Beware Of Hypocrisy - Part 2

Today on Fellowship in the Word, Pastor Bill Gebhardt challenges you to become a fully functioning follower of Jesus Christ. A trial and a temptation is the same Greek word. You decide whether it's a trial or a temptation based on the context of the passage, but it's the same word. So notice James 1 says, consider it all joy when you have various trials. See, trials come from God, temptation comes from the evil one or the world flesh and devil. So God wants to prove something good in me through a trial. Satan wants to prove something bad in me through a temptation.

One leads the growth and one leads the sin. And so I think what he's saying is, Lord, you know me, try to keep me, deliver me from evil, keep me away of things in which I think I would fail. Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bill Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church located in Metairie, Louisiana. Let's join Pastor Bill Gebhardt now as once again he shows us how God's word meets our world. Jesus in a moment is going to give us the disciples prayer, not the Lord's prayer. The Lord's prayers in John 17, that's him praying. This is telling disciples how to pray publicly. That's the Lord's prayer. We call it the Lord's prayer. So what did the church do with this prayer?

He just said, do not use meaningless repetition. So what do we do? Let's repeat the Lord's prayer. And in some disciplines or some views, think of this, on the basis of what you did, you're going to have to do 17 our fathers.

Like what? Yeah, just keep repeating this prayer. He just said, don't repeat prayers. He said, that's meaningless to repeat prayer. The church got a hold of it and said, let's repeat the prayer.

I mean, it's almost stunning that we could interpret his words and come up with that conclusion. He said, so don't be like them. Your father knows what you need before you even ask him. So he says, look, pray in this way. Our father is in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, forgive us our debts as we have forgiven our debtors and do not lead us in a temptation, deliver us from evil.

You'll notice in your Bible for yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen is in brackets. That means it's not in the oldest manuscripts that was added by a scribe later. Nothing wrong with the words. The words are fine. It's not in the oldest manuscripts at all.

Just one sidebar and this might help you. The earlier translations is safe from the King James on the earlier translations are built on the newest manuscript evidence. So the King James is based on newer manuscripts. Now, the translations today are based on older manuscripts.

And so consequently, that's why they put brackets around this. Those manuscripts were found by archaeologists and others after the first translation of the King James version. So when they say when it says it's not in the oldest manuscripts, that's what it means.

It's not in the closest to Christ manuscripts. So you'll see sections like this. Nothing wrong with the words. The words are fine.

But they were likely added, he says, by a scribe. So what he talks to us here is, OK, we're going to show you how I give you a model of praying. Now, this is interesting. There's less than 70 words here. Jesus said, you want to pray in public? Use less than 70 words.

You want a model. This is how short this is. This is not long at all. Now, he's talking about a public prayer. He's not talking about interacting with God. In fact, if you remember, what did Paul say about this on prayer? Didn't he say pray without ceasing?

Now, some Christians take that wrong. You mean all I should do every day is get up in the morning and start praying until I go to bed? No.

It's not what he's saying. You see without ceasing, constantly, constantly interact with God as you live your life. Constantly. It's not only a prayer time for this, it's just constant communication. God has communicated to me through his word. I communicate to him through prayer. I virtually don't have a meeting that takes place where I wouldn't pray beforehand for God to give me insight or meaning or truth in the meeting that could be helpful to the other person. That's just prayer. You see, I mean, you could have a prayer where I'll give you one that God speaks to me. If somebody comes in and talks and intentionally wants to insult me, I want to do that.

What do I do? First, I listen to God. He's spoken to me. He said, let no unkind word come from your mouth. Then I say, thank you, Lord. Thank you for the insight. I'm praying to him and I try not to do that.

That's your life. That's a different thing. Jesus is here talking in a public way. He uses this less than 70 words. What he comes up with here that's interesting is that he has six requests here. The six requests are three for God's glory and three for our good.

That's how this breaks down. He starts out and he says, our Father, that's common for you and me, not for Jews. I guarantee you that a Pharisee almost never prayed to our Father. Pharisees never viewed God as their father. Jews at this time did not like that, that familiarity, that intimacy with God as our Father. They didn't like Jesus talking to his Father that way.

