Hypocrisy
1 Timothy 3:8-13
By Pator Jordan Hines

At this time, you can stand as Ryan comes to give scripture reading. Good morning. This morning we're going to be in one Timothy, chapter three, verses eight through 13.

Jonathan asked me to fill in at the last second, so I'll be reading scripture this morning. So likewise, deacons must be reverent, not double tongue, not given too much wine, not greedy for money, holding the mystery of the faith with a pure conscience. But let these also first be tested.

Then let them serve as deacons, being found blameless. Likewise, their wives must be reverent, not slanderers. Temperate, faithful in all things.

Let deacons be husbands of one wife, ruling their children and their own houses well. For those who have served well as deacons, obtain for themselves a good standing and great boldness in the faith which is in Christ Jesus. Let's pray and go to the Lord in prayer.

Heavenly Father, Lord, we love you. We thank you for your mercy and your grace, and we thank you for the beautiful weather outside. We thank you for your scripture reading this morning.

How deacons are to be. Father, we just pray and ask that you help us to ponder those things and to reflect. Glory to you.

And just, we just pray and ask that you would give pastor the words to preach this morning and pray that our hearts will be attentive to you. This morning, we thank you for everything. In Jesus name, amen.

This morning we're continuing our series through, really, what the church is, but more specifically, what a deacon is. And I'll forgive you for not remembering the last time we talked about this, because it's been a few weeks, because we talked about the context of what a deacon is. And we looked to acts, chapter six, and we were talking about, really just the context of there being a need, about the widows not being cared for, and about there being a problem in verses one and two of chapter six of acts.

And then the solution was brought forth by the apostles to have men of God, men of godly character, not necessarily men that were highly qualified in a worldly sense, but men of God, men of character, to serve tables. And really, that's the impetus or the beginning point, the starting point for why we have deacons. Now, deacons solve the problem, but ultimately the problem is solved by each and every one of us being the church and serving one another.

And then the next week, we finished the passage, and we talked about how deacons attend to the needs of the church through spiritual qualifications and also their natural tendencies towards service. And this resulted in a healthy, growing church. And the process of picking those deacons was looking for men who had certain character qualities.

And the results spoke for themselves as the church grew and multiplied and the church was healthy. And as Ryan already read for us this morning, one Timothy 3813 says, likewise, deacons must be reverent. This was where we're going more into qualifications.

This is later on in history, as Paul speaks to a church that's more established. Likewise, deacons must be reverent, not double tongued, not given to much wine, not greedy for money, holding the mystery of faith with a pure conscience. But let these also first be tested.

Then let them serve as deacons, being found blameless. Likewise, their wives must be reverent, not slanderers. Temperate, faithful in all things.

Let deacons be the husband of one wife, ruling their children in their own house as well. For those who have served as well, serve well as deacons, obtain for themselves a good standing and great boldness in the faith which is in Christ Jesus. And today, really, we're going to talk about one word from this passage.

I promise we're not going to be crawling through this passage at that pace the entire time. But we're talking about something that really the world has on its mind when it comes to the church. And that word is hypocrisy.

The word hypocrisy is powerful because people identify it with maybe a certain event that took place where they felt like they were wrong. Maybe they see sin in someone's life and it was unrepentant, and they don't see the church as really operating the way it should. And the reality of the situation is, is that we all have hypocrisy in our life in some way or another.

We all have sin. We all are incongruent with what we say we are at times because we have a sin nature, because we have a sin problem, and yet we are still believers. We still have a firm foundation.

So as we go to this text, we cannot come with a pompous, high attitude of, this is what these people needed. This is what I need today. Hypocrisy is a problem, and especially in the context of a deacon, because a deacon is to be a leader, is to be someone who is looked towards as a spiritual person, a person who can be emulated, and someone who can be replicated in the church.

So as we look to this passage, let's pray. Let's ask God to help us come with humble spirits, with humble eyes, so that we ourselves can be changed. God, you have truly challenged us with the idea that we are sinners.

Often we don't like to think of ourselves in this way because we are saved. We are positionally perfect, and yet we do deal with sin. We have to reconcile the fact that we have a sinful nature tearing us or trying to tear us in the opposite direction of you.

God, help us to not be hypocrites. Help us to not walk in this way as we are about to read through. God, you have truly given us a genuine salvation and help us to live out that genuine salvation so that people do not call us hypocrites.

