LIFE IN GOD’S KINGDOM
SEEKS MAXIMUM PLEASURE
MATTHEW 6: 1-8 & 16-18
INTRODUCTION
Two-faced, con man, fake, fraud, imposter, phony, hypocrite…None of these
are words we want to describe us. Just like Roger Fox, none of us likes
it when someone has been a fraud with us. Yet all of us, if we’re honest,
have to admit that we have at times played the hypocrite. We have pretended
one thing in order to gain another. It’s one thing to be a hypocrite with
men, it’s quite another to be a fraud in relationship to God. To pretend
to love God, worship God and serve God while not really being concerned
with what God thinks but only concerned with how people will treat you
is a great evil. Pretending to be God’s child in order to get others to
respect and admire you is condemned by Jesus in the severest terms.
But Jesus is not content with just condemning hypocrisy he is interested
in enabling his followers to overcome their tendencies to hypocrisy. So
in Matthew 6 he explains how the children of God practice their faith
without succumbing to the trap of hypocrisy. Jesus teaches that…
MAIN POINT
Everyone who has God as their Father…
I. Does good
The first thing I want you to note is in v. 1. The NIV translation covers
up a connection that Jesus wants you to make. The NASB makes it clear
when it translates the phrase accurately. It should say, "Be careful not
to practice your righteousness before men to be seen by them." The last
time Jesus mentioned "your righteousness" was in chapter 5:20. "unless
your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of
the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven." Now we’ve
seen in vv. 21-48 that Jesus has been careful to show that the righteousness
that the religious teachers had was insufficient to get them into heaven.
They claimed to be righteous, to follow all God’s laws. However, they
actually changed the meaning of God’s standards in the OT. They reduced
God’s demands so they could claim to be obeying God’s laws and so worthy
of heaven. Jesus demonstrates that the only righteousness that is sufficient
for getting into heaven is absolute perfection. See v. 48?
Jesus intends for us to have 3 responses to what he has said in vv. 20-48.
First we are to be in despair. You and I should see this perfection and
realize that we don’t have it and no matter how hard we try we can never
produce it. The despair comes from realizing that if we are not perfect
we will be forever separated from God in hell. Second we should cry out
to God to have mercy on us. It should be the chief ambition of our life
to get from God what we can never give ourselves, perfect righteousness
through Jesus. Finally, we should then see the righteousness that Jesus
describes here and we should love it and pursue it in our actual experience.
Asking God’s forgiveness for our failure to be what we ought to be but
pressing on towards it nevertheless. Now in 6:1 Jesus is continuing his
discussion on the superior righteousness that must characterize his disciples.
Jesus assumes, throughout this passage, that his disciples will be practicing
righteousness. He picks out the three most basic activities of anyone
who claims to be God’s child. Look at v. 2 "when you give to the needy";
then v. 3, "But when you give to the needy"; then v. 5, "and when you
pray"; then v. 6, "but when you pray"; then v. 16, "when you fast"; and
then v. 17, "but when you fast". It does not say, "if you give, pray,
fast" but "when". These are all activities that are commanded in the OT
and Jesus assumes that his followers will continue these practices. If
God is your Father then you will generously give of your resources to
help the poor. You will regularly offer prayers of praise, thanksgiving
and request to your heavenly Father. You will regularly not eat in order
to express your sorrow over your sin and to seek God in greater ways.
These are just examples of the many ways in which God’s children practice
their righteousness. There is a very important verse in I John 2:29 that
speaks exactly to what Jesus is saying here. It says, "Everyone who has
been born of God practices righteousness." When God gives a person spiritual
life, when the Holy Spirit comes to dwell in a human heart, then the person
loves to obey God and seek God, to do righteousness.
When each of my children were born we knew they were alive because they
opened their eyes, their little chests began going up and down as they
breathed, they cried, the doctor put the stethoscope on their chests and
heard their hearts beat, their little hands balled up into fists…All of
these were the signs of life. If these signs are not present then the
child is not alive. Now my children didn’t start talking and walking and
playing sports on the day they came out of the womb. It took time to grow
and mature and develop these abilities. But we knew they had life because
they showed the signs of life. The signs that you have been given spiritual
life are many. In addition to a love for and a strenuous pursuit of the
life Jesus has described in Matthew 5, are generous giving to relieve
the needs of the poor, regular prayer and fasting. Obviously, the practice
of these things by a person who has only been a Christian for a short
time is going to look different than their practice by a person who has
been a Christian a long time. Let me just ask those of you who have been
Christians for at least five years, "Are you better at giving, praying
and fasting today then when you first became a Christian?"
