this Wednesday at 7. But at this time, I'd like to direct your attention to the Word of God. So if you haven't already, please open the Word of God to Matthew chapter 6. We're back in the Sermon on the Mount, and Jesus has just addressed in this context the need for a radical sort of righteousness. We said it is unlike anything that the world really knows or prescribes. This is categorically above and beyond the righteousness of this world. And so it really fits the tenor of everything Jesus has been saying in the sermon. He is presenting us with a counter cultural way of living. We might even call it a Christian counterculture. And Jesus has just described that the righteousness that we need, a righteousness that is as righteous as God in heaven is righteous, is something that, of course, we can't generate on our own. This is a righteousness that is so pure, it is so lofty and holy that only God himself can produce this righteousness in the heart of a regenerate sinner. Now having stressed the need for the practice of this kind of righteousness, Jesus next deals with our motivation. That is, he wants to go deeper to dealing why we do what it is that we do. And beloved, because God sees your heart this morning, your motives matter to Him. God is very interested in your motives. In fact, He is just as interested in your motives as He is with your actions. And now we're not going to have time to cover verses 7 through 15 as we read through this text this morning, where Jesus will give us some extended teaching on prayer. In fact, I'll just read the verses for sake of context, but for sake of time, we're going to have to deal with those next week. So I just want to draw your attention as I read this text, the repetition here. Jesus is going to give some repetition. It's very meaningful. And why don't we stand out of respect for the reading of God's word? I'm going to read Matthew chapter 6, verses 1 through 18. There Jesus says, beware of practicing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them. Otherwise, you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven. So when you give to the poor, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be honored by men. Truly, I say to you, they have their reward in fall. But when you give to the poor, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving will be in secret, and your father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. When you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they may be seen by men. Truly, I say to you, they have their reward in full. But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door and pray to your father who is in secret. And your father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do. For they suppose that they will be heard for their many words. So do not be like them. For your father knows what you need before you ask him. Pray then in this way. Our father who is 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 do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. For if you forgive others their transgressions, your Heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions. Whenever you fast, do not put on a gloomy face, as the hypocrites do. For they neglect their appearance, so that they will be noticed by men when they are fasting. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. But you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, so that your fasting will not be noticed by men. but by your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. That's the reading of God's word. You may be seated. Let's ask the Lord to meet with us and to change us from his truth. Our Father in heaven, we come to you acknowledging you as the God who sees, who knows every corner, every crack, every closet of our life, Lord, we have nothing hidden from you. And so I pray, dear Lord, that you would show us to us, show us our motives. Father, we want to go deeper with the Lord Jesus. We want to be more like him. And so I pray that you would not spare us from your holy truth, as difficult and hard as some of these things are to admit to ourselves. Father, would you please, by your spirit, deal truthfully and mercifully with us to show us the truth about ourselves, make us a people who is pure in our worship, pure in our motives. And Father, we pray if there be anybody here who has never come into a saving relationship with God through your Son, we pray that you would draw them to know the saving grace of Jesus today. This we ask in Jesus' name, Amen. Substance addiction is a serious problem. I don't think I need to convince anybody here of that. Every year, millions of people are destroyed by drugs. Many even die from overdosing on some addictive substance. And there's certainly a stigma that our society at large would attach to having some kind of a substance addiction. This is the reason that it can be extremely difficult for someone to even disclose to friends that they are struggling. with some kind of an addiction, whether it be to some kind of a drug or alcohol or something like that. This is a real problem. We know this is shameful. And we know we need to be set free from that kind of addiction. And if you have any such sort of addiction, let me say, you need to get help. That's part of why God has the church where it is here, for you to help you. Pornography is another addiction that is rampant in our culture. One that is not just a problem for men, by the way, but also for women. And again, we should recognize that this sort of a behavior, as shameful as it is, with this sort of an addiction, people often don't even want to admit it. They don't even want to get help, although they need help because it's so shameful. And so let me say again, if there's somebody struggling here in a very secret, private