WHY WOULD YOU EXPECT ANYTHING, YOU HYPOCRITE?

For almost forty years I have been happily married. I have no interest in dating. But, as I was reading the newspaper, a headline caught my attention. I read it and swiped to the next page; but, as the page disappeared, transmogrified into the following, one of the enumerated points caught my eye. I swiped back to the previous page. The headline was, “What You Are Doing Wrong In Dating—And How To Fix It.” The point was number 3. “You’re not holding yourself to the standard of the person you’re looking for.” Immediately, I thought of a reality I have encountered again and again while pastoring. “That’s exactly it,” I thought as I read the explanation of that point. Basically, it said, “You want someone that stays fit and trim, but do you exercise to stay fit and trim?” “You want someone that reads fifteen books a year, but do you read any books?” The reality is, the writer was calling such a person a hypocrite. In other words, she was saying to the date-hunter, “You expect from others what you yourself do not offer, you hypocrite.” Some folks expect to be visited when sick in the hospital. But when others are sick in the hospital, they do not visit them. Folks expect to be included in a social gathering. But they do not invite those same folk to their social gathering. Folks expect others to take the initiative to include them in their activities, but they include no one in theirs. Folks expect others to encourage them, but they seek to encourage no one. Folks expect others to pray for them, but they pray for no others. Speaking of being happily married, this reminds me of what my wife, a pastor’s wife, did once. Before church one Sunday evening, she was going around the sanctuary shaking hands with folks greeting them with her warm smile and friendly words. She shook one elderly man’s hand and greeted him. He was poutingly piled up on the pew frowning gloweringly. Ignoring her welcoming words, the crotchety old curmudgeon croaked out, “This is the most unfriendly church I’ve ever been in. Nobody comes by and shakes my hand.” My wife had had enough of this frequently encountered attitude. That Sweet Thing cut his complaining short with “Well, Brother, you’ve been going to this church for five years, and I have never seen you make any effort to go around and shake anybody else’s hand and be friendly.” Touche, Babe! She stuck him and nailed it. (Mixed metaphor intended). Bottomline: He expected from others what he himself did not give them. He expected others to be to him what he never was to them. There are other things wrong with his complaint too. If he had been there for five years, he would have been a part of the Church he criticized. But that is how it works. To criticize the family of God, one has to separate himself from it. He has to make out the people of the church as a separate entity. What my wife was saying was, “You are a part of the Church you are criticizing. Thus, you are really criticizing yourself. If our church isn’t friendly, it is because you are not friendly.” And, of course, such criticism is rarely accurate. Truth is, many folks had initiated a conversation with this man. Many had every service shaken his hand. And his accusation ironically belied the fact that his hand was being shaken simultaneously to his saying no one shook his hand. Another brother who had attended quite a few years left. I phoned him to ask him why, “Well, that church doesn’t worship fervently and demonstratively enough.” (We are Pentecostal. He used the expression “shout enough.”). I protested, “But, Brother, you never worship that way!” The hypocrisy of such carping is thick. If you’ll indulge me, let me give you the recipe for contentment with the church, contentment with your home, and contentment with life: Seek to be to others what you expect them to be to you. Since we started with an analogy from dating, let me end with one: Back when I was a young minister, I used to do workshops and seminars on dating and marriage. I remember so often emphasizing this point: “I know you want to find the right person for you. The right person to marry. But, quit trying to find the right person. Focus on being the right person and you will—by doing that--find the right person. If more would seek to be what they should be to others, if they would seek to be what they expect others to be to them, they might find that the others aren’t quite as bad as they thought. In fact, they will find them far better. Their previously unfulfilled expectations will be met or substituted for the ones they should have. However, if you are not to others what you expect of them, why would you expect anything of them, you hypocrite*? --Pastor Clifford Hurst *Such strong language is a reference to the analogy above from the article on dating. P.S.: Oh, by the way. If you expect folks to like your posts, you will like mine. If you don’t, don’t ever complain—if even to yourself—that others don’t like yours. Just joking. But, since, I’m rambling on, if you claim you have done and done to others and it has all been to no avail and your efforts have been unrequited, first, take another look. Perhaps, there is more coming your way than you have given credit for. And, if not, you are still in better shape than those who never reach out to others--until you complain about others not reciprocating your efforts.