The Art of being a Pharisee

This morning I read an interesting article in the news. The Article starts off by saying that after Al Gore received an Oscar for his feature film documentary, “An Inconvenient Truth”, he now needs to put his own house (or should we call it a mansion) in order. According to the article Al uses a whole lot of electricity and natural gas and they think far more then he needs. They were basically saying that there is some real hypocrisy being shown by Al and that he needs to practice what he preaches. (http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewCulture.asp?Page=/Culture/archive/200702/CUL20070227c.html)

I have seen Gore’s documentary and really enjoyed it. I think we need to give Al some slack here and let him answer his accusers. At the same time this subject of hypocrisy is an important one to me...

The other day I was reading in the Gospel of Luke and in Chapter 11 Jesus really speaks strongly against the hypocrisy of the Pharisees. The Pharisees of Jesus day were a Jewish group that put a heavy emphasis on ceremonial cleanliness and the keeping of the law. They seemed to follow Jesus around checking on him constantly to see if he fulfilled all the traditions and the Law the way they believed they should be fulfilled. Why did Jesus call them hypocrites? In their desire for ceremonial purity etc… they became experts in trying to keep the literal interpretation of the Law but totally missing the inner spiritual significance of it. Jesus said in Luke 11:39,40,” …You Pharisees are so careful to clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside your are still filthy—full of greed and wickedness! Fools! Didn’t God make the inside as well as the outside?”

So why am I so interested in the problem of hypocrisy or talking the talk and not walking the walk? Well because I think we are all guilty of this. Whether or not Al Gore is guilty of wasting too much energy at his Mansion and guest house, while he speaks about global warming, I still need to consider my own life and make sure that I am living what I am preaching.

I believe that God created the heavens and the earth and put us humans here to take care of it. But I find that I am real quick to forget about recycling and wasting energy too.

I believe that I am to do for others what I would like them to do for me (the golden rule right?). And yet I find myself demanding things from others that I am not prepared to give to them.

I believe that I am to love my neighbor as myself. And at the same time I find that I am always looking out for number one, “ME”, more than anyone else.

When it really gets down to it I find that I am much more concerned about the way other people perceive me then I am about the way that God perceives me. Even though I know that He knows me better than anyone else. I guess you could say that I have my Pharisee tendencies. And if I go farther with this, I guess we could say that we are all hypocrites at times. We say that we believe one thing but often do just the opposite. We act one way but deep in our hearts we believe something else and given the right circumstances when no one is looking we live out what we really believe.

Being real and walking the walk is something that I need help in order to do. I seem to fall short all the time with my own efforts and the Bible makes it very clear that God knows our hearts and nothing is hidden from him. He knows who I really am and He still loves me and offers me a trade. He says, I will make a trade with you, your hypocrisy for “My” truth. Jesus says, “I am the way the truth and the life, No one can comes to the Father except through me.”