way with a sin of pornography, this addictive sin, you need to get help. Don't deceive yourself that you can just go in on your own. The Lord has given you the church to help you in this fight against sin. But there's another addiction that doesn't get enough attention, and certainly I could mention several other forms of addiction, but there is one that is certainly very common, extremely common. In fact, I believe that every single one of us struggles with it in one way or another. And yet it is hardly ever recognized. And that's very ironic because this is the addiction that we have to attention. Is our craving, our struggle, our addiction to and for the praise and recognition of others. The German philosopher Hegel argued that the struggle for recognition was the ultimate driver of all human history. I don't think it was very far off in the sense that everywhere we look, people want to be recognized. People want to be acknowledged, and this constantly drives what we do. This is largely the reason social media has become such a hit in the first place, and it's the reason that many are addicted to it to this day. We love to be seen. We want so badly to be approved. We want some letters to our name, some kind of profile, something that exalts us in the eyes of others. We love praise and affirmation. The problem is that our love for applause can be very much like a drug. It makes us feel so good, but it doesn't really get us anywhere, does it? And our incessant pursuit of it actually eats away at our soul. It's not helping you, Christian. It's hindering you from what really matters in life. And ironically, this intoxication with the praise of men, this is not something limited to the irreligious. This is the reason that here in Matthew 6, Jesus wants to warn his very own disciples, beware. Notice verse one sets the, really the idea, the new idea. He's been talking to this point, chapter five, about practicing righteousness. Now here, he's turning a corner to warn us about our inner motivations. And that begins in verse one, chapter six, beware of practicing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them. Why? What's at stake? He says, otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven. Jesus knows that you and I, however godly we may be, however close to him we may be, however much we want to practice righteousness, he knows we are susceptible to this temptation, to being addicted to the praise of men. And the consequence of living on this drug is that we waste our lives. We forfeit God's blessing, the Father's reward. This is serious. It's a very common problem, as subtle as it may be. But we need to talk about it. Jesus wants to draw attention to it this morning. Now if you've been remembering back to chapter 5 and verse 16, what Jesus said there, you might feel somewhat of a tension between what Jesus is going to say here in our text in chapter 6. Jesus has told us in chapter 5, you are the salt of the earth, talking to his disciples. You are the light of the world. And so in verse 16 he says, let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works. and glorify your Father who is in heaven. Jesus told us to live out works that are beautiful, that attracts people to God. So what's going on here? Well, Jesus made this statement in chapter 5 in the context of having just told his disciples, you will suffer persecution. And you are blessed when you suffer for my sake. When you suffer for the sake of righteousness. When persecution comes, we will be tempted to shrink back. from doing what is right, although it's right. And in such a case, we need to show the world the beautiful works of our Lord. Don't hide when tempted to show. But Jesus also knows there will be times when being the prideful sinners we are, we will be tempted to do good merely to be noticed. Noticed by men, that is. And so that's what he's addressing here in chapter six. The scholar A.B. Bruce sums up the tension here by saying, that we are to show when tempted to hide and we are to hide when tempted to show. We are to show forth the works of the Lord when the devil, the flesh of the world wants us to hide and we are to hide this this inclination to show, hide the works that we would want others to see when we are tempted to show them forth. Jesus' main point in this text is that to please God we must be freed from impressing others. You can't pursue both the praise of God and the praise of men. Those two things, those two pursuits are diametrically opposed. And so in today's text from the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus gives us three spiritual disciplines where we must be free from impressing others and where we need to set ourselves to please God. And these are three disciplines essential to your Christian life. So you can't live without these things. You want to follow Jesus. And in each of these three cases, I hope you maybe you caught notice of this as we were reading through the text a moment ago. They follow the same basic pattern. There's a repetition here. Jesus will begin in each case with a prohibition, prohibiting what is really a common attitude. Very subtle. And then he'll follow up by prescribing a countercultural attitude essential to authentic Christianity. So the first spiritual discipline Jesus discusses in verses two through four is giving. Giving. Verse two, he says, so when you give to the poor, do not sound a trumpet before you as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets. Jesus is beginning with a prohibition prohibiting doing these good works, giving namely, to be seen by men. And he says when you give to the poor. Notice he does not say if, but when. It is assumed that if you are following him you will give. The Bible has much to say about giving. Giving to the needy. And we are