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Join us every Sunday morning at 9 or 10:30 AM in the Maywood Center. Sermons & Bible Studies available online on any podcast platform or visit our YouTube channel "@flipsidechristianchurch"! Download our app at https://flipsidechristian.churchcenter.com/setup for more info about our church and ministries.
Flipside Christian Church
Madera Ranchos, CA
Just a quick question.
Everybody here, the yard work
that's going on back there.
Listen,
let's
try to be good witnesses to our neighbors.
Sometimes they get a little upset
at what we do, especially on Sundays.
So they schedule
tree work on Sunday mornings
during service
and had a little bit of an issue
this morning.
So anyway, just let's just be praying that
we're super gracious and good neighbors.
Is that fair?
Yeah.
Don't park in front of his property
on Sunday mornings.
Let me just say that.
Hey, next week is our 21st birthday.
As a church, we finally are legal.
And so we can start
using wine in church now.
So for communion,
I guess that's what that means.
No, it's just so I was I talked to
I talked to the church this morning
and my prayer time and the church said
that all at once for its birthday is
new chairs. So
by the
church of birthday present, $60 a chair.
And we'll celebrate our birthday next week
with brand new chairs.
They show up on Tuesday,
so I'm excited about that.
The the entryway is coming.
It it got delayed a couple of weeks again,
but it is coming.
And so I'm excited for kind of how
we're able to make this place a little bit
more accessible and deal with first world
problems like comfortable chairs.
When you talk about
what's going on in Guatemala,
these chairs are going to be given
to one of our church plants
in Fresno, inner city Fresno called
Remedy Chapel with Pastor Sean.
So we're just going to give him
all these chairs they are in need to.
So by your generosity with new ones,
we're given the old ones away
and blessing another church.
And it's all good.
I want to warn you right up front
now, as you get into Matthew 23,
we're all big people.
We can handle it.
But I just want to
I want to warn you up front that
at some
point this is going to turn offensive
and some of you are going to be
maybe offended by it.
You're going to be okay,
you're going to handle it.
But I don't know what another way
to teach this passage of Scripture,
this is this is the point in Jesus's
earthly life
where he really turns a corner
and he's he's confronting
religious establishment
because they just don't get it.
This is the final week of his life.
From Matthew 21 through 24 or so is all
takes place on Tuesday, all in one day.
It's a huge day.
And in chapter 22, sorry,
chapter 23 is the follow up of chapter 22.
And what happened in chapter 22 is
you had these four religious groups
the Pharisees, the Herodians,
the Sadducees, and the religious lawyers
who were questioning Jesus's authority
and challenging his authority.
And he handles all of it.
He's very gracious,
but he's very he's very firm.
And in chapter 23, he's done.
He's done with their questions.
He's done
allowing them to challenge his authority.
And in chapter 23,
he draws a line in the sand.
And the term,
if you read chapter 23, if you read it in
its totality, you're going to see one word
over and over and over.
And it's the word hypocrite.
It's the word hypocrite.
And it's the key term
that he uses for religious people,
religious leaders,
I should say, over and over and over.
He calls them hypocrites.
He calls them
a lot of other things as well.
He calls them snakes.
He calls them a brood of vipers,
which is a family of little baby snakes.
He calls them blind guides.
He calls them whitewashed tombs.
He calls them fools,
and he calls them sons of hell.
And so he's,
he's he's drawing a line in the sand.
And I want to I want to
simplify chapter 23
because it is profound.
It's it's difficult for many.
It feels offensive.
And it may for some of you this morning.
But I want to boil this down to one simple
big idea.
And the simple, big, big idea
is this true discipleship begins
with repentance in the heart
and produces transformation in life.
So here's here's
what happens with religion.
Religion tells you to change your life
and oftentimes
doesn't deal with the internal.
Jesus says,
I want to start with the internal,
because if the internal changes,
the outside will be transformed.
Religion says, just look, do better.
Our problem is
we can't do better for very long, right?
We try and we do well for a little bit.
