Global Association of Hypocrites

June 07, 2016

I wish they had a website. Although they don’t, I know your name (my dear reader) may have been on their membership list if they did. You may not have officially subscribed to it, but your mere actions granted you membership. Undoubtedly, some names may have been cancelled from their membership list (or maybe never existed on it). I don’t know which group you belong to; but, once you’ve started reading, I would entreat you to read to the end.

“This church is filled with a bunch of hypocrites! I can’t believe he did that!” And then it becomes a topic for hot gossip until we have finished “him” in our minds and have run out of things to say. Subconsciously, as we met out judgement (which is God’s work) on the “sinner”, we feel increasingly righteous. We instantly forget how many clothes we coveted when we entered the church, how many people (in addition to this poor sinner) we gossiped about, the evil we thought about our closest friend, among many others. Yet, because the sin of this “sinner” has been made public, we have been automatically excused of our lingering, unconfessed sins, as long as the “sinner” stays in the spotlight.

Let me clearly illustrate my point if it still sounds obscure to you. A church board meeting was arranged to determine the fate of two young people in the church. The young man was the son of the church Pastor, and the young woman was the daughter of the church elder. The reason was simple: as a result of an affair between them, the young lady was pregnant. In attendance at the board meeting was a deaconess and a choir leader, and in conjunction with the attendees of the meeting, the verdict was to suspend the culprits for 6 months. Although the verdict was a painful one to almost all present, the general feeling was to discipline them in the love of Christ. It was difficult to ignore the verbal aggressiveness of deaconess and choir leader, who went about ranting about how the leaders of the church were being hypocritical and how they had tarnished the image of the church by the actions of their children. What you don’t know (but I do know) about this story is that the deaconess has had five successful abortions and the choir leader’s first two girlfriends died in abortions he forced them to do. Clearly, the reason they were “righteous” at the moment was that their sins had not been found out.

Neither is any creature that is not manifest in His sight, but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do. Hebrews 4:13

An inspired writer, Ellen White wrote that “We will be judged by the light we have received”. I didn’t fully understand this quote until recently, it helped me understand what Jesus said in Matthew 7:1-5

Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 2 For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.3 “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 4 How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye

Now the point: God has given men different amounts of the lights of His truth, according to His infinite wisdom. How often had you not heard the word of God until one day, it hit you so hard you couldn’t turn back! You realize that you “have put on the new man, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created (you)” Col 3:10.

Consequently, you began seeing things in the light of Jesus, which He gave you by His grace, and so you “put off your old man with its deeds” Col 3:9 and “crucified the flesh with its affections and lusts” Gal 5:24.

My question is: how about those that have not received as much light as we have? Do we have the right to judge them and gossip about their deeds? Let me give you a better alternative: Pray for them. Imagine we prayed for all the numerous people we constantly gossiped about. I can assure there would be a major boost in the number of people who give their lives to Jesus each day if we prayed instead of gossiped, if we encouraged instead of criticised. If we blessed instead of cursed, if we smiled, instead of frowned. After all, if we were honest with ourselves, we would notice that we are no better than these people we treat like the “chief of sinners”.

How many Christians have left the church because of our judgmental attitudes! How many of them that came because they wanted a “home” have turned back because they saw a “court room with many judges” instead. Indeed, everyone is a blood-bought Child of God; and had it been just one human being on earth, Jesus would have still come to die.

“Whosoever shall break one of the least of these commandments and teach others to do so shall be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven, but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven” Matthew 5:20

If this whole judging thing is still hard for you to grasp, kindly remember the following facts: not everyone has yet received the amount of light that we have, and so we should pray and encourage such people so that they are able to withstand the great temptations the devil brings to them; the second and most important is: every one is a Blood-Bought child of God!

So now you see why you may be an active member of the Global Association of Hypocrites? I pray the Holy Spirit impresses this truth upon your heart. Amen