If you claim to be a Christian and have no desire to give money to help
others, no desire to seek God in prayer and with fasting, no desire to
read the Bible or to be with God’s people, then Jesus would ask, "are
you really a Christian?" When you read Matthew 5 is it a source of great
sadness to you that you do not live more as Jesus describes? When you
hear a sermon or read the Bible, do you find a growing desire for and
a practice of the life you hear described? If so, these are the signs
of life. But, if you are more energized by doing golf or woodworking or
hunting or fishing or preaching or reading or computer games or soccer
or shopping or TV watching or whatever than you are by doing righteousness,
that is not a sign of life. However, it’s not just doing righteous things
that is the sign of life.
Everyone who has God as their Father…
- Practices righteousness
- And…
II. Guards against wrong motives and wrong thinking
What Jesus makes so very plain in these verses is that your motives matter.
He is not simply interested in what you do, but why you do what you do.
So he begins with this strong word of warning. "Be careful", he says,
"to not practice your righteousness before men to be seen by them." In
other places this word is translated, "be on your guard" or "pay careful
attention to". What this warning tells me is that doing righteousness
in order to be seen by men is a very natural thing for human beings to
do. It is easy to do the right thing for the wrong reason.
Everyone wants to be liked. Everyone is very aware of how the people
around him are reacting to what he or she is doing. Anyone who says, "I
don’t care what people think" is a liar. You may not care what some people
think about you but everyone, except for the insane, cares what someone
thinks about them. All of us do certain things and refrain from other
things because of how other people feel about our doing or not doing certain
things. It is not necessarily wrong to be concerned about what others
think of you. Prov. 22:1 says, "A good name is more desirable than great
riches; to be esteemed s better than silver or gold." What Jesus is doing
here is not condemning the desire to be respected by others but doing
"righteous" things in order to gain the respect of others. The logic of
Jesus’ argument here is astonishing. But before we look at his reasoning
I need to draw your attention to something that matters a great deal.
Look at 5:16. It says, "let your light shine before men, that they may
see your good deeds and praise your father in heaven." Do you see all
the words that are similar? "Before men", "that they may see/to be seen
by men", "your father in heaven" and "praised" in v. 16 is the exact same
word as "honored" in v. 2. This is not accidental. Jesus means for us
to put these two verses together and to ask, "how can we do good deeds
in order to be seen by men and not do our righteousness to be seen by
men?" Are people supposed to see our righteousness or not? The answer
is yes and no. The context of 5: 16 is 5: 10-12. When you are the person
described in the beatitudes, when you live like a Christian you can count
on the world hating you and persecuting you. The temptation, because we
want people to like us, is to not act like a Christian so that we won’t
suffer but will be accepted. However, in chapter 6 the context is different.
It is living in the midst of people who value religious/Christian behavior.
So we are tempted to act religious in order to get religious people to
respect us. I think John Stott is right when he comments, "It is our human
cowardice that made him say, ‘Let your light shine before men’, and our
human vanity which made him tell us to beware of practising our piety
before men." In many ways the temptation is the same in both cases, we
like to be liked, we hate to be hated. So sometimes we won’t be what we
are to keep from being hated and at other times we will pretend to be
what we are not in order to be liked. It just depends on who we are talking
to.
In each of these practices Jesus describes the behavior of the hypocrites.
He is using satire and exaggeration to show the foolishness of the behavior
of hypocrites. In each case he is not condemning the practice but rather
the motive that is behind the practice.
- Look at vv. 2-3. It is doubtful that anyone ever brought their gifts
for the poor to the temple and the synagogue with trumpets playing in
front of them. Jesus is using exaggeration. However, though the ways
in which hypocrites let other people know about their generosity are
far more subtle than blowing a trumpet, they are no less obvious. That
is Jesus’ point. Now, if you are a generous person and let people know
that you are, you will receive their respect and admiration. People
appreciate generous people and speak highly of them. If you are generous
you will not only receive the gratitude of those who you help but of
the broader community as well. Jesus says that if you give in order
to be noticed, you will get what you are looking for, but that is all
you will get.