We don't do this.
And you're not supposed to do
we do this, we're supposed to do.
So we think for a little bit and then we
we fail.
And a life of that is a religious life.
And that's
what Jesus is pushing up against here.
He said, listen,
the outside should change, no doubt,
but the outside should change
because the inside has been transformed.
And to address this, he uses this word
hypocrite of religious leaders.
Now the word hypocrite is used seven times
in this one
chapter in the book of Matthew.
It's used 15 times outside of Matthew
and the rest of the New Testament.
It's used a total of 19 times.
So 15 of the 34 times
it's used in the book of Matthew.
And every time Matthew records
the word hypocrite,
he does so in quoting the words of Jesus.
So Jesus uses this word a lot
to talk about
the religious leaders of his day.
Let me ask
this question just to get our minds
straight.
Do any of you have
any of you ever known a hypocrite
you like? Does someone come to mind?
You think about word hypocrite.
Yeah, yeah.
Have any of you looked in the mirror?
Let's get our minds right.
I know that many people in this
who can hear me
are going to think, yep, hypocrites.
You're going to think of somebody else.
You're going to think of something
they've done, something
they said how their life doesn't match up.
Our tendency is to think of somebody else.
So here's the challenge.
Let's let we can all let's not do that.
My prayer in this, in this passage is that
that God's Word would cut the messenger
before it becomes a cutting message.
You don't have to look very
long in the church to find a hypocrite.
You just have to look in the mirror
at the church.
So let's just acknowledge
that many people are going to have
their reasons and their excuses. That's
why I don't go to church.
That's why I don't believe in God.
That's why I don't trust Jesus. That's
why I don't like religion.
That's why that's why. That's
why we're all going to have those excuses.
But please understand
this. And I understand those excuses.
But please understand
that regardless of the excuse, nobody
but you will have to stand
before God one day
and give an account for your excuse.
And there's a lot of people
use the excuse of hypocrites.
And so let's just understand,
let's let's let this cut us first.
The word hypocrite comes from two Greek
words.
It's the Greek word hypocrites.
And it comes from two words hypo,
which means under or and which judge.
And so literally the word hypocrite
is to under judge oneself
and thereby over judge somebody else.
That's what is to be hypocrite.
I'm going to judge myself.
I'm on over judge others.
It was used of in the theater world
of someone who lived behind a mask.
So the mask is in the one thing,
but what was behind
the mask was something different.
Hypocrite.
It being hypocritical always involves
inconsistencies in one's life,
either in thought and word or deed.
There's just inconsistency there.
That's the idea of hypocrites.
The truth is
that if we define hypocrite,
as I point out in others, what I choose
not to acknowledge it myself.
This hits every one of us.
And the Bible says in
Isaiah nine, for everyone is a what?
Do you realize
the Bible said that every one of us
hypocrites
and an evildoer, and every mouth
speaks folly.
First Peter two once is therefore
rid yourself of all malice
and all the seat of what?
Hypocrisy, all kinds of hypocrisy, envy,
and slander of every kind.
I appreciate a pastor.
His name's Gary. I listen to him a lot.
I study a lot of his his
his his, his writing, his teaching.
As I look through this passage,
I tried to find a gentle way
to go through Matthew 23,
and there just isn't.
And what I learned and kind of leaned into
is this idea of hypocrisy.
We live hypocritical lives
in three different ways.
One is just the hypocrisy regarding others
that I have a standard
for you and an exception for me.
That's it.
And we do that with others all the time.
When when I hold you to a standard, I'm
unwilling
to live at myself or when I'm never wrong.
Wrong. And you always are.
Tipple critical.
The second way we live lives of
hypocrisy is hypocrisy.
Regarding myself,
when there's a contradiction
in what I claim to believe
and how I actually live.
So not only is there a different standard
for the two of us is standard
for you and exception for me,
but even what I claim, I don't live.
So there's a hypocrisy regarding others
in a hypocrisy regarding myself.
