Behavioral patterns in the species Christiano hypocritus 

 

Luke 7:36- 8:3

 

            A pastor was visiting with a man at a local store when he discovered that the fellow did not attend any church. He politely invited the guy to visit his congregation.

            “I’m not going to your church,” the man replied, stubbornly. “There are too many hypocrites there.”

            “Hey, don’t worry about that,” said the pastor. “We’ve always got room for one more.”

 

            To hear some people talk, Sunday morning is the weekly meeting of the local chapter of the Hypocrites Unlimited. Churches attract hypocrites like moths drawn to a flame. They are the home turf for pompous folks who put on a big show of being righteous, in real life, they’re no better than everyone else, and sometimes worse. 

 

            I always find it irritating when I hear an inactive or unchurched person play the hypocrite card. It is such a tired old excuse--an easy, thoughtless, judgmental, lazy old cliché.

 

            Yet, there usually is some truth at the root of all clichés—some bit of reality that got the thing started. So it’s worth asking, is there any truth at all to the claim that this is a room full of hypocrites?

 

            A word exercise that is both fun and revealing is the “I am, you are, he is” sequence. It shows how a single character trait can have widely different meanings, depending on your perspective. Here are a few examples of how it works:

 

            I am thrifty.

            You are cheap.

            He is a miserable old tightwad.

 

            I am tenacious.

            You are stubborn.

            He is a pig-headed fool.

 

            I am outgoing.

            You are a big talker

            He is a gassy old windbag.

 

            I am laid back.

            You lack motivation

            He is a lazy bum

 

            I am safety conscious

            You are a worrywort

            He is a coward

 

 

            I am thorough and conscientious

            You have a tendency to nitpick

            He is an obsessive compulsive pain in the neck

 

            Where do you suppose hypocrisy fits into that scheme? A hypocrite is not something I am; and it’s probably not something you are. It’s something he is.

 

            I aspire to a high standard

            You are pretentious

            He is a hypocrite.

 

            Hypocrisy is not something we are likely to see in ourselves. In our most introspective moments we may recognize the occasional lapse into the trait of claiming to be what we are not—but we almost always assume hypocrisy to be a character flaw of others.

 

            The Gospel story for today from Luke, however, forces us to confront the issue of hypocrisy in the church. Let’s take a closer look at the story:

 

            A Pharisee named Simon invites Jesus to dinner. This is interesting. Jesus and the Pharisees don’t run in the same social circles. For the most part, Pharisees don’t like Jesus at all. Why the invitation? We don’t know for sure, but we’re suspicious. Not sure this guy’s intentions are honorable.

            Regardless, Jesus accepts, goes to Simon’s house, and sits down to dinner.

 

            When a woman who had lived a sinful life in that town learned that Jesus was eating there, she showed up, with a vial of expensive perfume.  Hold on. What is she doing at this private dinner in a Pharisee’s house? How did the servants let this social misfit get into the house, much less all the way into the dining room?

            According to William Barclay, homes of wealthy people in that time and part of the world often had an open courtyard, with a well-tended garden. This was where meals were eaten in nice weather, like a modern day patio or deck.

            The custom was that when a Rabbi was invited for supper, the public was allowed to come into this courtyard for a while to listen to whatever wisdom this honored guest consented to offer. That’s how she got in.

 

            As she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears. She wiped them with her hair, kissed them, and poured perfume on them.

 

            Seems to be some awkward logistics here. If she’s behind him, how does she wet his feet with her tears? Is she crawling on the floor, poking her head around his legs?

            No, despite such famous paintings as DaVinci’s Last Supper, dinner guests did not sit in chairs around a table. The guest reclined on a sort of couch. He would lean on his left side, knees bent, feet behind. With Jesus in that position, the woman cowering behind him could easily get at his feet and do what was described in the story.

           

            This is a notoriously bad woman. She has a terrible reputation, and has no idea how to act in polite company. A proper Jewish woman of the time never appeared in public with loose hair. This woman completely ignores that bit of etiquette; she wipes his feet with her unbound hair. She doesn’t understand boundaries. She has no social graces—what she is doing is way out of line.

 

            When Simon the Pharisee saw this, he muttered, “If this man were really a prophet, he would know who is touching him and what kind of woman she is—that she is a sinner.”

 

            Just as we suspected. This was not a gracious invitation that Simon offered out of friendship or courtesy or a desire to learn more. Simon is a skeptic. He doesn’t say, “Jesus, why are you putting up with this?” He says, “Hah, I knew it. He isn’t a prophet. He isn’t who he claims to be. Look at that phony disgrace himself by coming in contact with this lowlife.”

 

            Not a surprising comment from a Pharisee. After all, the whole point of a Pharisee’s existence was to honor God by separating himself from all that was sinful and impure, and he took this to mean separating himself from all people who were sinful and impure.

