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We share stories of how the blood of Jesus has transformed ours and others' lives.
Denalee:
Hey everybody, I'm Denalee Bell and welcome to the Red Ledger. Tyler Bell is joining us remotely from Arizona. What's going on? So today we are going to talk about why people hate Christians. It is a thing, the world is very different than when I was growing up. It's very acceptable to hate Christians where it wasn't when I was a kid. So we can see this in social media, we see it in the movies, we see it in every part of our lives. And I wanted to investigate further why this was happening. And I found some answers that I wasn't necessarily thinking I would find. I found that people cited a range of reasons on my social media and directly to me. They were very passionate about why they hated Christians, my non-believing friends. But you know what I found interesting, Ty, they were super respectful.
That's cool. They were very polite about it and very kind. I really appreciate that. I do too. And I was actually shocked by it. I thought I was going to be hit with more vitriol and I was hit with vitriol. But guess from who? Christians. How strange The Christians were really defending their right to be hated properly. So because Jesus said we were going to be persecuted, and so if we're going to follow him, we're going to be persecuted. But what I found through the responses, they did ring true with me. We don't show the love of Jesus. We can be very judgmental. And the number one reason that people cited for hating Christians was the hypocrisy. While I'm not here to bash on Christians, I am here to maybe enlighten and expose some areas where we're doing ourselves a disservice, where we are really actually asking for some of the persecution that is being brought upon us, where it is our own fault, it is warranted, and what we can do about it.
Because our whole goal in Christianity is not for people to like us and love us, to bring other people to God. It's to be disciples. It's to share the love of God with others so that they might be saved too. Right. Amen. When I was preparing for this, I found myself in a couple of situations where I didn't think I was necessarily a hypocrite. Even one of the people I asked who explained what hypocrisy was to them and Christianity, he didn't really have the word for it, but he said it really well. He says, it's when people have this moral standard that they want everyone to live by, that they're not living by themselves. And I thought, that is just perfect, right? And I could see his frustration with it and why he didn't like Christians for this reason. And I thought, well, have I ever been that way to you? And I asked him the question and he goes, well, no. And so I thought, okay, well I must not be a hypocrite then.
Tyler:
Little did you know,
Denalee:
Little did I know later that day I would be exposed by my own son. That's awesome. So your brother, I love to kind of go over our podcast with him. He always has some interesting insight and brings an interesting perspective. And so we were talking about the hypocrisy podcast and really the negativity that hypocrisy brings into life. And we kind of moved the conversation into more gossip and negative energy that people bring. And we were talking like, yes, we just hate that gossip and that negative energy. And then I had the perfect example of somebody who brings gossip and negative energy that I shared with him. And I realized, oh my goodness, I am literally doing the thing. I am gossiping about someone after I just said how much I didn't like gossip. And the reason I don't like gossip is it because if somebody's going through something and people gossip about it, you're just bringing more negativity to it.
You're not helping the solution. We should be praying for that person. We shouldn't be helping beat them up and bring more bad words into the world about them. So it was kind of funny, and he really drove the point home when he said, yeah, but it's okay when it's us, right mom. And he wasn't really saying it was okay. He was piggybacking off the hypocrisy topic. It was pretty awesome, but not really. It was very humbling. It was very humbling. It really opened my eyes and exposed that. I do have some issues with hypocrisy even on social media. I go on there and I really am big about being the love of Christ and learning about what love looks like. Been my journey is to learn what love looks like so I can heal and I can help people heal. I understand the importance of it.
But when I go on social media, it seems like I forget that when I used to go on social media and talk about politics or religion, I almost became this troll when somebody wasn't getting it. If they were blind to something or if they didn't see the truth. When I presented them with the fact I was like this evil troll. I wasn't sharing light. I was just causing strife and chaos. And the truth is, I really did want them to see the truth. I really did want them to see the perspective I was presenting. But how if I was beating 'em up, I mean, it doesn't even make sense. So I don't know. Tyler, do you have any of these embarrassing stories you might want to share to take some heat off me for a minute?
Tyler:
Literally the same exact ones that you just said are the ones that I kind of prepared for this. So I was working at a restaurant and definitely gossip became a part of my life. I was living a dramatic part of my life when I was working there. And I definitely was a certain topic to be talked about at the restaurant. I found myself being pretty upset about it when I found people were talking about me or talking about my situation. But I would also be the same person that was jumping in on the gossip when I could. So yeah, just wasn't very pretty.
Denalee:
Isn't it funny how we all hate it when we're gossiped against, but
Tyler:
It's it
Denalee:
So fun, easy to jump in,
Tyler:
Share the tea, what's going on? Yeah, I definitely also jump online. I think I've done a better job at it now, but with disagreements when it comes to theology or atheist arguments, I would definitely get a little bit more passive aggressive and maybe a little meaner and condescending. And that's not the love of Christ. And I think I'm doing a much better job at it now, but I've definitely been that person. It's just like it's not helping. It's only making it worse. It's only driving 'em further away from it. Who wants to be someone like that?
Denalee:
I doubt that there's anyone watching this who hasn't been hypocritical in some area of their life. And I doubt there's anyone that's watching this that hasn't been affected by a hypocrisy in some area of their life. So I think the problem is we just don't know it. Sometimes I think we live in a world also where people don't even care about the truth, where it's more important that they're right or their side is right.