People can see that we are perhaps different from the people who have sinned against them. God, we are thankful for this church and for what it stands for. I pray that as we look at this text that we would see it with humble spirits, humble eyes, and walk away different as a result.

In your son's name we pray. Amen. If you ever have gone to a job interview and have heard the questions that an interviewer would ask, you might see there's positive questions of what are your strengths? Or what do you like to do? What have you done in the past, but also what are your weaknesses? What are the red flags that we see in your career, in your work life? One of the things we're looking at today, in fact, the next couple times, is going to be what a deacon avoids.

And one of the things a deacon avoids is hypocrisy. The big idea is that we are to avoid hypocrisy in all of our relationships, but especially here in the context of the office of deacons. And to do that, we're going to do something slightly different.

We're not going to stay in this text the entire time. In fact, there's a couple other texts we're going to, but we're going to start with definitions of hypocrisy just so we have an understanding of what we're really talking about. Because when you say the word hypocrisy, some people think of just someone who doesn't speak the truth.

Some people think of someone who lives differently than than what they say. Some people just think of a personality. Like, we need to define what a hypocrite really is in a biblical sense.

And then we're going to do some further study on hypocrisy. And then we're going to tackle the hypocrisy problem in the modern church. Not in a comprehensive way, obviously, but we're going to see that we ought to be avoiding hypocrisy.

We ought to be not living in it. So let's begin just with some very simple definitions in the text. The word that we're looking at focusing in on is double talking.

It's also, it's really hypocritical or insincere speech. It's meaning what you're saying is not really what you're doing or what you believe. The Holman illustrated Bible Dictionary says the word is based on a Greek word originally meaning to give an answer.

So hypocrite, in the classical Greek, could be an interpreter of dreams, an orator or reciter of poetry or even an actor. So originally this term was very neutral. It's a hypocrite.

But this word gained negative connotation in the pretense of duplicity or insincerity or lying to someone. So if you think of someone who is an actor, their job is literally just to lie to you about who they are. You go to a movie or you pop in a movie at home and you see that they're not just saying, hi, my actor name is this and this and this and I'm really this and this and this.

I'm not this character I'm trying to portray. No, they're lying to you. They're actively lying to you.

Every time you see an actor in a movie or a TV show, that is what they're doing. Similar word, a similar word to this is found in Matthew, chapter six, as a hypocrite or an actor as well, a person who professes belief and opinions that he or she does not hold in order to conceal his or her feelings or motives. That's sort of the more evil side of this, is where they're concealing what they really think.

They're saying something, they're doing something. But underneath the surface, there's really something boiling where I don't believe this. I'm doing this for my own selfish gain or my own desires or something else like that.

So it's double talking. It was a neutral term, but really, it is really just to be an actor. It is to conceal something.

And in a spiritual sense, this has really powerful connotations because as a spiritual person, as a spiritual being, as a person who has been saved by the grace of God, what's inside we should want to come out. We should want that to be seen. But the reality is we have sin in our hearts.

We have sin that, that corrupts us. We allow temptation to take over us, and we allow the temptations of the world to be a part of our lives. And this is why people call the church on hypocrisy because it does exist.

So let's do some further study on this idea. Just get some. Some history on hypocrisy in the Bible, especially in the Old Testament.

I want to read for you a couple verses. The first is Isaiah 20 913. It says, therefore, and the Lord said, inasmuch as these people draw near with their mouths and honor me with their lips, but have removed their hearts far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the commandments of Mendez.

A similar verse is found in Jeremiah twelve two. You have planted them. Yes.

They have taken root. They grow. Yes, they bear fruit.

You are near in their mouths, but far from their mind. So in other words, the people of Israel are saying the right things. They're doing the right things, but their heart is far from me.

They're spiritual hypocrites. This is something that's very, very easy for us to do. We can get in patterns.

We can even get in good, healthy patterns. But where is your heart? Do you desire the Lord? Are you reading your Bible begrudgingly? There are times, even as a pastor, that reading the word of God can become normal, which it shouldn't be, because, I mean, it should be regular, but it's not like it should become underwhelming. The word of God should always be exciting.

When you open this book, you get to read the words from a holy God that existed eternally, and he has chosen not only to speak to you, but to speak to you specifically through the person and work of Jesus Christ, and also through the written word of God, to teach us how to live godly in this present age. It's a love letter in the New Testament. It brings to light a different sort of focus on this word as well.

