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PRACTICE SECRET DISCIPLINES: YOU ARE NOT NUMBER ONE
[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]“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.” Matthew 6:1[/perfectpullquote]This passage of Scripture touches on 3 spiritual disciplines that Christians should practice: giving, praying, and fasting. The first one, giving, speaks to not giving for public recognition. Giving publicly was a common practice in Jesus’ day where people would sometimes sound a trumpet to call attention to themselves when they were about to give some of their money away. We have other examples in the Bible where Pharisees would make a lot of noise as they dropped their coins as an offering so they could be recognized by their “generosity.” People still do that today. How many plaques on buildings have you seen displaying names of those who gave?
The second spiritual discipline is praying. Again, we see here that there would be those who would publicly pray on street corners so others could hear how “spiritual” they were. This prayer that Jesus uses as an example is commonly known as “The Lord’s Prayer.” When we pray, we should avoid flowery prayers that are full of meaningless words. Instead, our prayers should be full of honoring God, desiring His will, seeking forgiveness, and asking for protecting from sin. So many times our prayers can seem more like a wish list of requests for God to fulfill, and a spiritually mature person will not pray like that.
The third spiritual discipline is the one of fasting. Now, fasting can take many different forms, and depending on your health and diet restrictions, you may not be able to fast like Jesus fasted – for 40 days. But the concept is still the same – setting aside time when you would normally eat and instead use that time to pray and focus on God. This is the spiritual discipline that I hear about the least often, and I’m not sure how many people fast these days. And you know what? That’s fine because I’m not supposed to know.
So, what do all three of these spiritual disciplines have in common? They are all to be done secretly! Jesus uses the term “hypocrite” at the beginning of each section. We, as followers of Christ, should be genuine. If we say that we worship God, then we should not try to recognition for the things we do. Everything we do should be to glorify God and not ourselves. Recently, somebody gave my wife and I some money, and we don’t have any idea who it was. I can only assume that they are spiritually mature because they obviously did not want any recognition for their generosity. How about you? When you give, pray, or fast; do you do it to show others how spiritual you are? Make sure that when you practice these spiritual disciplines, that you evaluate your motives.
Remember, you are not #1; God is! Our focus is to bring people closer to the Lord, not towards us. God is #1!
– Pastor David Guenin
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