Hypocrisy

[00:00:01] Speaker A: Thanks for tuning in to the Met Church podcast. Here at the Met, we are all about connecting people to God and one another. If you have any questions or want more information about what's happening here at the church, then head to our [email protected] we would love to stay connected with you throughout the week through social media, so be sure to connect with us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Now. Enjoy the message. [00:00:24] Speaker B: Good morning, Met Church. How we doing this morning? Are we glad that he knows our name? I don't know if you're aware of this, but in 18 days, it's Christmas. Yep. So if you haven't had at least 10 boxes on your porch here lately, you're behind and you need to order some more. Isn't it crazy? Do you remember when we used to have to go to the store to buy Christmas? I mean, what's gonna happen next? We're gonna have cars that drive themselves? I mean, we have been in our series called Blind Faith, and we have been looking at some tough questions that people have. And sometimes these questions keep them against or away from the faith. For instance, why do bad things happen to good people? How can the Bible be trusted? Or how can the Bible be true? And then Pastor Bill talked about what happens after we die. And today we're gonna talk about, to me, what seems the biggest reason people say they don't wanna be a part of the church? It's because the church is full of hypocrites. Mahatma Gandhi said, I like your Christ, but I do not like your Christians. So as I started preparing this message, isn't it, have you ever hear God, like, kind of laugh at you or chuckle at you? And so as I'm preparing and I'm like, gosh, hypocrisy. What do I know about hypocrisy? And God's like, trust me, you know enough. You know a lot about it. You're gonna be good. But I felt like, as I prepared, I looked at myself a lot. And I felt like, have you ever heard getting your toes stepped on? I felt like that happened. So that may happen a little bit today. And I just want you to know, even this past weekend, my son had a basketball tournament. And I'm at the tournament, and yesterday I'm sitting there and I'm like, man, I need to be careful. I need to save my voice. Cause I'm preaching tomorrow, so I better stop yelling at the refs. And God kind of goes, see, you're good. You got this. But hypocrisy, the History of the word comes from Greek theater. Do we have any theater nerds in here? Okay, couple of you. Nice. And it's for actors to display whether their scene was a comedy or a tragedy. What they would do is they would put on different masks. So, for instance, if it was a comedy part of the show, they would put on the mask that has more of the smiley face, the eyebrows uplifted. It looked like a happy face. And they'd put it on. They would say their lines. They. And the audience knew at that moment they could laugh. It was a funny part of the show. Then they would take the mask off, and when it came to a more dramatic or serious part of the show or of the play and it was more of the tragedy part, they would put on the mask. They had kind of like the sad face, the frowny face, the brows kind of came down. If that's your face, you need to take that mask off. But that mask would be on. They would say their lines, and people would know that that was a moment, that that was more serious. They could mourn, they could cry. They could feel emotional about what was happening. And what would happen is the actor, depending on what scene he was doing, would take on the mask, say his lines, take it off, and put on the other mask. The Greek word for this is actually. And yes, if you say it with confidence and with a little bit of an accent, people will never question whether you say it right or not. It means someone who wears a mask. From this word, we get the word hypocrite. And what's interesting with this word is up until the Bible, up until the New Testament, this word was never used except for talking about theater. But then Jesus started using this word. And in the New Testament, we see that he said this word or variation of this word over 17 times, not meaning someone who was in theater, but rather condemning people who were insincere, not living according to their own teachings. In a way, they were performing acts for public attention rather than genuine devotion. Let me give you a little more of an updated scene and see if you can tell me who this person is. He made free use of Christian vocabulary. He talked about the blessing of the Almighty and the Christian confession, which would become the pillars of the new government. He assumed the earnestness of a man weighed down by historic responsibility. He handed out stories to the press, especially to the church presses and the church papers. He showed his tattered Bible and declared that he drew strength for this great work. And from it, scores of people welcomed him as a man sent From God, who is this pillar of the community. His name was Adolf Hitler, a master of outward religiosity with no inward reality, a hypocrite. Now, Jesus makes it very clear that hypocrisy is a sin and something he despises. And. And we see it in Matthew 23, and it's known as the woes. Look at your neighbor and say, whoa. If you watch Blossom when you were