They didn't like that. He's God. You can't talk to our Father.

Yeah, you can. We were children of God. He said, who is in heaven? In the word hallowed, hallowed simply means we call it holy or set apart.

Set apart be your name. In other words, I know who I'm addressing. I'm addressing my Father in heaven who has a name above all names, who is different than everything else that exists. I'm just recognizing and honoring God, our Father in heaven. He said, your kingdom come, your will be done. Right in the beginning, Father, I just want your kingdom to come. Do you know what right at the end of the book of Revelation what the Bible says? Come, Lord Jesus. Come, the kingdom of God.

That's the whole point, isn't it? The whole point of what we call now is approaching for the second coming of Christ, that his kingdom is going to come to earth. Why not pray for that?

That's God's program and I'm for God's program. You see, that should be something that's always on our mind. Could it happen? For instance, could the rapture of the church occur while we're meeting here? Yes.

Okay. Now, I would like it to come because it's the beginning of God's kingdom coming. There are other days I'd probably like it to come so I don't have to deal with a lot of the stuff that I have to deal with. So, come on, bring the rapture and get me out of here. That's probably not a good prayer.

That's a selfish prayer. But he says, your kingdom come and your will be done. So, after he says that, he said on earth as it is in heaven. God's will in heaven is perfect.

Whatever he wants in heaven happens. Now, is God's will on earth perfect? No, but is God sovereign over all of it?

Yes. God's sovereign, but he's not deterministic. In other words, you can't say to God, why did you have that man kill 25 people? Because that happened, and you're God. God says, I can't even tempt somebody. So, don't blame that I'm sovereign over, but don't say I did it. You see, don't say I did that.

That's not the case at all. I would like more of God's will being lived out here than it is. That's all the prayer says, as it is in heaven. And then he says, give us this day our daily bread. Sustain me for today.

Would it be the best way we could say it? Just sustain me for today. In a certain way, you know why I'm here today? Because God has sustained me every day of my life to the day. So, I pray, sustain me today, Lord.

You see, be your will to sustain me. He says, give us our daily bread. For Americans, this is difficult. We're so much in control of our own destinies. We have so many resources. The idea of thinking God's going to supply us with daily bread is almost funny. We've got enough. We can supply ourselves that we're dead.

I can take care of myself. But God says, that's not true necessarily at all. Years ago, many years ago, Joe Harvey was a medical missionary we supported in the Congo. And we were having lunch and Joe was saying, you know, I feel sorry for American Christians. He said, because even in the Lord's Prayer, American Christians don't understand that they're being sustained by God every day.

They don't understand it. Congolese Christians do. He said, when a Congolese Christian prays, give us this day our daily bread, he means give us this day our daily bread. He said, because if you don't get it from God, we're not going to get it. He said, they're so dependent on God for the basics of life. Here, we're dependent on ourselves. We don't really think we need God for any of the basics of life. In fact, we don't even ask God to intervene until something big happens that we can't control. Now we want God to intervene. But the truth is, God intervenes all the time for everything.

You know, think about this. Satan goes about like a roaring lion seeking who he can devour. OK, why hasn't he devoured you? Because you're tough.

No. God won't let him. We're all sustained that way. If Satan had the capacity, he'd kill every one of us when we become a believer immediately.

You see, he'd do that, but he can't. So God sustains us, and that puts my reliance on God, not for just the big things in life, but for everything in my life. And then he says, and forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.

This is one we struggle with. The word is afolima, debts. It's one of five words used for sin in the New Testament. Afolima is used 30 times in the New Testament.

Almost every time it's a verb, except for here, it's a noun. He talks about our debts, what we owe God from that. But you could rephrase it and say it this way. Forgive us of our sins as we also forgive the sins of others.

That's what he is saying. Christians seem to struggle with this. What I find with Christians is we love the idea that, first of all, whenever we became a Christian, God forgave us of all of our sins. We stand justified before God. He's declared us righteous.

