How To Not Be A Christian

INTRO

Many years ago before my brother got married he met a girl “online”. He did this before meeting guys and girls online was a cool or normal thing. My brother, Corey, and this girl exchanged pictures emails and began to chat. Everything this girl put forward my brother liked. She was kind, sweet, pretty, and he wanted to meet her. But every time he wanted to meet her she would have some excuse, she was sick, she was out of town, she was afraid,ect. Even though they lived in the same town, he never got to see her. This went on for over a year. He bought her gifts, they confessed their love for each other. But then finally it all came crashing down. After a whole year, Corey finally figured out this girl he was “dating” was a complete fake. There was someone else behind all the pictures all emails, all the messages, and this girl was nothing like the image she was projecting. Thankfully, my brother is a happily married man to a wife he actually gets to see and is great.

The Main Points of the sermon is: Jesus warns us against doing the right things, but for the wrong reasons.

Remember the reason we started the Sermon on the Mount was so that we would be invited into the life that Jesus has called us to live. No where in our culture will people tell you to live this way. As soon as we get right back into our jobs, there is a constant strain to be pulled away, to drift, away from obeying Jesus’ teachings here. So let’s dive in again.

The Danger of Hypocrisy

If you remember up until chapter 5, Jesus has been dealing with righteousness. What kind of righteousness do you and I need to be His disciple, to be a Christian? Jesus makes it very clear, it is a righteousness that is internal, not external. Jesus isn’t simply concerned with our behaviors, but the state of our hearts. So up until chapter 6, Jesus defines this righteousness. Then as we begin in Chapter 6, Jesus begins to switch his focus a little. He says this:

“Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. Otherwise you have no reward with your Father in heaven.”

Jesus gives us a warning. Be careful! When Jesus says be careful, or gives us a warning, it means that this is a sin that you and I will be tempted to fall into. We want to pay attention to what Jesus says here.

Not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them.

Now if Jesus simply said “don’t practice your righteousness in front of others.” and stopped there. He would be no different than any other religious teacher. If all Jesus was focused on was changing our behavior, changing our actions, than He would be no different than Buddhism or Islam. But notice Jesus sees right through our actions and sees into the motivations of our hearts.

to be seen by them.

Jesus says this. We must guard against the temptation to do the right things, prayer, giving, fasting, ect, but doing it for the wrong reasons. So what Jesus will do is give us 3 examples of what this looks like. He uses giving, prayer, and fasting. We will take one week to look at each of these. But these could be replaced with many other things we do as Christians, evangelism, serving, preaching, ect.

Why is this so dangerous? When you and I are tempted to fall into the sin of practicing our righteousness in front of others to be seen by them?

You will get what you want but you will get no more. (wages)

The Deception of Hypocrisy

“So whenever you give to the poor”.

Jesus doesn’t say “if” we give. But when we give. Giving to the poor, tithes and offerings, were a major part of Judaism, and today church this continues to be one of the ways that we worship God. God is glorified when we take our finances and we offer them to Him and give to the things He has told us to give to. That is worship to Him. But notice how Jesus describes these men’s giving:

Jesus calls them “hypocrites”. Right now at Morrison I know people are busy preparing for the play. Many of you here are involved in the play. And in fact right here in our midst, we have Jospeh himself. Joseph the main character is played by Caleb Reilly. Now we all know that Caleb isn’t really Joseph. But he is playing a part, he is putting on a costume and playing to the audience. This is what Jesus is describing here. That hypocrisy means we are playing a part.

1. “sound a trumpet before you”

very clear this giving was not about the poor or about God was it? These men were sounding a trumpet to bring attention to themselves. That man gives to the poor, not so much to help them as to be seen helping them.

draws attention to themselves, not to God.

in the synagogues and in the streets

notice where they were doing it? in the streets, and in the synagogues! Now why would they want to be sounding the trumpet and doing this there? That’s where they can be seen by the most people! Hypocrisy is calculated. Because you are craving man’s praise, you will be led to do things where you can get the most attention. So maybe that means we won’t serve in the church unless it gets the most attention, we won’t give our finances unless we can get some kind of recognition, ect. Sin will always find it’s way here. What this does, why it is dangerous is because as we can, their giving, this act that was meant to be worship towards God, was merely a means to make much of themselves. Make much of themselves. So here we have these men, blowing trumpets, in the streets, in the synagogues, saying look at me, look at me! Look at all the good stuff I am doing! Look how much money I give, look at how holy I am. And you would think that we would see that, or people would look at that, and say “man those guys are full of themselves!” See how conceited they are! But is that what Jesus says?