And then thirdly,
there's a hypocrisy regarding God
when I call right what God calls wrong.
And so we live in these
three arenas of hypocrisy.
And until we start to
turn the mirror on ourselves.
We will forever remain unchanged
and untrue.
Now, now, please hear me when I say this.
When we fail,
there is no hypocrite
where there is repentance
in our failure.
When there's repentance
and we allow the Holy Spirit to transform
us, we're not living hypocritical lives.
We're living human lives
that are repentant
and saved by the mercy and grace of God.
But when I live in sin and refuse
to call to such and refuse to repent of it
and act as though I'm righteous and right,
that is hypocritical.
Do you follow?
So though every one of us can claim,
yeah, I'm the hypocrite
when I claim that and repent of that
and allow the Holy Spirit to transform me.
Now I'm no longer living hypocritically.
I'm living in repentance
and in repentance.
God gives all that grace will allow.
And so the safest place we
can be is to live with the realization
and the admittance.
Yes, I am hypocritical, but I repent of it
and I allow God to do it.
Only God can do which is transform me
and then give me unmerited
grace and favor.
And so Matthew 23.
Jesus.
This chapter begins with Jesus.
He's surrounded
by all these religious leaders
and by all these people and disciples
who are listening
to these exchanges that he have
with all these religious leaders.
And so Jesus began.
Chapter 23 begins with Jesus
addressing the people and the crowds,
not the religious leaders.
And this is what he says.
Then Jesus said to the crowds
and to his disciples,
the scribes and Pharisees
sit on Moses's seat.
So do and observe whatever they tell you,
but not the works they do.
For they preach, but they do not practice.
So he's addressing the people,
and he's he's going to turn his
his anger and confrontation
against the religious leaders.
But now he addresses the people
and he says, listen, these leaders
sit on Moses's seat.
Now, Moses's seat was the term
that they used in every synagogue,
which in their day was like their local,
their local gathering place
or their church, if you will,
where they would learn God's Word.
The rabbi would sit on a stone seat
and all the people would stand.
So if you really wanted to be biblical,
you would all stand up while I'm teaching.
Aren't you glad we're not back then?
Or maybe it's that they couldn't afford
$60 chair, so they had to stand.
I don't know which it was, but.
So they called it Moses's seat
because that was the place of authority.
And the rabbi would teach
from that stone seat.
And what they would teach was primarily
the law of God recorded by Moses.
So it became authoritative
as Moses's seat.
And so what he said, they teach
from Moses's seat, the, the, the law.
In other words, they teach with authority
not because they are
people of credibility,
but because the word is authoritative.
We use this same term in our day.
For instance,
the Catholics.
The Pope is said to speak X cathedra
from the seat or from the chair.
It's the position of authority.
The word cathedral used primarily
by the Catholic Church, that is, the,
the, the, the place of authority
of the bishop of the area.
That's his seat of authority,
even in our universities systems,
the lead of a department
is called the chair of the department,
the authority of the department.
So we use this same idiom today.
It was used back then.
They sit in Moses's seat.
They sit as someone
speaking the authority of God.
And what God, what Jesus says is
listen to what they say,
because what they're saying is
because it's God's words
just don't live like they live
because they don't
practice what they preach.
In other words, don't let
the Word of God lose its authority
because the person who's teaching
it doesn't live that way.
The word still has authority,
even though the one who's giving you
the word is not credible.
The person's lack of practice doesn't
nullify the power of the Word of God,
is what he's saying.
Second Timothy 316 is still true
regardless of the person.
The Word of God is breathed out by God.
It is profitable for teaching,
rebuking, correcting,
and training in righteousness
regardless of the one who's presenting it.
The authority comes in the word,
not in the presenter.
Do you follow?
Do you follow?
And so this is his warning to everybody
right up front.
Don't invalidate the truth of the
and authority
of God's Word because of the broken
vessels who teach it.
So this is the danger right now.
This is the danger right now
with some people even in this place,
you're
going to say, I see too much contradiction
between those who teach God's Word on
what God's Word says.