Tyler:
I could not tell you how many times I've heard if God was actually real and he showed up, would you believe in him? And they'd still be like, no. If there was die hard evidence, they'd still be like, nah,
Denalee:
It's interesting, huh? They don't want to believe. And it could be for any reason in politics, you can present somebody with a fact either way. And I've noticed it's easier to see this now. The extremism is so far on the right and left that they've come together in some ways in their anti-Jewish hate. They've really come together the extreme and left. And you can really see if you present them with a fact, they believe an interesting ideology. But if you present them with a biblical fact, they don't want to hear it. Even if it's historically biblically in every way truth, they don't want to hear it because it doesn't really support their position.
Tyler:
And that's what I think has kind of turned into ideology over truth for a lot of people now. Instead of like, oh, what's the actual truth? And can I have humility to see that being the truth? And can I set my own personal opinion and preference to the side and care more about the truth?
Denalee:
And there's the gain of power, the power of who they want to empower or who there's a gain for them. They're wanting,
Tyler:
How can I feel better about myself?
Denalee:
It could be. There's so many reasons I could be, and I really notice there's just a few hypocrisies I've noticed, and I'm sure we've all seen it. So I'm going to say we have to be really careful about the words we use because we'll get in trouble with the algorithms. So I'm going to say the great weather chain. So I noticed a really popular celebrity that I even like and have followed for years because she's just been popular forever. And I really kind of like her. And she was posting recently about from her private yacht how we need to be better stewards of the environment, which I do believe we need to be given
Tyler:
Stewards. Oh, I thought it was a private jet.
Denalee:
No, she was from her yacht, but she has a private
Tyler:
Jet. Oh, she's from the yacht. Oh, yeah. But she flies across the world for her tours on our private jet.
Denalee:
Yes. And she was talking about how we're not doing enough for this weather issue we're having, right? If I say the words, we'll get banned. So anyway, and she was a little dismayed at all the heat she got because she does have multiple yachts. She does have a private jet, she does travel frequently. She has multiple homes, all things that are incongruent with the message she was trying to put out there for the rest of us, for the masses, I get to do all these things, but I need you guys all to watch the crisis. Right. Rules for the but not for me. And it's this kind of elitist view that the masses are not taking well to. And here's the problem is I do believe we need to be good stewards of our environment. I don't know that I agree with everybody's way on how to do that because we need to be good stewards of all of our resources, our finances, the earth, everything. The problem is when people talk like that and their actions don't support their narrative, it's hard to believe and then nobody believes that we should do that. It becomes almost a defiance that happens. So people are going to push against it. Now you have all these celebrities and all these politicians screaming at you do it this way.
Tyler:
It's like weak authority. And why would I want to follow that?
Denalee:
Right? Oh, so you believe this or you're pushing this narrative, but you don't really believe this, so why should I believe this? And I think that happened too with the masks during the great flu a couple years ago too, when we were told not to wear masks, then we were told to wear the masks because of course they would help. And it was really kind of hard to believe that they would help when you're walking into a restaurant, but not when you're sitting in the restaurant. The hypocrisy behind it was just hard for people to understand and take. And then even if they did work, which I would think that a handkerchief isn't probably going to do anything, but even if we did had the right masks and it worked, the hypocrisy behind it would make people resist. And that's what happened. People resisted, and I get it. I resisted like, this doesn't make sense. I was fine for the first two weeks. I'm all on board. Let's stop this if we can do two weeks to control this. But then the hypocrisy started to unfold, right? And then people started resisting.
Tyler:
Then common sense started to set.
Denalee:
Yes. But you can see a pattern here. People are hypocrites and then they resist the people that you're trying to bring around. Resist.
Tyler:
Funny how that works.
Denalee:
It is interesting. It is interesting. So we see all these kind of examples out in the world. Do you see any examples? And please post in the comments if there's examples you see in the world that make you resist the hypocrisy that is shown that make you resist.
Tyler:
Yeah. Yeah. Something that I personally see, and this isn't like one side of politics or the other, but it's a certain group of people who claim to be very tolerant, but only tolerate the ideas within their group and demonize any other opinion outside of their common ideology
Denalee:
And not in the interest of being neutral because I am conservative. I'll just say that. I'm seeing that on the extreme and the extreme left where, and it is kind of hilarious because this extreme is saying what you just said about the left, and then they're doing the exact same thing. And I think that happens whenever you get into the extremes of anything, which is part of the problem that your ideology becomes your God.
Tyler:
Yep. Literally. Yeah. Couldn't have said it better.
Denalee:
So we are seeing the hypocrisy in the world, and these are just real life world examples to start getting you to wrap your head around how you might be falling into hypocrisy. But we see it in the church as well. We see the clergy, the pastors, these people doing abusive things to the church, even to children.
Tyler:
I know the atheist community likes to dig into that one as if it's a complete full picture of what Christianity is for sure.
Denalee:
And I get it. I mean, it's fair. It happens.
Tyler:
I get it. Yeah. I mean if that's your only view of it, that would make sense.
Denalee:
Yes. And they need to be held accountable. They do What you just said about the atheist is so true. So they see a pastor at the pulpit telling you how to treat people in love and then abusing their congregation,
Tyler:
And that's your spiritual leader.