- In v. 5 Jesus is not condemning public praying, he is not condemning
prayer while standing up. Notice that hypocrites love to pray in public,
what they do not love is praying in private. What Jesus is condemning
is the very common practice of coming to church on Sunday and to Bible
study on Tuesday and prayer meeting on Saturday but never reading your
bible and praying privately. It is a simple thing to know if you are
being a hypocrite in your praying and worshipping. Do you only pray
and worship in public and never or rarely in private? The solution to
your problem isn’t to stop coming to church or going to Bible study
but to start pursuing God privately. I can tell you without any hesitation,
that if the only time you give any attention to God is on Sunday mornings
the only reward you will get is our admiration and respect, our friendship.
God is paying absolutely no attention to you. Listen, hanging around
with church-going people is a happier way to live than hanging around
with drunks and thieves. I’ve done both and life goes way better when
you have friends that don’t engage in self-destructive behavior and
drag you along with them. However, if the only reason you’re here is
because you want a more positive social environment, you will get that,
but God will ignore you, now and on the day of judgement.
- Fasting is an activity that all of us associate with people who are
really serious about their relationship with God. To deny yourself food
and cause yourself to experience the pain of hunger just so you can
know God better is radical behavior. While most people will think you
are a little strange and too fanatical about your religion, everyone
will admire your discipline and praise your sincerity. Especially in
the religious community, if you are known as a person who regularly
fasts, you can increase the respect that people have for you and the
influence you have over others. If you are known for the seriousness
with which you approach spiritual things you can expect lots of people
to seek your help with their spiritual problems and questions. Jesus
is not condemning the practice of fasting, in fact he expects his children
to fast. He is not condemning the practice of the church calling a public
fast. He is condemning fasting in order to be respected and admired
by others, he is condemning the motive.
I do not think that most of us consciously and in a calculating manner
give money, attend public worship services, and practice fasting for the
purpose of attracting the attention of people. Some people are this calculating,
but most of us, if asked why we do these things would say that we are
doing them in order to know God. If you were to ask any of the religious
teachers of Jesus’ day why they did gave money to the poor, prayed and
fasted would they have told you it was in order to get men to like them?
I don’t think so. That’s why Jesus is so strong in his warning and so
specific in his instructions. He wants us to be constantly checking our
motives. It is very easy to be self-deceived in this matter. It is so
easy to be a social Christian and to not be a real Christian. It is so
easy to engage in all the right Christian behavior for all the wrong reasons.
You can have a very happy life doing Christian things and end up in hell.
That’s the warning Jesus is giving you here.
Here are several tests for you to give yourself to check your motives:
- Do you ever question your motives? Do you ever gasp as you realize
that you did a good thing in order to impress another person?
- Are you ever troubled by the fact that you are willing to go to church
but have no desire and little practice at reading the bible and praying
personally, privately?
- Do you feel proud of what you’ve given to the church or a charity?
Do you like to add up how much you’ve given at the end of the year when
you do your taxes?
- When others confess their struggle with personal bible reading or
prayer, do you feel smug and proud of how consistent you are in your
own "devotions"?
Share about my experience in the fall of 1984.
Everyone who has God as their Father…
- Practices righteousness
- Guards against wrong motives and wrong thinking
- And…
III. Passionately pursues all his or her happiness in God
What is astonishing about Jesus’ logic in these verses is that it is
so contrary to how we are normally taught to think about religion and
doing good. The common thinking is that an action is only truly good if
I do it with no thought of personal benefit. If I do a good deed and receive
any benefit, then I am being a hypocrite, I am not being altruistic. This
is completely foreign to how Jesus and the entire Bible thinks about love
and doing good deeds. Notice that the motive that Jesus commends in each
instance is the expectation of reward from God. You are not to give to
the poor primarily because the poor need your help but so that you will
be rewarded by God. You are not to pray in order to improve your character,
to be a better person or to get your needs met but in order to be rewarded
by God. You are not to fast in order to overcome sin in your life or to
be a better Christian but so that God will reward you. We are supposed
to be motivated by the knowledge that God rewards giving, praying and
fasting that is done in secret.
This is not how we normally think. Shouldn’t we love God because it is
the right thing to do? Shouldn’t we give and pray because it is our duty?