So I don't believe God's Word.
That's a mistake.
The authority comes from God's Word,
not from the prisoner of it.
Do you follow?
And so he's going to say, these people,
they're giving you truth,
but they don't live it. So don't.
So listen to them, but don't copy them.
And then in verse five.
They do all their deeds.
He was seen by others, for they make
their full actors broad in their fringes.
Long. Okay.
So how many of you
brought your full actors with you?
Does anybody know what a full actor he is?
Yeah. So?
So I need to translate this
into our verbiage.
He's talking about two
to the full actors and fringes.
And what is referring to is
what was what was in in Scripture
back in Deuteronomy 11 and numbers 15.
And in those two verses
the word of God says, Keep God's
Word on the front of your forehead
and on your right hands at all times.
In other words,
let's keep it in the front of your
in front of your face and at your hand.
Do it.
They understood that to mean
by the letter of the law
to take Bible verse, scripture verses
and put them in boxes
and fix them to their foreheads
and headbands, and wear them
as tassels on their or as bracelets,
so that they would
keep the Word of God forever
on their foreheads and off the right hand.
And so they made these
little leather boxes
and had a couple different scripture
references in these boxes.
One was the great hero of the Lord,
was one of the Lord is God.
And they would put that in a little box
and fastened to a headband on their front
on the foreheads.
And where is it? Dangly box
on their wrist.
And so Jesus is saying,
some of them love this so much,
they're like,
hey, I'm going to be real spirit.
I'm gonna get a real big box.
So everybody would see, wow,
they love God's Word.
Look how big that flattering box is.
And these tassels, old Testament law.
Make sure at the edges of the corners,
the four corners of your garment,
there's a blue cord to remind you
and symbolize the authority of God
in his great provision
and comfort and rule in your life.
And so every garment had a blue.
The show would have a blue thread
running down it to remind them of this.
Jesus,
we believe, had this war the same thing.
And that's actually what the woman
with the issue of blood reached out
and touched the hem of his garment,
the blue cord, because that was the symbol
of the presence and compassion
and authority of God.
And so Jesus like, look,
some of these guys, they got their big
old boxes on their forehead,
like Amazon just showed up
and their blue chords are like huge
because they want to look,
look out religious.
I am,
you know, we know what those
people are like with their real big Bibles
or the real gaudy covers.
So everybody knows that they're carrying,
you know what I'm saying?
Like, look at how really look
how spiritual I am.
I want you to know how godly I am.
And he said, this is who these people are.
It's all for show.
Nothing's changed inside.
It's this ridiculous.
And then look at what he says
verses nine, ten, 11 and call no man
your father on earth, for
you have one father who is in heaven.
Neither be called instructors,
for you have one instructor.
The Christ, and the greatest among
you shall be your servant.
Whoever is also in self would be humble,
ever humbles himself, will be exalted.
He said, all these guys want to do
is exalt themselves
in their spiritual superiority,
and so they make you call them
your father.
Now Jesus is not saying don't have titles.
He just say,
make sure that the title that you claim
doesn't elevate yourself
to some spiritual superiority.
Now, I'm a reverend.
I don't allow anybody to call me Reverend
because it's used one
time in the Bible is not used of pastors.
The reverend is
the title man gave me to acknowledge
my authority,
my education, and my calling.
But it's you used in our culture
as a as a spiritual superiority title.
This is one pastors
that Catholics have a real problem with
because they don't call anybody father,
because it's used in that context
to indicate someone
who has spiritual superiority over laity.
Do you understand?
Listen, quit showing off.
It's not about you.
Quit trying to look ultra religious
and spiritual.
And so he's going to press in now to these
hypocrites and these religious leaders.
And the first time the hypocrite word is
used is in is in verse 13.
And so this first issue, hypocrisy
regarding others.
Let me just read a few verses to you.
This is when you're going to turn on
the Pharisees and the religious leaders.
But what are you,
scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites?