to bless others from out of the riches that God has entrusted to us. But the focus of our Lord is really on how we are to give. He says, when you give to the poor, do not sound a trumpet before you. You say, why would you need to say that? People do this. People were doing this. He says, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets. Now it's not clear whether Jesus intended for this language to be understood as literal or metaphorical. We are a couple thousand years removed from the sermon, right? Some scholars have suggested he's referring to the literal blasting of horns that would happen to signal the feasts, the beginning of feasts, such as Numbers 10 describes, where sounding trumpets was used to call the people to assemble. And since these feasts often involved giving alms to the poor, then it is thought that some religious figures may have been using these occasions The sounding of the trumpets, the gathering together of people in such a public fashion to demonstrate their wonderful, ostentatious generosity to the poor. And it was so impressive. That may be now. because the temple treasury used a shofar, this is a sort of a horn or trumpet, to funnel coins into the temple treasury box. Others believe Jesus could be referring to people that were anxious to have their coins rattling all the way down, loudly clanking down into the temple treasury box. Can you just imagine that? Drawing everybody's attention so that you and I would catch them in the act of giving. They wanted others to see what they were doing. I'm sure that happened as well. But most likely, Jesus is giving us a metaphor here, one that applies in any case, any situation. He's saying, don't toot your own horn. Don't toot your own horn. When you give to the church, when you give to someone else, don't call attention to what you're doing. Don't publish what you're doing. And notice what's really the issue here. It's not giving to those in need. Jesus says, They give so that what? They may be honored by men. That's the problem. This giving that he is rebuking here or prohibiting was not from out of love for others. Loving others as I love myself. Giving to others as I would desire others to give toward my needs. That's not what's going on here. No, this is about buying favor with men. This is about exchanging my gifts that I'm allegedly giving to others for the praise of men. It's about myself. This is selfish. And Jesus says then that we are not to be concerned. He's not merely concerned that we give. He says when you give, of course we should give. But he's concerned with why we give. Because he knows we can do the right thing, such as giving, for the wrong reasons. Imagine that. And nobody else may know. Everybody else may be very impressed. But God knows. God knows your heart. That's what he's saying here. And so in such a case, Jesus warns us, truly, I say to you, they, that is those who give in this manner, have their reward in full. He's using a commercial term. There is a commercial term in the Greek that was commonly used of a receipt of purchase. And the idea is that if you are seeking to buy honor from men by what you're doing in your giving, then you've gotten your payment in full already so that you shouldn't be expecting anything later. Nothing more will be paid you. And the ironic thing is that many people doing good works in the church or in our community for that matter, they're doing it and they're expecting something, right? They're giving toward donations for the church or whatever and they're thinking, man, I got so much, I'm laying up treasure in heaven and the real Truth here is that they're in for a great disappointment. They're in for a major disappointment. In reality, they are wasting their lives by squandering all their time and energy on honor from men, mere men. If that's what you're laboring for, brother or sister, well then don't expect anything in the kingdom to come. You've got your reward already, in full, Jesus says. And so let's take heed to what Jesus is saying because we know, don't we know, that we are immersed in a culture where people are anxious. to signal their virtues. Again, social media has made this so easy for us to just tell others what we're doing, what we're donating, what we're giving. And we have to be careful. Consider any number of generous donations made to a charitable organization. What do we see? The donor typically holds this enormous check and poses for a picture with the recipient And that picture is then published in papers, social media, all over for everyone to see. Now, thank God for generous donors and generous donations, but to be publicly recognized for your giving in the front page of a paper or on some platform somewhere, That recognition is its own reward, Jesus wants you to know. That is the way of this world. Give to be recognized. Give to be thought great. Give to be exalted. But Jesus wants us to take a counter-cultural approach like everything else he said in the sermon. And so he follows up with a prescription for giving to please God. Verse three, but, contrastive conjunction, but when you give to the poor, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing. In other words, even you are not to be paying much attention to yourself. Jesus not only prohibits us from seeking the praise of men, but he's prohibiting us from dwelling on our own praise. He doesn't want us to even entertain vanity in our own hearts regarding ourselves. John Stott put it well. He said, Christian giving is to be marked by self-sacrifice and self-forgetfulness, not by self-congratulation. Not this patting myself on the back, feeling good about myself all the time. That's not why we give. Why? Why is this? Why all the caution not to exalt or obsess over ourselves? Verse four, so that your giving will