 

            It was a noble goal in a way, I guess. But in order to separate yourself from the sinful, you have to divide people into the worthy and the unworthy. You have to exalt yourself, put yourself in the category of the worthy, and you have to reject anyone who is not up to your standards. You have to set yourself up as better than others.

 

            The reason the Pharisees had such trouble with Jesus is because Jesus preached a totally different vision of God. God does not look to skim off the best of humanity and shun the dregs who don’t measure up; God cares for and desires to save all of God’s creatures.

 

            Jesus makes this point in two stages: First, he makes a personal appeal to Simon’s learned, rational nature. “Tell me, Simon. Two men owed money to a lender. One owed two years wages, the other owed a tenth of that amount. Neither could pay their debt, so the lender canceled both debts. Which of them will love him more?

 

            Simon sees the point that Jesus is trying to make, but he’s kind of resentful about it. Instead of just answering, “The one who had the bigger debt cancelled,” he says, grudgingly, “I suppose the one what had the bigger debt cancelled.”

 

            He doesn’t like what he hears. The story isn’t about the good guy with no debts and the bad guy with enormous debt. It is about two debtors. Jesus just lumped Simon in with that unclean woman, even though he is so far out of her league that it’s not funny. Worse yet, in this story, this loser of a woman comes out ahead. She gets the closer relationship with God.

 

            Jesus is stating an obvious truth: it’s hard to love someone when you don’t need anything they have to offer. It is impossible to love someone if their existence doesn’t affect you one way or another.  

            The problem for Pharisees is that they achieve righteousness on their own. According to their rules, if they do it right, they don’t need God for anything. If you don’t need anything God has to offer, you don’t love God. And if you don’t love God, then it’s silly to make such a big show out of loving God.

 

            It is the height of hypocrisy.

 

            I don’t know that there is a church member of any Christian denomination who would have the audacity to say that he or she does not need God. But sometimes we can give the impression that we don’t need God very much. And we don’t have much time or patience for those who do.

            It’s especially true when it comes to worship. It’s easy to get the attitude that we are the ones trying to worship God the right way, and we don’t have much tolerance for those who can’t get it right. When we do that, we become Simon the Pharisee, looking down his nose at the woman who, despite her ineptness, really, desperately needed Jesus.

 

            Simon is a hypocrite, and Jesus can prove it. The Pharisee has set himself up as the good person—the one who honors God, and with whom God should be pleased. Simon cannot imagine that anyone would question this truth.

 

            But Jesus points out a few things that Simon has overlooked. According to Barclay, in this social setting, there were three accepted ways of showing respect to a distinguished guest:

            1) The host greeted the guest by placing his hand on the guest’s shoulder and gave him the kiss of peace.

            2) The host had a servant wash the feet of the guest to clean them from the dirt of the open roads.

            3) A pinch or a drop of a sweet-smelling incense was placed on the guest’s head.

 

            That was how one showed respect and consideration for others. Simon the Pharisee, the good person, the one who knows the rules and honors God, and with whom God should be pleased, didn’t do any of these things. The misfit who walked in the door uninvited, did.

 

            “You did not give me water for my feet,” says Jesus. “She washed my feet with her tears.  You did not give me the customary kiss of respect; she has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not anoint me with incense; she who could hardly afford it, has done so lavishly.

 

            “So Simon, if you can’t even manage the basic courtesies of respect, just what is it that makes you better, more deserving of God’s favor?”

 

            The question is: who are we supposed to identify with in this story? The sinful lowlife who doesn’t know any social boundaries? Or the smug phony who pretends to God’s gift to mankind? That’s a tough choice.

 

            Which is exactly the point. The Pharisees set up a hierarchy, a separation of the good people from the bad, of God’s people from those who don’t measure up. Jesus says that sort of judgment isn’t ours to make, because, frankly, we’re not very good at it. We tend to be just a little biased in favor of ourselves.

 

            After all, I aspire to a high standard

            You are pretentious

            And he is a hypocrite.

 

            The lesson of this encounter is that God is not impressed with individuals, or churches, or nations, who claim to be more godly than their neighbors.

 

            As the Bible reminds us that “All have fallen short of the glory of God.”

 

            When my uncle, who died last year, was a brand new pastor, just out of seminary, he found himself having to preside at a church service at which the elite members of the church and community were gathered. Famous people, learned scholars, local celebrities, and great leaders.

            Someone asked him if he felt intimidated by the prospect of preaching to such an audience.

            “No,” he said. “They’re all sinners.”  

           

            We come to church not to separate ourselves from the sinners, but to take our place among them. We take our place among the people who recognize that we need God. We come into the presence of God shoulder to shoulder with sinners, but when we ask God to have mercy on us, we do so with our eyes straight ahead, on no one else.

 

            We come into this house of worship knowing that we need God, and so do the people who surround us, and the details do not matter. God is here for us and for the person next to us, and for the person who is afraid to walk through our door of our church for fear of being condemned. God offers to be most present for those in the greatest need.

 

            Come all you who are weary and carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.

All who are carrying heavy burdens. All.