For you shut the kingdom of heaven
in people's faces, for you
neither enter yourselves
nor allow those who would enter to go in.
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites!
For you travel across sea and land
to make one single proselyte.
And when he becomes a proselyte,
you make him twice as much a child of hell
as yourselves.
Now some verses skip
what may be in your Bible
or some translation of skip
what may be in your Bible as verse 14,
because in the earliest manuscripts
of verse 14 wasn't in there,
but some translations included
because it is in some translations,
and it just adds more color and flavor
to what Jesus said.
So if you have verse,
if verse 14, verse 14
says this, woe to you, scribes
and Pharisees, hypocrites,
for you to vow widows houses for
and for a pretense.
You make long prayers, therefore
you receive the greater condemnation.
And he just lays into these guys
because they're hypocritical
regarding other people.
Here's what here's what he's saying.
Your religious rules are all about your
tradition and your
spiritual superiority,
and you actually keep
people from the kingdom of God
by your religiosity.
You're all about
winning them to your culture
and to your cause,
but not winning them to the kingdom,
because you have not submitted
to the Christ, nor the authority
of God's Word.
And you're keeping people from heaven.
And when Jesus uses this idea
in verse 14,
you rob widows of their houses.
Here's what we believe was going on.
These widows were in desperate need, and
so they would ask the religious leaders
for prayer, and the religious leaders
would pray for them for a big donation
and death,
because they knew that desperate people
will pay big money for help.
And so that's what they were doing,
literally
robbing widows of their livelihood
to get them.
And we've seen this in our day, right?
Just saved your faith with a gift.
And I'll send you a prayer cloth
in the name of Jesus.
I could be a televangelist,
I think I could pull it off.
I'll get a wig.
I'll wear some, you know, slack.
Like I could do it.
And Jesus says, you're
a bunch of hypocrites, man.
You're you're denying you're
keeping people out of your sin of people
to hell by your religion.
You're so hypocritical regarding others.
You're doing all this stuff for show,
and it has no transformative fact on life
because it's not test
to the authority of God
and the authority of His Word.
It's all for your own well-being.
And then he says this. Look at verse 23.
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites!
For you tithe mint and Dylan come in
and have neglected
the weightier matters of law,
justice and mercy and faithfulness.
These you ought to have done without
neglecting the others, you blind guide,
straining out a net and swallowing a camel
like Jesus knows how much he's pressing.
He's he's doing this
to set the religious leaders off,
to drive them out of their minds
in conviction.
So they'll have one of two responses
either repent, although crucify him
and he knows he has to go to the cross,
and so he knows he's being heavy.
And he says,
you guys are so ultra religious
that you tithe mint and deal and cumin.
Now here's the thing.
Tithing was a practice
in Scripture 430 years
before the law of tithing was ever given.
So it supersedes the law.
But then it was commanded in the law.
But tithing deal
and and was never part of the command.
Tithing was never to include
Old Testament was in the spices.
And so these religious people
are going over and above
in their generosity, their tithing stuff
that they're never commanded to tithe.
And Jesus says, look it.
I approve of your generosity.
I disapprove that you're
trying to buy your way into the kingdom
because you've neglected justice and mercy
and faithfulness, he says.
So you should tithe anybody who claims
that tithing is an Old Testament command,
not a New Testament command, has not read
the Bible and is not read Matthew 23.
Anybody who says the tithing does
not apply to New Testament Christians.
You haven't read the Bible.
If it didn't apply, Jesus could have set
the record straight right there and said,
you don't have to tithe,
just make sure you love people.
He didn't say that.
He said you should do those former things
without neglecting the latter things.
Do you follow every follow?
Not only tithe, you should be
extra generous because that's
what they were doing.
Just don't neglect
the greater things as well.
So let me just put this in our terms.
It's hypocritical
for the Christian to say Jesus is my Lord.
He's just not the one that rules over
my finances.
Hypocrite.
Follow.
Lord means sovereign ruler.
