Passage Read: Luke 11-12
Meditation Verses: 12:1-3
Thought
Beware hypocrisy. It is easy to say one thing or claim to be and do certain things, but secretly do nothing of the sort. It is easy to hide hypocrisy from men, but impossible to hide it from God. He sees everything we do in secret. He hears everything we say in private. When we think no one sees or hears, God is watching and hearing. And one day, He will expose our secret self for all to see. The past can be forgiven and expunged. We can repent of our hypocrisy and have it washed away. But if I continue to live a double live, thinking I am safe, I deceive myself and I'm in for a shock and great embarrassment at the Judgment. And the end result will not be good. Woe to hypocrites! Woe to white-washed tombs. Their secret deeds will be exposed to justify their condemnation. Now is the time to repent and make things right.
Application
To avoid hypocrisy, I need to be careful that what I am in public is also what I am in private; there should be no difference. If what I am in private is someone I'm ashamed to present in public or before God, then I need to change who I truly am. The private me is the real me, and if I have not been redeemed, it will be someone I'm not willing to present in polite company. And if that's the case, I need to be afraid. I need to repent in truth and humble myself before the Lord and be made holy by His Spirit, so that I no longer have anything to hide. My secret deeds and words will be made known; I need to make sure they are nothing to be ashamed of before God and men.