Wayne said precisely in his prayer
what I've been thinking this morning. There's a lot of things
for us to be thinking about, concerned with right now. But oh, that the Lord give us
just a couple hours of worship. Give us a heart of worship. Thank
you, Wayne. All right, I titled the lesson this morning, What
is Your Motivation? Now, the Lord has been teaching
us that righteousness, what righteousness really is, Righteousness does
not come by us keeping the law outwardly. Now God does require
that we keep the law outwardly, but he also requires we keep
the law in our heart. That righteousness is not even
wanting to sin, not even thinking about it. Righteousness has to
do with the heart and with our motives. Now the Lord's going
to teach us the very same thing is true about our religion. True
religion is not outward acts of religion. True religion, true
worship, is in the heart. And God rejects any form of religion,
any act of religion, that is done so that other men will see
us, see how religious we are, and be impressed by us. If that's
our motivation, God will reject it. You see, our attitude and
our motivation in religion is very important because as in
all things, God looks on the heart. He doesn't look on the
outward appearance. And Lord hears this morning,
Lord willing, we'll see this is going to teach us about three
main works of religion and what our attitude needs to be in all
those things. Number one is our attitude towards
others. Number two is our attitude toward God. And number three
is our attitude towards self. So let's look first at our attitude
toward others. Matthew chapter six, verse one.
Take heed that you do not your arms before men to be seen of
them. Otherwise you have no reward of your father, which is in heaven.
Therefore, when thou doest thine arms, do not sound a trumpet
before thee as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the
streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you,
they have their reward. But when thou doest arms, let
not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth. that thine
alms may be in secret, and that thy father, which seeth in secret
himself, shall reward thee openly. Now this giving of alms, when
we think of giving of alms, we normally think of giving money
to the poor. But alms are any act of kindness toward others.
The marginal reading there says righteousnesses. Acts of righteousness
are good works that we do. Now I've told you many times
that this is the definition of good works. This is the definition
of good works our Lord gave. their work's done to help people,
to help the body of Christ. Now, the only way a sinner can
be made righteous is in Christ. That's right, isn't it? The only
way we can be made righteous is by the Lord Jesus Christ obeying
the law for us as our representative. Well, then the only people who
can truly do a good work are people who've been born again,
who've been given a new righteous nature. The only people that
can truly do a good work are people who have God-given faith,
because a good work can only be done in faith and love, two
things only the new man has. Now the word of God teaches God's
children. We are to do good works to help God's people. Good works
are not two four-letter words put together now. They're something
that God's people are commanded to do. So when you do something
to help somebody else, don't let anybody else know what you're
doing. Don't give gifts to somebody only in public. Don't go volunteering
your time for a good cause and then go around telling people
you don't have time to get anything done because all the time you're
spending volunteering and doing this for this person, this for
this person. Nowadays, you don't even have to do it to people
you talk to. People just put it on Facebook so a thousand people
can see it. The Lord says, do that if you want to. But if you
do, you got your reward. You got the reward you're looking
for. Other people are saying, look, what a good Christian.
You got your reward. If you want the glory and the
praise that comes from man, you can easily have it. It's a worthless
reward, but you have it if you want it. But if that's your motivation,
you have no reward from your father, which is in heaven. And
the point of what the Savior is teaching here is what is your
motivation to do good works? If your motivation is that other
people see you and be impressed by you, then like I said, you've
got the reward that you want. You've got the praise of men.
But you don't have the praise that comes from God only. But
if your motivation is purely to help somebody else, that you
want to be gracious and kind to somebody else because it overwhelms
your heart that Almighty God has been gracious and He's been
kind to you. God bless that. God will accept
that. If your motivation is to help
a child of God, simply for God's glory, and you know he's the
one that enabled you to do it, and you're not wanting any recognition
for it, you just want this poor person who's suffering to be
helped, God will bless that attitude. Because God looks on the heart.
And if you're honest, you try to do something for somebody
else, you think, oh, that wasn't very good, that wasn't right,
that could have been better. Well, God's not looking at the
Albert Act. And he's looking at the heart, at the motivation,
and that's what he accepts. Look over at 1 Corinthians chapter
13. Here's such a clear teaching of what the Lord is
saying. 1 Corinthians chapter 13, verse 1. Though I speak with the tongues
of men and of angels, and have not charity, have not love. If
my motivation is not love, I'm become as a sounding brass or
a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of
prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though
I have all faith so that I could remove mountains and have not
charity, my motivation is not love. I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods
to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned and
have not charity, If my motivation and that is not love, it profits
me nothing. Now, if I do all these things
and I haven't done them out of a motive of love for God and
love for his people, I am nothing and I'll receive no profit and
no benefit, no blessing from doing them. All right, now I
got a question. Maybe you're wondering this.