Denalee:
That doesn't something
Tyler:
I want to be a part
Denalee:
Of. So there's some issues with this that I have one, just like any group, we don't throw out the baby with the bathwater in any group. There are some bad apples and some bad characters. But this is what I don't think the Christians did properly in this. We didn't hold them accountable quickly and harshly enough. I think that was a problem. And then instead of holding them accountable, there was actual coverup. I think the coverup is as bad as the crime when we're covering that kind of sin. Instead of saying and excising it and moving it out of a position of authority, that's a problem. Yeah, I agree. That is completely a problem. And I think it's a fair reason to resist. And unfortunately the damage that these clergy have done is huge. It's unfathomable the amount of people they've pushed away from. God. My other problem is we have clergy that don't even believe in God.
Tyler:
Yeah, that's nuts.
Denalee:
Yeah. What was the
Tyler:
Statistic
Denalee:
On that? At one point it was like 50% from a pew research study, but I tried to find it online. It is much less, but they believe in God, but not like the biblical God. Wow. A very large percent. We see that waffle of, and this is the danger, what the church has done. They've moved with the cultural times instead of with the spirit of God and the Bible. So they're looking for a man's approval, right. In the church. Exactly. And that could be for a variety of reasons, power, money, greed. Who knows what it is, but it's the truth. So if you are seeking a truth or if you're seeking God, it is important to be in church. It is really an important part to assemble, but be really spirit led by that. Really pray about what church God wants you to go to. He's not going to lead you to a church of unbelief. He won't. And if you are in that church, ask him to expose to you if it is to move out. And I think I never really used that approach when I was picking a church before and I kind of bounced from a church to church for a little bit because I didn't pray about it. I just went. I just, oh, it's a church. God would want me at a church. It wouldn't really matter. But it is important. The church you choose is important. I
Tyler:
Think so too.
Denalee:
The things you feed yourself with are important. The words that you put in your head are important.
Tyler:
Agreed.
Denalee:
There are tons of other examples we see in the real world, but let's look at it from a family perspective on the way to church. When you were young, it was always this thing to get the kids ready and get to church and be there on time. And I'm herding cats. I'm not sure anyone wanted to go by me. And so I am getting everybody ready. I'm crabby, I'm complaining. I'm getting really
Tyler:
Worked up,
Denalee:
Vocal, worked up, and we're in the car. Your dad and I are fighting the whole way. We show up at church and we all put our perfect smile on. That is just a great example of some hypocrisy that unfortunately would make our children resist God. Because why? I mean, how do you show your kids that this is how we act and we're going to be fake here? I mean, that's pushing your family away from God.
Tyler:
I have this image of a Christian showing up late to church, being very thankful that the church is usually pretty accepting about that and leaning about it because they're just happier. You're there. But then kind of seeing the person walk in after you and being like, wow, they're really late.
Denalee:
So we're hypocritical with our family and then we're comparing ourselves to somebody else and being hypocritical with them. Yeah.
Tyler:
Yeah.
Denalee:
Sin begets sin. So we're walking in this hypocrisy and it just creates more of it and it creates more of it, and it grows into something which is the problem of hypocrisy. And it's
Tyler:
Easy to do it if you're not assessing your yourself and your behavior and being honest.
Denalee:
Yeah, exactly.
Tyler:
I think a big example for something that Christians do that is hypocritical is mainly the workspace gospel. They use people who struggle with certain behaviors, maybe drinking or watching corn, and they really condemn them and tell them that they're going to go to hell. Or if you don't get your behavior, you're risking your salvation and your eternity. And I don't think that those people realize that they're also sinners. And this really plays in particular for the person that's holding the repent sign in the middle of the street. When I was visiting Switzerland, me and Nicole, she's my fiance. We saw a couple and they're hanging. You have to believe in Jesus or else you're going to go to hell. And I think that might be one of, it's definitely not the best way to evangelize and bring the gospel to people. I think it is one of the biggest turnoffs because if you're throwing, trying to throw fear, if you're trying to threaten
Denalee:
It, strong arm somebody into Christianity,
Tyler:
Yeah, it's really lame. And I don't think I don't like it. It's not what Jesus did. Those people just don't often understand the message that they're portraying. And I think often it shows that they're saying that they're not sinners anymore and they're not right. But in the way that other people, worldly people, atheist people could understand. They think that they're saying, I'm holier than thou.
Denalee:
Well, it comes off that way because they're beating him over the head with, you're bad, you're evil. I'm good. That's the feel, right? And well, they are probably saying truth that you need to repent. This is what's going to happen.
Tyler:
I think leading with That's tough.
Denalee:
I don't see Jesus doing it. No, I think I see Jesus coming out with people with love when he was with sinners, right? They wanted more of what he had. They followed him. They had dinner with him. I can't imagine anybody on the street going, Hey, let's go have dinner after that. Which is fascinating. I
Tyler:
Couldn't imagine anybody saying, oh, well tell me more about this gospel that you believe. If I'm going to hell
Denalee:
No.
Tyler:
No. It's like this is
Denalee:
Lame. Exactly. So I just saw a guy doing this on YouTube. Your dad and I were watching it, and it was a repent sign and it had all the list of sins that they needed to repent from. And he was kind of on a loud horn at this college. I assumed it seemed like a college campus. And so some young people were kind of coming up and they were steaming mad. Now I will say the first one he disarmed. He was nicer when they got to him, but then I saw him looking at his phone while she was talking, getting ready for his next dart that he was going to throw at her. Just shoot
Tyler:
Intellectual bullets back and forth. It's like if you're going to stand on the street and represent Christ and your representation is fire and brimstone, I don't think anybody would want to follow that. God.