Shouldn’t we help the poor because of their need? Doesn’t all this talk
of reward make us mercenary and, well, hypocritical? Listen to what C.S.
Lewis says about rewards:
"We must not be troubled by unbelievers when they say that this promise
of reward makes the Christian life a mercenary affair. There are different
kinds of reward. There is the reward which has no natural connection
with the things you do to earn it, and is quite foreign to the desires
that ought to accompany those things. Money is not the natural reward
of love; that is why we call a man mercenary if he marries a woman
for the sake of her money. But marriage is the proper reward for a
real lover, and he is not mercenary for desiring it…The proper rewards
are not simply tacked on to the activity for which they are given,
but are the activity itself in consummation."
What is the reward that we will be given and for which we are to do these
things? The answer can be seen in 5:20, it is the kingdom of God. The
answer can be seen in the Lord’s prayer that is in vv. 9-12. Notice what
we are to pray first of all. It is God’s rule in our lives and in the
world. Our reward is God himself and his rule and fellowship. In the OT
God tells Abraham, "Do not be afraid, I am your shield and your very great
reward." In Psalm 16:11 the psalmist says, "You have made known to me
the path of life, you will fill me with joy in your presence with eternal
pleasures at your right hand." In Psalm 73: 25 it says, "Whom have in
heaven but you and earth has nothing I desire besides you…as for me it
is good to be near God. I have made the Sovereign Lord my refuge."
The reason to give money to the poor, to pray, to fast, to not be angry,
to be reconciled to anyone whom I’ve offended, to not lust, to be faithful
to my spouse, to not lie, to love my enemies and do good to those who
hate me is so that I can experience the joy of knowing God. He is what
I am after. He is my reward. The only way to get to him is to seek him
in secret, to be careful to not do my righteousness in order to be seen
by men. Jesus’ argument is so stunning. It is a wonderful thing to be
loved by people. It is wonderful to be respected and admired and held
in high esteem. It is thrilling to have people seek your counsel and value
your opinions. But the joy of being loved by people is nothing compared
with the joy of being with God. So Jesus is commanding us to seek our
happiness with all our might—in God. He is asking you to make a decision,
which is a happier thing? To live for 80 years on planet earth enjoying
the respect and admiration of people and then to spend eternity in hell
experiencing what it is like to have God as your enemy? Or to live your
life here seeking only God and maybe never enjoying the admiration of
another human being and then to spend an eternity with him showering his
kindnesses upon you?
Johathon Edwards says it this way,
"The enjoyment of God is the only happiness with which our souls
can be satisfied. To go to heaven, fully to enjoy God, is infinitely
better than the most pleasant accommodations here. Fathers and mothers,
husbands, wives or children or the company of earthly friends are
but shadows; but God is the substance. These are but scattered beams,
but God is the sun. These are but streams, God is the ocean."
In my Bible I have circled Matthew 6:1 and 5:16 and then drawn a line
between them. The reason I have done this is to show that it is only those
who practice their righteousness because of the joy of knowing God who
will glorify him. If you engage in any Christian activity without doing
it because all your happiness is in God, you will not glorify him, you
will not show how great he is but rather how great you are.
Let me close with an illustration that some of you have heard me use
before. I first read it in a book by John Piper. Imagine that on my next
wedding anniversary I made reservations for dinner at Jane’s favorite
restaurant. I bought 24 roses because that’s how many years we will be
married next August. I arranged babysitting and spent the evening engaging
her in delightful conversation. At the end of the evening she told me
how much she appreciated all I had done to make for such a special evening.
I told her, "don’t mention it, it was my duty." Or even worse I said,
"Well I think its important for our neighbors to think we have a good
marriage. So I really did it up so I can tell them what a great marriage
we have so they’ll want to become Christians." If I say anything to her
other than, "The pleasure is all mine. I love to be with you and whatever
makes you happy makes me happy. I’d do anything in order to please you
because pleasing you pleases me", then I am a hypocrite. My giving of
my time and my money shows how precious and valuable Jane is, it glorifies
her. So in the same way, any obedience you render to God that is not rendered
out of a heart of delight in delighting him is hypocrisy.
Everyone who has God as their Father…
- Practices righteousness
- Guards against wrong motives and thinking
- Seeks all their happiness in God
© Copyright 2000 John Swanson.
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