How can I do a good deed for somebody else and nobody know
about it? You know, if Cecil, he does something
for me to help me, somebody's going to know about it. I'm going
to know about it. Jan's going to know about it. Sheila's going
to know about it. Somebody's going to know about it. You can't do
a good work for people and people not know it. So the important
thing is not that it's done completely in secret. I mean, I reckon if
you could give a gift completely anonymously, do it. But the point
is, it's not that other people can't know what you're doing.
The point is, our attitude in doing it. Is my motivation for
the glory of God or my own glory? Now is it, I want, I want God
to, you know, to get the glory for this. He's the one enabling
me to do this, but you know, I kind of like a little recognition,
a little pat on the back, you know, for it. You know, can I do this? And now this is for God's glory,
but you know, I'd like for you to know nobody else did this
for you, did you? Just I did. God's not going to bless that
attitude. He's not going to bless it. That's what the Lord means
when he says, don't let your left hand know what your right
hand is doing. I mean, you got to try to, you
know, do something with your left hand and keep your right hand.
That's not what he means at all. This is what he means. He doesn't
even mean keep your good works a secret to yourself. That's
not possible. This is what he means. Don't
do a good work for somebody else to please yourself. Don't do
a good work for somebody else so that you feel good about yourself.
That's the wrong attitude and God won't bless it. But if our
motivation is truly for God's glory and it's truly for the
good of his people to help them. Our Lord says, your father receiveth
in secret shall reward you openly. Just a few minutes at the end
of the lesson, we're talking about this reward. So this is
our attitude toward others. It's attitude. That's what's
important. All right. Number two is our attitude toward
God. Verse five, Matthew chapter six. And when thou prayest, thou
shalt not be as the hypocrites are, for they love to pray standing
in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets that they
may be seen of men. That's their goal. Verily I say
unto you, they have their reward. But thou, when thou prayest,
enter into thy closet, and when thou shut thy door, pray to thy
father, which is in secret, and thy father, which seeth in secret,
shall reward thee openly. I plan to do a whole lesson on
prayer from these verses in a week or so. But right now, this is
the topic here is our attitude, our attitude in these acts of
religion. What is our attitude in prayer? That's very important
because our attitude in prayer is a very clear indication of
our attitude toward God, to whom we pray. Now, the Lord here talks
about public prayer. And please understand, the Lord
is not condemning public prayer in any way, not at all. We pray
publicly in our worship service. We began this service, Wayne
leading us in public prayer. Now, if you're out somewhere
in public at a restaurant or someplace and you want to pray,
do it, do it. The Lord's not condemning that
at all. This is what he's condemning. praying in public so other people
look and say, wow, look at them. They're so religious. All those
are good Christian people. That's the attitude of the Pharisees
and that attitude is what the Lord's condemning. Now remember,
the Lord's teaching us here the proper motivation, the proper
attitude of true religion. So the master tells us this is
true prayer, to pray in secret, to pray in your closet. I remember
being a little boy. I wish all our children could
hear this. I remember being a little fella.
And I had a desire to pray. I don't remember what it was
about. It may be that the Reds beat the Dodgers that night.
I don't know. But I had a desire to pray, you know. And I would
go in my closet. I would. I'd go in my closet.
I'd move stuff out of the way, you know, on the floor, the footballs
and the baseball gloves and the shoes. I'd sit there in my closet. I'd close the door. I would.
And I'd pray, thinking. Well, God's more likely to answer
my prayer from in here. And I'm very glad to tell you,
that's not what the Lord's teaching. I've gotten so stiff, I couldn't
sit in that closet today. I don't even fit in there, you
know. There's gotta be a walk-in closet, I can bring a chair in,
you know. That's not what the Lord's teaching at all. When
the Lord says, pray in your closet, he means in secret, from the
heart, from the heart. And brother Henry said so often
about them, that was a big issue. You know, I was, when I was a
boy about taking prayer out of school, you're not allowed to
pray in school anymore. He'd tell us they never did take prayer
out of school because prayer from the heart, you can say,
thank you, Lord. Anytime you want a child in school,
say, Lord, help me remember what I studied for this. You know,
Lord, help me, Lord, give me the right attitude, deal with
all these hooligans. You can pray from your heart anytime
you want, but it's from the heart. God looketh on the heart, God
heareth the heart, the cry of the heart God hears. Now if we
pray and we want other people to see us praying, so they'll
praise us, so they'll think highly of us, then we got the reward
that we wanted. It's not a very good reward,
it's worthless, but you have it if you want it. But we won't
have any reward from our Father, which is in heaven, who hears
our prayers in secret, because he's not going to listen to that
kind of prayer. Praying so that others can see us is exactly
what the Pharisee was doing in the temple. And what did the
Lord say? He prayed thus with himself. With himself? He didn't pray to please himself.