Denalee:
And you notice when Jesus was fire and brimstone, it wasn't with unbelievers. No, it was with the hypocritical Pharisees. That's who he got fired up about. He wasn't fired up about those who didn't know He was fired up about those who knew and did not do better. And I think that's interesting too in itself. But what I have to wonder about the repent guys on the street, the people screaming hell at people who don't even understand the gospel or the good news, the good news that we're supposed to be sharing. I think this is my theory. I think they must have been effective in some way in their mind at some point to keep doing this. So maybe they went and stood out on the street and someone talked to them and maybe that was enough. They thought they did something
Tyler:
Or someone encouraged them that was like a fellow Christian that maybe also believed in the worst space possible.
Denalee:
Exactly. But there is a much more effective way to lead people to Christ. And every story I've heard of a big conversion, like somebody who is Muslim or somebody who did not believe in a staunch atheist or somebody who was deep in sexual sin, it was never because someone beat 'em over the head with a sign. It was never because somebody preached hell at them. It was always somebody preaching the good news by behavior, not even preaching at them. They were modeling the behavior of love.
Tyler:
I would completely understand if that gave a spiritual encounter like expressing love.
Denalee:
Yes. So this Muslim man that I'm talking about, he was invited into a Christian home for Thanksgiving, and he saw the love, he heard the love in their prayer before their food, and he saw the love and they were careful about his culture. You know what I mean? There was certain things they were careful about, just out of respect, not out of unbelief. And that man came to Christ just from those things he says solidly. Those were the two things that happened. And I just think about all the people who want people to come to God. We do it in love. We don't push 'em away with our hypocrisy. Right.
Tyler:
Yeah. I think another point that I think Christians can be very hypocritical about is engaging in theological battles or intellectual battles online. I think seeing a group of Christians hatefully arguing with another group of Christians about how we're saved or about small theological matters is definitely discouraging to somebody who's seeking truth
Denalee:
Or somebody in the truth facts. So we're not called to fight amongst each other. We're called to be in unity. Chaos is not God. And I get a fun apologetic tour. I get that we're having fun. We're debating on some of the minors, right? Yeah, that's fine. I get it. If it's fun for you, you've done a ton of research. Where's the heart posture exactly. And where's the motivation? And it's always the motivation of the heart. Are we doing this to be righteous? Are we doing this for God? And I think that's where we get tripped up in everything in life. Yeah,
Tyler:
I agree.
Denalee:
So I want to kind of define hypocrisy a little bit. We've given some really good examples of it, which I think there is many more. Oh
Tyler:
Dude, yeah. You go for days.
Denalee:
There are many more for us to talk about, but it does. It comes from this Greek word that means to play, act, or to pretend. And in every instance of the Bible, and in these instances of hypocrisy, it seems there was some kind of gain and some kind of concealment. So this pretend we're concealing or we're hiding something from our outward appearance that is different than our inward reflection of who we are or of what we truly believe. Why would we do that? Probably for some kind of gain. Political powerful financial is usually the important one in current times probably all times, to be honest. I mean even Judas took some money. True.
There's a ton of reasons why people want gain, but I think sometimes we just don't even know that we're being hypocritical. In that instance of my example, I started gossiping and I didn't realize I was doing it, but then God gently convicted me and said, oh, you're doing this right? You're doing this right now, so I'm convicted. And then you step away from it and you repent and you step away. And that's that whole refining process. It's the motivation of my heart. Was I humble in that? Yes. I said, okay, I did do this. I'm sorry. God, we move on. It's the insincere people that your atheist friend has a problem with. Right? Facts. There's some normal persecution. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about the persecution that we could stop. It's the insincere that people have a hard time forgiving when we walk in humility and say, oh, okay, yeah, I messed up.
I did that. I shouldn't do that. When we apologize, when we repent, when we confess, when we live a different life after our mistake, that's a lot different than purposefully willingly living in that. Right? Okay. I know I'm being a hypocrite and I don't even care. I want this power. I know I'm a hypocrite and I don't even care. I'm going to get paid for this. I know I'm a hypocrite. We can see people promoting different narratives and you're like, I don't know if you really believe that because your actions are showing me something else. But I think it's all about the motivation of our heart. And I pray that as we go through this, that anybody who's experiencing this, God, please expose it to them. Please expose any hypocrisy and please expose the motivations of our hearts so that we may be able to bring people closer to him.
Tyler:
Agreed.
Denalee:
So I mean, that was a long definition of why some people are hypo hypocrites. Why do you think people are hypocrites?
Tyler:
I think a lot of people are victims of the workspace Gospel. I kind of mentioned that earlier, meaning that you believe that your deeds, your good works, your value system grants you a spot into heaven. It breeds pride in it enters into your ability to, your manmade ability to be able to earn a spot of salvation and relationship with God. And it's just not what it is. It's a free gift. And when you approach it, I can earn it. It's a lot easier to look at another person who's at a different point in their journey and condemn them for their sin and not even realize that they are sinful themselves.