We see the idea of worship come into play. You can turn to Matthew, chapter six, and Jesus here is teaching a lot on the hypocritical ways of giving Matthew, chapter six, just to highlight a couple verses from that text. In verse two, it says, therefore, when you do a charitable deed, do not sound a trumpet before you as a hypocrite, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory for men.

Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward. These hypocrites are proclaiming that they're worshiping God, which, on his face sounds good. But the problem is God can see into their hearts, and God can see that they're not doing this with the right intentions.

They're not doing this just to worship God. It's not just because their worship is loud. It's because they want people to know how good they are.

So they can receive high esteem, respect from men. Just a few verses down in verse five. And when you pray, you shall not be like the hypocrites.

For they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward. Again, a similar idea.

And down to verse 16 in that same chapter. Moreover, when you fast, do not be like the hypocrites with sad countenance. For they disfigure their faces, that they may appear to men to be fasting.

Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward. The trend in those verses is that these people seek a reward and they get it. And the reward they receive is very temporary.

It's not genuine fellowship with God. It's not real worship with God. And I think that's really easy to do as well.

In our culture where we seek, we want people to know how good of a person we are. And we want to keep up appearances. And it's easy to want to be a good person.

It's good to be doing those things, to be worshiping. But these people have gone so far as to disfigure their faces so that people can see, oh, they're very spiritual. They're very good.

Turn with me to Matthew, chapter 23. Same book, different chapter, chapter 23. And really, I just want to read verses 13 on here for a little bit.

And in this text, you see a lot of powerful language being spoken at the Pharisees and scribes. And this is a lot of woes being spoken as well. So.

Matthew 23, verse 13. But woe to you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites. It's the first time it appears in that text.

For you. Shut up the kingdom of heaven against men. For you neither go in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in.

Verse 14. Woe to you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites. For you devour widows houses, for they are.

And for a pretense make long prayers. Therefore you will receive the greater condemnation. Verse 15.

Woe to you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites. For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte. And when he is one, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.

We're gonna pause there for a second. I think you're beginning to see that Jesus is not messing around, that he's speaking to people who know their bibles well, who knows the scriptures well, and yet he's saying, woe to you, or damnation, condemnation on you because you are speaking to people. You're traveling across lands to make one proselyte.

And even in that action, you're making them even more damned than they were before. These hypocrites are not after genuine, real worship or change. And I know that these hypocrites are scribes and pharisees.

And we have almost nothing in common with them in 2024. And yet I think we have a lot in common with them. And sometimes we have the attitude of, I've been in church for my entire life, and I know the scriptures well.

And it's easy to think, to begin to think that I have things under control. And that the gospel is impacted in people's lives because of what I do. And if we just go to the community, if we just do something, if I just do something, something might happen.

In reality, every single thing that we do happens because God allows it to happen. And every single good spiritual change or spiritual decision that happens, happens because God allows it to happen. And God draws people in.

I want to read a couple more verses. Drop down to verse 23. Woe to you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites.

For you pay tithe of mint in anise and cumin. And have neglected the weightier matters of the law, justice and mercy and faith. These ought to have to have done without leaving the others undone.

Verse 25. Woe to you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites. For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside you are full of extortion and self indulgence.

And there's more in that text, but we don't need to go through all of them. The idea is that Jesus is calling out people who are nothing, believing, or they don't have the conviction of what they're actually doing. So some people are presenting themselves as glorifying God or following God.

But they are empty inside. They are dirty inside. Jesus spoke of the Pharisees heart condition again in mark, chapter seven, verse six.

When he said, he answered them and said to them, well, did Isaiah prophesy of you, you hypocrites? As it was written, this people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Jesus teaches his followers to be careful how we view our sins. And to watch out for hypocrisy in Luke, chapter six.

Or how can you say to your brother, brother, let me remove the speck that is in your eye when you yourselves do not see the plank that's in your own eye. Hypocrite. And then the next.

This is an inspired but this exclamation point after that, hypocrite first remove the plank from your own eye. Then you will see clearly to remove the speck that's in your brother's eye. It's really easy to see sin in other people.

It's really easy to see faults in other people. But often we don't see the sin in our own life. We're blind to it.

We have a real problem here. I want us to understand that the problem of hypocrisy has not been solved, but it can be. It can be solved by us, the church and as individuals having genuine hearts for worship and allowing that to impact how we live.

