Wisdom and Righteousness
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. My name is Chet. I'm one of the pastors here. Grab your Bibles. Go to Proverbs chapter 1. We have spent our summer in the Proverbs the past couple of months working through it.
We've made it all the way to chapter 1. And Proverbs is a collection of wisdom sayings, and so we've approached it differently than when we usually work through a book of the Bible. Usually, you know, the book of the Bible progresses intentionally. Proverbs has some stuff that kind of anchors it at the beginning, some stuff that anchors it at the end. But we've walked through kind of topically addressing some of the ideas that Proverbs addresses over and over.
And so today we're going to finish up our series in the book of Proverbs talking about righteousness. So at the beginning of Proverbs, we read this section in chapter 1, and we said that some of what the Proverbs is getting at is that it wants us to grow in wisdom and that it's going to teach us how to be wise, that it's going to develop us in wisdom. And as we read through it, we got to Proverbs 1-7 that says this, The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. Fools despise wisdom and instruction. And so the beginning of growing in wisdom is that we would actually fear the Lord, that we would trust Him.
In some ways, God's coming and saying, This is how to live in the world to enjoy the world I created. In some ways, it's like unboxing a board game, and then you get the instructions out and you read, How do I play this board game? You don't unbox it and go, Instructions are for losers and throw those away and then say, Let's do this. And so what He's doing is He's saying, I created the world. Let me give you wisdom on how to live in it and live in it well. And so He says some things we don't necessarily agree with, and so that's where we begin with the fear of the Lord.
That we trust Him. That we want to honor Him and obey Him and that we want to follow Him. And so that when He tells us how to live and to live well, we listen. That's the beginning of wisdom. But if the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and we follow through and listen to wisdom, the end of wisdom is righteousness.
It says that in chapter 1. It says that twice in chapter 2. I want to show you Proverbs 2.9. It says basically if you listen, then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity and every good path. Or Proverbs 2.20, it's saying again, if you listen, it says, So that you will walk in the way of the good and keep to the paths of the righteous. That if we follow wisdom, we walk in righteousness.
If you go to the school of wisdom, you graduate with a degree in righteousness. If wisdom is your sensei, you get a black belt in righteousness. Now, that's how that works. And so that as we've talked through all the things we've talked through over the course of the summer, which has been a good bit. We've talked about parenting, manhood, womanhood, friendship, words, anger, money, work, decision making, sexual purity, lying. If you're like me, as I read through that list, you had a little PTSD because some of those weeks weren't that fun.
We've walked through these things and we've said this is what wisdom looks like. We could have also just said this is what righteousness looks like. This is how to live rightly in God's world. But as we finish up the book of Proverbs, we want to develop our understanding of righteousness a little better. So that we can really appreciate and kind of understand what it's calling us to.
Because the reality is we have kind of a natural draw, a desire for wisdom that I think is a little distinct from our desire for righteousness. Here's what I mean. If we said, hey, would you like wisdom? You'd say, yes. I'd love wisdom. I'd love to be wise.
And if we came and said, hey, would you like righteousness? You'd be like, sure. I guess. What do you mean? Where? How much?
Like, what are we talking about? What do you mean by righteousness? How's that going to affect my life? There's this general, it's a little bit like chivalry sometimes the way we use the word righteousness. You kind of know what it means. And you know that people used to care about it a lot.
But you're not sure how it affects you. And y'all know that since I'm a pastor, I'm supposed to care about it and talk about it. But I'm not even sure I'm doing it right because I'm a Baptist pastor in the South. I'm pretty sure I'm supposed to pronounce it like righteousness. You really got to grab the word and break all the syllables out of it. You know, you got to shake them out to get to really talking about it the way you're supposed to.
There's this general sense of like, what do we mean by righteousness? What? How does that benefit me? And in some ways, what God is doing when he teaches us wisdom, he's calling us into righteousness. And it's not that Toto ran around and pulled the curtain back for us. But that God himself is pulling the curtain back and saying, do y'all want what's good in life?
Do y'all want to see how I designed this? Do you want to have joy? Do you want to have hope? Do you want to have security? Do you want to have things work out well for you? Then come follow me in wisdom and righteousness.
It makes things better. Wickedness usually works well short term. Makes things easier quickly. Righteousness, we're told, often makes things more difficult at first, but then ultimately leads us to life and betterness. And that's what he's saying. The other thing is I think we have a vague picture of righteousness that affects us.
We don't have as clear a picture as we should. But my wife and I, when we first got married, we started watching through the Band of Brothers, which is a TV show. We had borrowed a DVD box set from my brother because that's how you used to watch things if you were going to watch them. You often bought box sets. It used to be VHSs. We had DVDs because they were moving up in the world.
And so we were watching this DVD box set of the Band of Brothers, and we were thoroughly enjoying it. And it worked really well for us for the first couple of episodes until they went to war. And when they went to war, we ceased to be able to watch. Not because it was too violent, but because my wife could no longer follow the story. Because they were all wearing the same uniform. They all had on helmets.
All of their faces were dirty. And she could no longer tell who was who. She was using other clues to know. Haircuts. Hair color. But like we would have these discussions all the time where she would go, wait a second, wait a second.
Why did he just kill his best friend? I'm like, who killed? What are you talking about? Who's best friend? His best friend. He just killed him.
They were best friends. I was like, wait, wait, the guy that just died? She's like, yeah. This is a legit conversation we had. I said, he was a German soldier. We just met that guy.
She was like, no, that's the guy from... I was like, no, it's not. She would get surprised because people would come back from the dead. She'd be like, I thought that guy died. I'd be like, what guy? She'd be like, that guy.
I'm like, that guy just showed up. It was tearing our young family apart. So we just had to give up on it. We watched the Marvel movies work really well for us because Captain America and Iron Man don't look anything alike. It's easy to keep up with. And so whatever she uses to categorize people, it apparently isn't like nuanced faces.
Which I'd like to think I was handsome, but I married a person who doesn't even notice faces, so I don't know. But she had a general picture of each person and then when they became too similar. And I think in some ways that's the way we are with righteousness. If someone asked you to define righteousness, you'd be like, you know, doing right. And if they pressed you, you'd eventually kind of usually flip it to just saying negative statements. And not negative like righteousness is bad, but we define it by what righteousness doesn't do.
Well, you know, you don't lie and you don't pursue like sexual sin. You don't sleep around and you don't, you know, like cuss or chew tobacco. I don't know. There's a lot of things you don't do and that makes you righteous. And if that's your only definition, some of you own old dogs that would make excellent Christians. Because they don't do anything.
But righteousness has to be more robust than that. What God's calling us to has to be a bigger picture. And when he calls us into wisdom and he calls us into righteousness, we need to have a better definition. And so that's the hope this morning is that we would have a more full definition of righteousness. And the first thing I want us to see as Proverbs paints this picture up for us is that righteousness has a social aspect. That it is not simply personal morality.
