Riding the Hypocricycle

2010-06-27 Galatians 5:1, 13-25
Lake Hills Presbyterian Church (USA)
James McTyre

Gal 5:1, 13-25
For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.
For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters; only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love become slaves to one another. For the whole law is summed up in a single commandment, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” If, however, you bite and devour one another, take care that you are not consumed by one another. Live by the Spirit, I say, and do not gratify the desires of the flesh. For what the flesh desires is opposed to the Spirit, and what the Spirit desires is opposed to the flesh; for these are opposed to each other, to prevent you from doing what you want. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not subject to the law. Now the works of the flesh are obvious: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions,envy, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these. I am warning you, as I warned you before: those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit.

The works of the flesh are pretty obvious. But for those of you who have trouble remembering, the Bible has a big list. So we can self-identify. It's a NOT to-do list. It reads like an episode of Jersey Shore. Fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, etc. etc. etc. See it all on the next season of “The Real Housewives of Sevier County.” Now that would be some reality TV. Painful reality.

Now that you've heard the Top Ten List (or the Bottom Ten NOT to-do list), I know many of you are stealing a nonchalant glance at the person down the pew from you. Just wondering. Or maybe you already know, or think you know. Lakemoor Hills is a small community. And we have the Internet. If you are an idolatrous, licentious, angry, envious, fractious, quarreling, jealous, loose, impure, drunken sorcerer... invite us to your next party. No, just kidding. We don't really want to come. But we would like to see the pictures on Facebook. Just keep the music down. Don't make us call the cops. Don't trash your front yard and everything will be just fine. You'll have your life. We'll have ours. See you at Food City.

I don't know if this is completely true, but from what I hear, people who don't go to church often think people who do go to church are all a bunch of impure, idolatrous, hostile, drunken sorcerers, who one hour a week pretend to be loving, joyful, peaceful, patient and kind. Sadly, on occasion, that has proven to be true. It's just like how there are lots of people from cultured areas of the country, like, New Jersey, who watched “Hee Haw” and think that's how everyone in Tennessee looks and talks.

I love it when we travel and someone asks where I'm from and I say, “Tennessee,” and they say, “That's funny, you don't sound like you're from Tennessee.” And I say, “That's because I'm originally from West Virginia.” In West Virginia, we hold our pinkies out when we eat souffle. With Grey Poupon.

It's amazing how people can see a couple of impure, idolatrous, drunken sorcerers (and who hasn't?) pretending to be loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind church-going folk, and draw the conclusion that that's how everyone who goes to church must be. We've all heard it: “I'm not going to church. They're all just a bunch of hypocrites.” What better place for hypocrites to be? Maybe some of that love, joy, peace, patience and kindness will stick. I can safely and gladly say that, here at Lake Hills, there is not one impure, idolatrous, hostile, drunken sorcerer. To the best of my knowledge that is true. On the other hand, there's not one of us who hasn't jumped to the conclusion about someone else, that they're impure, idolatrous, etc., etc., etc. And on yet another other hand - third hand - there's not one of us who hasn't dabbled, or dreamed, or spoken in hushed tones out of the corner of our mouth – let's be honest – about something on the Bottom Ten NOT to-do list.

The Bible says, “For freedom, Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery. For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters; only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence.”

On one hand, you can pat yourself on the back that you aren't as bad as the collective whole of the Bottom Ten NOT to-do list. But on the other hand, we're all enslaved. We're enslaved to hypocrisy. We're enslaved by the hypocrisy of others. We're enslaved by our own hypocrisy.

How do we break free?

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The Bible says, “For freedom, Christ has set us free.”

The Bible says we are all enslaved. That sounds funny to us, free people, living in the freest country on earth. But the Bible says it. So how are we all enslaved? Certainly, we're not physically enslaved. We are enslaved by our minds. Or let me say it this way: we're enslaved by the limits of our minds. Our minds are tied up by our ideas about other people. Our minds are on the invisible leash of preconceived notions. Our minds are duct-taped to the chair of our prejudices. Our minds are chained up, enslaved by rules formed from exceptional bad examples. We all do it. It comes from the gaps.

We have gaps in our knowledge. How many people are in the world? A whole bunch. How many people are in our neighborhood? A slightly smaller bunch. We can't know everybody. We can't know everything. A lot of us barely know our next-door neighbors. So there are gaps. There are gaps in our knowledge of people and things. We don't like gaps. Gaps make us feel uncomfortable. Gaps make us feel stupid. So we fill in the gaps with guesses. Some guesses might be OK. Some might be almost totally wrong. And even if we know our guesses are wrong, we can live with that. We are more comfortable with the guesses than with the gaps.