It typically critical to say
Jesus is my Lord,
but he doesn't control our family schedule
typically.
Spurgeon says this will
you lose anything that you give to God?
Never depend on it.
He will be no one's debtor.
God never fails to see, to record,
and to reward.
If you and I
want to call Jesus Lord
and not be a hypocrite, he must be Lord.
Of the two
most important things in our life our time
and our money.
In our day.
It is hypocritical to have a standard
for others that's different for ourselves
or to judge others sin and not our own.
So, for instance,
it's hypocritical to judge someone else
for how much do they drink
while we overeat?
Hypocrite.
It's hypocritical to judge
someone for their foul mouth
while we gossip.
Hypocrite.
It's critical to chastise
someone for cheating on their taxes.
When you steal from your employer
by showing up late and leaving early,
hypocrite.
It's hypocritical to degrade people
because they're lazy
and yet you're completely out of shape.
Hypocrite.
It's hypocritical to say
health is really important to me
and then live and eat unhealthy.
It's hypocritical
to live by the law of materialism,
a credit card debt, and then beg God
to get you out of financial trouble.
It's hypocritical
to live a sick life
and ask God for healing.
A standard for others.
Exceptions for self.
True discipleship
is a transformed life
because there's been an interior
change.
D.L. Moody,
one of the great evangelists and preachers
of the 19th of the 20th century,
the last century
wanted.
He'd never met Charles Spurgeon,
and he really wanted to.
And so Dale Moody decided
he would go over to
to London to meet Spurgeon unannounced,
two of the greatest preachers
in evangelists
of the last hundred years.
And D.L.
Moody showed up at Spurgeon House
unannounced, knocked on the door.
Spurgeon opened the door with a cigar,
smoking a cigar, and Dale Moody
said,
how can you, man of God, do such things?
And Spurgeon, looking at D.L.
Moody, who was a portly large man,
padded Dale Moody on his belly and said,
and how can you,
man of God, do such things?
See, when
we have a standard for ourselves
that's different from others?
Hypocritical.
Do you follow?
And so
the same could be said
of worry and fear that you carry
when we claim
to trust the sovereignty of God and claim
to believe in Romans 828,
that God works all things
together for good,
and yet live with worry and fear.
Hypocrite.
Do you see how quickly this hits home?
Therefore, you have no excuse, old man.
Every one of you who judge
for a passing judgment on another,
you condemn yourself
because you, the judge, practice
the same, very same things.
We know that judgment of God rightly falls
on those who practice such things.
Do you suppose,
oh, man, you who judge those who practice
such things, and yet do them yourselves,
that you will escape the judgment of God?
All we have to do
is look in the mirror
and find a hypocrite.
So the questions we ask ourselves
is this what am I requiring from others
that I'm excusing? And myself?
Am I harder on others failures
than I am on my own?
What standard do I proclaim
better than I preach and practice?
Those are the questions.
The sign of a hypocrisy is this
I always have a rule
for you and a reason for me.
Listen, I know what time is,
but we're going to get through this.
You blind guy string out a that
and swallowing a camel.
This is where Jesus lightens the mood.
This is a joke.
Hebrew Hebrew humor was exaggeration.
So at this point, it's like, look,
I know that you're getting,
like, a little uncomfortable,
so let me lighten the mood.
And he says, look, it's like straining
in that and fall on the camel.
And they're like, that's so funny.
Jesus, you crack me up
because this is funny.
And so they would
literally cover their cups
with a little cloth
so that a gnat wouldn't get in,
because the Old Testament law says
you can't have any blood in an animal
when you eat it.
And so they're afraid
there might be a little bit of blood
in a nat
and accidentally swallow than that.
And so they've ingested blood.
And so break the command.
And Jesus is like, look,
you go to that extreme for some things,
but yet you swallow a camel.
Are you kidding me?
So he's just putting the throttle down
and watch this.
This the this next.
This goes pretty quickly here.
There's not a lot of explanation
I have to make over these next
few passages,
but I want to point out
these next two ways that we're hypocrites.