That is a part of righteousness, but it's not simply personal morality. Let's look at Proverbs 11, 10. Proverbs 29, 10. To benefit those around them. It is not simply that they're personally going to do what is right, but there's some benefit to being surrounded by, being led by, being cared for by the righteous. That if you are righteous, it's not just a benefit to you personally as you relate to the Lord.
It is that it begins with a fear of the Lord, but that in some ways God then commissions us in righteousness to be his agents in the world to make the world better through righteousness. Through doing what is right. Not simply not doing what is wrong. Now the wicked do what's wrong and they harm others, but the righteous do what is right and they benefit others. Bruce Waltke, who we've used his commentary. Goodness, that word just ran out of my head.
Commentary on the Proverbs throughout this series says this. He says, That's a helpful, memorable way to understand how righteousness and unrighteousness work. How wickedness and righteousness work. That righteousness will disadvantage, the righteous will disadvantage themselves to advantage those around them. To make things better for those around them. That they'll go out of their way.
They'll take up their time. They'll take up their money. Their energy will be spent at their own expense to benefit others. And the wicked do the exact opposite. They're trying to figure out how they can get out of others to benefit themselves. That's a really good, simple test for am I living righteously in my relationships?
Am I trying to advantage myself out of this relationship? Is it about what I get out of it? Or am I disadvantaging myself for the sake of my roommate? For the sake of my friends? For the sake of my spouse? One of the only places we do this very easily and clearly and have some of the most joy and some of the best relationships is with children.
Parents to children naturally do this because you just have to disadvantage yourself for the sake of your children. And you'll notice that you really love your children. You've been around parents and they adore their children. And their children are the worst. You've seen their children and you're like, what? But that's because they've set themselves to act righteously in that relationship.
Where they are disadvantaging themselves for the advantage of the others. And the truth is we can have joy and righteousness in all relationships if we'll approach it that way. So that's why it says, when the righteous increase, the people rejoice. But when the wicked rule, the people groan. I want to show you a couple places that it shows up. Proverbs 12, 26.
One who is righteous is a guide to his neighbor. But the way of the wicked leads them astray. So that by righteousness, those who are around you benefit. That if you work with righteous people, it's not just that they show up and do what they're supposed to. They do. But they make the whole place better.
All the people around them benefit. They help others. They give extra time to work on projects that aren't theirs. They stay late to help fix things that they didn't cause. They disadvantage themselves for the advantage of others. That's righteousness at work.
That if you live in a neighborhood with righteous people, it's not just that they tend to their own stuff and they mind their own business. They do. But they also help tend to the things around them. They keep an eye on things. They care for other people. That's righteousness at work.
Proverbs 29, 7 says, A righteous man knows the rights of the poor. A wicked man does not understand such knowledge. The poor, as a whole class, aren't much benefit to anyone. The only way historically people have benefited from the poor was to enslave them. To take away what they had and use it for their own gain. But it says, The righteous knows that what makes you valuable isn't what you offer.
It's not how I can take advantage of you. That's not where value comes. That you have rights intrinsically. And the righteous understand that, but the wicked don't. So the righteous care about those that are around them.
Care about those that can't pay for things. Care about those who can't get along on their own. Care about those who are weak and who are poor and who are in trouble. One of the ways to understand if we are righteous as an individual or as a church is, Do we care about the poor? Do we care about those who are hurting around us? Or is it just, If you can carry your own weight, great, you're welcome.
And if you can't, Sorry. It's one way to understand the righteousness of your group. Is does your group rally around those who are hurting and disadvantage themselves for their sake to help them? Or do they just get overwhelmed by them and burdened by them and bothered with them? It's not just the poor. It says this, Proverbs 12, 10, Whoever is righteous has regard for the life of his beast, But the mercy of the wicked is cruel.
That the righteous are a benefit to everything that's around them. They care for their animals. They tend to their animals. They love their animals, even if they don't like their animals. One of the tests of righteousness is how do you respond when you are the one in power? How do you respond when you're the one in control of the situation?
How do you respond? Not when you're an employee, but when you're a boss. When you're the supervisor. When you're the older sibling. How do you respond in the situations in your marriage and in your friendships and in your roommate situations where you're the one who has the most control and the most say? Does your strength benefit those that are below you?
Does your wisdom benefit those that are unwise? Does your money benefit those that don't have money? That's righteousness. That it's not simply I behave and don't do the things I'm supposed to don't do. But it's actually that we're at work as agents of the Lord to benefit those around us.
So the righteous benefit and care for those that they have the opportunity to care for. The option to care for they do. The other thing that the righteous do is they oppose wickedness. Proverbs 12, 6. It says the words of the wicked lie in wait for blood, but the mouth of the upright delivers them. Proverbs 20, 26.
A wise king winnows the wicked and drives the wheel over them. That wisdom and righteousness at work oppose wickedness. And it's difficult to oppose wickedness. Proverbs 24, 24 and 25 says, Whoever says to the wicked you are in the right will be cursed by peoples, abhorred by nations. But those who rebuke the wicked will have delight and a good blessing will come upon them.
But so often the wicked are very difficult to deal with. They're problematic. They cause drama. They lie. It's often much more easy to appease the wicked than it is to stand up to the wicked. It's often much more easy to convince the other nice people around you to help you appease the wicked rather than to stand up to the wicked.
I was reading recently a story of a husband and wife. They were getting a divorce and the husband had basically led the family into this through a lot of rebellion and sin. And then as they were going through the divorce, the husband was doing absolutely everything he could to destroy the wife. Borrowed heavily against their house. Quit making payments on the house. Eventually locked her out of the house.
Took all the kids' toys away. Locked them up. Lied to the kids about the mom. Was trying to get her saddled with a lot of debt. Was just, I mean, at every turn was doing everything he possibly could to cause problems. And the wife has a lawyer.
The wife has a therapist. The kids have a therapist. They're working through all this. And the guy who was one of the therapists in this situation said that as he was dealing with the wife later on, he began to realize that everybody around her, although they knew the husband was wrong, was telling her, why don't you just meet him halfway? Why don't we just, like, let's just try to work this out with him. The banks, the police, the lawyers, the people who were dealing with the therapy for the children were saying, well, look, can't we just, and the reason was she was easier to deal with than he was.
And eventually, the guy who's writing this book said he asked one of the people, why didn't you say all this about how he'd handled the children? And they said, look, frankly, I just didn't want to have to deal with it. I didn't want him attacking me. And the truth is, isn't that how it works? You have someone in your family who causes problems, and it's just much easier to tell everybody else in the family, can't y'all just deal with it rather than us standing up to this person? You got someone at work that causes problems.