And what did God say about that? God didn't hear that prayer,
did he? Well, why would he? The Pharisee went praying to
God. So why would God hear it? But if we pray from the heart,
simple, plain words, God, be merciful to me this evening.
God, I hear that prayer every time. Peter didn't have a very
complicated prayer. Lord, save me. And immediately
the Lord stretched forth his hand and caught him. God will
always hear that prayer. Well, all right, what about public
prayer? Because public prayer is something that we do. And
if you have never done it, let me tell you, it's the hardest
thing you'll ever do, public prayer. So how can we pray publicly
in secret. How can we pray publicly so that
God will hear us and we can lead the congregation before God in
prayer? That God might bless us in our public worship so that
we could worship, send his spirit upon us, enable us to worship.
How can I secretly pray in public? Well, it all has to do with our
motivation and with our attitude. Look at verse seven. But when
you pray, Use not vain repetitions as the heathen do, for they think
that they should be heard for their much speaking. Be not ye
therefore like unto them, for your father knoweth what things
ye have need of before ye ask him." Now, we pray publicly. We need to pray. Pray. I'm not talking about giving
a sermon and preaching so everybody knows, you know, how much we
know, and they're impressed with how much we know. We need to
pray to our Father. And our Lord says, don't use
vain repetitions. Now He doesn't mean don't repeat
things in prayer. I mean that every single prayer
we ever pray must include Thanksgiving. I mean, how can we, you say,
thank you, Lord, over and over and over again, every prayer.
Thank you, Lord, for forgiving my sin. Thank you, Lord, for
hearing me. Thank you, Lord, for giving me
the things that I need. Everything I got you, you've given me, thank
you. Every prayer ought to include
praise. Oh, praise your name. I mean,
how? I don't even know that I know
what that means. The vastness. Lord, praise your name. Oh. And our Lord taught us to ask
what we need. Give us this day our daily bread. You know, you're
going to say those things in every prayer, and the Lord's
not saying don't do that. This is what he's saying. Don't
say things over and over and over again to make your prayer
longer so that you see more religious to people listening to you pray.
The thing to do is block out the people. If you would pray
in secret publicly, block out the thought of the people that
are in front of you and pray to the Lord. Brother Henry said,
I love the, I wish I could say things like he said, much speaking
is not much praying. Isn't that good? Much speaking
is not much praying. Public prayer should tend to
be shorter than our private prayer. The longest prayer in scripture
take you between two and three minutes to read, probably not
that long. But the length of the prayer is not the issue.
No. Pray about what the Lord has
laid upon your heart and do it in your language, in your words,
and say, Amen. The Lord knows what you have
needed before you ask. And if we think that Almighty
God is impressed with our much speaking and all the doctrine
that we can include in our prayers and all the emotion we can include
in our prayers, so much we love everybody, If we think Almighty
God is impressed by that, that shows you what we think of God,
not much. See that? That's our attitude
toward God. It's seen in our prayers. And
thirdly, this is our attitude towards self. Look down at verse
16. Moreover, when you fast, be not as the hypocrites of a
sad countenance, for they disfigure their faces that they may appear
unto men to fast. Verily, I say unto you, they
have their reward. But thou, when thou fastest,
anoint thy head and wash thy face, that thou may appear not
unto men to fast, but unto thy father, which is in secret. And
thy father, which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly. Now,
The Lord's not telling us that we should fast like the old Jews
did, you know, the deprive our bodies of food. You know, the
Jews fasted two days a week. That's what that Pharisee was
saying. I fast twice in the week. You know, whatever days they
were appointed, they're supposed to fast in those days. Fasting,
what the Lord's talking about here is not depriving our bodies
of food. Fasting has to do with our attitude
towards self. It's denying the flesh something. because the spiritual man is
more important. So first and foremost, denying
self means denying any righteousness, any works that we've done, that
we can produce, that would add to our salvation. We must deny
the flesh that. The flesh wants it all the time,
and the flesh must be denied that. Denying self means that
I deny that any goodness at all has come from me, and Christ
is all of my righteousness. Christ is all of my goodness.