It starts with you, so it's not pointing to the larger problem, it is looking at your own heart, just like Luke chapter six just said. So really I want us to dive into this hypocrisy problem in the modern church, starting with a question. Why does the world see hypocrisy in the church? Well, the obvious answer is because there is hypocrisy in the church.

And I think that the more extended answer to that is that I think the problem is initiated when we act as though it does not exist. There are issues in the church. No church is perfect.

This church isn't perfect. You're not going to find a perfect church. But instead of pointing fingers I think it's wise to look in the mirror first and see who we are.

And this is a hard message to preach. This isn't like John 316, this isn't like Ephesians two 8910. This is a message where it's very confrontational.

But I truly believe it's important that we go through these things. We need to see that we all have a sin nature. We desire to be seen by men.

We want people to see what we do. We're not perfectly consistent with God or his word. Yet by his grace we are allowed to walk with him and he changes us.

So by God's grace we are becoming less and less hypocritical. We are, however, led by this grace into good works to have a good testimony so that as we are worked on by the Holy Spirit we become more and more like the image of Jesus Christ. So practical thing here.

What are some examples of what the world sees as hypocrisy? I would say one thing is sort of a pompous, holier than thou attitude, which I think is the main culprit in our circumstances, is where we can begin to think that, well, those people are so unchurched. Those people are sinners. They love sinning.

Yeah, they do. Because they don't have the gospel. They don't have the Holy Spirit living inside of them.

There's nothing telling them or stopping them from sinning because they're just doing what they think is right, because they're not living for eternity. They're living for right now. Just like the Pharisees and scribes, just like the ones, the hypocrites that we read about earlier who are doing this.

To be presented before men, Christians who are unwilling to show love to people is also a huge problem. So first we have sort of a pompous, prideful attitude, holier than thou, but then we also have people who are just unwilling to be extroverted, I guess is a more modern way of saying it. Because we believe the truth, we know the truth.

We have the gospel impacting us. If you are indeed a Christian, and yet some people are scared. It's a most people are scared to share the gospel, myself included.

There are times when I know I should be more bold, but I'm just not because I'm scared. But showing love, not just sharing the gospel, but also just being genuinely kind, is a way of expressing the character of God. Because as the character of God infects our lives, it changes the way we behave.

And people begin to see that, oh, well, those people are saying that they love God and they're acting like they love God. So I believe those two are the main two culprits in our society of just people either seeing a prideful spirit or people seeing a church that's unwilling to serve other people. And there's a balanced warning here with these objections.

See, many people, many times people will call out Christians as being hypocritical, but also they won't understand the difference between holding a God given standard and a personal attack, because there are things in this book, especially relating to our culture, that is controversial today. And holding the standards of this book often can be misconstrued as even violence, of saying that you disagree with someone and so therefore you hate that person. But the word of God is a standard.

So it's not wrong to hold the standard. It's wrong to not show love despite people disagreeing with you, despite you being very different from that person. The truth is that the gospel is offensive because it calls out sin.

And Christians get into trouble when they present themselves as without sin or above the sins of this world and sort of have first class, second class, and third class sins. The reality is that we all have the capability of murder, of lust, of envy, of all these things that we find in the Bible. Our hearts are capable of that.

We're not any better. Before we had Christ, we were without grace, we were without mercy, we were without standing. Before God, we were condemned just as much as any person who is addicted to substances or who has committed a major crime.

We are wicked. Every single person is guilty before God, and every single person needs the gospel. Our hearts are deceitfully wicked.

We're capable of terrible things, and yet God saw us and showed compassion on us by giving us the gospel. So quite simply, the solution to this hypocrisy, simple to say, harder to do, is genuine Christianity. Genuine Christianity starts with humbling yourself.

So how is humility connected to hypocrisy? How are these connected? It doesn't just sound good, but, like, what does it really connect to? I would say that humility is properly seeing yourself as a child of God, and it leads to a heart that is bent on worship, bent towards serving God and therefore serving others. Humility is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge. And humility is the place where we go, and we want to see ourselves as who we really are.

It's proper. It shows us how to properly worship and consistently worship God. And once we are humble, we are able to submit ourselves to the Holy Spirit's leading from Galatians five, so that he can work in our vulnerable hearts, work in our hearts, so that we can be changed and transformed.

And then as we are changed, we can demonstrate the fruit of the Holy Spirit. We can allow our heart to overflow with acts of genuine worship and genuine kindness. Now, those three steps are really easy to say, but harder to do.