You got a boss, a supervisor, and it's like, isn't it easier to just do what they ask? Can't we all just, let's just bear with it rather than standing up to them? The reality is the righteous step in at great cost to themselves to defend the weak. Most people who stand up to bullies end up with a bloody nose. That's just how it works. And there are times where you, in the midst of righteousness, should end up not getting a promotion because you stood up to somebody for the sake of others, not just for your own name and your own pride, and I'm going to make sure I look awesome.
That's not what this is talking about. But that you did some work that took some backbone to stand in righteousness, to defend and to care, and it's hard to do. So the righteous care for those around them, they benefit those around them, they defend those around them, and they care for the long-term souls of those around them. Proverbs 11, 30. The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life. Whoever captures souls is wise.
Now the tree of life, in the scriptures, is the tree that gives eternal life. And so then it says capturing souls, and what this is saying is that the righteous help others live eternally. It keeps going. It says again in Proverbs 24, 10 through 12, it says, If you faint in the day of adversity, your strength is small. Rescue those who are being taken away to death. Hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter.
If you say, Behold, we did not know this. Does not he who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not he who keeps watch over your soul know it? And will he not repay man according to his work? Part of what the righteous does is that they step in in the day of adversity and take on some difficulty for the sake of carrying and defending. Now, that proverb includes things like World War II.
To step in in the day of adversity to help those who are being carried to the slaughter. But for us, who have been sent with a mission to see people redeemed from hell and wrath because of their unrepentant sin, it also includes your co-workers that work the night shift with you who are stumbling to the slaughter and that later we can't say, well, I didn't really know that we were meant to care for their souls. That includes those that live in your neighborhood. That it includes those that go to class with you. That it includes those in your community group who are choosing sin currently over loving Jesus.
And it's so much easier to just say, well, let's love them. Let's be nice to them. Let's hope they figure that out rather than to sit them down and say, you are wrong and you're headed in the wrong direction and we love you enough to oppose you because you're stumbling to the slaughter. As the chorus of America says, if you say anything to correct them, you don't love them. We have to fear the Lord and trust His wisdom and stand in the way even though it's difficult and it costs us. As the chorus of America sings that you should mind your own business and not try to convert people and not try to get in their way to talk to them about the Lord and not harass people and not do any of these things that they're going to add these labels to and that somehow we're oppressing people by helping them submit to Jesus.
And we'd say, I don't care. I can't let people stumble to the slaughter. I can't stand before the Lord later and say, I didn't know because I knew. I knew. It says, does not he who keeps watch over your soul know it and will he not repay man according to his word? Now, as the Proverbs paints up for us and fills in for us what righteousness looks like and as we've done this this whole time being called into wisdom and as we've been called into wisdom been called into repentance and righteousness.
I don't know about you but it turns out I'm a sinner. Some of these weeks were very difficult. There were weeks where in preparation I had to repent before I could get up here and even say these things. I had to continue repenting afterwards. We talked about parenting. Manhood and womanhood.
Friendship. Words. The rejection of correction and the pursuit of foolishness. We talked about anger. Money. Work.
Decision making. Sexual purity. And honesty. And we've looked further today at what righteousness looks like and I'm inclined to say I don't think I'm righteous. And maybe that's what you're thinking. I may not be righteous.
I don't know if I'm doing this. Honestly, when righteousness was just don't do bad things I didn't even do that. I just picked some of the bad things I didn't do and tried to act like those were the most important. But as soon as it becomes I've got to defend people and I've got to care for those around me and every time I'm in a position of power I'm supposed to use it to defend and care for those who are disadvantaged around me. I'm supposed to be disadvantaged to advantage them. I don't know if I'm righteous.
And if that's you and if that's been you throughout this series that you've consistently come face to face with your own foolishness and sin I'll have something that might make you feel a little better. The New Testament also talks about this. Romans 3 says this. Next one. As it is written none is righteous no not one. You're not righteous but at least you were right about not being righteous.
That make you feel better? You're not big capital R right but you were right about this. Thank goodness for small victories. that the reality is as we come face to face with our sin we aren't righteous. And so then you go okay hold on a second what's it say next? Because our general tendency is okay then I better get it together. I better get to work.
Some of us as we've come through this series that some of your response is okay I'm going to get to work I'm going to do this better I've been bad at it but I'm going to do better I just need more of me and the problem is as you found that as you pressed into I need more of me is that the problem was you so more of you makes it more better. So this is what it says next. It doesn't say get to work. It says this Romans 3 20 is 10 verses later it says for by works of the law no human being will be justified justified in his sight to be justified means to be made right. No human being will be righteous in his sight since through the law comes knowledge of sin.
So we've seen more of what he wants from us and what did we see? More of where we sin. Through the law comes knowledge of sin the more we've seen what he desires of us the more we've seen oh I didn't realize that was a category look at that it's like at the end if you started school and then at the end of the semester when they gave out grades there were a couple classes you didn't realize you were supposed to be taking so you have F's in them. That's what this feels like sometimes you're reading the Bible and you're like oh look at that I'm failing at other things I didn't even realize that was a class I was supposed to be in.