But that's justification. But when we move into living our lives, sanctification, because of our flesh, we continue to sin. And so 1 John says, 1 John 1-9, if we acknowledge, confess our sins to God, he's faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and cleanses us from all unrighteousness. In other words, we stay in fellowship with God as we acknowledge our own sins and God continues to forgive. The sidebar here, though, in this sanctification process is Jesus says, yes, and you're saying to God, forgive me on a daily basis just like I forgive others on a daily basis. How does that feel to you?

You see, that gets to be really hard for us. But you're going to see in a moment, Jesus is so keen on this, he's going to repeat it. Because the idea is, forgiven people should be forgivers.

Everything that I have in the future, everything, I have eternity with God, I'm a joint heir with Christ, only for one reason. God has forgiven all my sins. I'm forgiven. He said, no, yeah, now forgive.

But we find that hard. It's an amazing thing, how many of us say from time to time, I'd like to, but you don't know what they did to me. Well, I know what I did to God. I put him on a cross. My sin made him scream out, Eloi Eloi lama sabatsini. I know what I did to him.

So tell me again what they did to you. You see, being unforgiving as a Christian, the reason God won't forgive us, it keeps us in a state of perpetual sin. I won't forgive someone else, I'm sinning. God's told me to forgive. I'll forgive. That's obedience. And so the point is, look, I can't play this game with God and say, I'm not forgiving.

I like you forgiving me, but I don't want to forgive anyone else. Then he says, do not lead us into temptation, deliver us from evil. Now, the scripture says God doesn't tempt anyone, so God's not going to lead us into temptation.

In fact, we're not even sure if that's the best way of doing this. I think what the writer of what Jesus is saying here is, Lord, don't put me in circumstances that you know I'd fail. Deliver me from evil.

You know certain circumstances I'd fail. Because the difficulty with the word, the difficulty with the word here is the word parasmos. Parasmos is the word temptation. It's also the word for trial. A trial and a temptation is the same Greek word. You decide whether it's a trial or a temptation based on the context of the passage, but it's the same word. So notice James 1 says, consider it all joy when you have various trials. See, trials come from God. Temptation comes from the evil one or the world flesh and devil. So God wants to prove something good in me through a trial. Satan wants to prove something bad in me through a temptation.

One leads the growth and one leads the sin. And so I think what he's saying is, Lord, you know me. Try to keep me, deliver me from evil.

Keep me away of things in which I think I would fail. Now notice what he says in 14 and 15. If you forgive others and their transgressions, your heavenly father will also forgive you. If you do not forgive others, then your heavenly father will not forgive your transgressions.

Is that clear enough? Three verses dedicated to the same idea. You and I have to be forgiving people. See, the only way I can relate to God vertically is through forgiveness. And the only way, in a sense, I can consistently relate to all of you in the horizontal is through forgiveness. You need to forgive me at times. I need to forgive you at times.

We're all sinners. You see, and that's what's heartbreaking about so many times I get involved in marriage counseling. No matter how you spend marriage counseling or how many seminars you go on, communication skills, conflict resolution, all that kind of stuff, the way a marriage sustains itself as a good marriage for a long time, forgiveness. If you have two people that will forgive, you can have a long, good marriage. But if you have people that won't forgive, you've got trouble.

You see, because it's the bomb of all horizontal relationships. So that's what he says. Three times he's praising God for God's glory, and three times he talks about things for our good.

So then the last thing he moves on to is this. Whenever you fast, he says, Do not put on a gloomy face as the hypocrites do, for they neglect their appearance so they be noticed by men that they are fasting. Truly, I say they have the reward in full. Again, Pharisees. Pharisees fasted a minimum of two days a week. Two days, Pharisees fasted. Now Pharisees were up, they were pretty supportive guys.

They were pretty well off. They were clean, good dressers and all that, except on fast days. On fast days, they'd each had their old clothes.

Sort of like your Saturday morning stuff. The whole idea, put on your old clothes, and then they would mess their hair up. Then they would put charcoal under their eyes and on their cheeks.

Then they would just... What would you say? Ah, he's fasting. He's fasting. Look at that. Look how godly. Look how fasting.

Then the next day, I look fine again and go right back with everything it is. They actually want you to think they're more spiritual than you because look at them. They're fasting.