Denalee:
I think it is rooted in pride. I agree with that.
Tyler:
And I think this kind of correlates with misunderstanding your election. Why did God choose you? It's not because you earned it, it's because he loves you. It's not because of me, it's because of him. I
Denalee:
Think that root of pride is sometimes we're embarrassed of our behavior and we know we should be better. The example would be me acting like a moron on the way to church, but knowing I'm wrong, so putting on the better fake face for the church, or I've even done it in other areas of my church. I want in the past, I really work at not doing this anymore. But you want your pastor to, you want the friends at church to like you, so maybe you behave a little differently than you would in real life. And some of that is okay, meaning we're moving towards a better life and we know better.
Tyler:
Or you're trying to respect you're at church and you're not trying to swear. That makes sense. Right,
Denalee:
Exactly. You're respecting the institution. But the problem is, okay, now I know I'm not supposed to swear because it's not encouraging or uplifting in its language that isn't really beneficial. So why am I doing that in my real life?
Tyler:
And that starts the sanctification repentance process.
Denalee:
Exactly. And I think this is something that maybe people who aren't believers don't understand that that is a process. I think the problem they have, the bigger problem that they could point out accurately, so is sometimes there is no process sometimes. Okay, so we know swearing isn't really what God wants for us, so why are we still doing it?
Tyler:
People don't want to kill their sin.
Denalee:
Exactly. So you're able to clean it up here. Why not here? Yeah, because hypocrites, yeah, they're meaning me. They meaning me.
Tyler:
And it's hard to kill your sin life. It's the path of least resistance is not killing your sin and crucifying it. So I get it. I get why it happens. But before you go present yourself as a Christian, maybe you should look at how you can be a stumbling block. But hey, I've done the same thing. I'm not here trying to be a hypocrite. I've done the same thing. I'd probably do it every day. You know what I mean?
Denalee:
Every instance that I'm saying is something I have done or am doing, and I am really just preparing for. This has exposed to me what a deep problem it is. Jesus was pretty upset with the Pharisees for how hypocritical they were in the woes part of Matthew, the Matthew 23. I think he states seven or eight times calling them
Tyler:
Hypocrites. I think it might've been seven, but I'm not sure. Yeah.
Denalee:
Okay. I think, yeah, it was a lot. So in that one chapter and they taught about God, but they didn't honor or love him and he said they were going to keep people from him. And the people who followed him, they taught the law and obeyed the minor parts, but they missed out on the weightier parts, the justice, the mercy, the faithfulness. They presented themselves as righteous, but they weren't.
Tyler:
And hypocrisy is just trying to show how righteous you are to yourself or to other people instead of seeking to please God. So I see what would happen, man, it is easy to get there. It's easy to not even realize you're getting there. I get it.
Denalee:
Well, and it's easy for us to pick on the Pharisees who did do this,
Tyler:
Right? None of us want to be the Israelites in the desert. None of us want to be the Pharisees in the book. But a lot of the time we are.
Denalee:
But apparently that's who we're representing as Christians as a whole, because that's what people are seeing. And so we need to be made aware of it within ourselves so that we can change in our hearts can change and we can reflect. One person does make a difference. One person healing makes a difference of those who surround them, and it's a ripple effect. So it is important. So there's a ton of danger in hypocrisy, right?
Tyler:
Yeah, absolutely. I think a very good example of how dangerous it can be is in Galatians two kind of overarching the whole chapter to paint the picture of what's going on. Paul's traveling to Jerusalem with Barnabas, who is a Jewish believer in Titus, who is a gentile believer. Paul has a private meeting with a lot of the influential early Christian movement leaders. And Paul is presenting the message of Jesus that you are only saved by your faith. He's just confirming that this is the message for them, that they're all in agreement that this is the message I'm spreading around the world right now. The question that creates for the Gentile believers is now that I'm saved, do I have to start following the law? And ultimately they all agree that no, it's not necessary for Salvation Titus. You don't have to get circumcised. Even though that would be a requirement in the Mosaic law, Peter, James, and John, they agree by doing the right hand of fellowship, which I'm interpreting as kind of like an overt way of saying we agree with Paul and what he's saying. So you guys can also follow what he's saying because he's blessed by God. And not everybody though agrees. So Paul calls them false brothers. He says that they want to steal the freedom of Christ away from the Gentiles. And he also says they want to make Christians slaves to the law. And I think those are some
Denalee:
Strong language,
Tyler:
Strong language. I think that's some pretty strong words he has right there. So fast forward Peter or is visiting Paul in Antioch, and Peter has agreed by that right hand of fellowship agreement that Gentiles are saved if they believe in Jesus alone. And the traditional approach to Jewish law says that Jewish people and Gentile people cannot eat together. And that's what Peter was doing. He was eating with the Gentile people as a Jewish person. It was all fine and dandy until James and his followers, and a lot of them who didn't agree with what Paul was saying in Jerusalem, they walk in and Peter's like, oh man, I'm sitting with the Gentiles. He gets scared and he's trying to not look bad in front of the new company that James and his followers walked into. And he leaves the table and that ends up, meaning his influence influences all the Jewish followers to leave the table with him.
