Page 153 - GRACE

GRACE, Exploring Its Riches

just outward. Any outward show of piety without inner
transformation is hypocritical, like a masquerade that
appears differently from what is within. Mere outward
transformation leaves the old man within unchanged; such
hypocrisy is a dangerous state that God abhors. It is inner
transformation that produces conformity with the word and
will of God, and non-conformity with the ways of the
world.

Conformity for a Christian is the form, or shape, or mould
that produces our character. Christian Conformity is simply
the image of Jesus Christ, His nature, character, death,
resurrection and glorified body. All that a Christian is in
words and actions has to reflect Christ; anything outside
this is an aberration, un-Christ-like, and unacceptable
before God.

Acts of Hypocrisy

All forms of hypocrisy come from the wrong use of grace;
and they portend grave dangers. Hypocrisy is the source of
four distinct abominable practices that do not coexist with
grace in the life of a Christian.

1. Frustrating the Grace of God
Paul explains in the Galatians text just referred what
frustrating the grace of God in one’s life entails. It means to
set aside, to waste, to nullify, to neutralize, or to render
useless the grace one has received. These descriptions show

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