMPLETE IN CHRIST" (Col. 2:10). What more could we desire than to be COMPLETE in all things?

Hope this helps your understanding a little better.

God be with you, Marie

Ray

[stello]

Thanks for the replies all. I am learning to trust in God more and more each day. I won't say it's easy for me but God is so good. When my friend mentioned i am the "covering" for my family that didn't sit well with me. I know as a husband and father i have to love my wife and future child, but i can't cover them any more than i can cover myself!

So many encouraging posts and loving brothers and sisters here, i am grateful to God for his love for all of us. He is truly doing an incredible work with all of us.

stello