How did the people respond? Jesus says they do these things to be applauded by people.

We live in a culture that celebrates this. The danger of living our lives as hypocrites is that you can be the family or the person who is serving non stop, sharing the Gospel, giving large amounts of money, fasting, and everyone else looking on is just praising and celebrating your lifestyle. All the while Jesus says, if that’s the reason you are doing it? You’ve received your pay. That’s it. Nothing else is coming. That’s what he means here. You have received your reward.

We can pile on(have dirt) all of this amounts to nothing. A like on Facebook, an applause of the crowd, and thats all your going to get.

But here is the good news of of this passage. It may not seem like good news at first but I promise you it is:

while you may be able to deceive yourself, while you may be able to deceive others around you. You and I can not deceive God our Father.

Basically if there wasn’t an audience would they still do these things as unto God?

If there wasn’t an audience watching our lives, a Facebook to post our good life to, a twitter to tweet out our spiritual prayers, would we still be as faithful to do these things “as unto the Lord?”

The Delight of The Father

Jesus says “but when you give to the poort don’t let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.”

in secret. This is in comparison to “in the synagogue, in the street” what is the secret place? Our hearts. While people can only see us in the streets and our actions, God the Father sees in the secret place. Behind out actions to the very motivations of our hearts. He knows why you are doing the things you do. He knows why you give your money, He sees the motivation behind the reason you and I serve.

But here is the good news of of this passage. It may not seem like good news at first but I promise you it is:

while you may be able to deceive yourself, while you may be able to deceive others around you. You and I can not deceive God our Father.

That means our hearts have got to change. None of us have pure motives nor will we ever until we finally reach heaven.

Here is the good news: Jesus says: the only One who sees your unseen places, our hearts, motives, and desires, is the Only one who can CHANGE those places.

This is good news church because while people may never be impressed with you, while people may not take notice of the good works you do, there is One, who sees you. There is One who takes notice of everything that we do, and that is the God of the universe! And Jesus is teaching us what we have heard all throughout the Bible, God is after our hearts. That God is not impressed with the things that people are impressed by! This is so counter cultural! We are impressed with actions, God says that doesn’t impress me. You could give 1 million dollars to the church, but if your heart is motivated by personal glory that is offensive to me. What I delight in, is the person who gives 1 NT or any amount, but does it as worship to me!

Transforms our whole life! We don’t have to hide anymore. We can take the masks off, we don’t have to live under the constant pressure to perform for this audience to be applauded by people. We can rest securely in the God who sees our hearts.

“your father in heaven will reward you”. The emphasis of this verse is not on the reward(what is it, what will it be, or what amount!), but on WHO is giving the reward. YOUR FATHER. This passage teaches us that God rewards us not as a judge who gives wages, not as people do with their fleeting applause, but as a generous loving doting Father.

Many years ago I remember my dad saying that he wished he could have given me so much more. That if it was in his power or means to give me more he would have. As a father don’t we all have that desire in us? To bless our kids, to give generously to them? Well if we as earthly fathers have that desire, God the Father has not only that desire but the means and ability infinite times more!

Living for that reward, living for the delight of the Father frees us from the danger of hypocrisy. if you are here and you have never heard the Gospel or have never been a Christian than Jesus today is inviting you into a life that you can not live, but that He alone can live through you. Listen to me. The purpose on the sermon on the mount is not for you to look at this and say okay I’m going to try as hard as I can to lvie this life! No the point is that Jesus shows

there is an exchange. On the cross, our impure motives,