be in secret and your father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. Any good we do is only by the glory and grace of God. Is that not true? What do you have to give that you have not first received, Paul would say in 1 Corinthians? Even your abilities to give, your heart that disposed you to give, all of that comes to us from God. And God knows then, he has given us what we have to give. He's given us our abilities to give and all that, a heart to give. And so our giving should be secretive to the glory of God so that God gets the credit. for what is due his name. Remember back in chapter 5, that's what Jesus was after when he said, let your light shine before men so that they may see your good works and glorify your father. That's what your life is about. Christian, that's why you're here. That's why when you got saved, God didn't just snatch you up to heaven. He left you here to draw glory to your father. And so whether something you do is noticed or not noticed by men, God sees. He knows your heart. And Jesus is saying we're not to compete with him for his glory. So let me ask, do you feel that compulsion? Do you feel that compulsion to draw attention to something noble you've done, something admirable you've done in your life? Do you feel that need for the affirmation of others? Are you able to thrive without being recognized by your peers, by those in your church or in your community? Are you content with the praise that comes from God with knowing that you're pleasing God in secret? That's my hope. That's my joy. Or are you in competition with God this morning? We need to take note of this. Now, please understand, the desire for recognition is not inherently a bad thing. That's not what Jesus is saying. When a child seeks recognition from his or her father or mother, that's natural, right? That's good. Actually, the desire for recognition is something God built into us that we might desire His approval as our father. But the problem is not our desire for recognition then. It's our desire for the wrong kind of recognition. At the end of the day, the question is, whose recognition really matters? There's going to be reward. whether in this life or in the next. There's going to be approval. There's going to be recognition. People will recognize you. But Jesus is saying, what kind of recognition are you living for? The heavenly father's or man's approval? And Jesus is implying you can't genuinely be seeking both at the same time. You have to make a choice. So keep your giving low key so that your approval may come to you eternally and ultimately from God rather than immediately and only temporarily from those around you. To this, Jesus adds a second discipline essential to the Christian life, praying. Verses 5 and 6. Verse 5, when you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites. So see here again, he begins with a prohibition, prohibiting us from praying to be seen of men. Verse 5, when you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites. What is a hypocrite? We use that term a lot, right? A hypocrite is someone who is not what they really seem to be, right? They're not what they appear to be. You might think of a celebrated preacher who is secretly carrying on an affair with another woman. That's being a pretender. That's a hypocrite. A hypocrite is an actor. He or she says one thing and does another. They pretend to be one thing. They are, in reality, another. But the whole point of being an actor or an actress is having an audience. Is it not? The whole point of being an actor is putting on a show. And what good is a show without anybody to watch it? Notice Jesus says they love to stand and pray in the public places, the synagogues, these public street corners, so that they may be seen by men. That's it. That's it. They want an audience. This is the temptation, brother or sister. We want an audience with men. We want viewers. We want likes and subscribers so that we can receive glory as we perform our noble act. And the whole world might think, you know, that this is, you know, this is a great thing of you. The whole world might like and subscribe to your spiritual profile. We could fool everyone. But if that's what you're after, Jesus is warning, just know God is not impressed. He's going to go on to say this. I'm reminded of Luke 18, where Jesus talks about the Pharisee going into the temple to pray. And he makes this comment. He says that the Pharisee stood and was praying to himself. Wow, isn't that ironic? This would seem to apply. God was not at all his audience. He didn't have an audience with God, but he was praying to himself, truly. God's not going to be an audience to our glory. Truthfully, God must be sick to see us using prayer as a guise for glorifying ourselves. because God intends prayer to be the most direct way that we would give glory to Him, that we would acknowledge Him. That's what prayer's about. Just imagine throwing a birthday party for your best friend, and then when everybody shows up with their presents, you collect all the presents for yourself. I mean, how backward, crazy would that be? That's about how ridiculous and selfish it is to offer prayer to go about in the guise of worship really seeking to draw attention to ourselves. This must make God sick. But God knows. And if we want God to hear our prayers, we must talk to Him. We must focus on Him. We must give attention to Him. We must let Him be the one that people glory and praise. Now, I'll be honest with you, brothers and sisters, this was very convicting to me. Studying through this passage and thinking about how many times I, in my own mind, as I'm praying or preaching, am more focused on what you think of me than what God thinks. Look, that's not the point of getting up and declaring the Word of God. It's