The crisis, the cure and the curse of hypocrisy, Luke 12:1-12

Last Sunday we looked at the end of chapter 11 and the nature of hypocrisy.  Today we are continuing in that theme starting in chapter 12 and we will be looking at the crisis, the cure and the curse of hypocrisy.

Last time we discussed Jesus statement in 11:39 in which Jesus basically describes the nature of hypocrisy or the definition of hypocrisy as one who cleans the outside, but on the inside they are full of corruption.  I went on to say that the original Greek word for hypocrite referred to an actor in theater, who performed an act on stage for the applause of men.

But I would like to broaden that definition of a hypocrite this week, if I may.  Because I think while that defines a hypocrite in the major sense of the word, it is somewhat limiting.  I like the definition of Martin Lloyd Jones who said hypocrisy is not just someone who is pretending to be something he is not, but it is someone who wants the best of both worlds.  They want to be able to enjoy the pleasures of this world while guaranteeing them the safety of the next.  It is the man who wants to do the minimum necessary to guarantee their safety in regards to the next world.

So therefore, a hypocrite is not only someone who deceives others, but he is someone who deceives himself.  He believes that he is righteous, and as a result he is self satisfied with his present condition.  He sees no need for confession of sin, because he is well content with who he is and what he is doing.  He has deceived himself in regards to his righteousness, and he is content to stay in that condition. This is the crisis of hypocrisy; that the hypocrite has deceived themselves by what is ultimately a form of false religion.

I believe there are three factors that contribute to hypocrisy. The first is a lack of honesty. The hypocrite is not honest with himself nor does he judge the scriptures with integrity. Jer. 17:9 says, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?”  He is not willing to open his whole heart to the truth, that God may search him and try him.  David cried out to God in  Psalm 139:23, “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”  But the hypocrite protects himself against the truth.  And when the truth touches on his pet concern that he wants to protect, he turns away from the truth or twists the truth for his purposes.  God desires truth in the inward parts. David said,  “If I regard iniquity in my heart the Lord will not hear me.”

The second factor that contributes to hypocrisy is lack of understanding.  The hypocrite may use religious phrases but he doesn’t understand the meaning of the phrases.  For example; he may say he has confessed Jesus Christ and believes in Him, but he doesn’t understand what it means to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.  It means nothing less than the whole of Christian doctrine.  He uses the phrase but he doesn’t really work out what it means to believe in the LORD Jesus Christ.  Jesus illustrated that in great detail in the Sermon on the Mount when He said you think you say you haven’t committed murder, but actually he who hates his brother is guilty of murder. Jesus goes beyond the letter of the law, and explains the intent of the law of  spirit of the Law.  The hypocrite tends to misinterpret the scripture because they don’t fully understand the things that they are professing.  He has never worked out the conclusions of his own professions.

The third contributing factor of hypocrisy is lack of application; a failure to apply the whole truth to the whole of one’s life.  They may know something on an intellectual level, but they have not applied it on a practical level.  There is a great dichotomy  between what they confess to be with what they appear to be.

Now these three contributing factors produce three types of hypocrites; intellectual, emotional and the practical.  Each are guilty of hypocrisy and yet each denounce the other.  There is the intellectual hypocrite who is  content with an intellectual system or doctrinal system in his mind but does not live it out.  And there is a hypocrite who is characterized by emotions.  He is not necessarily concerned about doctrine, but he has had an experience, or he feels a certain way at certain times.  He doesn’t care much beyond his feelings.  But he persuades himself he is alright because of  his emotional reactions.  And then there is the practical hypocrite: he is not interested in doctrine or emotion, but takes pride in his moral accomplishments.

In every case though they stopped the gospel at a point where they wanted it to stop in order to keep that sin that they were comfortable with, twisting the scriptures to their advantage. They have a form of godliness but they have denied the power of the gospel to transform them.  Because they have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God in all it’s fullness as it is revealed in the scripture.  Paul says in 2 Tim. 3:2 that these hypocrites will be characterized by being “lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power; Avoid such men as these. For among them are those who enter into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth, men of depraved mind, rejected in regard to the faith.

This self deception which is hypocrisy is what Jesus is warning against here in chapter 12.  He says to the disciples – note that.  Not to the Pharisees or to those that were not interested in His gospel, but Jesus speaks this warning to those who were His disciples.  “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.”

