Job 27:8 For what is the hope of the hypocrite, though he has gained, when God takes away his soul?… I. THE FEARFUL NATURE OF RELIGIOUS HYPOCRISY. With all His mildness, gentleness, and compassion, we yet find Christ thundering against the hypocrite. There is a class of men who make a profession of religion which they know to be false. These are the persons whom the Redeemer denounces. A religious profession is undoubtedly an excellence, but this is the honest avowal of the religion that is already in the heart; taking care, that as the hypocrite hides his sins under a cloak, we should not hide our religion under a cloak, but should honestly avow that Saviour whom we profess to believe on in secret. Now that which is uttered and avowed before nil the world, because we have it in secret, is surely a different affair from a mere profession that is allied to an attempt to impose upon men, and setting the omniscience of God at defiance. II. VAIN ARE ALL WARNINGS GIVEN TO HYPOCRITES, BECAUSE HYPOCRISY HARDENS THE HEART. See the case of Judas. We ought to be made of glass, that every man may see what is our real character. We are more transparent than crystal before the eyes of the eternal God. The sin of false profession infatuates the mind, hardens the heart, and keeps a man always forming such false reasonings and conclusions that they lead at last to the most manifest overwhelming of him with his own crimes and with God's judgment. III. HOW VAIN ARE ALL THE THINGS ON WHICH THE HYPOCRITE PLACES HIS HOPE WHEN GOD ARISES TO JUDGMENT. A man may accustom himself to falsehood until he makes lies his refuge, and can scarcely distinguish between the most gross imposition upon himself and sincere safe dealing. When men accustom themselves to a system of deceit, they get perfectly bewildered and know not that which a child would have known and expected. IV. A LIFE OF HYPOCRISY IS LIKELY TO END IN A DEATH OF IMPENITENCE. The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination; the prayer only of the upright is God's delight. We dare not think that a man, after living a life of hypocrisy, need only utter a few prayers and all is safe and well. True prayer is alone the prayer of true penitence. (James Bennett, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: For what is the hope of the hypocrite, though he hath gained, when God taketh away his soul?WEB: For what is the hope of the godless, when he is cut off, when God takes away his life? |
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