“The true convert prefers obedience for its own sake; he actually chooses it, and does it. The other purposes to be holy, because he knows that is the only way to be happy. The true saint chooses holiness for its own sake, and he is holy.”
— Charles Spurgeon, True and False Conversion
First of all, hypocrisy is indefensible. Jesus criticized hypocrites, he didn’t criticize sinners. But we’re all hypocrites in one sense. We don’t live up to our ideals.
However, some ways of dealing with our hypocrisy are better than others. One way is to stop claiming to believe what we don’t practice. As in, I ain’t no hypocrite, I know I’m a sinner.
But something’s lacking there. The other way of dealing with our hypocrisy, much harder, is to stop practicing what we claim we don’t believe. Until I can do that, I’d rather be a hypocrite.
“Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, to all the people you can, as long as you ever can.”
– John Wesley
The truth is hot and hard to touch. Unless it has lost its power, it will sometimes hurt you. The truth is salt and you have wounds. Unless it has lost its savor, it will sometimes hurt you. You can avoid this pain at the cost of your soul, but not forever.
“Do you think we run on uncertainties? …We forsake our dear children, whom I would not forsake for the whole world, and we stake upon it all we have – should we run on uncertainties yet?”
– Claesken, Martyrs Mirror, p. 613
“Let us constantly remember the days of our illumination, and how little we then were in our own eyes, when we humbled ourselves under the mighty hand of God.”
– Joost Verkindert, Martyrs Mirror, p. 848-863
It only takes a minute to form a tradition. Otherwise, we would have to face ourselves or our Master more directly. A tradition is like a callous, in that sense. As a callous makes it harder to feel, a tradition makes it harder to hear. You don’t need to hear or obey God if he no longer needs to speak. Then you can replace his word with your own ideas. The drive constantly pulls on us to control our own consciences and lives instead of letting God do it. Like the Pharisees, we have already acquired our own reward, and there is nothing left for Jesus to give us. For we believe we are some variety of saint, and he only came for sinners.
“But where are the tears which we have shed, my dear wife, over our past sins, when our souls were wounded even unto death, yea, sunk in hell?”
– Thomas van Imbroeck, Martyrs Mirror, p. 578-582
“He who has no vision of eternity will never get a true hold of time.”
– Thomas Carlyle
What is our motivation for trying to change our government and our society? Woodrow Wilson said he was fighting World War I to make the world safe for democracy. Many progressives want to make the world safe for alternative lifestyles. Many conservatives merely want to make the world safe for themselves.
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