impressing anyone. And I need to be honest with you that I need your prayers. I would ask that you would pray for me or anybody in this pulpit, for that matter, that This is not about anyone seeing us. May we pray as a church that whoever's in this pulpit delivering the word of God is hidden and that Christ is magnified. Isn't that the point? But yet it is all too common for preachers or those in any ministry for that matter to use the ministry to draw attention to self. So for those seeking honor from public prayer, Jesus says, truly I say to you, they have the reward in full. They've got it already. And he next offers another countercultural approach. Here's the prescription for prayer that pleases God. Verse six, but you, in other words, you meaning for my disciples, but you, when you pray, notice not if, but when you pray. Go into your inner room, close your door, and pray to your Father who is in secret. Now stop right there. Jesus is not forbidding us from ever praying in public. If that was the case, we wouldn't get up and lead you in prayer or have any of the men lead in prayer here or have corporate prayer meetings where men and women are meeting together, crying out to the Lord, Jesus himself led in public prayer. His disciples led in public prayer. We're going to see that next week. We'll study prayer more, the prayer that our Lord leads us. What Jesus is doing here is he is calling us to pray to the right audience. Audience with a capital A. I do thank God, by the way, for each one of you that serve in just leading the church in prayer. It is a wonderful, beautiful thing to hear God's people pray. And I thank God for all of you who, in our corporate prayer meetings, you lift your voice and you pray because the idea is we are all to echo that prayer, right? We are all to unite together. And how can we do that if we don't hear you, right? But the focus should be on God. It shouldn't be, oh, what a marvelous, wonderful prayer. That person is so gifted. in what they said, but it should be, oh Lord, yes, answer, amen. That's what amen is. Lord, work. Lord, do that. Yes, Lord, that is true of you and your character. We are to be talking to God. Let Him be our judge in prayer. Let God in heaven be our audience. Let others listen in only that they might echo and say amen to the same God. Now, by calling us to retreat and to go into our inner room and close the door, Jesus is demanding nothing less than 100% absolute authenticity. All right. The idea here is Jesus wants perfectly authentic prayer. He wants you to be real with God because he knows it is that private sector of our lives that part of a stripped from public view, Usually the part of us that we don't put on social media, it's not a part of our profile. He wants you as you really are, stripped from public view, that purest expression of you to come before God. That's the real you. As the preacher Robert Murray McShane once said, what a man is on his knees before God, that he is and nothing more. And so in the meaningful exercise of prayer, Or in order to exercise meaningful prayer, Jesus prescribes taking time to shut out the world and get in secret with God, so that you're not even tempted to think about what anyone else is thinking of you. And by the way, I might even say, Don't even spend too much time reflecting on yourself in that moment, how you're praying. Just focus on God, right? And so, Lord willing, we will again attempt to look more at prayer and how we ought to pray next week. But moving on, Jesus assures us at the end of verse six, your father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. This is one of those matters of repetition through this text, but I'll draw attention to it right now. Your father Seize. Your Father sees. That is the nagging truth behind all three of these spiritual disciplines Jesus raises before us. Your Father sees your giving, your praying, your fasting. He knows what you do and why you do it. And so even what is done in secret, do we see that? He knows about those things that no one else does. He knows and sees into the deepest, darkest recesses of your heart. Hebrews 4.13 says, there is no creature hidden from his sight, but all things are open and laid bare to his eyes. So a very appropriate question would be, what does God see in your heart this morning? How does the Lord see you? Or when he looks into your heart and why you do what you do, what does he see? By the way, God doesn't just see, but He will expose. 1 Corinthians 4, 5 warns us that we should not go on passing judgment before the time, but wait until the Lord comes, who will both bring to light the hidden things of the darkness and disclose the motives of men's hearts. Then each man's praise will come to him from God. Wow, that is sobering. Let me say, that is the moment of truth. when we stand before God and He gives us the assessment as He sees us. This isn't going to be a popularity contest because there's no contest. God will have the last word on your life. And it really isn't going to matter how fashionable you were in your worship and what everybody thought of you. It's all going to amount to what God knows is true of your life. So we need to let this sink in as we listen to our Lord. I said before, Jesus will go on to give us some additional instruction on prayer. We're going to study that next week in verses 7 through 15. But because that focus on prayer is peripheral to this discussion on pleasing God over man, we're going to plan to look at that next week. So for sake of time, we're going to skip down to verse 16. And after expanding on his thought on prayer, notice Jesus will address now a third discipline essential to the Christian life. And that is fasting in verses 16 through 18. Verse 16, whenever you fast, do not put on a gloomy face as the