younger, say whoa. Okay, few of you, great. So Jesus, he is saying, woe to you. And he says it over and over. And every time he says it, right after he calls them out on their hypocrisy, he calls them hypocrites. And he's talking to. To the Pharisee and the scribes who were the religious leaders of the time. Not even a few chapters earlier, in chapter five, we see Jesus, and he's on the. He's preaching the Sermon on the Mount, and he's talking about the Beatitudes. And if you remember the Beatitudes, it was all those people who were blessed. And he would say, blessed are those. Let me give you a few examples. He would say, blessed are those who are poor in spirit. Blessed are those who mourn. Blessed are those who are the meek. All of these types of people who were blessed. And then we see it just a few chapters later, him saying, woe to you. Not a curse from God, but rather an expression of sorrow about their fate that is to come. Woe means great sorrow or distress. And as he's calling them out on their hypocrisy, he calls them a few things. He calls them whitewashed tombs, meaning on the outside it's real, pretty and clean, it looks great, but on the inside, it's dead. We see later, he says, for you, shut the kingdom of heaven in people's face. Think about that for a second. Jesus tells them, because of the way they're living, because of the way they're acting, because they're saying something and doing something differently. Everything that they're doing to bring people to God, they're actually shutting heaven. These people will not go to heaven because you're giving them false truth. It's not real. What you're doing is not of God, and you're keeping people away from heaven. Later, he calls them a brood of vipers. Tell us what you really think, Jesus. A brood of vipers. Because what they were spewing, what they were saying and what they were doing was venomous and it was deadly because it was keeping people from eternity with God. But as you look at hypocrisy. I think there's probably two main types of hypocrisy that we see and partake in. The first one, professing a belief in something, then acting in a manner contrary to that belief. Meaning we don't practice what we preach. Okay, here's an example. Someone who says they don't drink or ever partake in alcohol, but you always know where to find them on Margarita Mondays. Someone who claims to be of optimal health, never putting anything bad in their bodies, but yet they go with Pastor Scott to his favorite restaurant, Golden Corral, every week. The second one is this. Looking down on others and pointing out their flaws. When we ourselves have a lot of flaws, the easiest thing to do is to point out somebody else's wrongdoings or their flaws. Right? Especially when we don't struggle with the same thing. We say things like, I can't believe they do that. I can't believe they struggle with that. I can't believe they give in to that. I would never. Even though we got a long list of things that we do that we struggle with, that we get into, that we give into. Why? Because we all have stuff. Matthew 7 says, how can you say to your brother, let me take the speck out of your eye, when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? Why do so many people say they don't wanna be a part of the church? Because it's filled with hypocrisy. What is it that leads people to believe that? And I believe that there's three types of people in the church that kind of lead people to thinking this. The first one being this. Not a believer. Titus 1:16 says this. They profess to know God, but they deny him by their works. There is such thing as people who claim to be Christians, but in reality are far from God. And that includes people that go to church every Sunday. There are people that attend church because it's what they've always done, it's what their family did. And so it's just a part of who they are. And so they go. But there's never been a moment where they individually have actually put their faith in Jesus. There has to be a time where we take ownership of our faith, where we say, I know this is my family's faith, but. But I believe it too. And I wanna take it on Jesus. I believe what you did on the cross for me when you died for my sins, Jesus. I believe that three days later you conquered death and you were raised from the grave. I Want you to be my Lord and Savior. And I wanna follow after you with all that I am. That has to happen in our lives. Confess with our lips. Believe in our heart that Jesus is Lord and it has to happen. Until then, it's not your faith, it's just something you've always done. So there are folks who do that. For instance, I have been to a lot of zoos in my life. Not to brag, but I remember when I was younger, my grandparents lived in Gainesville. We used to go to the Frank Buck Zoo. Anybody ever been there? Do you remember Jerry the Elephant? Anybody? I remember feeding Cheetos to, to Jerry the Elephant. I would say one for you, three for me. Okay. But I remember doing that as a kid. I remember when I lived in Lufkin. Lufkin had an awesome zoo. We went to the zoo all the time. I had kids and they're getting older now, but as they were growing up, anytime we'd go anywhere, if there was a zoo, guess who was there? Yes, the Bomer family. We were there. Even this summer I