ACTING OUT

 I started to omit commentary on hypocrisy this morning because I think that I am the “real McCoy,” so to speak. God had other ideas; He pointed His Holy finger directly at me! Now for the commentary that I intended to gloss over:

Jesus had a problem with those who were play-acting — the “hypocrites.” Why would anybody act as if they are Christians when they are far from it. The Ten Commandments as I have written in the several previous commentaries were attitudes to have, or what Christians are to be — they are to be attitudes, and those who named the blessings got it right!

There are various reasons that those who call themselves “Christians” are actors in a play. Most of us have been “actors” at some time or another. Perhaps the most obvious reason for hypocrisy is so that sinners can still enjoy sinful acts all the while expecting eternal life. (I know that from experience, and most of you do as well.)

Some are righteous in public but sinful when alone, as if God is blind, or at least blind to sin. Although God is God, many act as if He is either an ignorant God or a liar. We all shall be judged, and He has all the evidence, to wit: 

¹ O lord, thou hast searched me, and known me. ² Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandest my thought afar off. ³ Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways. ⁴ For there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O Lord, thou knowest it altogether. ⁵ Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me. (Psalm 139:1-4)

 Verse one therein is what theologians call, “omniscient” — all knowing. God even knows our thoughts… all of them in all of us. How He does that, we do not know, but He is “Almighty God” who is everywhere at once — “omnipresent.” His ability to know all things is “omnipotence.”

Even Christians remain sinners because of imperfection — we are not Jesus; “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and his Word is not in us. (1 John 1:9-10).

That is what hypocrites are… those to whom Jesus was speaking in Matthew chapter 6. The Jews to whom He was speaking were religious, even righteous, but they were still not Christians. They followed Jesus wherever He went but they were not doing as Jesus was doing!

Later, Jesus told His followers, by then many Jews, “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me” (Mat 16:24).

Jesus carried His own Cross to His destination. Why Simon the Cyrene volunteered, no compelled, to carry the Cross of Jesus remains unknown. Perhaps the soldiers thought that Jesus was too weak to do His work for mankind, or perhaps to take away His Glory. Or it could be that Simon the Cyrene was the example to take up the Cross of Jesus and follow Him!

Simon the Cyrene did just that. On the other hand, the hypocrites did what? They were among those who said, “Crucify Him… Crucify Him!”  They followed Jesus all the Way to the Cross, but once they got there, none of them were found to bear the Cross.

As it turns out, because Simon carried the Cross, and because he is a Cyrene, he had never been a hypocrite. Indeed, his two sons also became disciples of Christ (Rom 16:13) indubitably because Simon their father carried the Cross of Jesus.

Pilate thought that he had the power of life and death over Jesus. Pilate could not compel Jesus to do anything because God, the Father, was who sacrificed Him. The point therein is that Simon was not really compelled to do anything. He was “conveniently” there, near Jesus on the Way to the Cross, and Simon was part of God’s plan and not an afterthought of the soldiers.

Simon picked up, now his cross, and followed Jesus. Jesus still carried the sins of mankind, and as such, Simon brought his sins to Calvary to be dealt with by Jesus. Simon the Cyrene could have been called, “Simon the Hypocrite,” if he had not followed Jesus all the way to the Cross!

As it turns out, God did not choose a hypocrite to carry the Cross to Calvary, but the real deal — a true disciple of Christ who was following Jesus as if He was an apostle chosen by God. God did choose him, and nobody “compelled” Simon to do anything. God planned that Simon walk the Way alongside Jesus and all the Way to the holocaust. He followed Jesus from Cyrene in Libya across the Sea to be there to carry the Cross.

Simon could have dropped the Cross. He had followed Jesus from Cyrene thousands of miles. He could not stop short of the Calvaraie Locus – the exact place of the cranium — to stop short of carrying the Cross for Adam as well; he had to go all the Way with Jesus to redeem the sins of mankind (Adam’s kind.) [1]

Even Peter denied Jesus. The others stood silently by and saw Jesus suffer the Delorosa Way. None of them were near Jesus to be selected.

Right then, Peter’s hypocrisy was revealed, and to his credit; no longer would he be a hypocrite but a true follower of Jesus. Peter, as it turned out, died on his own cross, but upside down. The “Antichrist,” Nero, crucified Peter. Peter, after all, had went all the Way with Jesus! [2]

Jesus called many of His followers “hypocrites.” They followed Him around but not because He was God in the flesh. Many thought Him to be Elias (Elijah) and others the legitimate contender to the throne — the King of Judea, the King of the Jews!