For example, there are some Tennesseans – and West Virginians – who look and sound like they walked off the set of “The Beverly Hillbillies.” There are Mexicans who are in this country illegally. There are Muslims who are terrorists. There are oil company executives who are yacht-sailing goofballs. There are politicians who are corrupt. There are ministers who are slime balls. And, yes, there are people who go to church not out of faith, but out of the need to see and be seen. There are people who go to church to exercise their pointer fingers. They go to church because they get a thrill out of publicly pointing their fingers at people who might or might not be exercising fingers at them. Yes, these things are true. These examples exist and sadly can be found without turning over too many slimy rocks. These examples make for good television, and good barber shop conversations. But as true as a few sensational ideas might be, they are only a small part of a bigger story we don't have the ability to completely know. Jumping to conclusions based on one or two bad examples is a sign of a lazy mind. Lazy minds fill in the gaps with bad examples instead of taking the time to find good ones.

People from Blount County are bad drivers. I confess, I used to believe that, when I lived in Knox County. Someone would pull out in front of me, and I'd see the license plate and say, "Aha!" Now I live in Blount County. It seems like everyone who pulls out in front of me is from Knox County. There is the possibility that they're ALL bad drivers. Or it could be that the bad ones are the ones I notice, wherever I am.

We notice the bad examples. And then we make guesses and generalizations about them all. We'd rather fill in our knowledge with guesses than live with the gaps. Why is that? I don't know. But I know that my mind is very easily enslaved, willingly enslaved, by its limits.
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“For freedom, Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery. For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters; only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence.”

“Do you go to church?”
“Well yes, I do.”
“Then, why are you so annoying?”
“I don't know. I guess I'm stuck. One day I do good, the next I do bad, because I think I'm better than I am, but I'm not...”
and on and on it goes. We get stuck on the cycle of hypocrisy. The hypocricycle.

Other people see our hypocrisy. Don't deceive yourself. Other people are watching. It's not just because you're paranoid. The people who don't go to church see what the people who do go to church do, and what the people who don't go to church say about the people who do go to church is, "Aha! See? Hypocrites." The correct response is not to get mad or defensive. Just say, "Yes. You're right. I am a hypocrite. I go to church so I can learn how to stop." And if you're feeling a little cheeky, you can add, "What do you do?"

Tended wounds heal quicker. Anyone who attempts to gain spiritual freedom is going to realize that they're riding the hypocricycle. Better to accept it than try to fool yourself. If you accept your fault, and accept that it IS your fault, you're taking a step toward freedom. But the Bible cautions us. It says, "Do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence.”

Even if we accept our hypocrisy, and begin to work toward eliminating it somehow, the great temptation is to misuse our new freedom by becoming self-indulgent. We misuse our freedom by becoming self-indulgent to the point of becoming proud. We become proud of how free and enlightened and good we have become. We judge ourselves with leniency. In fact, we might judge that we've become so good the rules don't apply to us anymore. And if the rules don't apply to us then we're free to become impure, idolatrous sorcerers, etc. etc. And then the cycle of enslavement to freedom back to enslavement recreates itself. The hypocricycle gets stuck in an infinite loop.

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So is it even possible to remove ourselves from the cycle of our own hypocrisy? Does it take some kind of magic? Does it take a miracle? The truth, according to the Bible is that it takes neither. It simply takes dedicating yourself to a diet of fruit.

It says:

the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things. 
In other words, everybody knows the fruit of the Spirit is good for you. There's no law against these because everyone knows these are good. The Bible goes on to say:

If we live by the Spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit.

It takes work to set your mind beyond its limits. It takes work to see love, joy, peace, patience, and kindness because the world, which is not of the Spirit tells you, "Fill the gaps with the examples of the bad." The world, which is not of the Spirit tells you, "Let your mind be lazy." The world tells you see the negative in one and throw it like a shadow over them all." and worst of all, the world, which is not of the Spirit, tells you, "You're not like them. You're better. You can have your own set of rules." It takes work, and courage to choose to go against the crowd and be guided not by the world, but by the Spirit. It's a simple answer. But sometimes the simplest truths are the hardest.

Your mind doesn't have to be a slave to its own limits. You can break free. We know this because Jesus Christ has crucified the power of the flesh. We know we can be free because those who belong to Jesus Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Does that mean we can live without temptation? Does that mean we'll never again be hypocrites who fail to live up to their churchy ideals? Of course not. But what it does mean is that our failings do not define us. Our failings do not define us. Instead who we are comes from whom we follow. Who we are comes from the Spirit, not from the weakness of our flesh. You can choose to be guided by the Spirit, today and every day. You can choose to live by the rule of love, the rule that overcomes all exceptions.

Let's pray.