went on a trip to Germany with my son and my in laws and there was a zoo. We found out there was a zoo, we went to it. Now I don't speak German, so I didn't understand what the animals were saying, but it was awesome. It was so much fun. But just because I've attended a lot of zoos, it doesn't make me a zookeeper. Just because I've attended a lot of zoos does not make me a zoologist. And just because I've attended a lot of zoos, no matter what you all think, I'm not a zoo animal. Just cause I've been a lot doesn't mean that's who I am. It has to be something that I own. There is a possibility that some folks who give Christianity a bad name or the church a bad name are actually not even who they say they are. Hence the Pharisees and the scribes who Jesus was talking to when he was saying woe to you. The second person is not a mature believer. There is such thing as baby Christians and it has nothing to do with your age or how long you've been a Christian. You could have given your life to Jesus at 9 years old. You could be 85 years old and you could still be a baby Christian. Meaning you've never matured in your faith. There's a process when it comes to your faith called sanctification. And this is the process of becoming more like Christ. And that is because you have taken steps to get closer to God. Listen to Hebrews 5. It says for everyone who partakes only of milk is unacquainted with the word of righteousness, for he is an infant. But solid food is for the mature who because of practice, have their senses trained to distinguish between good and evil. From the time you give your life to Jesus till the time that you are with him in heaven, the sanctification process is going on. So how do you grow? How do you get spiritually mature? Let me give you some examples. You're here today. That's awesome. That's a part of it. Coming to be a part of the fellowship. Hearing God's Word is a part of it. But that's not the only part. Serving, being generous, doing the things of God, being like Jesus and how he loved and treated people. That's a part of growing in your faith. Spending time in prayer, connecting and talking to God is a part of you growing in your faith. Reading God's Word and not only reading God's word, but applying it to your life and is a part of the sanctification process that we all need to partake in. There was a study recently with Christians where it talked about their habits of reading God's Word. And what the study came up with was those that read the Bible once a week, not a lot moved. The needle didn't move in their faith very much. When they read it twice, it was about the same. Not much happened. When they read it three times, there was a little bit of movement, a little bit of growth, little bit of difference in their life. But what's interesting is the study showed when people read the Bible four times a week, they saw major jump in their spiritual walk, in their spiritual maturity. Spending time in God's Word is so crucial to understanding who God is, who Jesus was, and who he wants us to be. The more we can spend time in that, the more we can take on that sanctification process and become more spiritually mature. And then the third group is this. You are a mature believer, but still mess up. And let's just be real honest. That's a lot of us, and that's okay. We're reminded of this all the time. Pastor Bill says it. He says, if you've never been hurt by a church, you just haven't gone long enough. The church is made up of. Of imperfect people. The church is not perfect because it's us. Meaning we're gonna offend, meaning we're gonna hurt. Meaning we're gonna be hurt. Why? Because we are broken. It's interesting because we see it all the time. Charles Swindoll, he's a great author, great pastor. If you've never read one of his books, I highly recommend it. But he has a little spiral notebook and in this notebook, and he's in his 80s, I think he's been in ministry a long time. He's got a notebook and he writes down the names of people that he knew, knows who were in ministry, who were no longer in ministry because of poor decisions they made. And a lot of them are moral failures. And he writes them down in his notebook to remind him for a few things that. To pray for them and their families and to remember that godly men and women can fall. And you know where he keeps it? Every day he puts it in his shirt pocket right here. Because it's close to his heart and it reminds him to guard his heart. Cause even men of God can fall. And we've seen it. Anytime a pastor does something, it's everywhere. And it causes people to look and to blame and be like, I told you, the church is just full of hypocrites. And godly people can mess up too. Because we are sinners. We're broken. And Psalm 103 shines a little light on it. It says Psalm 103, 114. It says, for he, God knows how weak we are. And listen to this. He remembers we are only dust. We are dust. We came from dust. We're gonna return to dust. Look at your neighbor and say, you're dust. Now, I don't. This happened in 9:30. You guys must be afraid of offending somebody cause it gets real quiet. Look at your neighbor and say, you're dust. Look at yourself and say, I'm dust. I don't know how you look at yourself, but I'm dust. For he knows how weak we are. He remembers we are only