Fake It Until Christ Makes It
ASH WEDNESDAY
Isaiah 58:1-12 • 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10 • Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21
No one likes a hypocrite. And the bigger the fake the more hated they are. Maybe that’s why we can’t help but smile when a politician who runs for office on a family-values platform is exposed as an adulterer. The only hypocrites we would rather see fall from grace are the religious leaders who make a living pointing their fingers at sinners and dishing out heavy doses of judgement. Is there anything more satisfying than seeing the holier-than-thou preacher’s mugshot on the front page of the paper?
I learned only a few months ago that the term “hypocrite” didn’t have a negative connotation until it was taken over by Christian culture. A word that literally means “interpreter from underneath,” its origins are from the ancient Greek stage, on which actors would interpret their characters’ roles from underneath the masks they wore. The word hypocrite didn’t make an appearance in English until the 13th century, when it was used to describe someone who was pretending to be pious in order to deceive others, and it didn’t come to mean a person who was acting contrary to their stated beliefs until the 18th century.
In the Hebrew of the Old Testament, the word that is sometimes translated for us as “hypocrite” actually means “godless” or “profane.” In other words, it referred not to someone who was faking religiosity but was used as a criticism for God’s people when they forgot what it meant to belong to God. Although the concept of a play-actor isn’t found in the Old Testament, we understand that, when prophets exposed the predatory lending practices or exploitation of widows and orphans by so-called religious leaders, they were highlighting the incongruity of a projected religious identity and a faithless way of life.
But, when it comes to religious practice and acts of piety, aren’t we all hypocrites to some degree? Aren’t we all here because we know that there’s at least a slight disconnect between our public lives and our private thoughts? We pretend to be nice. We hide our real feelings. We bite our tongues, and instead we say, “Bless your heart.” But don’t we want the inside to match what’s on the outside? Don’t we want loving-kindness to be our way of life not because it's how we’re supposed to act but because it’s what we really feel deep within us?
In some ways, I think that’s why we come to church—because we want to reconcile that difference and because we know that this is the place and that this is the community that can help us find that unity of identity we seek. We are here because we believe that the love and forgiveness and reconciliation that Jesus offers us can shape us from the inside out. Only then—only when what is within us has been renewed by God’s love—can what shows up on the outside reflect the truth that is within us. But that process of renewal doesn’t start by avoiding hypocrisy. It starts by embracing it. Here's what I mean.
Jesus doesn’t care if you’re a hypocrite. In fact, in a sense he encourages it. That’s why he tells the rich young man to sell all of his possessions and give the money away to the poor—not because the man has already figured out how to love God with all his heart, mind, soul, and strength and his neighbor as himself but because Jesus knows that a radical outward action like that has the power to shape a person deep within. In the parable of the tax collector and the Pharisee, Jesus praises the tax collector who lowers his head and beats his breast not because he has reformed his life but simply because his prayer is earnest and humble. Sometimes we say we’re sorry not because we mean it but because we want to mean it. Sometimes we say our prayers not because we want to but because we want to want to. The journey of faith must start somewhere. It starts even with a small step.
Of course, hypocrisy does have a dark side. The warning Jesus gives us every year on Ash Wednesday is an important one for us to hear: “Beware of practicing your piety in front of others in order to be seen by them; for then you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.” Using the example of the hypocrites, who like to make a big show about giving alms, saying their prayers, and fasting, Jesus tells us to hide our generosity, to pray only behind closed doors, and to wipe the ashen crosses off our foreheads before walking out the church door. Why? It’s not because Jesus is worried that our Lenten practices will mask our heart’s true intentions but because our piety will have no power to shape our hearts if it is only for show.
The spiritual problem with hypocrisy isn’t that we pretend to be something we’re not. It’s thinking that pretending is all that matters. Jesus calls us to go deeper than that. When a spiritual discipline is outwardly focused and the only thing we care about is what other people see, the only benefit we get is the esteem of our peers. But, when the practice starts on the surface and then turns within, causing us to examine our own hearts, then we have the opportunity to be shaped by the one whose example we seek to imitate. Then our piety draws our hearts closer to God, and our whole lives begin to follow suit.
When Jesus tells us that only those who practice their piety in secret will be rewarded by their Father in heaven, it’s because the only reward worth seeking is the one that is found in here—deep within our hearts, where no one but God can see. This Lent, may that be the spiritual journey we take. Even if we are only going through the motions of faithfulness, may they be for us an invitation to encounter God within our hearts. May our Lenten devotions be a personal journey back to God—the one whose love transforms us from the inside out.
© 2023 The Rev. Evan D. Garner
St. Paul’s Episcopal Church – Fayetteville, Arkansas