“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.’
Matthew 6:1
Through these first verses of Matthew six, Jesus reflects on the righteous works of giving, prayer, and fasting, showing us how to do these things rightly, in His sight, i.e., righteously.
Jesus’ beginning word today, BEWARE, exhorts us to guard against the evil desire of wanting to be seen by others. Being seen by others will never fully satisfy the validation our hearts crave. Our personal motivations are huge. We must consider the reasons why ‘we do what we do. Is our desire to be pleasing to Him through our obedience, or is it to just be seen?
Jesus’ submission to John’s baptism of water was to fulfill all righteousness (that which was right before God). His submitted obedience rewarded him with the fullness of the Holy Spirit and the Father’s validation that he was a ‘beloved son in whom God was well pleased.’
We are called to be examples of believers, so our faith is inevitably seen by others. Whether we want to be seen for our own validation (idolatry) or to be seen through our obedience that points to the Lord (Icons, pointing past ourselves) can only be revealed through the searching of our hearts.
Only God can know what lies in the heart of man. Man himself can be deceived from a lifestyle of practicing the right way of doing without personal and private fellowship with the Father. This is how the bad connotation of religion is built. A form of Godliness. A white-washed tomb. Something that looks right in appearance yet is filled with 'dead man bones.’
Jesus told his disciples to watch out for two things ~ the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod. These are practices held by others (religious and political leadership) that can appear right to the sight of man but, from God’s perspective, come from or lead to, unrighteousness.
Jesus' eight woes to the Pharisees in chapter 23 of Matthew highlight works done from an unrighteous desire to be seen. Note verses 25 through 28.
[25] “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. [26] You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, that the outside also may be clean.
[27] “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness. [28] So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
Jesus sought no glory from man. His purpose was to reveal the Father. “He who has seen me has seen the Father”, John 14:9. Every word, every deed pointed to His Father.
Our question today would be, “Who do we want people to see?”