dust. This is a reference to the frailty of life and how short our time on earth actually is. But it also does this. It reminds us that we have a loving God who has a loving awareness of who we actually are, where we actually come from. And he shows compassion and he shows mercy, and he shows grace to us while we have our time on earth. We are dust. You are dust. I am dust. And what is it about dust? Well, I know this. Dust is dirty, dust is filthy, we are filthy. Meaning we are sinners, we are broken, we are messed up. Turn to your. No, don't tell your neighbors they're messed up. I'm just kidding. But we are messed up. We are in need of a Savior. And I'm here this morning to tell you that his name is Jesus. Jesus is the one who can take all of our sins away so that we now can have a righteous relationship with God because of what he did on the cross for us. Meaning one day we can be in heaven with him. O precious is the flow that makes me white as snow no other fount I know nothing but the blood of Jesus. Now just because Jesus did what he did for us, we are free from the penalty of sin. Meaning when we die, we're not separated, we're gonna go to heaven. It doesn't mean we're free from sin, means we still have to deal with it here on earth. And there's a story that I want to end with this morning and it's about Paul and Barnabas. And these are two missionaries. They were sent in Acts in twos to go share the good news of Jesus, the gospel, to go tell everybody what Jesus did for them on the cross and now how they don't have to be Perfect in the 613 laws in the Old Testament. Now because of Jesus, you can believe in him, have a relationship with him, put your faith in him and you now can be in a right relationship with God. And that's what they were out doing, doing God's work, doing ministry. And I want you to see in Acts 13 what happens. It says the word of the Lord spread through the whole region. That's what was happening. They were spreading the gospel, spreading the good news. But the Jewish leaders incited the God fearing women of high standing. And the leading men of the city stirred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas and drove them out of their district. They're there doing God's work. Who would be there to support them in doing God's work? You would think it would be God's people that God's people, those that say, I believe in God, I love God, I follow and my life is in God's hands. You would think those would be the people that would support the work of the ministry. But look who the Jewish leaders enticed. They enticed the God fearing women of high standing and the leading men of the city. Who was it that pushed Paul and Barnabas out of their district and said, nope, get out of here. It was the church people. It was those that said they followed God, they love God, they want to do what God wants them to do. And God had sent these missionaries to share the good news of the gospel. And it was the church, who said, no, we don't want that. I don't know about you, but if I'm Paul and Barnabas, I'm seriously thinking about, am I doing the right thing? If the people who are supposed to be on my team don't even support what I'm doing, should I just give up? Should I just stop what I'm doing? Should I just quit at all? Because if I can't get the support of God's people, then, gosh, this is gonna be really difficult. And I think about that in our times and in our lives. I don't know about you, but I've been hurt by the church before. Have you ever been hurt by the church or the people of the church? I mean, I've been on staff at a few churches in my career, and there are some that I left that wasn't great. And I was like, gosh, what am I doing doing? This is so hard. God, really, I'm doing what I feel like is honoring you. And it's just difficult. People are not nice. They're not. The Bible says, where two or more gathered, one's gonna be mean. And so it's so easy to get frustrated. You know, it's easy to be willing to give up when you're doing things for God, when God's people don't even support you. But I want you to see what Paul and Barnabas did. Remember, you are dust, I am dust. People are dust. Acts 13:51 says, but they shook off the dust from their feet against them and went to Iconium. Another translation says this. They shook off the dust from their feet. And as a warning, See, there's a symbolic gesture that implies that God also saw the dust being shaken off and that he would judge people accordingly. In other words, Paul and Barnabas did what God called them to do. God's people rejected them. People were mean. They were harsh to them. They kicked them out. Paul and Barnabas then said, peter, people are dust. I'm gonna shake off the dust. And God, as I shake off the dust, I'm saying, it's not on my hands anymore. You got this. How many of us need to do the same thing? How many of us have been hurt by people or have hurt people? Guess what? It's all of us. What if we started looking at people as God looks at us? Imperfect, messed up dust. And when we're hurt by people or when we're hurt by the church, which is people, instead of being upset, instead of saying, well, it's just not worth it, I'm not gonna. What if we said, you know what, God, if this is truly what you want, I'm gonna shake off this dust, I'm