That's what this feels like sometimes you're reading the Bible and you're like oh look at that I'm failing at other things I didn't even realize that was a class I was supposed to be in. For some of us that's a nightmare. You have a recurring one of those where you realize it's the end of the semester and you didn't realize you were in that class and sometimes that's what the Bible's like it's like oh I didn't even realize that was a thing. But by works of the law no one is made righteous
Which means that you cannot leave here and go okay I'm going to get bigger I'm going to get better I'm going to get stronger I'm going to do this I'm going to find out give me the rules I'll do them. The reality is what you will find is that maybe you can keep that going for a while but what it ends up doing is leading you into further sin and further seeing your sin or that becomes so unbearable you cease to be able to see your sin and you begin
To convince yourself you're fine and you begin to promote your own self-righteousness which is not the righteousness of God so how do we become righteous well the New Testament has more to say than just this we become righteous through Jesus Christ the righteous who actually perfectly embodies righteousness he fears the Lord and submits to his Father and comes sent by him he says this multiple times that I do the will
Of the Father a thing that we're incapable of doing at least consistently and perfectly that he has perfect personal morality that he's tempted in every way that we are but he's without sin that he does not sin that he does not pursue sin that he was a blessing to those who were around him and every time he came into contact with someone who needed something from him who was downhill from him
He blessed and cared for and worked in that he opposes the wicked personally in his day to the point of them killing him and ultimately eternally to the point of facing off with Satan sin and hell taking the keys from death and ultimately crushing death through the power of the resurrection so that he rules forever because he defends the weak
And opposes wickedness and that he has a day of wrath that is coming for the wicked and he cares about the souls of those on earth that he so cares about your soul and the fact that you're stumbling to the slaughter that he would come and not stumble to the slaughter but walk headlong into it that he would set his face towards Jerusalem so that his disciples
Would say come let's go die with him that he would ultimately be sacrificed brutally beaten murdered and die so that the unrighteous could be made righteous by the blood and the work and the resurrection of Christ the hope is not that the book of Proverbs would give you wisdom so that that's
All you'd need and you could walk out of here and get it together the hope is that the book of Proverbs would get you wisdom so that you would fall at the feet of the Lord in fear that he might rescue and redeem you so Galatians 2 says this yet we know that a person is not justified made righteous by works of the law
But through faith in Jesus Christ so we also have believed in Christ Jesus in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law because by works of the law no one will be justified you are not good enough Jesus is that's why it's good news there's a thing that we have the Baptists do they go to
Schools and they have a thing after school called the good news club it's not the good behavior club if it were Baptists wouldn't be allowed in it this isn't the good behavior club we don't gather on Sunday to grow in good behavior we gather to grow in good news and we gather at times
To see our sins so that we would more dearly love our Savior that we would have the wounds from a friend that would lead us to redemption and to joy and to hope and to worship that's why we raise our hand and sing that he redeemed us that he saved us that he rescued us I once was
Dead in sin alone and hopeless that's a weird thing to sing y'all y'all ready to sing something good I deserve to die I'm the worst yeah but then we get to the joy of a risen Savior who so loved us that he would die for us and do you want to know the primary thing that the Proverbs have to say about
Righteousness I want to show you two more passages in the New Testament and then I want us to see that it says 1 Corinthians 1 30 it says because of him you are in Christ who became to us wisdom from God the wisdom from God righteousness he became
To us righteousness and sanctification and redemption so that it is written let the one who boasts boast in the Lord that we would walk out of here today and people would say are you righteous and you wouldn't go yeah because I took the Proverbs class and I got it together you'd walk out of here and go yeah because Jesus is great let's go get some chicken and have some lunch
He's good I have hope that we ought to see our sin we ought to be broken of our sin and then we might turn to see that Jesus became for us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification which means he makes us good and redemption which means he gets rid of all of our old bad then he pulls us out of it and then we might boast in the Lord we would praise Jesus because he saves sinners
That we really can sing a song that's I'm the worst Jesus is great thank you Lord 2nd Corinthians 521 says for our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin so that in him we might become the righteousness of God Jesus Christ came to redeem you so that at the end of all eternity he might be praised not you so that as you try to get it together and you say what he really wants from me is to get it together so that I might stand in front of him later and have
Done this and that's to the praise of your own glory but he made him to be sin so that we might be made the righteousness of God through the work of Christ to the praise of his glorious grace and his name for all eternity you say well I'm a terrible sinner yes he's a glorious savior let's praise him for all eternity I shouldn't be in heaven no you shouldn't and that honors and glorifies Christ who can redeem a sinner like you so that he receives glory but do you want to know the primary thing that the
Proverbs has to say about the righteous says it 28 times the righteous endure the righteous make it to the end and in Christ that is fully forever true for you you can read the Proverbs it'll tell you 28 times if you've been made righteous by Christ you will not be lost you will not be crushed you will not be defeated not because you're good enough or you're strong enough but because Jesus is good enough and he's strong enough and you are in him if you climbed in a tank and then bulldozed through the city you wouldn't say look at how
Strong I am you would say look at how great this tank is and we have climbed in Christ and in his righteousness he bulldozes through everything and gets us to the end Proverbs 24 15 says lie not in weight as a wicked man against the dwelling of the righteous do not do no violence to his home for the righteous fall seven times and rises again but the wicked stumble in times of calamity you know the righteous have seven lives some of you are like I've fallen I'm in the middle of sin I'm broken I don't know how I'm gonna get out of this you can find anybody
In this church has been following Jesus for some time and they'll go yeah I was there in 1992 yeah I felt that in 2002 yeah I thought that last year but the righteous fall and rise again because Jesus fell and rose again and ultimately we will rise again Proverbs 10 25 when the tempest passes the wicked is no more but the righteous is established forever Proverbs 10 27 the fear of the Lord prolongs life but the years of the wicked will be short Proverbs 10 30 the righteous will never be removed but the wicked will not dwell in the land Proverbs 12 7 the wicked are overthrown and are no more but the house of the righteous will stand 28 times
The righteous will stand the righteous will make it the righteous will not fall the wicked will be destroyed and one day there will be a kingdom that belongs to the righteous those made righteous by Christ and we will stand forever to the glory of Christ may we grow in wisdom by loving Jesus and following him in righteousness and freedom now this wisdom is practical and it's helpful and the hope is that you would live a life of wisdom and righteousness in your relationships that you would live a life of wisdom and righteousness confessing your sexual sin confessing your anger confessing and repenting of lying that you would walk in wisdom and righteousness so that you might be a good agent of Christ on earth
Disadvantaging yourself to the advantage of others which he ultimately did fully and beautifully in the cross that we might be righteous people and we might be the type of free righteous people who do not have to be righteous on our own to be okay so that we are free and enjoy following Christ and at times mourning our sins so that we might more fully praise the Savior band's going to come back up and as we close the book of Proverbs the hope is that we would see our sin so that we would repent and be redeemed and be rescued that he would become to you wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption and salvation and king do not leave thinking I'm good enough I'll be okay do not leave thinking well I'm not good enough but I can get there leave in Christ made good
Through his work to his glory for all eternity that you might stand with the unconquerable righteous redeemed of Christ because Christ is the unconquerable righteous king and you come to him by faith which means you ask him to save you you come to him by faith saying I trust that you did this and I trust that my hopes in you you come to him by faith not works the only reason you'd bring a resume was to show why you shouldn't be included so that he might take it and cover it by his grace to the praise of his glorious name we get to endure forever let's pray God I pray that nobody would leave here unrighteous because righteousness is given to those who hide in your name that nobody would leave here in their own strength that nobody would leave here trying to do better at the works of the law because by the works of the law no one will be made righteous we know that that will not redeem it will not save and Lord may we leave rejoicing as we see our sin may we rejoice not that we're sinners but that we have a savior who redeems and sanctifies and fixes and as we feel low and destroyed and like we have failed so many times over may we rejoice that the righteous fall and rise again because you're the king fell and rose again and with you we will rise again we ask all this in Jesus name amen
Righteousness: Before God or Others?
Transcript
Good morning. So over the Christmas holidays, I had a little bit of downtime, and when I just kind of want to relax and chill, I'm a TV person. So I just decided I would pull up Netflix on my phone and just kind of start trying to find a TV show to watch, just something kind of mind-numbing. And my go-to is always comedies. So I'm an office person, 30 Rock, Parks and Rec, for obvious reasons.
But I had caught wind of a particular show I used to watch with my dad. I caught wind that it was on Facebook, and so I was just kind of scrolling, on Netflix, and so I was just kind of scrolling through, trying to find it, trying to find it, and then there it was, The West Wing. I could tell by your, like, judgy smirks and laughter. Some of you don't share my excitement. For the two of you that do, you're welcome. West Wing's on Netflix.