Just a word about leaven by the way.  Leaven is always pictured in the Bible as a form of sin.  That is why the bread eaten at the Passover meal was to be unleavened bread.  Leaven is a lump of dough that is taken from an old loaf of bread and stored until you are ready to make a fresh loaf.  The lump that is stored has already been fermented by yeast.  And that is what is referred to as leaven.  So when they wanted to make a fresh loaf of bread they would take the old lump of leaven and put it, or hide it in the new loaf.  That leaven would then began a process of fermentation.  It would start a corruption process within the new loaf that causes it to emit gases and the bread starts to rise.

Jesus uses this to illustrate the nature of sin and it’s effect on person which produces hypocrisy.  It is self righteousness covering up sin that is unconfessed, that is hidden, and begins a process which eventually causes corruption in the entire body. Paul says in Gal. 5 that a “little leaven leavens the whole lump.”

So Jesus elaborates on that principle of hiding sin in vs. 2. “But there is nothing covered up that will not be revealed, and hidden that will not be known.”  See, you can have two loaves of dough lying on the kitchen counter.  Someone hides a piece of leaven in one loaf and not the other and for a while they will continue to look the same.  But sooner or later the truth will be revealed.  The leaven will cause the one loaf to rise while the other does not.  This is what Jesus is so brilliantly  illustrating.  Those that hide their sin may appear on the outside as righteous, but sooner or later their sin will begin to manifest itself.  Unconfessed sin is like leaven that starts to spread and corrupt all the body and the hypocrite will eventually become apparent when their actions fail to measure up with their profession.  Sin starts off small and the hypocrite thinks they have concealed it, but it soon corrupts the entire person.

See, God sees the heart, not just the outward appearance.  1 Cor. 4:5 Paul said that the “Lord will bring to light the things hidden in the darkness and disclose the motives of men’s hearts.”  God sees the heart.  And He will judge the heart by His standard of righteousness  which is not altered by our conceptions of what we think is proper but by His unchanging nature as revealed in His law.  That is what Jesus is saying in vs. 3, ““Accordingly, whatever you have said in the dark will be heard in the light, and what you have whispered in the inner rooms will be proclaimed upon the housetops.” Jesus is saying that one day God will reveal all hypocrisy.  Now that is the crisis of hypocrisy, it is a sinful condition that permeates a person subtly, gradually, but eventually completely corrupts and Jesus warns his disciples to beware this destructive influence of unconfessed sin.

Now then, let’s consider the cure for hypocrisy.  How do we avoid this sinful condition? What can we do to stay away from it? Well Jesus is going to reveal three principles that will keep you from hypocrisy. They sound simple, but like the illustration I gave earlier of the lack of understanding, the real import of these three principles can easily be missed because of the familiarity of the phrases.  But there are three principles to ensure you don’t get caught up in hypocrisy; one; honor God, two; honor Jesus Christ, and three; honor the Holy Spirit. As I said, that sounds simple, but let’s look at what is involved.

Look at vs. 5, "Fear the one who after He has killed has authority to cast into hell." This is where it starts. God must be honored. God must be feared. Prov. 9:10 says
“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.”  But hypocrites don't really fear God, they fear men. And they live their lives to please men, they live their lives in an outward show of self righteousness for men’s approval aren’t concerned about righteousness on the inside which is invisible. Jesus said stop fearing men and start fearing God.  Stop worrying about what people think and start worrying about what God thinks.

We need to fear God because one day He will reveal the inward thoughts and motives of our hearts.  In vs. 2, 3 Jesus says God will one day reveal everything we have said, everything we have done.  And we need to fear God because though men have the power to kill the body as Jesus says in vs.4 and 5, God not only has the power to kill the body but also the power to cast your soul into hell.  That’s good evidence by the way for those that don’t want to believe in a literal hell.  They just want to believe that the grave is all there is to death.  If it was, then Jesus wouldn’t make that distinction, would He? He makes a distinction between physical death and hell. And thirdly, we should fear God because He knows everything about us. Vs.6 “Are not five sparrows sold for two cents? Yet not one of them is forgotten before God. Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear; you are more valuable than many sparrows.”

