Pray the Word with David Platt is a resource from radical.net.

Matthew chapter 6, verse 1.

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.

Oh, what an important verse. What important words

for us to hear from Jesus here in the middle of the sermon on the Mount right before he starts

talking about giving and praying and fasting, which are all obviously good things. But Jesus is showing us that we

can be tempted and are tempted all the time to do good things in order to be seen by others,

to do good things in ways that what we're thinking about is what others see, which what may come

to our minds immediately is just the most arrogant person doing this in order to be impressive

to others, in order to be acknowledged by others.

But I just want to encourage each of us to think about how often we think about what

others think about us. This hit me in a fresh way just yesterday. I was processing through

something, and one of the things I was processing through is what will these people think?

And immediately, the Holy Spirit just said to me, what matters is not what they think.

What matters is what God sees and what God knows.

And I think we would all admit that we often process what others might think of us or what others are

thinking of us. And Jesus is freeing us from this to focus on what God sees, specifically in our giving and our praying and our fasting,

when it comes to prayer, Jesus says, just go in the room, close the door where nobody else can

see what's happening. And you just spend time with your father who sees you and knows your

heart as you're seeking after him, be content with what God sees.

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