hypocrites do for they neglect their appearance so that they will be noticed by men when they are fasting. This scenario Jesus raises follows the same format as the two previous cases and he begins with this prohibition. What's he prohibiting? Fasting to be seen by men. The Pharisees fasted twice a week on Mondays and Thursdays, and when fasting, it was fashionable for them to let everyone know this. How did they do that? Did they wear a t-shirt that said, you know, I'm fasting? Well, today they might have done that, right? But they would put on a gloomy face. You know, they had this very sober countenance, and he says they would neglect their appearance. That is, they were intentionally looking disheveled, like they just rolled out of bed or something like that. Because they were saying to people, I don't really care how anyone appears to me. I don't really care what anyone thinks when they look at me. Very ironically, that was the whole point of looking disheveled, was to draw attention to their appearance. And so that you and I, or anyone for that matter, watching them would say, wow, how spiritual he or she is. They're fasting. They're taking time to think about God more. So beloved, there is such a thing as false humility, and we have to be aware of this. I remember hearing an evangelist, a certain evangelist I admire, sharing that in his early years of evangelism, he took pride in driving around the most beat up truck he could possibly drive. All the rust and the dents were badges of honor. Because, as he said, surely anyone seeing his truck would say, now there's a man, there's a preacher who doesn't take thought for his own life, his own welfare. But this preacher, to his credit, realized that this was a sort of false humility. A false humility on his part, driving around a beat-up truck so that everyone would think, he's no materialist, he's a man of God. That's the idea here. We could do this in many different ways, but people in Jesus' culture had ways to publicly signal spirituality, virtue. impressive godliness to others around them. And maybe this is like the compulsion we feel to put a sign in our yard or a bumper sticker in our car or make some post on our social media profile. Don't misunderstand me. It's not wrong to ever take a public stand on a moral issue. We need to at times, right? There's a time for donning sackcloth and ashes, figuratively speaking, right? There's a time for a public demonstration of grief over injustice. But we need to ask ourselves, in any case, what am I saying or what am I really showing? What am I really concerned about? Why am I saying or showing what I am? Is it that others think I'm right? You know, many times we can be more concerned with being thought right than with actually being right. Isn't that true? For instance, some people are more interested in being thought learned or appearing learned, learn ed, than they are in actually learning. Someone in the ministry once told me he hoped to attain a doctorate as soon as possible, and he said it would be cool if people called him doctor. And so he was set on looking for a shortcut to getting a degree, and I tried to be gracious, but I wanted him to understand what you actually know is far more important than what people think you know. I mean that's the whole point of education, isn't it? But could it be, brother or sister, That's where we are this morning with approaching God. We are more interested in being thought right with God than we are in actually being right with God in secret as He knows us. Take it from the Bible. We are, as God says, selfish, prideful beings. We all have a natural tendency to prioritize our appearance, to prioritize what others think about us. But Jesus is saying that's all secondary to the main thing. You are what you are before God, and that's more important than how you appear before men. Now, to those living to be seen of men, Jesus repeats himself. He says, truly, I say to you, they have their reward in full. End of verse 16. We've heard that phrase before. He's repeating himself. But this repetition is not without purpose. Do we hear the Lord? Do we have ears to hear? Are we paying attention to what Jesus is stressing? I mean, how many times does our Lord need to say it? This is important, right? But he follows up next with a prescription again, prescribing a fasting that actually pleases God. Verse 17, but you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face. Again, it needs to be said, Jesus expected his disciples to fast. He didn't leave us the option. He said, when you fast. So guess what? We should take time to fast. And I have to mention this, because fasting is not skipping meals for health's sake. That's usually the way we describe it, right? Oh, I'm doing a lemon fast or something. People have different health reasons why we fast. Hey, that's great. But that's not what Jesus is talking about. Jesus is talking about consciously choosing to set aside eating. Or we could add sleeping or any activity of whatever sort, be it essential or not essential to life, and setting that aside for a time so that we might instead give ourselves solely to seeking God, giving Him an audience in prayer. That's what fasting is. And we might emphasize the need for giving and praying in the church, but when's the last time you really heard fasting emphasized, right? We don't hear too many sermons on fasting. It's just not a popular doctrine, I guess, in our church, probably for obvious reasons. I don't think it's a stretch to say that fasting is somewhat of a lost art in our time and culture in the church. And it's one that we need to return to and get better at practicing, especially in our overindulgent culture. Probably more than ever before, we need to fast. We need to practice weaning ourselves off the