It said that Barnabas was led astray by this. And those are some big words as well. So immediately, Paul just opposes Peter to face the hypocrisy. And I think that might be a good example of maybe how we approach hypocrisy is just direct confrontation. And if you now live as a Gentile, he says, since you're eating as a Gentile, how can you force the Gentiles to follow the Jewish law on this? It's hypocritical as a gentile believer that's saved. And you came to agreement with this, how can they be saved if they can't eat with themselves? So all, ultimately, this all kind of dries back to the point of chapter two in Galatians that there's no reason for a Christian to believe that and behave like their works, their rituals or whatever, give them salvation. There's no need to behave like that. And no one can earn righteousness from following the law.
Denalee:
And I think the big hypocrisy for me too in that area was I'm going to eat with the Gentiles now unless the Jews show up. What message does that send? It kind of goes back to our earlier discussion about how, what is that going to do with the Gentiles? Are they going to resist now? Oh, what we were good enough for you to eat with when nobody was watching? Yeah, literally. What would that do? That would put up a wall, I would think and lead not just Barnabas astray, but others. And I'm not sure, but I think the scripture says that. Does it say it? And others?
Tyler:
Yeah. Yeah. It ended up, I think it just said Barnabas was led astray, but I could only imagine what kind of or based theology that breeded. You know what I mean? Right. Thank goodness. Paul stood up for it and said something about it and confronted it because maybe how many more could have been led astray.
Denalee:
There's multiple problems of that
Tyler:
For how hypocrisy affects people. It deceives the hypocrite. So it deceived Peter, it damages the unbelievers and it also dishonor God, I would say it also damages believers as we can see in this whole chapter. So Peter was more interested in that moment to how he looked to James and his followers looking to people please basically and look cool in front of his buddies. And because of that, a follower was damaged and who knows how many other people who saw that were like, I don't want to be a part of that. So hypocrisy, deceit, Peter, damage the ministry and ultimately dishonored God.
Denalee:
So hypocrisy is deceit and people, I mean, we just don't want to be part of deceit. No. And so how many people would this push away from God? Because they would believe, oh, maybe this isn't true because there's so much deceit involved already. You can see how it pushes people who are not even believers away from God.
Tyler:
Look, his biggest followers can't even get their stuff together.
Denalee:
Conviction, not condemnation here that, okay, so let's breathe a little easier that we are not the only ones who've ever been confronted with
Tyler:
This. Oh no. Yeah.
Denalee:
But see how God exposed it and they repented and turned away.
Tyler:
Right. We'll also see how much misrepresentation, accepting misrepresentation can be a problem. It's big words, but atheists won't see salvation. Yeah.
Denalee:
Lives are literally at stake here.
Tyler:
Yeah,
Denalee:
Exactly. Lives are at stake with our minor misrepresentation so that we can seek men's approval at the table. That minor thing that we're doing that we don't think is a big deal is stealing eternal life from other people.
Tyler:
Exactly. And I was watching the middle ground or that show on YouTube and it was basically Christians versus ex Christians. And the Christians asked the ex Christians, why did you leave Christianity? And more often than not, it was somebody just ruined it for 'em. Like somebody in their family, a girl came out as gay and her mom ripped up her birth certificate and sent it to her. There's these big things that hypocritical works based just focusing on the wrong things other than who Christ is and what he did for us. And focusing on behavior modification, I would say is the big one that they had. I think that it's just a big misrepresentation and they allow that misrepresentation to be their example of Christianity and they don't want to have a part in it.
Denalee:
So this is what I don't want people to misconstrue. We are to call out our brothers and sisters in Christ in love. It's not kind of us to not say truth to our brothers and sisters. That's the words in the Bible. And we are to share the gospel to the ends of the earth, to unbelievers. So sharing the good news, that's what the gospel means. The good news that crisis come and died for us, died for our sins that we could be transformed. I don't think we start the transformation before their, you know what I mean? We don't start beating up people over their sins, not that we should ever do that. And Jesus didn't do that. How did he confront people right now? Well,
Tyler:
It's like you don't have to be qualified to come to God. He qualifies you.
Denalee:
Yeah, we come dirty. He cleans us up. Okay, let people come dirty people. Don't clean them up before they get here. Let Jesus do his transformational work. We are here to plant seeds. We're here to plant the love and help disciples grow water and make disciples the seeds. For sure. And I'm not saying we don't hold our brothers and sisters accountable. Please don't misunderstand me, but I think there's a way to do that. And Jesus did it right too. So I believe that the Pharisees, there was no righteousness. It truly was a deceitful issue. They were blaspheming, I believe the Holy Spirit. They were saying, this isn't true. Jesus isn't true. The Holy Spirit isn't true. Right. They were saying that when they were saying that Jesus was speaking by a spirit but not from God. That is a completely different situation. We don't ever want to get to that point. And he called them fools. He called them blind. He called them blasphemers, right? Yeah. So I think we don't want to be that, right? Agreed. But we also want to reflect Jesus. And how did he handle sin? He wasn't ripping up birth certificates. He was sharing life. He was sharing truth
Tyler:
And love.
Denalee:
And that really made me sad, what you just told me. Yeah. It's
Tyler:
Bummer. And that was just one example. I mean, it was a laundry list of how people just destroy Christianity for them.