Notice that Jesus starts by saying “fear God” and then ends by saying “do not fear.” The point being that God knows those that are His.  He knows the heart of man, the thoughts of man, even down to the smallest details of our lives.  And in that all compassing knowledge obviously God knows those that are His.  Those that truly fear God have nothing to fear because they are His offspring.  And it’s evident they are His offspring because they exhibit the characteristics of their Father. But those that are of their father the devil do the works of the devil.  So their hypocrisy is evident.

The second principle of curing hypocrisy is to honor the Son.  The way to honor God is by honoring the Son.  Jesus Christ is the manifestation of God.  There is no other way to the Father except by Him.  So in order to honor God you must honor Christ. John 5:23“He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him.”

How then do we honor Christ? The answer is in vs. 8; ““And I say to you, everyone who confesses Me before men, the Son of Man will confess him also before the angels of God; but he who denies Me before men will be denied before the angels of God.”  What is meant then to confess Jesus?  Is it just to admit that Jesus existed?  No, I would submit that it is far more than just recognition of a historical Jesus.  It is a confession that Jesus Christ is Lord and all the doctrinal truth related to that fact. Romans 10:9 says “that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”  It means confessing that Jesus Christ has become your Lord, and has a place of Sovereignty over all of your life.  Remember the sin of hypocrisy is hidden sin.  Confessing Christ as Lord is confessing your sin, giving over all of your life to Him to be used for His purposes.  There is a difference between calling Jesus the King of Kings and giving Him all the keys to your kingdom, inviting Him to live in all rooms of your heart.

In Matthew 7:21 Jesus said, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.”  So it’s not just a confession with their lips, for those people confessed Him with their lips saying “Lord, Lord.”  But it’s the confession of transformed lives that do the will of the Father in heaven.  Jesus said in Luke 9:23 “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me.” So we die to our desires and live after God’s desires which is what we see Jesus doing.  We are to be like Jesus was, doing the will of the Father.  Dying to self. Living for God.  These aren’t just churchy phrases without meaning.  This is the reality of confessing Jesus Christ as Lord. And this is the basis for our salvation.  If we truly confess Jesus Christ as our Lord, then Jesus will confess us as His in heaven.  But if we deny that Lordship of Jesus Christ and do our will, then He will not confess us in heaven.   Salvation is not just saying a prayer a certain way or walking down an aisle or having some experience that you think might have been spiritual.  Those things might contribute to your coming to Christ, but please understand the truth of salvation; it’s not just Jesus dying on the cross for your sins, it’s taking up your cross and following Him. It’s not adding Jesus to your life, it’s losing  your life that you might live for Him.  It’s not having Jesus come along and grant your dreams and fulfill your ambitions, it is saying no to your dreams and your ambitions and yes to His sovereignty and to His will.  And for those who are willing to confess that, God is willing to grant you the righteousness of Jesus Christ in exchange for your sins.

Thirdly, the cure for hypocrisy is honoring the Holy Spirit. You can't know Christ without the work of the Spirit. It's the Spirit that shows us Christ. It's Christ that shows us the Father. The way to Christ is through the work of the Spirit. The way to the Father is through the work of the Son.  Just as Jesus revealed the Father, the Holy Spirit reveals the Son. We honor the Spirit as the one whose revelation concerning God and Christ has been made known to us. No one comes to God except through Christ. No one comes to Christ except through the Spirit because you can't come to Christ unless you know the truth about Him and you can't know the truth about Him unless you believe the revelation of the Holy Spirit. It is the Holy Spirit that tells us about Christ. It is Christ who points us to the Father. To say it again, God is revealed in Christ and Christ is revealed by the Holy Spirit.

Romans 10:17 says, "Faith comes by hearing and hearing by  the Word of Christ," Who is the author of the Word of Christ? Who is the author of the New Testament? Who is the author of the Old Testament?  The Holy Spirit.  Peter says "Holy men of God were moved by the Spirit,"  It is the Spirit that has authored the Word. He is the revealer of Christ’s gospel.

