Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

I am admittedly dating myself with this sermon title.

When I was a kid, and you learned to ride a bike, the next thing you wanted to learn how to do is to take your hands off of the handle bars and stay upright.

You wanted to ride hands free.

And you would practice and practice this until you got it down.

Of course, once you got it down, you didn’t want to keep this new skill to yourself.

At the first opportunity you got, you’d go call your mom or your dad.

“Mom!

Dad! Come outside!

I need to show you something!”

Mom or Dad comes out to see what you’re carrying on about.

With a big smile on your face, you get on the bike, start riding, and then take your hands off the handle bars.

“Look at me!”

I am admittedly dating myself with this sermon title.

When I was a kid, and you learned to ride a bike, the next thing you wanted to learn how to do is to take your hands off of the handle bars and stay upright.

You wanted to ride hands free.

And you would practice and practice this until you got it down.

Of course, once you got it down, you didn’t want to keep this new skill to yourself.

At the first opportunity you got, you’d go call your mom or your dad.

“Mom!

Dad! Come outside!

I need to show you something!”

Mom or Dad comes out to see what you’re carrying on about.

With a big smile on your face, you get on the bike, start riding, and then take your hands off the handle bars.

“Look at me!”

Now, you may never have said, “Look Ma!

No Hands!”

But I have no doubt that every child in here and every adult in here has at some point in their lives said to someone who mattered to them (a parent, a teacher, a boss), “Watch this!” “Come and see what I can do!” “Come and see what I’ve accomplished!”

And if you’re a parent, it puts as big smile on your face when your child accomplishes something.

When I would show my parents what I could do, they wouldn’t say to me, “What is it now?

I don’t care if you’ve learned something new.

I’m not interested.”

No! Parents say, “Show me!” Then they give their children a high five, a hug, and say, “Great job!” “I’m so proud of you!” “I knew you could do it!”

Why do children do that?

Why do we say, “Watch me!”

We do it because there’s almost no point in the accomplishment if nobody notices.

We want people to notice because we want to be recognized for our accomplishments.

We want to be valued for the things we’re able to do.

We want to be rewarded.

“Look Ma!

No hands!”

We like to hear people say to us, “Good job.”

Why do parents enjoy affirming their children when they’ve accomplished something?

Why do effective leaders recognize and affirm the people they’re leading when they have accomplished something significant?

It’s because we know that it’s important to notice people when they’ve done well.

It’s important to our sense of value, dignity, and worth to hear someone say, “Good job.”

“Well done.”

This need and desire for affirmation is a part of being human.

It is not a warp in our make-up.

It is not because we’re just self-centered people and can’t do without someone boosting our ego.

Within Christianity we can tend toward two poles.

We can tend toward one pole that says, “I’m just a wretch of a person.

I’m a wicked, guilty sinner, who doesn’t deserve anything good from God.

I have to make sure that I always remember how really bad I am.

That way I won’t become self-centered.”

The other pole we can tend toward says, “Because of Jesus, I’m the head and not the tail.

Y’all better recognize that I deserve to be on top because I’m blessed and highly favored.”

When we turn to Jesus, however, we find out that he is extraordinarily consistent.

There is some truth in each pole, but neither grasps the heart of what Jesus is teaching his disciples in our text.

Jesus mentions reward, or getting paid, seven times in the first 18 verses of this chapter.

This passage kicks off with a warning, so it’s not surprising that four of those seven instances are negative.

“Be careful,” he says in v. 1, “not to practice your righteousness before others in order to be noticed by them.

Otherwise, you have no reward with your Father in heaven.”

Righteousness matters.

But three times Jesus says to them, “Your Heavenly Father will reward you.”

Jesus doesn’t say, “don’t practice righteousness.”

But Jesus also doesn’t say, “don’t think about being rewarded.”

He doesn’t say here, “just think of yourself as an ungrateful sinner who’s just doing his duty.”

He says, “Your Father sees in secret.

Your Father sees into the secret place of your heart.

He’s your audience.

And he does delight to reward his children.”

So, what you’ve got to watch out for is why you’re doing what you’re doing.

Jesus gives this warning and then gets practical with three primary examples of what it means to practice our righteousness rightly.

We’re going to talk about Sacrifice, Supplication, and Satisfaction.

Jesus is extraordinarily consistent.

Remember the bookend verses that I told you about last time in 5:20 and 5:48.

Jesus said in 5:20, “For I tell you truly that unless your righteousness far surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

Then, in the last verse of ch. 5, he says, “Therefore, you must be perfect, as your Heavenly Father is perfect.”

What Jesus did in between those two statements is help his disciples to see that righteousness had to do with a heart condition.

Righteousness wasn’t simply about external obedience to God’s law.

It wasn’t about trying to write out volumes of detailed laws like the scribes and Pharisees had to rule out the possibility of anybody slipping up.

It wasn’t even about being error free.

So, the refrain from vv. 20-48 of chapter 5 was, “You heard that it was said…, but I say to you…” I need you to understand the heart of the law, so that you understand the heart of God, so that you are fully aware of your need for him to work in your heart to create a Spirit empowered obedience.

So that you learn to love like God loves, to forgive like God forgives, to be peacemakers the way God makes peace with us.

Now he says, “Be careful.”

As you are living out this righteousness in practice, be careful that you’re not doing it to show other people how righteous you are.

Jesus knows that even when we want to do the right thing, we’re tempted to do the right thing so that we can receive accolades from other people.

Even though the desire to be valued by others is not of itself wrong or sinful, it is infected by the sinful desire to only be doing it for ourselves.

When we say, “Look at me!” “Look what I did!” Look what I can do!” we’re not normally saying, “Praise the Lord with me for what he’s done!”

I’m going to get to our three S’s and move through them quickly, but I need us to see something here.

The motive for practicing righteousness, doing the right thing, living for God, must not be so that others will notice me for at least two reasons.

First, the issue with practicing our righteousness to be noticed by other people is that others don’t necessarily agree with what’s righteous and what’s not.

Look back to the beatitudes in ch.

5:10-12, Jesus said

Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.

Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

The definition of righteousness, the definition of what it means to do the right thing comes from God and his word.

That must at points inevitably rub up against the righteousness defined by society.