The second way is this
hypocrite regarding myself
when my inside life doesn't
match my outside life,
where my heart doesn't match my habits.
And so Jesus says here in verse
25 and following.
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites!
For you
clean
the outside of the cup and the plate,
but the inside are full of greed
and self-indulgence, you blind Pharisee.
First clean the inside of the cup and
the plate, that the outside may be clean.
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees,
you hypocrites, for
you are like whitewashed tombs
which outwardly appear beautiful,
but within are full of dead
people's bones and all uncleanness.
So you also outwardly appear
righteousness, or righteous
others, but within your full of hypocrisy
and lawlessness.
He says, you're outside
doesn't match your inside.
Outside you look clean
and polished inside your dead.
And this is easy for us to do.
We look great on Sunday morning, right?
We're all smiles
and happy and joyful. Trust God. Oh,
and inside we're just.
We're a mess. We're broken, we're dead.
During the Passover time,
they would paint all these roadside tombs
so that they were painted white
and they looked good
so that people wouldn't accidentally touch
what hell, deadness and defile themselves
before they sell the Passover.
That's what I was during this time.
And he says that's what some of you are.
You look great on the outside,
but there's nothing but dead and decaying
rot on the inside.
Take care of the inside
before you adjust the outside.
He's not saying don't address the outside.
He say make sure the outside his address,
because the inside has been transformed.
Because true discipleship
is the transformation of the outside.
Because the insides been
transformed. Do you follow?
We have to ask ourselves, what do I say?
I believe that my life says I don't.
Hypocrisy.
How far is the distance
between my confession and my conduct?
Hypocrisy.
If one were to watch my life
without hearing my words,
what would they
think is the highest priority of my life?
To follow?
Is there a gap between what I say
and how I live?
Is that football practice last week
and there's one of our guys in our team
is wearing this shirt under his pads
and says, Jesus is Lord, Jesus is King.
Oh my God,
I like the shirt and he's in the huddle.
You get your.
So between plays
I walked up and pulled a shirt.
Listen, if you're going
to wear that, clean that up.
It just
if there's a discrepancy,
there's there's some hypocrisy.
Now here's the good news.
I'm so thankful
that God forgives hypocrites,
because if he didn't, I'm damned.
You follow.
Lastly,
hypocritical regarding God.
Look at this.
What do you scribes and Pharisees,
you hypocrites?
For you
build the tombs of the prophets
and decorate the monuments
of the righteous, saying,
if we had lived
in the days of our fathers,
we would not have taken part with him
in the shedding of blood of the prophets.
Thus you witness against yourselves
that you are sons of those who murdered
the prophets.
Fill up, then,
the measure of your fathers.
You serpents, you brood of vipers!
How are you to escape
that being sentenced to hell?
Therefore I send the prophets and wise
men and scribes.
Some of you, you will kill and crucify,
and some you will flog in your synagogues,
and persecute from town to town,
so that on
you may come all the righteous blood
shed on the earth,
from the blood of the righteous, able
to the blood of Zechariah,
the son of Bakura, whom you murder
between the sanctuary and the altar.
Truly, I say to you, all these things
will come upon this generation.
He just lays into them.
He says, you're bunch of snakes
and brood of vipers.
Satan is called the serpent.
Baby snakes are baby Satan's.
You follow?
That's what he's saying to them.
He said you've killed every profit
from Abel, the righteous one,
whose the Bible says his blood cries out
from the earth to Zechariah,
not the prophet Zechariah,
but the son of Bakura, listed in Second
Chronicles, which is the last book
of the Hebrew Old Testament Bible.
From beginning to end,
he says, you've killed the prophet,
you've killed those, you've crucified him.
And I think he was pointing to himself
because he knew what was coming.
And he says, you have the audacity to say,
how do we live?
Back then, we wouldn't have been as bad
as they are hypocrites, he says.
We say the same thing.
How could they miss it so badly?
If I'd have been a disciple,
if I'd have seen Jesus move,
I would have done what they did.