Hard to believe, but true. He says, but you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face so that your fasting will not be noticed by men, but by your father who's in secret. And your father, he said, who sees what is done in secret, he'll reward you. Best days of your life? When you should look your best when you're fasting.

You should look good. You see, because you're not fasting for people, I hope. You see, that's not what he means.

What he means is this is between god and me. Fasting is a pretty easy thing to understand, but sometimes gets difficult for people. The Jews fasted when they were mourning. They fasted when there was danger. They fasted sometimes when they started new ministries. But it's anything you, a fast is designed for you when you become so preoccupied with something important in your life that you fast.

You can pray without fasting, but you can't fast without praying. I mean, that's the way this works. And so sometimes you get so preoccupied. And if you've had moments like that in your life, and I think we all have had, but someone will say, you lose someone you love suddenly. And the next day or two, someone says, have you eaten? What do you say?

Normally, no. Why? I'm only in this moment. I don't feel like eating right now. The fast means I'm so laser focused on what I'm up against that I'm not eating right now. But he said, even when you do that, make sure that you look as good as you can. But there are times in our life when we fast. It's just an intensity thing.

You have to be more intense. Remember when the disciples couldn't exercise a demon and they wanted to ask Jesus, why couldn't we? And he said, well, this requires fasting. Now, it wasn't like fasting is magical.

OK, guys, no one eats for 12 hours and then we're going to get them out of there. That's not what it means. You need to be focused on this. This is laser focused. You have to be preoccupied with this.

You have to be sincere about this. It's different. And that's the way it is when we fast.

There's magic in the fast, but there certainly is intensity in the fast. And he said, yeah, but don't do it for people. You see, we don't do that. We don't put ourselves up like that.

I've had a couple of occasions in my whole ministry, though, where someone I was just talking to and they said, Pastor, you have to know I'm fasting. And my thought would be, why do I have to know that? You see, why?

Why do I? Why would you tell me that? That's an important thing that's between you and God. And Jesus seems to make it clear. Keep it there. You see, keep it there.

There's not because, see, if you're telling me that, is that so that I'll think more highly of you? Oh, she's a spiritual girl. He's a spiritual man. You know, but that's not what a fast is about. Fast is about my relationship with God. And he said, and your father in secret will see and he'll reward you in heaven.

So he deals with giving and praying and fasting. So the whole warning to you and I is beware of becoming a hypocrite. And I think there's a reason for it. We're all vulnerable. We're all vulnerable to do things so other people notice so that you and I can feel better about ourselves. If other people notice, they'll think more of me.

That'll make me feel better about me. Jesus says, don't do that. That'll often lead to nothing other than hypocrisy.

Don't do that. So the best thing I take from this is this. The thing that means the most to me is what Jesus has told me this morning is this. Whatever I do, spiritually, in any way, do it for an audience of one.

Do your life for an audience of one. See, it doesn't matter what we say. It doesn't even matter what we think. All that's going to matter is you and I will all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. Each one of us. And you'll give an account to him. And all that's going to matter forever is how he responds to this.

You see, it's his response. You and I should function for an audience of one. Let's do our best to do exactly that.

Let's pray. Father, it's easy to look at the excesses of the Pharisee and condemn them. But Father, those excesses are present in virtually all of us. We all find ourselves so often, even in our spiritual lives, seeking the approval of people.

And somehow, if they approve of us, we feel better about ourselves. Father, we confess that. I pray, Father, that we stay focused on one thing, our relationship with you. There's nothing we've ever done that you won't notice.

There's nothing we've ever done that you won't deal with an even reward if it's necessary. We live our lives for you. Jesus Christ has promised us what we call an abundant life. But that abundant life is not just for us.

It's a life we offer to you. Father, thank you for having Jesus say to us, beware of being a hypocrite. We pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen. You've been listening to Pastor Bill Gebhardt on the Radio Ministry of Fellowship in the Word. If you ever miss one of our broadcasts or maybe you would just like to listen to the message one more time, remember that you can go to a great website called OnePlace.com. That's OnePlace.com, and you can listen to Fellowship in the Word online.

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