Denalee:
So this is the whole podcast on why people hate Christians and righteously so sometimes, and it breaks my heart. And you know what? It breaks my heart on what I may have done as I've been growing before. I decided to get the plank out of my own eye and started picking on everybody else. And part of the reason we do that, we don't want to deal with ourselves. It's easier to point the sin out in my husband than to deal with the sin in me. And we had this happen in our marriage where I thought if he would just fix his problem, the whole thing would be fine. Well, God worked on me and showed me, oh, he is not the problem.
Well, it was almost like women, we have so much influence. It is a great responsibility. And as I just quit looking at him, I realized the only person I can change is myself. And started looking inward and started walking with God. He started working on that plank in my eye and we started playing whack-a-mole, right? So I have a big issue, and then something else comes up and we're playing whack-a-mole. And it was kind of a beautiful journey because I'm still on it, but it's not as big as in the beginning. But I was that person who was pointing out all the sin in my husband and he's just pushing away from God. He doesn't even want any part of it. But the moment that I stepped back and started just working on myself, it's like that was removed, that animosity from him. And you can see why he wasn't resisting me because I wasn't being hypocritical, not working on all of the big stuff in me with the big plank in my eye, pulling out the silliness that he was doing.
Tyler:
Yeah, hypocrisy is a huge defense mechanism that you create for yourself because the whole world tells you to be a good person to do the right thing. And if you mess up, you're a bad person. If you mess up, if you do this, this and that, you are awful and you don't deserve love basically, especially the
Denalee:
Online culture. Well, and that's what I was
Tyler:
Doing, and especially with the online culture and and your example as well. It's like nobody is righteous, man. We're all messed up in my healing. Creates healing in you like you say.
Denalee:
And that's what happened. Not pointing out sin, but my healing. And that's what happened is God took me on this journey to learn what love really was because we had some other issues going on in our family at the time, and I only understood conditional love. Well, if you behave appropriately, I will love you. If not, I will withdraw because that's what I knew. And God just really taught me how to love during the process of pulling these planes out of my eye that I was unable to love your dad. And he got saved, not because I was beating him over the head, but because I was being more like what Jesus wanted me to look like. And it came naturally because he just transformed my heart. I learned these things. It changed how I was
Tyler:
Where the clay, he's the potter.
Denalee:
And we really just do not, I mean it's really important to get that plank out of our eye before we come at anyone. I don't think, and this may just be my story, but I didn't know how to come in love to somebody because I mean, I thought, well, I feel like I love you, but it was a worldly love. It wasn't a godly love. So make sure you understand that Godly love before you start beating people up. Just joking, don't beat people up. So I want to talk too, this is Luke 12 one. I just want to read it. Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy for there's nothing covered that will not be revealed nor hidden, that will not be known. Therefore, whatever you have spoken in the dark will be heard in the light. And what you have spoken in the ear, in the inner rooms will be proclaimed on the house tops. So Levin is a big deal. It's like yeast.
Tyler:
It spread subtly and pervasively. It is a quiet, sneaky snake. And you can see how that happened in the Galatians two story that I talked about. It happened. Peter didn't know. He didn't think about it that deeply. He was just like, I want to look cool in front of my buddies.
Denalee:
It snuck in. There's this little thing and it grew into this bigger deal and it's yeast, it's growing. It's like cancer. My pastor Doug Helton was teaching a class once and it was similar. It was about adding two things. It wasn't with Levin, but it was interesting. He goes, if you had a little bit of dog poo, you don't want to put it in your sandwich, do you? Not even a little bit. It would ruin the whole sandwich. Yeah, man, just a little bit of dog poo.
Tyler:
That's
Denalee:
So funny. And I thought that was funny. That's
Tyler:
Awesome. I love
Denalee:
That. I thought it was hilarious. And I kept thinking of this when I was reading this. We don't even want to put a little dog poo into our lives, into our food. So why would we want to put a little bit of this? Because sin begets sin and it grows and it's not covered, right? It will be revealed because it does grow. We're not fooling anyone. And I think that's part of the thing is I think hypocrites think they're fooling people. You look at politicians, right? They waffle from their belief system to belief system from what was popular then to popular now. And if you're alive as many years as I am, you've seen them go through the cycle of, okay, this is popular now. This is what I believe. I believe in God, this is popular now. Now, okay, now I don't believe in God. This is popular now. And it's fascinating to see, but it's easy to see the hypocrisy. Nobody can not see it. We're not fooling anyone so transparent. If you're being a hypocrite, everyone can see it so
Tyler:
Easy to see. Even if you are pretty good at deceiving, it's so easy. You can feel it.
Denalee:
Maybe you might be fooling one or two, but they'll come around, they'll see it because guess what did he say? There's nothing covered that will not be revealed, not worried, and that will not be known. Let him know. And maybe the people aren't seeing it, but guess what God is? God sees it all. He knows it. He knows your heart. So we got to clean up the inside of the cup and the outside because we come in and it may look all pretty, but it's the inside that needs cleaning, right?
Tyler:
I agree. I like it.
Denalee:
So I think we see the danger of hypocrisy, right? It leads people astray, it moves people from God. It moves people from what we really want them to do and is to be saved and to know truth because that's really what the world is lacking is truth, right? Yeah. I think it's full of deceit and it makes people resist us our ideas. It makes us resist the truth and it holds them in bondage because we're not sharing truth with them and they can't hear it. They can't hear it because we were deceitful in this area. They're not going to hear truth from us. So we have to be super careful.
