Take care not to perform righteous deeds
in order that people may see them;
otherwise, you will have no recompense from your heavenly Father.
Jesus wants us to be able to find our reward in God, and more and more to find it in him alone. We learned yesterday that when we trust in him to take care of us and protect us we become able to love even our enemies. Similarly, when we trust him to provide for us and reward our almsgiving we become able to give freely and cheerfully.
Each must do as already determined, without sadness or compulsion,
for God loves a cheerful giver.
Moreover, God is able to make every grace abundant for you,
so that in all things, always having all you need,
you may have an abundance for every good work.
If we rely on human motivations, especially the acknowledgement of others, we won't be giving with the freedom and joy that God intends. There are rewards for those who give alms that God wants to give, but they are mysteriously separate from the controllable world of cause and effect. For this reason Jesus asks us to first disentangle our motivations from those of the world. We look to receive reward, yes, but not a reward that we can cause of control. This reward does not often come on our timeline or in accord with our plans. But if we are faithful God will not be outdone in generosity.
But when you give alms,
do not let your left hand know what your right is doing,
so that your almsgiving may be secret.
Let us practice disconnecting from the easy and obvious rewards of our good works. Let us learn to seek acknowledgement from others less and from God more.
The hardest reward to ignore is usually the boost to our own self-image that occurs when we do what we know we should. But if we get caught up in this reward we risk doing good works only so that we can feel like a good person, to fast and pray only so that we can feel religious. But we must not fixate on these feelings if they occur. If we do our giving and fasting will become limited by the feelings that we get from them so that we quickly abandon them in the absence of such feelings. We need not deny such feelings if they occur, but should instead simply not focus on them. If the left hand focuses on what the right hand is doing it will be paralyzed. It should instead continue to focus on whatever task as at hand.
When you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites.
They neglect their appearance,
so that they may appear to others to be fasting.
Most of us probably never fast so dramatically that we feel like acting gloomy would be appropriate. But there are certainly other times when we act gloomy to win sympathy and support from others. What if at such times we cared less about being rewarded in the sight of men and more in the sight of God?
And your Father who sees what is hidden will repay you.
Our flesh tends to push back when we think about doing anything without an immediate and predictable reward. But the more that we allow the grace of God to set us free from this compulsion the more we will experience a new freedom in charity, a better reward, and become cheerful givers who are especially pleasing to God.
No comments:
Post a Comment