They would follow Jesus to His throne and go part Way, but they would never follow Jesus to His kingdom in another realm. All the apostles did that! All but John died for the Name, Jesus, and was boiled in oil (Foxe’s Book of Martyrs.)

Now look at one possibility: Pilate, as acting “Caesar,” could have gone so far that he anointed Jesus, King of Judea, and essentially, he did just that when he posted the sign, “King of the Jews.” Pilate found no fault in Jesus in civil law. He was designated by Roman Law to be king, even if for one day.

Pilate was following God. Jesus had to be a king for scripture to be true, and Pilate, unawares, fulfilled scripture… “Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion” (Psalm 2:2). In that psalm David revealed that Jesus was already king in waiting, as the “Anointed One” (Messiah) in his time. That Jesus was “the Son of David,” made Him the legitimate king of the Jews (of Judea).

The Passion of Jesus was a “Passion Play,” but it was more than acting out a scene. It was the real deal, and the players in the play were chosen by God to perform the play live. Nobody knew what was happening, but each played their roles to a tee. However, as it turned out, they all were chosen for their roles before the foundation of the world, and on the day that Jesus died, the Father brought them all together.

The hypocrites were really hypocrites, Pilate was really “Caesar” for that day since he was the right hand of Caesar as Tiberius was isolated on the island of Capri at that time.

Judas was really the Antichrist with Satan in him and once he was dead, Satan surely found a new body in the person of Caiaphas.

Anyone who endeavors to kill God is perhaps the “Antichrist.”

Note that Longinus, the centurion, had nothing against Jesus except the sword. He had only goodwill for Jesus and consequently, Jesus revealed to him that He was indeed God (Mark 15:39). Longinus did not kill just a king, but pierced God Himself. That was all that it took for him to be a believer. 

Christian legend has it that Longinus was a blind Roman centurion who thrust the spear into Christ's side at the crucifixion. Some of Jesus's blood fell upon his eyes and he was healed. Upon this miracle Longinus believed in Jesus. (Godwin 1994)

 I had never read that, yet I concluded the same thing in my numerous commentaries and books; that Longinus became a Christian because he saw the Holy Ghost leave the body of Jesus, thus revealing the Nature of God in the man’s body. He surely got blood in his eyes when he pierced Jesus, and even if not physically blind before, he saw some Thing that the others could not see — the Holy Ghost of Jesus leaving the Person just like Luke saw the “bodily shape” of the Holy Ghost entering the Person, Jesus (Luke 3:22).

That seeing Jesus as God in the flesh is the hallmark of the Christian. An early example of this was when Greeks came to Philip to worship God, and said one thing, “Sir, we would see Jesus” (John 12:21). That one thing made them disciples of Christ and Christians.

On the other hand, the hypocrites saw Jesus, not to worship Him, but to magnify themselves (Mat 6:1:7). Now, you should turn there to discover Jesus’s standards of hypocrisy.

Many people of this age read the Word but still cannot see Jesus as God in the Flesh. Their “God” is a “blind” Jesus who fails to see all the evil that we do. Jesus, as God in the flesh, sees all that we do, and even though He is merciful, He is neither ignorant of our sins nor blind.

Jesus sees it all! On judgment day, Jesus will confront hypocrites of all times, “I never knew you: depart from Me, ye that work iniquity” (Mat 7:23). Your acting, nor mine, is so good that Jesus is fooled.

The first thing that hypocrites must do is to admit that we are “bad actors” in a real drama and that all things may not end well unless the “acting” is more compelling to God as reality.

Sometimes I act up and often God confronts me. He desires the real thing, and therefore the “Comforter” remains with us to make the Way easier to follow.

(picture credit; Catholic Say; "St. Longinus")

 

 

 

 

 

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[1] “Cavaraie Locus” is Latin for “place of the cranium” and is from where “Calvary” comes in English. Jewish thought is that Adam is buried beneath Calvary and his bones were brought there by Shem and Melchizedek. (See my book, The Skull of Adam, for more.)

[2] There are many antichrists, according to scripture. The author believes that they are many but since there is one Devil, then antichrists are sequential; that the Serpent was the “Antichrist” and so were Nimrod, Herod the Great, Judas who had Satan in him, perhaps Caiaphas, and as most believe, Nero Caesar. There seem to always be one and only one person around all major irreligious events that has Satan in him. Those, I believe, are the many Antichrists. Who is the current “Antichrist?” He has yet to reveal himself.