But I did. I used to watch that show with my dad, and for some reason, I've always been interested in politics. I'm not a super political person, per se, but just politics in general has always kind of interested me. So, like, why do people run for the offices they run for? How do they kind of choose their platforms? How do they raise money?
How do they do all this stuff? And as you're looking at elections or even watching some of these TV shows, there's this perception, this theme that kind of runs through them about the question of kind of the motivation for why politicians are running. So, you look at politicians and you think to yourself, like, are they running? Like, are what we're seeing on the outside, so the speeches, the handshaking, the sacrifice, the service, like, is that coming from a genuine heart of American patriotism, or do they have other motivations? So, are they running for the good of the public or for the good of themselves?
Or maybe the more basic question is, what's their motivation? And I think the reason that politicians are such an easy target for this question is because of how public their platform is. There's something to having every aspect of your life kind of lived under the microscope or being in the spotlight, being visible to others, your life kind of being portrayed on the news that makes you begin to wonder about the motivation behind why people do the things that they do. And up until this point in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus has been talking about what citizens in his kingdom should look like.
What should they look like? What should their perception be? How do they stand out from the culture around them? And Jesus has used language like, we should be light. So, in essence, it's going to be visible. And he's been talking about his followers being kind of held to a higher standard.
So, things that they would say would be, not just don't murder, don't hate or be angry. Not just don't commit adultery, don't even lust. Not just love your neighbor, but your enemy also. There's been a heart level theme to everything that Jesus has been talking about, not just the external. And we're going to see that continue today as Jesus begins to press in on what's our motivation behind the things that we do. Why do we do them?
And here's the deal. In this section, Jesus is going to lead off with kind of the main idea. And then he's going to give us three examples to illustrate it. And very rarely does Jesus do this in his teaching or in his parables. And I think the reason that he does it is to give the main idea and to show how all the other three things that he's going to talk about next are connected to it. The three things he's going to use as an example are giving, praying, and fasting.
These are three actions that devout Jews, faithful Jews would have already been doing. But Jesus is going to go deeper than just the action. He's actually going to take the emphasis off of that and begin to ask the question, what's the motivation? Is it genuine, heart level love for God, following God, or is it something else? And so what we're going to see is that Jesus actually cares as much about our reasons, our motivation for doing things, as he does about the actions themselves. So I'm going to pray for us and then we'll hop into the text.
God, I'm thankful that your word is clear. I'm thankful that we have it so that we can learn and study and grow. God, what we're talking about today is difficult to see and we need your Holy Spirit to expose it in us so that we have the ability to respond appropriately. God, this is your word. I pray that you would teach it this morning. Holy Spirit, I pray that you would fill me and speak through me.
In Jesus' name, amen. All right, grab a Bible. If you don't have a Bible, just grab one of the white ones that we have in the seats and go to page 473. We're going to be in Matthew chapter 6 today, beginning in verse 1. I will say this. If you don't have a Bible, take this one with you.
We want everyone to have a Bible. So just take it with you when you go. And again, the way Jesus begins is he starts off with the main point. So really, we could just throw the main point up on the screen and talk about it from there. And that's what Jesus does. He starts with what's the motivation.
So chapter 6, verse 1. It says this. Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them. For then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. I'll read it again. Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them.
For then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. So once again, Jesus leads with the point. What's the motivation? He says, beware, be on your guard, fight against any urge or temptation to practice your righteousness in front of other people to be seen by them. And so when he says practice your righteousness, basically what Jesus is getting at is any action or activity that anyone would do in following God or as worship to God. So basically, anything that we have in the Bible is what Jesus is going after here.
And the three examples that he's going to use are praying, giving, and fasting. But he goes beyond just the action and he qualifies it. He says, doing righteous deeds is what people should do just to beware of doing it in front of people so that they'll take notice. Jesus understands that by nature, these actions at times are going to be done in front of people. In fact, Jesus, in the next section, he's going to pray in front of people. His point is this.
You're going to do these things in front of other people. He just says, don't do them just to be seen. That's not the point. Jesus says, be on your watch that any action that you're doing to ultimately bring glory to God, or that's an act of worship or an act of obedience or following him, isn't done so that other people will see it. Because if that's the case, the way he ends the verse is, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. And here's why I think it's so important that Jesus leads with this idea, both for his original hearers and for us today.
For most of us, we're unaware that this is even happening, much less a problem. It's just kind of sneaky. For most of us, you don't walk around questioning your motivation for why you do the things you do all the time. We just don't. That's not natural for us. For the most part, when we're doing good things, or even like when we're doing something specifically that the Bible tells us to do, we don't question our motivation because we're just trying to be obedient.
Like we're just trying to follow and do what the Bible says, but Jesus is pointing out that there's a danger when we're following him, when we're trying to be obedient, that we'll begin to slip into thinking more about what other people think about it than we do the original intention of the action to begin with. And it's sneaky. Again, we don't question our motivation all the time. And so what he's basically getting them to do is look at these three examples and ask, am I doing this because I genuinely appreciate love, want to follow God, or is it something else? Or is it so that other people will notice?
And again, he's assuming that they're already going to be doing these actions. He's just saying, check your motivations. So verse 2 is where we get our first example. Pick it up there. Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward.
But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. Notice that he says, when you give to the needy, not if you give to the needy. Remember, Jesus is already assuming that people would be doing these things. He's just beginning to question their motivation. He's taking the emphasis off of the action itself and going more towards the motivation.
The Bible's clear in teaching that Christians should be generous. We should give. We should specifically look for people who are in need and try to meet those needs. The Bible tells us that basically everything we have has been given to us by God and it belongs to him and we're just his money managers. The part of the way we know the gospel has actually begun to affect our hearts is if it has begun to affect our wallets. But again, here, Jesus is putting the emphasis on their motivation rather than the action.
You see, giving to the needy in Jesus' day would have been a fairly public action. So whether you were going to the temple itself or going to a synagogue, there would be an alms box placed in kind of a public location and you would go and you would take your offering and you would put it in that box. In fact, in Mark 12, we see Jesus and his disciples, they're sitting in the temple watching people give when a widow walks up and she gives a very small amount but Jesus praises her because she didn't have very much but she gave out of her poverty. She gave all that she had. So it was this public thing.
And I had the opportunity to go to Cleveland, Ohio last year on a mission trip and that Sunday morning that we were there, we got the chance to worship with another church and it was kind of a charismatic church. I mean, the music was awesome. The preaching was awesome. It was just an awesome time. Like, I mean, people dancing, clapping. I mean, I was in it.
And the way the service ended was that they got everybody back up and we started singing. And everybody's dancing, they're kind of clapping. And I mean, I'm loving it, okay? But as I'm dancing and singing, I start to notice that people are leaving. But it's not like everyone's mass leaving.