And the reality is that when you go out today, you can do those three steps, and people will still hate you for being a Christian. And that is okay. Jesus illustrated this well in Matthew 717 20.

Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

Therefore, by their fruits, you will know them. So you can't be surprised that as a believer, when you are being poured into by the word of God, as you're growing in Christ every single day, that you produce good fruit and that people see a difference. You also can't be surprised if you're not growing in Christ every day.

You're not in his word. If you're not in discipleship relationships that you're not growing in Christ. And people see hypocritical things in your life because you're allowing the poison of the world around you to hinder your growth of that fruit.

We are a people who are prone to hypocrisy, and yet, by God's grace, that doesn't have to be us. Because if you are indeed firmly rooted in your faith in God, then you will naturally avoid hypocrisy, because people will see that you're not just saying something, but you're doing something. And that's evidence of a heart that believes something.

One of the basic questions that's taught in Bible colleges during counseling classes is asking the person you're counseling, what were you hoping to gain from that situation? What do you want to happen in that relationship? If you could? It's also phrased this way, if you could flip a switch or push a button and make something exactly how you desire, what would it be and why? Our hearts desire things. Our hearts want things, and those things could be power, could be position. It could be any number of things, could be wealth.

It could be whatever your heart is pulling you towards. We are in a place where we have to look and allow God to examine our hearts and show us. Where are we walking away? Where are we straying from him? Because if God and his truth are your focus, if you are genuinely serving the king of kings, then it will be easy to produce fruit.

It'll just happen in your life. In fact, in the Galatians passage, Galatians five, that action of producing fruit is not something that I do. It's something that's happening to me.

It's being produced in me. So as believers facing this problem of hypocrisy, it becomes less of a problem of look at this massive problem. I'm trying to get my arms around it.

Instead, it becomes, look at who I am. Am I hypocritical right now in my faith? Am I saying I believe in God and then not trusting God? What am I doing to dissuade people from believing that the church is full of hypocrites? Am I loving people? Am I showing grace? Am I being different? So I hope that this study has been helpful for you. But as we've just seen, a very clear definition of hypocrisy and just done some further study to tackle this hypocrisy problem we are to avoid hypocrisy in every relationship, especially in the context of deacons.

And I want to speak directly to the idea of deacons here, because deacons serve. And as you serve, you are to show people an example of what a godly man is, not just to the deacons that are currently serving, but the deacons who will serve and those who are serving, really in any capacity in this church. As you serve, you are an example.

And as an example, you have a responsibility. That responsibility is great because the church of God is important to God. He cares about how his church is run.

He cares about how the needs of the people are being met. He cares. And we are to avoid this hypocrisy, especially in the context of this relationship that the church has with deacons.

So an application as we think of what we ought to do. First, I want to turn to those of you who are saved, those of you who have placed your trust in Jesus Christ as your personal lord and savior. First, recognize that you are a sinner with a heart that loves to sin.

You are not perfect if there is hypocrisy inside of you. Even though we have the Holy Spirit, even though we have God's grace, there is still this sin nature for now. So don't present yourself as perfect to the world.

Now, when I say that, I'm not saying don't try to be perfect because we are to pursue blamelessness, to pursue godliness. But when someone points out sin in your life, admit it. If it's there, it's there.

It needs to be uprooted and removed and allow the grace of God to work in it. But don't present yourself as someone who could never do those things. And don't be shocked when the world around you misunderstands the message of the gospel or you holding the truth of the word of God.

Don't be shocked when they misunderstand that I don't hate you. I just disagree with you because of what God's word says, because this is the truth. Don't be shocked, Matthew 1022 says, and you will be hated by all for my name's sake.

Ephesians 418 says, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart. They don't see it. They don't understand why we have all these rules.

And to the saved person, you have to understand that there is little to no motivation for an unsaved person to walk with God. And that is why they're different. And that is why they're going to perceive your testimony as being offensive at times.

And to those who are not saved, those who do not know this Jesus Christ as your personal savior, know the church is not perfect. The people in this building are not perfect. But also know the reason that we come together is because we are a work in progress, because we need each other, because we come to the word of God together to grow in Christ.

The fact that we are here is a testament to our need for change. So know that. And also listen.

Listen to the word of God, the authority to listen to Christians who are striving to grow in their walk with God. And not everyone who uses church language loves God. Not everyone who talks like a Christian is a Christian.

