Hate Hypocrisy

Hypocrisy vs. Living in the light

Stories!!!

Hypocrisy is terrible - Any of you like hypocrites?

I’m not pointing any fingers but after hearing these stories I decided this was too important not to address it.

1 Cor.5:11 - You must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat.

Is that too harsh??? Remember what’s at stake.

Mt.15:18 – We often honor God with our lips when our hearts are far from Him.

1 Jn.3:8 - 10 - “He who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work. No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in him; he cannot go on sinning, because he has been born of God. This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not a child of God; nor is anyone who does not love his brother.”

I’m not just judging - I love you too much to not be real with you.

We are called to be different, set apart.

Sin defined.

Greek word for sin: Hamartano (αμαρτανω) – “to miss the mark.”

Rom.3:23 – For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

God’s standard, His law is designed completely for our good.

When you sin, YOU lose!!!

Heb.11:25 – Sin is pleasurable for a short time.

R.C. Sproul: “Sin can be pleasurable but it never brings happiness. It seems utterly stupid for a person to do something he knows will rob him of his happiness. Yet we do it. The mystery of sin is not only that it is wicked and destructive but that it is so downright stupid.”

What is sin?

Sin includes doing things that violate God’s standard.

1 Cor.6 and Gal.5 describes the battle between the flesh and the Spirit and a few major areas of sin. They are: wickedness, sexual immorality (lust, sex or just pushing the envelop - Eph.5:3), impurity (thought life and actions motivated by the world and my flesh), debauchery (partying), drunkenness (note about drinking: Rom.14 - don’t destroy your brother, or the work of God with your freedom), idolatry (putting anything above God), stealing, witchcraft, hatred, discord (not living in harmony with each other), jealousy, fits of rage (anger), selfish ambition (pride), dissensions (arguing), factions (being divisive), slander, greed, envy and drunkenness.

Those passages conclude saying: Those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God...And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

Remember: 2 Kingdoms.

Either we influence the world or the world influences us!

1 Cor.15:33 - Bad company corrupts your character.

Sin also includes not doing right: Not doing what God tells us to.

James 4:17 – “He who knows the good he ought to do and doesn’t do it, sins.”

Are pride, anger or refusing to share our faith any less sinful than adultery, stealing or violence.

All sin is sin against God that effects both me and others!

Ps.51:4 - Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge.

Sin is rooted in the condition of the heart not measuring up to God.

Jer.17:9 – “The heart is deceitful above all things.”

Mar.7:23 – Sin comes from the inside first.

James 1:14-15 – “But each on is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. Then after desire has conceived it gives birth to sin and sin when it is full grown, gives birth to death.”

Mt.5:22, 27-28 – Jesus equates hate and lust with murder and adultery.

Conditions of the heart are the worst sins: Sin is sin. It all starts in my heart. Pride and arrogance, greed and selfishness, hate and anger, bitterness, lust, envy and others.

C.S Lewis: “The sins of the flesh are bad but they are the least bad of all sins. All the worst pleasures are purely spiritual…That is why a cold self-righteous prig who goes regularly to church may be far nearer to hell than a prostitute. But of course, it’s better to be neither…Of all bad men, religious bad men are the worst.”

Sin begins with the condition of the heart, and is manifest in wrong actions and inaction.