Thursday, January 28, 2010

D. A. Carson on Hypocrisy

The next couple of days are going to be quite busy for me so I went to one of my favorite books by D. A. Carson to find a quote to use.  It didn't take long. 
"We human beings are a strange lot.  We hear high moral injunctions and glimpse just a little the genuine beauty of perfect holiness, and then prostitute the vision by dreaming about the way others would hold us in high esteem if we were like that.  The demand for genuine perfection loses itself in the lesser glory of external piety; the goal of pleasing the Father is traded for its pygmy cousin, the goal of pleasing men.  It almost seems as if the greater the demand for holiness, the greater the opportunity for hypocrisy.  This is why I suspect that the danger is potentially most serious among religious leaders." 

2 comments:

Scripture Zealot said...

Close your eyes and point and you'll find one. That book is on my main list. I can't get enough of the Sermon on the Mount.

Have you read Lloyd-Jones book on it?
Jeff

Louis said...

Jeff,

You're so right. That's why I went for a Carson book. I've not had the pleasure of reading Lloyd-Jones on the sermon. I would imagine it's excellent.