So be careful to compare it all to the word of God and walk with God yourself. And lastly, I would say to you, those who are unsaved, come and see this Jesus for yourself instead of pointing fingers at saying those Christians are so hypocritical. Become a Christian, become saved.

Become someone who is not hypocritical. Become someone who is so in love with the gospel that your heart cannot help but overflow with genuine Christianity, with real love for people. I want to read a post that was posted on Reddit about the church in general, and it's kind of hard to read and just because it's very confrontational to the church.

But this is an honest review about what someone thought about church. In my experience, holiness is no longer pursued in most churches. I found little difference between people inside and outside most of the time.

No accountability whatsoever. Just sing, dance and let everyone do their own thing. Get them to pray in the sinner's prayer and hit those conversion numbers.

And don't forget the 10% ties so we can keep the party going. Look at the model Jesus and Paul gave us to deal with these things. You warned them privately, alone, and then again with a few others, then before the whole church.

If they refuse to repent at that point, you cast them out. Even leaders are to be held to this standard. When was the last time anyone saw this done? Perhaps there wouldn't be so many issues with adultery, with pedophilia if we are more productive, more proactive about dealing with sin and keeping each other accountable.

We're supposed to be a family, brothers and sisters sharing freely with each other and holding each other up. We've stopped being set apart and tried to conform to the culture instead of changing it. Most people aren't even reading their bibles or spending time in prayer.

How can you be filled with love of Jesus Christ if you don't do that? Where is your cup getting filled? Most in the church have lost their power in genuineness, in love. There's so much division, too. People are more concerned with man made doctrines in politics than having a teachable spirit and seeking the truth and the word together, uniting under the leading of the Holy Spirit.

There are so many issues I could go on forever. I believe God is separating the sheep from the goats, and there will be few that find the narrow gate, just as Jesus said. That's a pretty scathing review on modern church culture.

And I would say that a lot of that's accurate because there's a lot of churches, a lot of problems in the churches where people are so caught up in what they're used to doing, so that they have forgotten the purpose of the church to begin with, to worship God and to reach communities. It's kind of a sobering thing to read that this is how people view the church. But it's also motivational because you look.

Because if you look at your heart and you can see, well, this is not what we want to be. This is not who we really are as a church. Show the world that we're different.

Show the world that we love them, that we care about them, and that we are united. And that when we do have problems, we face them together. And that we confront sin lovingly in discipleship.

And that we want to see the world change for the gospel so they aren't condemned to hell. We want to show love to people. We want to be united.

We want to be not people who are just trying to keep this thing going and collect the tithe and keep the church standing. But we are here to grow the kingdom of Christ. And I pray that as a church that we would think through our reputation in this community and help us just to even redefine to people.

That's why who we are. That's why we go out to the community. That's why we see people and talk to people and show love to people.

And when they come, we greet them and give them hospitality, and we help them with problems. If they have problems, help them to see a different church that loves them. And this starts inside of you.

This starts with you seeing the world as in desperate need of a savior. This starts with you seeing people around you and having compassion on them. And as you love people, as you are patient with people, as you're consistently showing your godly character through your actions, people will begin to see that church loves God.

I want to be a part of that church. It's like being a part of a business that does not believe in its own model, believe in its own purpose, statement, perhaps a business that's so old that the founders are dead and it's third or fourth generation now, and people don't really care about what it stood for 100 years ago. We're a part of a church, and the head of our church is the son of the living, eternal God, Jesus Christ, the one who made everything, the one who sustains everything, the one who gives us life.

So I don't want to end on doom and gloom. I want to give you hope and let you know that even though this is how the world may see some churches, and this is how the world may see churches, even in this area, we are the church of Christ. That is not what God made the church to be.

That is not what Christ wants the church to be. And Christ made you to be different. So the church can be different.

So have hope that God is still working in you, God is still working in this church, that God is still working in this community, and that honestly, we by ourselves cannot change that perception. It is God working in us. So simply ask him for help today.

How can I get rid of this hypocrisy? How can I show genuine love and care for people around me, knowing the truth? Help us to live the truth. Let's pray. God, thank you for this confrontational truth.

It's not easy to see these kinds of sins. It's not easy to see these kinds of epidemics in our life, in our culture, even in our churches. But God, I believe it's important to see the sin and to allow you to uproot it from us and to allow us to be motivated to serve our community and love our community, genuinely.

Help us to be rid of hypocrisy. Help us to show that we love our community. Your son's name, we pray.

Amen.