The Spirit is the one who gives life, it says in 2 Corinthians 3:6. The Spirit is the one who regenerates, Jesus told Nicodemus in John 3. John 16 says it is the Spirit who convicts the world of sin, righteousness and judgment. And the Spirit does that not in some mystical experience but He does that through Scripture. It is the reading of the Word of God authored by the Spirit that brings the sinner to the reality of his own sinfulness, because it is the Scripture that reveals the Law of God. And measured against that Law, you know you're a sinner and that's how you become convicted of sin and righteousness and the judgment that's revealed in Scripture. You wouldn't know what sin was without the Law. You wouldn't know what righteousness was without the Law. You wouldn't know what judgment was unless God had laid down the punishment for the violation of that Law. So the Spirit brings conviction through the Word. He brings regeneration through exposure to and belief in the Word. And He brings, of course, new life through the Word.

Now look at vs. 10, “And everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man, it will be forgiven him; but he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven him.”  To blaspheme simply means to reject Christ.  Everyone who is unconverted has blasphemed Christ.  They have rejected Christ and chosen to ignore the sacrifice that He made for their sins.  They refuse to confess their sins, to repent of their sins.  They don’t think that they need what He has to offer.  And that is blasphemy.  At one time, all of us were blasphemers.  But thank God we that have confessed Jesus as our Sovereign Lord and Savior are granted forgiveness.  But He who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit it will not be forgiven Him.  This verse has caused a lot of people a lot of confusion.  But it should not be confusing to you in light of what we have been teaching.  Blasphemy simply means that they have rejected the conviction of the Holy Spirit. They have rejected the revelation of the Holy Spirit as revealed through His word. If you reject His conviction through His revelation, you can't be saved because there's no other way to come to the truth.

Jesus said in John 15:26, “When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me.” How does that work?  Well, Jesus was actually conceived by the Holy Spirit we saw that in the beginning of Luke. And at His baptism, according to Luke 3:22, the Spirit of God descended upon Him. And as He began His ministry, you remember back in the fourth chapter of Luke when Jesus began His ministry, it says He went into the wilderness to be tempted but He was full of the Holy Spirit. And when the temptation was over, Luke 4:14, Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit. And then He began to announce who He was in the synagogue at Nazareth and He said, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me because He's anointed Me." And He went through His whole life operating not only in submission to the will of the Father, but in the power of the Spirit.  The Holy Spirit testifying that Jesus was Lord through the works that He did in Christ. And then after Jesus ascended into heaven, the Holy Spirit brought back to the minds of the Apostles all the things that Jesus had taught which were then written down for us under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

So here is the curse of the unpardonable sin, it is that of rejecting the testimony of the Holy Spirit through the word of God and His conviction in your heart. Look at Hebrews 10:26, For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and THE FURY OF A FIRE WHICH WILL CONSUME THE ADVERSARIES.
Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled under foot the Son of God, and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace? For we know Him who said, “VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY.” And again, “THE LORD WILL JUDGE HIS PEOPLE.” It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” Rejecting the promptings of the Holy Spirit, rejecting the conviction of the Holy Spirit is the sin of blasphemy of the Holy Spirit and the final curse that is associated with that is the judgment of God.  You rejected His Gift? Then you are left under the curse.

For those who do honor the Spirit, there's a wonderful promise in the final statement, verse 11 and 12, "When they bring you before the synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, do not become anxious about how or what you should speak in your defense, or what you should say for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say." Here's a wonderful thing about honoring the Holy Spirit. If you will believe the testimony of the Holy Spirit concerning Christ’s gospel you will have the Spirit as your permanent teacher throughout all your life here on this earth. If you will believe the testimony of the Spirit of God to the truth of Christ, if you will embrace the gospel and believe in what the Spirit has revealed concerning Jesus Christ, the promise is that the Spirit of God will come to take a residence in you and be there even to the severest time when you will be literally have your life on the line and the Spirit of God will sustain you even at that hour.  The Holy Spirit will empower you to do God’s will.  That is yet another  ministry of the Holy Spirit.  He equips us to do the will of God.

How do you avoid the destructive corruption of hypocrisy? How do you come to the full knowledge of the truth? By believing and honoring God as holy, sovereign judge, by honoring the Son as holy, sovereign Lord and Savior and by honoring the Holy Spirit as holy, sovereign revealer of truth. You cannot come to Christ but by the Spirit's testimony as revealed in the full counsel of God’s word. And you cannot come to God but by Christ as Sovereign Lord of all your life and action.