He says. Hypocrites.
You're worse than them because you're
redefining what God has said.
See, we have to understand.
Isaiah 29,
these people draw near to me with
their mouths and honor me with their list.
But their hearts, they're so far from me,
hypocritical towards my father.
So the questions are these
where have I decided that
my opinion outrageous.
God's word
critical.
What does God clearly call right and wrong
that I want to redefine?
Tip critical.
The question
is, am I submitted to Scripture
or am I editing scripture
until it agrees with me?
Hypocrites.
Every one of us.
The great sign of hypocrisy
is calling Lord, calling Jesus Lord,
while over
reserving the right to override him.
So clear a sign of hypocrisy, calling
Jesus Lord
while reserving the right to overrule him.
He cannot be Lord.
If we have the right to overrule him,
it's a clear sign.
Hypocrisy.
So may our prayer be the prayer of David.
Teach me your way, Lord,
that I may rely on your faithfulness.
Give me an undivided heart.
A hypocritical heart is a divided heart.
Give me an undivided heart
that I may fear your name.
I will praise you, Lord my God,
with all my heart.
I will glorify your name forever.
My dear friends.
We ought to make it our prayer.
God revealed to me
the duplicity and hypocrisy of my own life
that I may repent.
And friends, in repentance
is wholeness and forgiveness,
and in repentance
God gives all that his grace can allow.
But it doesn't come without repentance.
No one in the Bible who repented
was ever turned away by God.
Everyone in the Bible
who repented was shown mercy and grace
and the unmerited favor of God,
but it came through repentance.
Hypocrisy is not just
messing up
because we didn't live up to our beliefs.
That's human and that's sin.
In repentance is forgiven
because of God's grace,
because of the blood.
Jesus said on the cross,
when you and I fail is not hypocrisy.
If we repent.
And plead the blood of Jesus over our sin,
please understand this that God's grace
is infinitely greater than my sin
and your sin.
And God loves to forgive more
than you love to sin.
That's good news.
So repent
and be made new.
Aren't you?
Pray with me.
Father.
I thank you that you love us.
And regardless of our hypocrisy
and duplicity,
your love for us doesn't change.
Thank you.
We're doomed if you would love us
based on our performance.
So thank you that your love remains.
And because your love remains, you
offer us a way for healing and wholeness.
And that comes through repentance.
And so I pray in this moment,
Holy Spirit, I ask in this moment
that you would convict us
who need to be convicted,
that we would set aside
our pride, set aside our arrogance,
set aside our hubris, set aside
our agendas, set aside
everything that would keep us
from repentance.
That would be authentic
with ourselves and before you,
and repent
of our sin and hypocrisy.
Every one of us, father.
And father, in repentance,
would you grant all the favor
and blessing that your grace will allow?
Jesus, thank you for sharing your blood
on the cross so my sin could be forgiven.
I admit my hypocrisy.
I know I'm a hypocrite
and I'm pulling the blood of Jesus over me
in repentance.
Father. Forgive me.
Thank you.
Father, I ask for me that you give me
all that your grace will allow.
I don't want to leave.
Live a hypocritical life,
a life of duplicity.
Father, I want to be full of integrity
as far as my relationship with you
is concerned.
So thank you.
And I plead the blood over me and over us.
Lead your people to repentance.
In your name I pray. Amen.
Friends, I realize what time is.
All right.
Don't worry about it.
This is.
This is more important than a clock
right now.
There's going to be people up front.
There'll be people in the back to.
You can absolutely go to God.
It's in your own life, in prayer, 100%.
But it is even more powerful
when we solidify that with somebody else.
So I encourage you, set aside whatever
is holding you back from just approaching.
Someone said, just
would you just pray with me?
I want to get rid of some of this.
Would you just pray with me
and let them pray with you?
While we sing
during the song and after.
I just.
I feel like
some of you are on the verge of God
doing some incredible stuff in your life.
If you would just
repent.
Man, don't miss it.