Hypocrite Song

There is musician by the name of Eli that I have started listening to recently...well, in the last six months or so.  He sings contemporary Christian music with a folksy rock sound and amazingly well written lyrics.  One of my favorite songs he does is called simply, The Hypocrite Song, which has the following chorus:

Oh lai-dee-dai, Oh lai-dee-dee

I thank you, Lord, that there's a heaven

Full of hypocrites like me

So tell the angels to get ready

Because it may not be too long

'Til I come to sing my hypocrite song

It may just be me, but sometimes it seems that this kind of attitude is what's missing in a lot of Christians - the recognition that, despite our best intentions, we often fail to live out the things we claim to believe.  We don't always love, we don't always feed the hungry, we get angry, we get divorced, we have sex outside of marriage.  For the most part, we will all have a "hypocrite song" to sing before Christ.

As for me, I talk a lot about the need for Christians to be responsible with the environment, yet I still go to the gas station every morning and buy a 44 oz. styrofoam cup of Mountain Dew.  I go on and on about needing to feed the hungry and clothe the poor while continuing to drive by that guy holding a sign asking for food.  I have great thoughts about being a good steward with the resources God has given me but still waste money on frivolous garbage like online games and meaningless novels.  I'm pretty confident that my own hypocrite song would take a long, long time to sing...

Yes, it is most certainly a good thing that God's love and grace extends far enough to reach hypocrites and that there is a heaven "full of hypocrites" like me.  Perhaps over the course of time, I can re-write my hypocrite song and remove a few verses here and there.

Lord, help me to recognize the parts of my life that are merely the verses of my hypocrite song.  I don't want to be a vocal Christian, whose mouth says all the right things while my body doesn't do anything at all.  Teach me to be a better husband, a better father, a better pastor, a better follower of Christ.  If it's going to hurt, as I'm pretty confident it will, grant me the grace to suffer for the glory of the name of Jesus the Christ.  I know that, no matter how hard I try, I'll still have a hypocrite song to sing to you someday - but with your mercy, grace, and conviction, you can still help me make it really short.  Amen.