It's just kind of like by rows almost. And I turn and look over my shoulder and the one exit to the room, there are ushers on either side with buckets and they're getting it too. That was how that church did their offering. So the one door that everyone funneled through was the door that you gave. Ain't nobody forgetting their checkbook in that church. There was no like shimmy and bye or like I left my checkbook in the car because those ushers were like, just like closer and closer to you on the way out.
But I just, I thought that was crazy. We're, you know, we're a little more low key. We kind of put our box and our computer to the side and we just remind you about it. Nobody's in your face, giving you the old shoulder shimmy. But it was visible.
So giving in Jesus' day was visible. And even if you were just giving to somebody on the street who is needy, who is begging, someone who's in that position is going to go to the most high traffic area so that they can attract attention so that hopefully somebody will see them and give to them. It was a visible thing. And Jesus is not saying, never give money publicly. He's saying, don't let your motivation for giving be about the people who are watching. It's not about that.
He literally says in verse 2, and it's my favorite, he basically says, don't toot your own horn. Don't sound a trumpet before yourself as you go to give. It's not about the people who are watching. And Jesus does give us a picture of what faithful giving looks like. He says, don't let your left hand know what your right hand is doing so that it's in secret. And you guys understand that it's nearly impossible for your left hand to be doing something that your right hand doesn't know about.
Try it when you get home. You'll be amazed. Your brain controls both hands. So Jesus is using exaggeration. It's hyperbole. He's saying that the posture in us giving shouldn't be about who sees it.
Shouldn't be about who knows about it. Whether it's the mount or the person we give to or the situation. He's saying that our response as we give should be, our response should be responding to what Jesus has already done for us. It should be the gifts that we've already been given. That's our reason for giving. So, should we give?
Yes. And is it going to be public or visible sometimes? Yes. Jesus' point here is that when we give, it doesn't have to become a Facebook status where we put hashtag blessed to bless. He's saying that maybe if we're going to give, maybe we show up early before a gathering and put our money in the give box or use the computer so that nobody sees it. He's saying that if our neighbor has a need and they don't have gas money, that the next conversation at our community group isn't all about how we help this one person.
He's saying that our heart and our attitude needs to be in worship to Him. Not about the other people who know. And that's sneaky. Again, we don't question our motivations all the time. But I think if we would begin to, we would say, maybe they're not as righteous as they should be.
And he continues on in verse 5. And this is going to be a little bit bigger section. But this is the section on prayer. And as we get to the back half of it, you're going to see that it's going to be familiar to most of you. It's what's known as the Lord's Prayer. Next week, we are going to specifically teach through the Lord's Prayer.
So I want most of our attention to be spent on the first part. What is Jesus saying about the nature of us praying when it's going to be visible? Verse number 5. And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners that they may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward.
But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them. For your Father knows what you need before you ask Him.
Pray then like this. Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.
But if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. So again, we're going to focus on the first little part of that. So my question becomes, does this prohibit all public prayer? Goodness, I hope not because like 15 minutes ago I just prayed in front of y'all and I don't want y'all analyzing the fact that I just prayed in public. That's not what He's getting at. It's obviously not the point because Jesus prays in front of people.
Right here in Jewish culture just to give us a little bit of a background what He's talking about. In Jewish culture there were specific times throughout the day that it was just known that people would stop and pray morning, midday, in the evening. And what He's saying is there were some people who would kind of go off by themselves and pray quietly, maybe not even out loud, maybe just whispering to themselves. but then there were others who would kind of go out into the more open areas and raise their voices and with eloquent speech begin their prayers so that others could hear them. His original hearers would have known exactly what He was talking about.
And what Jesus is saying is that there are those who love to stand and pray and let everyone hear their prayers so that the people around them start looking and going, dude, my elbow and the person beside him is praying. That's a prayer. You listen to this? Oh, what perfect theology. Did He just say propitiation? I don't even know what that means.
Do you know what that means? Jesus is saying there's a temptation when we're praying out loud to begin to think about what others around us are thinking. Like, are they taking notice? Do they, are they impressed by the words that I'm saying? He also says don't pile up empty words or phrases to impress others or for that matter to impress God. God's attentiveness to your prayer is not based off of how many theologians you can quote or how many sections of scripture you can recite or how long you can go without taking a breath.
That's, that's not the point. He says pray simply. If you look at the prayer that Jesus prays, it is a short, simple, direct, heartfelt, genuine prayer. He says, don't do it so that others can see it and don't heap up all these phrases and empty words. When I was in middle school and high school, they would have this event once a year. It's kind of across the nation.
It was called See You at the Pole. And so there's this one day of the year that all the Christians were supposed to, before school, you would go out to the flagpole and you would circle around the flagpole and you would pray. I've got concerns about the fact that we were around the flagpole and praying. But, anyways, so you would get out of your car and you would walk out there and everyone's already in a circle. You know, sometimes they were holding hands at which point I'm always scoping out for the cutest girl like, where do I, where do I break into the circle? Here.
I'm sorry, I need to hold your hand. And so you're in this circle and basically you're praying about all kinds of things. You're praying for your school, you're praying for your country, all kinds of different stuff. And the way it would work is you would kind of say a short prayer and if you didn't want to pray, you just squeeze the person's hand next to you. So, a couple sentence prayer, squeeze, squeeze, squeeze, next person would pray. And we're all in a circle, everyone's heads are bowed and their eyes are closed and all of a sudden into the bright morning sky.
Father God, Father God, we thank you, Father God, for this day, Father God, because you are Father God, Father God. And like my head, like I just, immediately head shot up because I was like, who is this person? And they prayed for five minutes and all I can remember from middle school is that they said, Father God, 84,000 times. Now, I do not know what the heart level motivation was going on inside of the man that was praying that. What I do know is it looked like it was very showy, it was very loud, he said, Father God, to the point, I can't remember anything else that he prayed about and what Jesus is saying is that when our prayer begins to be more about the people who are watching or listening than it is about communication with God, we've messed up.
We've missed the point. And let me give us an example of kind of how this can show up in our lives, okay? So imagine, imagine you're hanging out with a group of Christians or you're hanging out with your community group and you're wrapping things up and someone looks at you and says, hey, will you pray to close us out? Sure. So you pray out loud as your group meeting times kind of come into a close.
No big deal. Well, the next week you show up, there's a period where you need to pray and someone looks at you and says, hey, hey, will you pray? You're really good at it. Okay, sure, I'll pray. And so you start praying but now the whole time you're inside your head. You're thinking, wait, I'm good at it.
What does that mean? Is that, okay, all right, so I'm praying. Then you're so inside your head that now every time when your group gets together and there's an opportunity to pray, you say, well, I'll pray because now you've, you know, you're the good prayer so you need to make sure that you're the one that's praying for your group or you're in a group setting and you're going around in a circle and everyone's praying and rather than praying alongside of the people who are around the circle, you're actually sitting there thinking, okay, what am I going to say when I pray? What are the words that I'm going to use?
