Authentic

Sunday Morning Sermon
June 11, 2017
John McKeel

A World Full of Fakes

It seems artificial everything fills our modern world. There are faux furs, artificial meats, and surrogates without number. That may be true all around us, but it should never be true in church. When I mention “hypocrite,” the first synonym to come to mind shouldn’t be “Christian”!

What About Me?

I am sure that every true child of God will sometimes wonder, if he or she isn’t really a hypocrite, so this morning we’re going to look at the marks of hypocrisy, take a moment to count the cost of hypocrisy and then we’ll close with a biblical cure for hypocrisy.

The Marks of Hypocrisy

No one talks more about hypocrisy than Jesus. He devoted a major part of the Sermon on the Mount to warnings about hypocrisy (Matthew 6) and the most caustic chapter in the gospels contains the Lord’s condemnation of hypocrites (Mathew 23).

The first mark of hypocrisy is the contrast between a hypocrite’s words and his deeds.

Matthew 23:1 – 3

Seven Kinds of a Pharisee:

  1. Wait-a-little Pharisee
  2. Humped Back Pharisee
  3. Shoulders Pharisee
  4. Ever-reckoning Pharisee
  5. Bruised and Bleeding Pharisee
  6. God-fearing Pharisee
  7. Son of Abraham

The second concerns his motivations for goodness: whenever he does right, it is done to be seen by others.

  1. Matthew 6:1-4
  2. A corollary to this concern is the hypocrites’ religion depends on time and place.

Finally, hypocrites “major in minors.”

  1. Strain out a gnat, Matthew 23:24
  2. They are generally more severe with others than they are with themselves.

The Costs of Hypocrisy

Have you ever considered the advantages of being a hypocrite? They generally have honor and respect – all the advantages of being a good Christian man or woman – until the truth comes out (and it will).

  1. Fear of being found out.
  2. The “Disquietude of Conscience.”
  3. The Anger of God

“Mr. Hypocrite, I see an item here which you usually forget, it is this—that despite of your profession God abhors you, and if there is one man more than another who stinks in the nostrils of Jehovah, it is such as thou art—thou miserable pretender. There shall be a special place reserved for thee amongst the damned.” — Charles Spurgeon (1859)

The Cure for Hypocrisy

The sad thing about hypocrisy is that it is the last sin we suspect ourselves of, and yet it is one of the easiest to fall into.

Note: it is not our task to look around and spot the hypocrites! That is God’s business.

The only way you can play the hypocrite is by forgetting this one fact: God is watching.

  1. Is God watching to catch us in the act?
  2. Or is God watching to praise us?

Be authentic!

  1. Humility
  2. Obedience
  3. Transparency