Phoney-Baloney – Sniffing Our Own Baggage
10 November 2024
Mark 12: 38-40
I recently celebrated my 50th Birthday – I know some of you are shocked, because I don’t look that old.
My Birthday was on Labour Day.
I wanted to go out for a morning coffee.
So where to go with my family?
I chose somewhere that I knew there’d be no question it’d be open on a Public Holiday;
where there is adequate car parking;
where there would be plenty of seating.
Can you guess where we went? (Wellington Airport)
At the airport we played ‘I Spy’.
And my daughter Sarah spied a sniffer dog.
And she was SOOOO keen to go and pat it, but she knows the dog is focused on serious work.
Sniffer dogs look like they are having the time of their life, don’t they?
They probably are – using their ‘super-power’ to smell everything and please their handlers.
I hope it’s doesn’t offend you to compare Jesus to a sniffer dog.
In this reading today, we see Jesus is very sensitive to sniffing out hypocrisy.
Generally, as we read the gospels, I don’t think we’d say Jesus was someone who was easily offended.
But he has a real problem with silly behaviour from people who ought to know better.
What smelled monster-rotten to him;
what made his nose itch until it drove him to frustration,
was the hypocrisy of those who preened themselves as moral, righteous, God-fearing citizens.
Their “play-acting” assailed his sensibilities.
In our own culture today, those who have a real gift for sniffing out hypocrisy are cartoonists.
We can thank God for the insight, skill and courage of the discerning cartoonists.
They perceive the ludicrous, and invite us to laugh.
They lampoon the double-speak of many who mis-use their positions of power and influence.
Jesus was like a cartoonist (creating word pictures) to subvert human delusions.
1. He shared the image of a camel squeezing through the eye of a needle. (Mark 10:25)
How’s that for a cartoon?
2. To the scribes and Pharisees, who meticulously tithed on even the mint and basil from the garden, yet ignored things like justice, mercy and faith.
“You carefully strain a gnat from your drink, but swallow a camel?” (Matthew 23:23-24)
How’s that for a cartoon?
3. Or his ‘cartoon’ of a guy trying to help get the speck out of his neighbour’s eye, when he’s got a massive plank of wood in his own eye. (Matthew 7:3-5)
Classic humour for a carpenter!
Like a cartoonist, Jesus had a nose for what was
‘phoney-baloney’.
And the phoney-baloney includes getting distracted by the small things, when there are more important matters to focus on.
So, one really important takeaway for us from Jesus’ warning about hypocrisy, is that
we shouldn’t appoint ourselves as sniffer dogs for God, who zealously pursue the hypocrisy in others.
We should sniff our own baggage.
We don’t need to fear what we might find out about ourselves – for Jesus frees us from having to pretend.
We can be fully honest because we don’t have to pretend to be perfect; we get our acceptance from Jesus.
Jesus lived with authenticity (service of others, washing their feet), and people were attracted to this in him.
And Jesus doesn’t just set a great moral example,
he died to set us free from all nonsense;
all make-believe; all self-justification; all lies.
Jesus has died to make it possible for us to live authentically.
Here is how the Apostle Paul describes what Jesus has done for us…
17So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! 18All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; 19that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself,* not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us.
(2 Corinthians 5:17-19)
As followers of Jesus, transformed by reconciliation, we are able to be completely honest about our shortcomings, AND offer this reconciliation to bring others into God’s freedom.
This ministry really resonates with people in our culture.
People are sick of the phoney baloney.
Younger people increasingly (Gen Z) value authenticity.
They’ll understand Jesus’ warning against hypocrisy.
Although it’s a warning – this is a very positive message that aligns with the Good News Jesus brings humanity.
So let’s finish with this positive emphasis, by imagining what the warning of hypocrisy looks like if inverted.
How might we imagine the opposite of hypocrisy?
What does it look like when our actions, our words and our hearts all match?
Instead of “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around…”
“Cherish those Christians who move graciously around the market places,
and greet the humblest person with unqualified warmth and respect.
They do not push for the best seats in church,
and at church lunches they do not expect to eat first or be waited on.
Such people use their own Christ-blessed humanity to liberate others from anxieties and secret shame.
Their prayers may be short, but they come from the heart.
These are the people who have the faith to be honest to God, and their unpretentious example is our inspiration.”
Perhaps you can imagine other ways the opposite of hypocrisy looks.
I’d hope so, because although we are all far from perfect (we’ve established that already) there are many within this church family who live an authentic faith characterized by honesty, humility, and love.
It involves a willingness to be vulnerable, to admit our flaws, and to extend grace to others just as we have received grace ourselves.
We have been reconciled through Christ,
and have been given the ministry of reconciliation.
There are many good examples for us here, and one person we have recently thanked God for is Janie Pack.
Janie lived her faith like this – with honesty, humility, and love.
At her funeral on Friday there was a lot of love in this room.
We cried. We laughed.
We heard the promise of resurrection.
We remembered God’s love and God’s purposes.
We recognised the pattern of Janie’s life aligned to the heart of God.
(And Janie was a dog-lover – which brings us back to where we started with the sniffer dog!)
And, as well as the inspiration we take from Janie’s example, I also observed so many of you expressing love at this sad time.
This is the opposite of hypocrisy.
This openness to one another.
No pretence.
An honesty about how her death affects us.
A willingness to give compassion.
An openness to receive care from one another.
So many offering to help in many ways.
So many praying for one another.
Well done friends.
Responding THIS way is what is most important.
Let us never forget.
PRAYER
God of amazing grace,
You show us the power of love.
You free us from all lies.
In Jesus You make death come untrue.
You show us that true greatness is in serving others.
May this be the antidote we offer the world.
Starting where we are, loving those around us, as you love.
In Jesus’ name.
Amen.