Interrogating the Church, 01 – Hypocrisy:

I recently asked a few individuals younger than I about themes the church should be addressing, but of which they were not hearing anything. I came away with a lot of writing prompts, of which this post will be my first attempt as a response.

There is a lot to say about hypocrisy. There are many angles from which we could approach it. It would take forever to list examples of hypocrisy in the life of the church, in the lives of all sorts of leaders, institutions, and human structures. The simpler approach might be to address the underlying issue in all the hypocrisy of which we are all guilty. We lack humility.

Yes, we are all hypocrites. That much is inescapable. By virtue of thinking I am right and taking a position on something, I am making a determination that everyone else must be wrong. It matters little what aspect of life I approach, I both need to makes some determinations of truth and reality even as I maintain the humility of expecting that my ideas, priorities, and values may well need to change. That is difficult for all of us. No one is immune to that struggle.

When the positions I take are directed to casting blame, accusations, or otherwise making some kind of judgment about another person, I am treading on thin ice. There are bound to be circumstances of which I am unaware, data points I have never seen, competing values I have not recognized, and a host of cultural and background I have not evaluated. Paul addresses that in Romans 14, saying, “Who are you to judge the servant of another?” There is no way I can remove myself to a high enough perspective to evaluate another person’s actions and life adequately. Any attempt to do so is hubris.

That hubris results in hypocrisy, no matter how I may attempt to distance myself from it. I may perhaps be better on one or another issues, but I will just as likely fall short on some other issue on which the person I judge has excelled.

There is a way out of this conundrum, but it is one that far too many churches, church leaders, and parishioners have been loathe to accept. It is not our purpose in life to cast blame and condemnation upon others. Blaming and condemning runs counter to the message entrusted to us. While we have gotten used to wielding shame as a tool to keep people in line, that is not how Jesus told us to live. Jesus tells us in John’s gospel it is the role of the Spirit to convict people of sin. That places it far above my pay-grade.

If we can let go of this penchant for condemning and shaming people, we can embrace the humility to which we are called. We can allow God to deal with all of us in terms of convicting us of where we may stray from the path. All we need to focus on is helping one another along the way. That is what love looks like, after all. It is the fellowship to which we are called. It is the way of the servant, the meek, the one seeking to experience the Reign of God. After all, it is not our reign we are to be about. It is the Reign of God under which we are called to find our meaning, purpose, and fulfillment. To do otherwise and claim Christ Jesus as Lord is the height of hypocrisy.



— ©Copyright 2023, Christopher B. Harbin 



http://www.sermonsearch.com/contributors/104427/

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