DAILY DEVOTIONAL – July 9, 2020

“Audience of One”

Prayer:  God our Father, we praise You for sending Your Son Jesus who lived perfectly and faithfully for You.  He alone lived the life we were supposed to live, and only by faith in His life, death and resurrection do we have the hope of salvation.  By the power of Your Holy Spirit, help us to live out our lives of faith with the desire to please You only.  Amen.

Scripture: Matthew 6:1

“Watch out! Don’t do your good deeds publicly, to be admired by others, for you will lose the reward from your Father in heaven.” 

Devotion – “Audience of One”

To some extent, all of us are tempted to put on a show in certain contexts and with certain people.  Of course, it is always appropriate to behave according to common courtesy and in step with appropriate social norms so as to remain respectful.  However, even those social norms and common courtesies only exist because as a humanity, as a society, we know that by nature we are not as presentable as we would like people to believe.  In our hearts, we know the mess that exists inside.  We know that if we were to stand on stage and reveal the unmitigated truth of who we are inside, people wouldn’t like what they see.

Jesus said in our passage from Matthew today, “Watch out! Don’t do your good deeds publicly, to be admired by others, for you will lose the reward from your Father in heaven.”  Now, there is no question that God calls us to live holy lives and to love our neighbor, to be respectful and live appropriately in the context of our society and its social norms.  However, we must always remember what our Lord said about our good works also in Matthew 5:16, “let your good deeds shine out for all to see, so that everyone will praise your heavenly Father.”  People don’t need to know how religious and faithful we are…because the truth is friends, we’re not.  What people do need to see is how faithful and loving and merciful our Heavenly Father is.  We do not and should not live out our Christian faith in accordance with God’s word because we think that people won’t be able to resist coming to faith in Jesus when they see how blessed and faithful and religious we are.  We should live authentic lives, truthful lives and lives that through our actions say to those who are watching, “look at how God can clean up even a mess like myself!  If God can redeem this sinful person, know for certain that Christ wants to redeem you also.”

In our effort to live godly and upright lives full of good works, we should always do so remembering that we have an audience of One.  When the curtain falls and the lights go out on this world, there is ultimately only One vote that counts.  Nobody’s opinion of you will matter, no one can vouch for you and your status and your popularity won’t save you.  Only God’s vote counts.  And when that day comes when we stand before the Almighty God, He is looking for One person and One person only.  His Son Jesus Christ.  God will not be looking for the most righteous and charitable saint, or the most theologically correct pastor…only those within whom God sees His Holy and Only Son are received into the Kingdom of God.  And the truth is friends, that is what this dying and hurting world is looking for, whether they know it or not.  They are not looking for Christians…they are looking for a Savior…they are looking for Jesus.

So as we live out each day in this precious gift of faith God has given us, let us always look in the mirror and strive to see less of ourselves and more of Jesus.  Jesus loved the unlovable – like the tax collectors and prostitutes – even when it meant the “popular” religious elite would look down their noses at Him.  Jesus ministered to the outcasts – like the Samaritan woman at the well – when He knew that it would not only confuse but make His own disciples nervous and embarrassed.  Jesus did not seek out, but fled from the approval of the masses as He sought out only the approval of God His Father.  Jesus had no possessions; nothing to show the world just how successful He was.  Jesus always spoke in love, but also spoke the truth…even when it meant His own disciples would abandon Him…even when it meant those very words would ultimately get Him crucified on a cross to pay for the sins of the world.

My friends, God did not wait for you or I to clean ourselves up enough and be “show ready” before He sent His Son Jesus to die for our sins.  No, Christ died and rose again from the dead because it is only by faith in Jesus, and through the Holy Spirit that has been sent by the Father through Jesus our Lord that we can even begin to have a hope of being presentable to God.  And the Good News of the Gospel is that by faith alone in Jesus Christ, God no longer sees the broken mess we are…but instead sees the perfect righteousness of His Son who raised us with Himself from the tomb.

Have a blessed weekend, and remember, that God has forgiven yesterday, is with you today and has already taken care of tomorrow.  Amen.