In our last reading tonight, Jesus talks about
doing good works. “Acts of righteousness”, as our translation puts it.
Jesus talks about people who want recognition for their good works.
People who, when they give to the needy, “announce it with trumpets”.
People who, when they pray, stand in public places so that everyone can
see their praying. People who, when they fast, going without food, try to
make themselves look as bad as they can, so everyone will know they’re fasting.
Jesus says that’s not how we’re
supposed to do things. He says that we should do our good works in
secret. If we give to the needy, were not supposed to let anyone know
about it. “Do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing.”
Not only are we not supposed to tell anyone, we’re supposed to keep it
hushed up. When we pray, we’re supposed to go into a room by ourselves
and close the door, so no one can see us. People who fast are supposed to
do everything they can to keep looking good, so no one can tell they’re
fasting.
Now, most of us would probably agree with Jesus’ point
here. We know we’re not supposed to make a big show of our good works.
Most of us would probably say that we don’t make a big show of our good
works. And I think most of us would probably be right about that.
We don’t make a big show of our good works. And
yet...there’s a part of a lot of us that does like to receive recognition for
them. We may not announce what we do with trumpets, but a lot of times,
there’s a part of us that hopes what we did will be found out. We may not
advertise it ourselves, but we do sometimes think it would be kind of nice if
somebody found out and we got some compliments for what we did.
Now, my point here is not to point fingers at anyone.
Maybe you’ve never felt like this. I don’t know. I suspect
there are some of us who have, though. I know I have. Wanting
recognition and praise for the good things we do is a natural human thing.
Why? Well, there can be a lot of reasons. It’s
not necessarily that we want to brag. It’s not necessarily out of
arrogance or self-righteousness. It can be that, of course, and when it
is, that’s wrong. The Bible tells us a lot about God’s opinion of
arrogance and self-righteousness, and none of it is good. In fact,
there’s quite a bit in the Bible, especially in the Old Testament, about God
punishing people for those things.
But I think there’s another reason we want recognition and
praise for the things we do. I think a lot of times, people are just
looking for acceptance and affirmation.
I think there are a lot of
times when we, as humans, don’t have all that high an opinion of ourselves.
We may like to pretend that we do, but deep down, we don’t. We
wonder, am I a good person? Am I living the way I should? Are the
things I’m doing good enough? Is my life really meaningful? Am I
really a valuable human being?
We want the answers to be yes.
We hope the answers will be yes. But we’re not sure. We want
someone to tell us so. We want someone to tell us, yes, you are a good
person. You’re doing it right. Your life is meaningful. You
do have value. And so, we do these things, and maybe we don’t brag about
them or anything, but we hope the word will get out somehow. We hope
people will find out what we did and think well of us. We hope someone
will tell us that we really did a good thing, so we can get that affirmation
and acceptance that almost all of us want.
Now, I’m not saying that
wanting that affirmation and acceptance is a sin, necessarily. I think it
can be, if it becomes too important to us. But God understands how we
human beings are. God understands how we are better than we do, because
God created us. Wanting affirmation and acceptance sometimes is not
necessarily wrong.
But it’s not exactly right,
either. It’s really not what God wants for us. God does not want us
to seek affirmation and acceptance from human beings. God wants us to
seek affirmation and acceptance from God.
The thing is, if our goal is to get affirmation and
acceptance from human beings, all we’ll get is whatever reward human beings
choose to give us. If our goal is to get affirmation and acceptance from
God, we’ll get whatever reward God chooses to give us. And we know that
God’s rewards are awesome. God’s rewards are salvation and eternal life.
But even that’s not really right. Because getting a
reward, even a reward from God, should not really be our goal. We should
not worship God and love God and have faith in Jesus as our Savior because of
what we think we can get out of it. If we look at it that way, that’s not
really love, is it? It’s bargaining. God, I’ll do this for you if
you’ll do this for me. I’ll have faith in Jesus if you’ll give me
salvation. That’s not love, that’s a business transaction.
That’s one of the reasons good works are not enough to get
us into heaven. God wants us to do good things, of course. But God
does not want us to do good things so that we can get to heaven. God does
not want us to do good things with the expectation we’re going to get something
for it in return. God wants us to do good things out of love. Love
of God, and love of each other.
God does promise that our faith in Jesus will result in
eternal life. But God does not promise that out of obligation. God
does not promise it because God has to. God promises that because God
loves us. God promises us that because God is the all-loving, all-caring,
all-merciful, all-compassionate, all-gracious God.
That’s why we should worship God. That’s why we
should love God. That’s why we should have faith in Jesus Christ as our
Savior. Not for what we can get out of it. Because of who God is.
Because God deserves our love. God deserves our worship.
Jesus deserves our faith. God does not owe it to us to give us salvation
because of what we may have done. We owe it to God to do what’s right, to
worship God and love God, because of who God is.
No matter how much we study the Bible, no matter how much
we pray, no matter how many great scholars we read, no matter how much theology
we read, I don’t think we human beings ever get anywhere close to really
understanding all that God is. We try so hard to capture it, we try so
hard to come up with all kinds of words and phrases, trying to really put down
on paper who God is, and I don’t think we even come close. It’s not even
really our fault. It’s just that God is beyond our ability as human
beings to truly comprehend. We just cannot get our minds around all that
God is.
That’s one of the reasons Jesus came. Jesus gave us a
chance to know God in a way that we never could otherwise. Jesus is God.
God the Son. God in human form. God with a face people could
see and a voice people could hear. God in a form you and I could relate
to and could understand.
Think of what an act of love that was. God, the
almighty, all-powerful God, a God who is beyond our comprehension, coming down
to the level of a mere human being. God the Son, giving up his place in
heaven to live among we weak, sinful, imperfect human beings. Doing that
so that we could have some idea of who God really is. That shows the
incredible amount of love that God has for us.
And that just shows all the more how much God deserves our
love. It shows all the more how much God deserves our worship. That
the almighty God would do something like that, would demean himself in that
way, just for us. It’s an awesome, incredible, mind-blowing thing that
God has done for us.
As we enter the time of Lent, let’s focus on that.
Let’s focus on how great, how awesome, how incredible God is. Let’s
focus on how worthy God is of our worship and our love. And then, let’s
give God that worship and that love. Not because we want to go to heaven.
But because it’s the right thing to do. Because God deserves it.
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