Tyler:
Agreed. I mean, why would an atheist want to join a group of judgmental self-righteous, prideful, holier than thou people? Why would anybody want to join the members only club of cherry picking sin and say, this one's bad, and this one isn't for me because it's little and affects the world differently in my own worldly perspective.
Denalee:
Like we said earlier, people can forgive imperfection if we are humble and we're not aware and we just made a mistake, let's not give them a reason to persecute us. Okay? I don't mind persecution. If it's persecution because they persecuted Jesus. He told me this would happen. I don't mind that type of persecution. The persecution I have problem with is the stuff we're bringing on ourselves. Friends, I can see where I've deserved it in the past, but I also am concerned, and please again, I pray, God, you redeem anything that I did that move people away from you and send laborers to correct my mistakes and show them the love that they deserved that I didn't give. But from this day forward, bring me closer to that person that I want to be that reflects God in his will. And I believe the solution to all of this is really paying attention to the motives of our heart. What's your motive? What's your motive in every situation beyond hypocrisy? But that's what our topic is today. What is your motive? Do you want personal gain or do you want to bring others to God? Do you need man's approval or God's approval? What is the motive of your heart? And I think that's where everything starts in truth, if we're open to letting God speak to us and rebuild the motives, and expose the sin, expose the hypocrisy, that's when we get to change.
That's when we get to grow. And that's when we start to look more like the evidence of Jesus, because we're yielding to the Spirit. We're yielding to truth. We're letting him transform our hearts to look more like His. And then we're able to be part of the great commission, be part of the go. The go and create disciples, the go and spread, the good news, the gospel underneath that law of love that covers all of this. If you don't remember any of this, figure out what love looks like to God. Not worldly love, not sitcom, not romance, comedy love, but godly love.
Tyler:
Agreed.
Denalee:
So in closing, the motivation of your heart is important, but so are your actions. You'll do the Holy Spirit. Let God transform your heart. Be kind to people, be kind. Learn what godly love is. Reflect that to people. Pull the playing side of your eye before approaching their brothers and sisters in Christ. And that process, you will be transformed to the love of Christ so that people can really see and hear you and hear him.
Tyler:
We're all human beings. We all sin every day. God's greatest command is to love him with all of our hearts and love other people like Jesus. I don't think any of us do that every day. We all live in a broken, fallen world. I don't care how Christian we think we are. When legalistic, self-righteous Christians are guilty of the same sin. They're yelling at the world for they're being a hypocrite. They also sin. The only perfect person was Jesus. And none of us deserve salvation after our trespasses against the holy and just God. No one is righteous enough to meet the standard, and that's why we need Jesus.
Denalee:
That being said, no matter what you have done, no matter how much you've fallen short, God still loves you. He's chasing you down. If you're watching this and you haven't been saved, he might be chasing you down, okay? Because I have fallen short. I have great sin. I would be embarrassed to lay it all out here before you, but I will if it would mean you would come to Jesus. And I tried to save myself. I failed. I couldn't do it. I tried to earn salvation. I couldn't. The only way to salvation is through Jesus. He's the light, the truth, and the way He's the only way. And God loves you so much that he gave you his only begotten son so that you could be saved so that you would be saved in eternity. But also here on earth, there is a freedom that comes with being saved here on earth that you can experience that I didn't fully understand. And I don't even think I could fully explain, but until you walk in it, and he wants you to have that eternal life,
Tyler:
Not just eternal life, like eternal life with him, like an intimate relationship with him forever. It's romantic
Denalee:
And not in a romcom sort of way, but in a Jesus sort of way. And he said, whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life. And if you're not saved and want to be given that eternal life and a life of freedom here on earth, real life, you can take that step now and just say this prayer with us. I'm just going to pray with you. Dear Father, you said, whoever should call upon your name will be saved. I am calling upon your name. I repent. I turn away from my sin and turn to you and make you my Lord. You said, if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, that I would be saved. I make this confession now. I believe Jesus Christ is the son of God. He died on the cross for my sin. He was raised from the dead for my victory. He paid a dear price for my sins. I confess him as my Lord and Savior. Thank you Jesus, and welcome to the Family Friend.
Tyler:
Amen. And thank you guys for watching. We had fun doing this. Let us know what kind of content you want to see from us. We really enjoyed doing this podcast and preparing for it. It's definitely kind of a more stark turn from what we've done in the past. And if you haven't noticed, we're part of, we're doing the Red Ledger now. Which do you want to explain what that is, mom?
Denalee:
Yeah. So we just rebranded from Soapy Box because I started feeling convicted that I don't know that my rants really needed a place. My heart was on red ledger, which was about the blood of Jesus and our words about them, whether they be written or spoken. And it's our testimonies. It's what we've learned in our days as we spend with Jesus and what he pours into our heart. And we want to share that with you. And please know that we are not theologians, we are students. We are his disciples, and we are humans, which means we are not infallible. So please bean and match anything we say to the word. And please also be brothers and sisters in Christ. If we missed it, please bring it to our attention. We want to learn and grow too.
Tyler:
And if you like this content, please like and subscribe, share it. Definitely comment what you think, what you liked, what you didn't like, what you agreed, what you didn't agree with, times you've seen hypocrites times, you've been a hypocrite. Just everything. Let us know what you're thinking. But yeah, thanks for tuning in and see you later.
Denalee:
Thanks.