professing to teach others what we do not practice ourselves
April 14, 2021•206 words
We learn, firstly from our Lord’s words, how great is the sin of professing to teach others what we do not practice ourselves. He says to the lawyers, “You weigh men down with burdens hard to bear, while you yourselves will not even touch the burdens with one of your fingers.” [Luke 11:46] They required others to observe wearisome ceremonies in religion which they themselves neglected. They had the impudence to lay yokes upon the consciences of other men and yet to grant exemptions from these yokes for themselves. In a word, they had one set of measures and weights for their hearers, and another set for their own souls.
The stern reproof which our Lord here administers should come home with special power to certain classes in the church. It is a word in season to all Bible teachers. It is a word to all fathers and mothers. Above all, it is a word to all clergymen and ministers of religion. Let all such mark well our Lord’s language in this passage. Let them beware of telling others to aim at a standard which they do not aim at themselves. Such conduct, to say the least, is gross inconsistency.
—J.C. Ryle, ‘Expository Thoughts on Luke’