We have a lot of fake things in this world. Fake leather, fake diamonds, fake purses, shoes, and clothes. But we can also fake things in our behavior. Fake smiles, fake laughs, and even fake praise. We sit in church, shout “Amen”, raise our hands, act like we love hearing God’s Word, but the issue is when we fail to apply God’s Word or let it change our lives.

Change is good. In the Christian walk, change is necessary; it is sanctification. We must allow Christ to mold us and make us more like Himself every day, so that we are less and less like the world. Christianity is a journey bringing us closer toward becoming more like Christ, and we can only get there by moving forward. If we never allow Christ to change our hearts, we are stagnant, unmoving, and have no impact on the world around us. But if we are moving forward and maturing in our walk with Christ and doing His Kingdom work, we are actively showing Christ to those around us. Therefore, we are not only allowing Him to change us, but showing others how He can change them!

We can know a lot of Scripture, and even listen to it preached at church or on the radio. The issue is not with knowledge, but rather the application. Do we listen to the Word preached and immediately think the message is for someone else – someone stuck in sin, or worse off than we are? Do we listen to God’s Word with our own agenda? Do we try and hear justification for our sinful actions and words?

We may try to fool one another, but we will never fool God! He can’t be fooled. He can’t be tricked. He can’t be deceived. He knows our hearts and our thoughts. He already has our agenda and motives all figured out. When we worship at church, He is watching.

Off all the things to fake, why do some believers try so hard to fake their praise and worship? Worship is not a show. Worship is not meant to draw attention to one’s self. Worship is an outpouring of love and praise to God and His Son for who He is and what He has done on our behalf.

Worship helps us develop Christlike characteristics. In order for us to be molded into Christ’s likeness, we need to daily give Him praise and honor. If we don’t constantly recognize Him as our Savior, we might be tempted to place something else at the center of our lives, whether it be other people, social media, money, or even ourselves. When we remove Christ from the center, we are no longer progressing in our faith – we have stalled out. In order to keep growing and moving toward Christ, we need to remind ourselves who He is and give Him due praise for it.

We need to praise God for who He is, not only what He’s done or can do for us. This is why so many worship songs address God by His multiple names: Father, King, Lord, Provider, Healer, Shepherd, Peace, and Savior. They are acknowledging who God is and worshipping Him for it.

So then why do believers go to church and raise their hands and agree with the message from the pulpit, but then walk out the doors and live in direct opposition to God’s Word? This contradiction should not be a common reality among believers.

James 3 gives us a great example of contradiction in believers:

“Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and salt water? Can a fig tree, my brothers, bear olives, or a grapevine produce figs? Neither can a salt pond yield fresh water.” -James 3:11-12

James is asking a rhetorical question to the believers. The believers in his day acted right with God in one moment, and then lived like sinners the next moment. He is saying, like Paul so often says in the New Testament, “this should not be.”

Do you sing and worship in church, blessing God, and then walk out the doors and into the parking lot, cursing others – be it your husband, or kids, or by gossiping about another member of the church?

Just like a public drinking fountain cannot produce both fresh and salt water, a tree cannot bear two different kinds of fruit. Either one or the other will come out. So if we slip and say a cuss word as a believer, does that mean we aren’t saved? No. But just because you’re saved doesn’t mean you’re perfect. However, when we start to do things that are not pleasing to God, and when we start to think things that are not pleasing to God, or when we begin to say things that are not pleasing to God… the Holy Spirit should be speaking to us saying, “No! Stop! Helllloooo!”

When we don’t yield to the Holy Spirit’s conviction, we are quenching the Spirit; and if we’re not careful, it will lead to a hardening of our hearts. We need to pray that God will make us sensitive to His Holy Spirit’s conviction and that He will help us as soon as that conviction is brought to mind, so we don’t stay down the wrong path.

If we are saved and have been saved for quite some time, we should be constantly growing in our walk – not being stagnant and doing the same old things. So let’s set out to be as James tells us in James 1:22-25 and be doers of the word and not merely hearers. Let God’s Word get into your heart and do the convicting work that needs to be done. Act on that conviction and make the application to your life. And if you are someone who sees a contradiction of actions in your fellow brother or sister in Christ, pray and ask God to help you to share truth in love with that fellow believer. Call their attention to the inconsistency of praising God in church, and living opposite of His Word.