Some have said that the best witness for Christ is a life lived for Him. But what exactly does this life look like? No doubt Scripture gives us many prescriptions and descriptions about what it means to live for Christ as His follower. But I want to highlight an aspect of our Christian witness today that may be often overlooked.
In Matthew 23, Jesus rebukes the Pharisees for not practicing what they preach, for exalting themselves, like whitewashed tombs who outwardly appear beautiful, but within are dead. More than that they construct false examples of godliness demanding that others live up to their standard. “Hypocrites!” Jesus says, which is precisely the right term for the Pharisees. What they proclaimed to be true on the outside was not true on the inside.
However, I fear that too often this term gets misapplied today. Usually when the church makes the press, it’s being accused of hypocrisy. And to be fair, there has been be gross sin and hypocrisy lurking in the church. This will continue until our sanctification is complete (Phil. 3:12) and Christ comes to separate the wheat and the chaff (Matt. 3:12). But should Christians really be accused of hypocrisy when they fall the short of moral perfection? This threat creates the ever-present temptation to prop up our outward image before the world, lest our sin be exposed, our witness be tainted, and we be called a hypocrite (or at least so that people would maybe say nice things about us). But to some degree, this leaves us resistant for people to really know us, sometimes even our Christian brothers and sisters. This is something I’ve struggled with for much of my life.
Again, this comes with big disclaimers. Unchecked sin can taint our Christian witness (think of the constant problems with the Corinthian church) and the Bible clearly calls us to be holy (1 Pet. 1:15-16). As the Spirit continually conforms us more into the image of Christ (Rom. 8:29), it’s our desire to live holy lives unto the glory of God. Still, on this earth, we will wrestle with the flesh (Rom. 7).
This should make us all the more thankful for the precious gift of grace in Christ our Savior, who saved us not according to works done by us, but according to his own mercy poured out on us richly through Jesus, so that we could have the hope of eternal life (Titus 3:4-7).
Now as a pastor, I’m afraid the temptation to maintain a respectable outward image is stronger than ever. I’m called to get up in front of our congregation every week and help lead God’s people in singing God’s praises. I better have it all together, right? I better not let people see where I fall short because then they won’t trust me as a pastor, right? I am so thankful for my wife. She once told me, “What our church needs is not to see you as having it all together, we need to see you dependent on Jesus. What better example to follow in a pastor?” Now that’s some Holy Spirit wisdom right there.
But this goes for all of us, not just vocational pastors! What the world needs to see is not perfect people, but a church fully and solely dependent on Christ for their hope in this life and the next. This is a Gospel witness: that apart from Christ we are hopeless, but God is pleased with us not on the basis of our righteousness but on Christ’s (2 Cor. 5:21). And how do we show this? By letting our guards down. By being real with people. By living authentic lives with our family, friends, neighbors, strangers, everyone. By admitting our failures but confessing our Savior. This is what it means to “make known the power of His grace!”
So how do we avoid hypocrisy today? We must be careful never to claim on the outside what is not true on the inside. We must never claim perfection, to have it all together, to be without sin (1 John 1:8). But at the same time we live by faith in the One who is perfect, who does has it all together, and truly is without sin, Christ Jesus our Savior. His righteousness is the only one we’ll claim before the judgement seat of God anyway. Thankfully, He is making us more and more like Himself each and every day. Let us lift high the name of Jesus together!
- Jonathan
Key Scripture Passages:
1 Peter 3:15
Ephesians 2:1-10
1 John 4:4
Psalm 103
2 Corinthians 4:1-6
Lift High the Name of Jesus
Written by Ed Cash, Fionán De Barra, Keith Getty, & Kristyn Getty
Lyrics:
Verse 1
Lift high the name of Jesus
Of Jesus our King
Make known the power of His grace
The beauty of His peace
Remember how His mercy reached
And we cried out to Him
He lifted us to solid ground
To freedom from our sin
Chorus
Oh sing my soul and tell all He's done!
'Til the earth and heavens are filled with His glory!
Verse 2
Lift high the name of Jesus
Of Jesus our Lord
His pow'r in us is greater than
Is greater than this world
To share the reason for our hope
To serve with love and grace
That all who see Him shine through us
Might bring the Father praise
Verse 3
Lift high the name of Jesus
Of Jesus our Light
No other name on earth can save
Can raise a soul to life
He opens up our eyes to see
The harvest He has grown
We labor in His fields of grace
As He leads sinners home
© 2013 Alletrop Music, De Barra, Fionan, Getty Music Publishing