gonna let you handle this, and I'm gonna keep going. And as I say that, I'm very aware that there are people in this room who have been hurt, deeply hurt in a way. Maybe abuse, physically, mentally, verbally. Maybe some horrible things have happened. And I'm here to be the first one to say, I know it's not as easy as just saying shake off the dust. But what I'm encouraging you to do is to start taking steps in that direction so you can get to that point where you can get to a point of forgiveness. Because how many of us have people that have done us wrong who live rent free in our head and in our heart? And as we go through life, we start thinking about them, and we start thinking about them, it kind of foggies everything up in our heads. And we're not able to do what God has called us to do because we keep thinking about people who have done us wrong in the past. So I say to you, it may be for you just to start taking steps, and it may require counseling. And I want you to hear this. Counseling is great. Go to counseling as much and as long as you need to. It also requires us to start giving it over to God and to really look in God's word. Start studying, start praying. Start finding a group of people in your life who can encourage you and pray for you and walk alongside you as you go through this so that one day you can get to the point where you say, man, this has held me down long enough today. God, I'm shaking this dust off my hands and I'm saying, God, you got this. God has got a plan for your life. He's got vision, he's got direction. He's got amazing things planned. If you will just say, God, I'm giving it all over to you. Whatever you want me to do, I am all in. And I want you to see what happens when we actually get to that place and do that. The rest of the verse with Paul and Barnabas, after they said shaking the dust off, it says, and the disciples were, were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit. I don't know about you, but I want that in my life. I want to be filled with joy. I want to be filled with the Holy Spirit. And if it takes me saying God things that are keeping me back, I'm shaking it off to you. I'm shaking off the dust. If it's people that have done me wrong. I'm shaking it off. I'm forgiving. I'm shaking it off. Why? Because, God, I know you have something bigger and better and you got whatever you got in the past. That's what he's called us to do. Why? Because God loves all people. Do you agree with that this morning? He loves all people. Those that are far from him. Those that say they don't believe in him. Those that say, I'm never gonna be a part of a church. Cause it's filled with hypocrites. He loves all because he loves all the dust. He created us. He loves us all. Jesus died for all. I mean, you have to think about it. If the great biblical poet Taylor Swift made a song about it, it's got. And I know you've been thinking about that as I said it in your mind, you're singing it. Shake off the dust. And if you were here today and you are saying, I don't want to be a part of a church, or if you're watching online, I don't want to be a part of church because it's full of hypocrites, I'm saying join us because there's room for one more. See, Jesus has zero tolerance for hypocrisy, but he has unlimited grace for sinners. And we all need that. He calls us to love, he calls us to forgive. And he tells us sometimes we have to shake off the dust and let him take care of it. Let's pray. God, you are so good. God, I pray that we are reminded of how much you love us this morning. I hope that we have self reflection, God, this morning on our lives. And I pray that in any area that we have in our lives that is hypocrisy. Any area that we have in our lives that is not of you, God, I pray that you make that very clear. God, that you show us and God, that we begin to take steps to change that. God, I pray for those who, who are here this morning, who are deeply, deeply hurt. And God, I pray for they would feel your grace and your mercy and your loving arms around them this morning. And God, I pray that they would also start moving into a way where they can take steps, take steps towards forgiveness, take steps towards healing and counseling and friends who can encourage and pray for God. I pray they begin to take steps in that direction so they can get to the point where they can shake off the dust and say, God, I'm giving it all to you because you got this. God, and I pray if we are here this morning and God we have lost faith in you because of people in the church. I pray we realize that we had our faith in the wrong thing the whole time. God lead us teach us to be more like you and God. I pray this morning as we shake off the dust that we begin to put our focus back on where it belongs and that's in Jesus Christ our Savior. We love you and we thank you God for your compassion in our many mess ups. May we become more like you this morning. May we reflect you in the way that we live and may people come to know you because you deserve it all. It's in your name that I pray. Amen. [00:32:30] Speaker A: Thank you so much for tuning in today. If you have any questions or prayer requests please contact us by visiting metchurch.com so that we can follow up with you this week. We look forward to seeing you next week.