desires of this world, denying ourselves what our body immediately demands from us. As Paul recognized the need to beat his body into subjection, 1 Corinthians 9, 24 through 27, we see that fasting can be a way of exercising much-needed self-control over our bodies. We need that. And Jesus said that when he, the bridegroom, is taken away, then his disciples will fast. Matthew 9, 15. So I hope I've emphasized that enough. But yet, Jesus' focus here is not on fasting. That's a forgone conclusion. It's how we will fast. Verse 17, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face. By anointing your head and washing your face, he's just saying, go about doing the things you always do. Just look as you always do. Don't talk about it. Don't try to draw attention to it in the way you dress or whatever. Fasting is not to be a way of impressing others. It's to be a way of demonstrating to God the devotion we have to Him and to His will. So Jesus explains verse 18. Do this, fast in this way, in this covert, low-key way, so that your fasting will not be noticed by men, but by your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. Much repetition in these verses, because Jesus knows how incredibly strong the temptation is we face to seek that attention from others. That's why we dress the way we do. That's why we work so hard to appear the way we do. It probably has everything to do with many of our choices, what we buy, what we don't buy, right? We're very concerned about how we appear. This is very much a phenomenon that is acutely a problem in this rich, indulgent American society. And we need to beware. than that our focus is on God. Like a drug, this approval of man can grab our attention. We want this instant momentary gratification of knowing others are watching us and how they view us. But the more we seek it, the more we feel we need it, and we are ensnared. And unlike many of our addictions, this one is subtle. We might not even suspect we have this addiction. So let me ask as we conclude, how much are you conscious of what others are thinking? How much does it matter to you what others are saying or thinking about you? Obviously, there's a point to having a reputation, having a good name, but why are we concerned about having a good name? What's the point of having a good reputation? Is it to draw glory to God? Are we afraid to be honest with others about who and what we really are because we're just obsessed with what they think of us? Maybe somebody here in the church, you're concerned what I think of you as your pastor. Don't be. Christian, keep your focus where it belongs. Keep your attention on pleasing your Heavenly Father. It's how He sees you that really matters. And the only way we can be truly set free from the enslaving addiction to seeking to impress others, have you caught it in the counter-cultural alternative Jesus is prescribing here. What's the only way we can be set free from being ensnared by the fear of man and what others think of us? It is to devote ourselves to fear and love and please God first and foremost. That's it. That's the spell that breaks the chains of this addiction when we make our life about pleasing God. The world's opinions, what others think, it just loses its hold. After all, why do we need the approval of men when we have the approval of God? Christian, Jesus wants to take you deeper. He wants to purify your motives. But this will demand repenting of sins like even being a people pleaser, idolizing what others think of us. Christian righteousness is not about pleasing people, it's about pleasing God. So what we need to do as we conclude, is we need to ground our identity in who and what God says about us, right? That's what ought to matter to us. And then grounding our identity and security in God and His Word and what He knows is true about us, we then ought to strive to be honest with one another and with God about who and what we really are. And maybe you're not a Christian. Maybe you would say, you know, I've been a pretender. I appear to be a follower of Christ, but I know I'm really not. Well, look, you could fool me, you could fool a church, you could fool just about everyone, but you can't fool God, can you? God sees, He knows. And so there's nothing to gain in pretending to be something you're not. This is only setting yourself up for the greatest disappointment and the most terrifying shock of your life, when you will stand before God, who sees and knows you like you really are. And so if you've never come to God by the humble way of His cross, if your relationship with Christ is not genuine, then I would just plead with you as only I know how, please see me, please see someone before you leave and get help. That's why God has given you the word. This would be His message to you. Let's pray. Father, I thank you so much for your word. that really doesn't leave any stone unturned in our life. There's certainly not anything that we need to be addressed in our lives that is not already addressed in your Word somewhere, somehow. And today, Father, this is something we all need help with, because we are tempted to be very conscious of what others think of us, and we pray that we would be more focused than ever in our life on what you know is true. Father, would you protect us from the fear of man, from being drawn into or drawn away by what others think? Lord, thank you for your people. I thank you for all who serve in this church. I pray for those who serve in public ways. Father, would you protect them from seeking to glorify themselves, but to glorify you, Lord? Let them draw glory to you. We pray for those serving in your church in private ways. Father, help them not to be discouraged, but may they take comfort and joy in knowing that you see. And this we pray in Jesus' name.