I don't, you know, I don't want to mumble. No stumbling. It needs to be perfect. And that didn't even cross your mind weeks ago. It can slip in that easily and I think all of us have a little bit of apprehension when it comes to praying out loud in front of people because we go, I don't want to sound, I don't want to sound silly. I don't want to say something silly.
I don't want to sound like a third grader. But Jesus is saying that there are times when our prayers are going to be public. And if the point of our prayer is so that other people notice and pay attention, then basically, basically, Jesus is saying if it's for them, then good. They can listen to it because I'm not going to. It's missing the point of what prayer is supposed to be. So let me just give us a couple of questions to consider specifically about prayer.
Okay? Do you volunteer to pray when your group gets together because in your group you're kind of good at praying? Do you only pray when you're around people so that it seems like you've got a deep prayer life? So what I mean by that is like do you, when you're by yourself, you don't pray a whole lot but if there's a chance to pray in front of people, you're up for it. When people have situations going on, do you tell them that you'll be praying for them? And if you do that, do you actually go away and pray for them or did you just tell them that so that they thought you would do that?
When you have a good quiet time or devotion time, you've been reading your Bible and praying, do you take your phone out and take a picture of your Bible and your coffee cup and run it through that best Instagram filter and then put it online because you have, I mean, it's not about you. You just want people to know. And here's the deal. The reason it's so easy for me to ask these questions is because that's what God's been dealing with me for the last couple of weeks. Guilty. All those things.
All of them. And it can be so subtle that it sneaks in that rather than prayer being communication with God, it becomes about who's watching, who will take notice, what are other people thinking. So, God's been dealing with me about this. But Jesus does lay out what correct posture and prayer should look like. He says, go into your room, shut the door. Prayer is meant to be communion with the eternal God, so let's make it about that, not about what other people are thinking or hearing.
And here's the deal. There's a way to actually do that. There's a way to talk to God like that when you're in front of other people. It's just thinking, believing, realizing that it really is just you and He talking. And listen, that takes work. It takes work to not be thinking about what everyone else is thinking as you're praying.
Jesus says, we've got to begin to check our motivations and let prayer simply be the part of our relationship where we get to have communication. And then He moves on to the third example to kind of illustrate this point in verse 16. Pick it back up with me. It says this, And when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face that your fasting may not be seen by others but by your Father who is in secret.
Okay, let me just say this. Of the three examples that Jesus gives, this is probably the one that is most foreign to us. And maybe we just don't emphasize it or talk about it as much as we do praying and giving. And so I want to take just a little bit of time to kind of camp out here and talk about it. We've actually never really talked about fasting at length in a sermon. So if you're a definition person or a note taker, here's kind of our working definition of fasting.
Fasting is abstaining from eating food for the purpose of pursuing God. Fasting is abstaining from eating food for the purpose of pursuing God. And even as I was preparing for this message, there are a lot of wonderful reasons why you should fast. But really the one that I find most compelling is that as your hunger begins to grow, the more easily you can see your own weakness and dependence on God. So in the same way that you get hungry or if you're like me, you get hangry, your body needs, craves food.
When you go without food for the purpose of pursuing God, it shows you how weak and frail and dependent you actually are. And in the same way that the body craves, needs food to survive and thrive, we need that kind of relationship with God to survive and thrive as well. And so when you look in the Bible at the times that people were fasting, they would fast to go along with their prayers. There were times where they fasted at different festivals or feasts. They would fast at times of repenting and mourning. And even as you move into the New Testament, you would see people fasting as personal devotion or they would fast before they were going to make big, wise decisions.
Jesus looks at his disciples in a situation. He's talking. He says, they're going to fast when I'm gone. So Jesus had the expectation that his followers were going to fast when he was gone. So fasting was and is a part of the New Testament church.
And part of what Jesus is trying to emphasize here, specifically in this situation, is that there were people when they would fast, he says, don't be like the hypocrites and look gloomy or disfigure your face. Sometimes when people would fast, they would put on what's called sackcloth. So just imagine like wearing a burlap shirt. Awful. Okay, so they would put on sackcloth and then sometimes they would put ashes on top of their heads as well as kind of like a sign of mourning. And basically what would happen is these people really weren't bathing during their time of fasting and I don't know if you all know this but the Middle East is kind of hot and so the ashes would kind of drip down over their faces and onto their sackcloth.
As well as kind of like a sign of mourning. And basically what would happen is these people really weren't bathing during their time of fasting and I don't know if you all know this but the Middle East is kind of hot and so the ashes would kind of drip down over their faces and onto their sackcloth. So when it says they disfigured their faces, it's not like if you were eating like a sour warhead
Or something like that. it's more like their appearance just they look disheveled and Jesus is saying that there were people who were fasting and they were going through this process so that people would see them as devout and holy so that they could get approval from other people just for their willingness to go without food and again Jesus says they've received their reward.
If that's the reason that they're fasting is just so that other people will see it then they've gotten their reward which is other people will take notice but Jesus keeps going and he says when you fast again not if you fast when you fast Jesus' expectation is that people would be fasting and this continues down through the New Testament to us today he just says wash your face
And anoint your head in other words it shouldn't be visible to other people by your appearance or by your words this is something that is between you and God when I was in high school I remember I got to class one day I sat down in my seat nobody was really in there yet just a couple of us I was early go figure and as I was sitting there there was a guy a couple of seats away and I'm just sitting there minding my own business I don't even remember
What I was doing but all of a sudden I hear oh man what's going on over here so obviously I took the bait and I just I just turned and said hey man you alright yeah oh man I'm just I'm super hungry okay and I'm I'm pretty sure I can't remember this I'm pretty sure we had just left lunch
So I just asked I was like dude did you did you not eat lunch he said nah nah man I didn't eat lunch just took the bait my next question why and he goes oh man you know me and some of the kids in my youth group you know we're fasting right now so you know we're not eating and man it's just it's just so tough and you know
I'm just I'm doing it I'm in I'm sold out I'm not going to give up it's really sarcastic I was like okay I just turned back in my seat and again I don't know what his heart level motivation was in that moment but the amount of grunting and sighing to then draw my attention I had to question like was he was he just trying to get my attention that's what Jesus is saying here
When our motivation for any amount of righteous action begins to be so that other people will notice we've missed the point and there is no reward from our father who is in heaven and here's the deal with fasting specifically I get it this is kind of weird for us you're basically depriving yourself of food so that you grow closer to God but here's
What I believe when you go away and try this you will be surprised at how close and how connected you feel to God I promise you that it's this time of just reminding yourself of your need and your dependence on him the times that I have fasted have been very very helpful for me and here's here's how fasting works okay the time that you would have spent eating you're going to abstain from food and you're actually
Going to spend that time with God whether it's praying or reading your Bible or singing worship songs like however you best connect with God and in those moments when the pains of hunger begin to to gnaw at you you're going to get to remember how much you need God that you actually need and depend on God more than you ever do on food and I will tell you one of the most
Helpful thing about fasting for me is it reminds me that food is not God food is just food that is so so helpful for me and let me say this if you're hypoglycemic or you're worried about any health concerns or health risks I would just caution you to use wisdom in terms of your specific needs if you want to have a conversation
About that when we're done I would love to but I believe that all of us fasting would be good for all of us and I would encourage you to do it and biblically fasting is abstaining from food but I think you can take that principle and really kind of apply it to abstaining from anything for the purpose of knowing God more so for some of us I think abstaining from TV
Would be a really good thing or maybe abstaining from coffee try that one boy that's fun for some of us maybe abstaining from playing video games for a time maybe abstaining from social media for a while and specifically with social media here's what's so dangerous for us in this day and time in the world when it comes to social media the point of social media
Is for you to put something up whether it's your thoughts or feelings or pictures or whatever for the purpose of other people seeing it that's actually the point of putting it up on social media so I think we've got to be careful as Christians to think like what's the motivation behind why I'm using
Social media or putting something up I think it would be very helpful for us to begin to question that but at the end of this fasting section I actually left off the last part of verse 18 so I want to go back let's actually pick it up we'll go all the way back to 17 it says this but when you fast anoint your head and wash your face that your fasting
May not be seen by others but by your father who is in secret and your father who sees in secret will reward you your father who sees in secret will reward you in fact this is Jesus includes this phrase in all three of the examples that he says your father who sees in secret who sees your righteous deeds done with pure motivation will reward you
So we've already seen Jesus clearly lays out what it looks like when our motivations are off that the reward for that is just that other people will notice that they're going to see it but he says that there actually is a genuine reward when it's done with the right motivation so the question becomes what's the reward if there actually
Is a reward what is it so is it is it circumstantial is it based off of whatever the action is so like if I give and I'm generous is it that God's going to bless me and give to me Bible says some stuff like that is it is it if I pray that God's going to answer whatever prayer I pray
No we know that's not that's not it is if I fast and sacrifice that God's going to make my he's going to bless my life and it's I'm not going to have any other hardship other than when I'm fasting we know that's not true either it can't
Be the gift has actually got to be bigger and better than that even a lot of the answers that I just gave that are wrong those just terminate on us they're temporary there's got to be a reward that the creator of the universe the king
Of kings and the Lord of lords would give to his creation that is worthy of being something he would call a reward so the question becomes what gift would God give that he would think this is the best gift
For my creation himself the reward that God gives us is himself and so if just now you kind of thought to yourself okay saw that one coming and it doesn't actually stir your affections for him I think you've just
Gotten used to smaller gifts to the approval to the clapping of tiny hands to the watching of tiny eyes rather than the good reward that God gives us which is himself and here's the way that works here's how
That's possible Jesus willingly came to this earth and lived a perfect life that we couldn't live he died on the cross the death that we deserve to pay for our sin the punishment that we deserve and then he
Rose from the grave so that we could have new life in him and could be made into a new creation now and if that's true then the reward that we get is God himself relationship with God has been made
Possible so that we can repent of our sin and place faith in him which means this if that's true that means that every bit of your action and activity and obedience here on this earth isn't to earn God's favor
Or to merit his wrath for those who are in Jesus it means that your action gets to be a response of gratefulness and thankfulness for what God's done because Jesus died for you you get
The relationship with God which then means that praying and giving and fasting and reading your Bible and any other righteous action that the Bible calls us to gets to be simply to enjoy God
That it's not about it's not about what others think or what others see it's not even to earn something from God it's a response so when the Bible calls us to give and to pray what it is going after is communion with God you
Get you get the one who holds the universe in the palm of his hand and he wants to have an intimate relationship with you so that all of those actions get to be just to
Enjoy him there were some theologians in the 1600s that got together and they wrote what's called the Westminster Shorter Catechism and I think it helps sum up what Jesus is getting at here so well
I want to say this here's what they wrote man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever we'll say that again man's chief end is to glorify God
And to enjoy him forever the point of all of our action gets to be because we get God and we want more of him and that through these things we get to
Enjoy him now and forever more so my question for us this morning and really the question that Jesus raises through this entire teaching is what's what's our motivation is our
Motivation for the things that we do to honor him to know him more or is it something else so that others might see and here's what I want you to do I want you to actually ask right now
Holy Spirit where where am I doing this because it's sneaky some of you as we went through you immediately it immediately started going off but some of you may need to ask
Where am I doing this where's my motivation so that others will notice versus relationship with God is it my social media account is it conversations inside of my community group where am
I just doing stuff so that other people will notice even further than this where am I not doing stuff because of what other people would think
If I did so where's my obedience just motivated by what my wife would say if I did that or what my group would
Think if I did that it's sneaky guys and God's faithful God's faithful to lead us in repentance and so I want our response this morning to be twofold
As we repent repenting means turning away from sin and turning to God I want us to repent of where our motivations are off so the first question
Is this that I want you to ask where are my motivations where am I motivated by what others think versus communion with God sit
And ask that like right now if you don't know if God hasn't shown you yet just sit and pray ask him to show you
Where you're selling yourself short because of the cross you actually get to repent of where your heart is off and the second part
Of that repentance is where do my actions need to change to actually match that repentance so that if my heart is changing what
Needs to change about what I'm doing you're going to have a chance to respond here in just a minute some of you may just
Need to sit and pray and weep and think about where your heart has been chasing after smaller gifts rather than the gift of
God himself and who cares what people think if that's what you need to sit and do some of you need to stand and
Sing and praise God and raise your hands and thank him for the goodness of the gospel and it's not about what people think
Sing at the top of your lungs if you want to raise your hands if you want to some of you may want to
Give you've been convicted about giving you may want to do that go for it but don't let it be so that other people would
Notice church you're free we're free for those who are in Christ our relationship has been purchased by Jesus which means that all of
Our actions get to be to enjoy him a good loving holy God band is going to come back up in a second we're
Going to stand and sing I just want you for a second imagine if we as a church followed Jesus from a place of
Pure motivation rather than being worried about what others think of us all the time imagine imagine how free we would be how much
Joy we would have think about the genuine types of relationships we would have both with God and with each other so let's let go
Of the approval of others and enjoy the reward for our actions done with pure motivation which gets to be genuine fellowship with God and
With each other let's pray God I pray that all across the room right now your Holy Spirit would be working and moving God that you would lead us to
Repentance God I know that you expose sin in us we need you to expose the sin in us and I thank you for the
Joy that repenting is because it means we get to turn away from something that is ultimately destructive that will not satisfy us to
A good loving God that we get to continue to pursue righteous living and following you in obedience but we get to do it
From a place where we're not earning anything we're actually just getting to enjoy our relationship with you so God all across this room
I pray that you would do work as we respond to you we pray in Jesus name amenxurl --app my-app auth oauth2 zachpippin