Now, I would imagine that comes, I know it comes naturally to
the new man, to every believer, to deny self. But here's a trap
we can fall into. The wrong attitude about denying
self is to deny self. And then constantly point out
to everybody how much I deny myself. Oh, I'm not trusting,
you know, in myself. That's just that's just. Oh,
I didn't do any good work. So I didn't. No, I didn't do
anything good there. That's just false humility. Yes,
you did. Just, you know, Lord, enable me to do it and go, you
know, that's the right attitude. But the wrong attitude is tell
everybody about it. You know, oh, look how little
I'm trusting in myself. And when we say that, you know,
the kind of meaning of it is look at me. Like I'm giving up
something of value to trust Christ. No, I'm not. What did Paul call
those things? Manure. I'm not giving up much
if I give up manure for the gold and the silver and the precious
stones of the Lord Jesus Christ. Spiritually speaking, I'm not
giving anything up. And God's just not going to bless
that attitude. any more than he accepted the Pharisees. When
on those days that they would fast, they'd get up and they
not comb their hair. They would wash their face. They
probably get, you know, they use candles or, you know, something,
get a little soot, you know, from put on their face, you know,
so people would, Oh, look how he's really suffering. He's fasting. He's really suffering, but he
won't eat because he's so religious. Or it says, that's your motivation. You got your reward. You got
the reward you're looking for. Secondly, denying self means
this is denying the pleasures of the flesh or the comforts
of the flesh, because I know I need to feed on Christ more
than I need to stay in bed and rest on Sunday morning. I know
you all work hard. You are hard working people. And the flesh just say you can't
sleep on Saturdays. I understand. And the flesh just
Sunday morning. Wasn't there a song about that?
Easy Sunday morning or something. I'll just rest. I can't wait
for Sunday morning. Just sleep in, rest. And that
appeal started for the last time. But the new man says, I need
to feed on Christ. I need to hear the gospel. Oh, I need Christ. denying the
flesh is saying, you know, there's some things I like to buy for
myself, but I'm going to deny my flesh that these extra things,
you know, because I need to feed on Christ. Then I need to support
the ministry in my hometown so I can have a place to come hear
the gospel priest. That's what the Lord was talking
about. Remember, they went to get him meat. He stayed there
and talked to that woman and they came back and he went hungry. And they said, I gave him something
to eat. When did he eat? And he told them, I've got meat
to eat. You know nothing about it. Now
he had to eat again. You know that. But for that time,
that spiritual meat, the spiritual need was more important. That
thing that sustains my soul for that time was more important
than the need of my flesh, what my flesh desired. And if we would
deny ourselves, We get up on Sunday morning, we come in and
tell everybody, oh, I'm so tired. I've worked so hard all week.
I just, you know, look. Oh, I've come to the worship
center. I'm such a good Christian. It's
insane to fall young. If I deny myself buying something,
you know, that I would like, so I'd be able to give more in
the offering. But then I go tell everybody
about it, you know. Well, I got my reward. I did.
What was I wanting when I said all those things to people? I
wanted them to think what a good Christian he is. Well, I got
my reward, the praise of men. It's not a very good reward.
It's useless. It's no value to it whatsoever.
But you got it. But you don't have any reward
from your father, which is in heaven. But if we deny self for
the sake of the gospel, not the praise of men, but for the sake
of the gospel, Almighty God, will reward that openly. Now,
I have to tell you, that got my interest. Well, what are these
rewards? Well, they're not the rewards
that false religion uses to try to motivate people. You know,
they're all the time saying, you do this, and you do this,
and you do this, and you're going to get a bigger crown and glory.
You can get more jewels in your crown and glory. You can get
a bigger mansion in glory. You know, God's going to give
you the best house, you know. If you're motivated by that,
that shows the wrong attitude toward others, toward God, and
about yourself. If I'm motivated so that I can
get a bigger mansion in glory than Dan Morgan, and if I'm motivated
so I can get a bigger crown in glory than Dan Morgan, then I
don't love Dan at all, do I? That just shows a wrong attitude.
God help us to be delivered from that. If I'm motivated by things
that I can do to get more recognition from God, I don't have a very
high opinion of God. You know, thinking I can do things
that's going to impress God so he'd give me a bigger crown.
Well, that means that I think that God can make me more righteous
and that God can make me more accepted than in Christ alone. That shows I don't know God at
all. I think so little of him. If I think that I can do something
to make God bless me in a bigger way than somebody else, then
I've got the wrong attitude about myself. I think way too highly
of myself than I ought to think, and I don't realize that I'm
dead in sin and helpless to do anything for God. My great need
is that God do something for me. God don't need me to do something
for Him. I sure need Him to do something
for me. So that's not the reward the Savior's talking about, is
it? It's not saying he's going to reward you openly in the day
of judgment and say, look what a good Christian this one was.
You know, this one wasn't very good, but I'll still let him
in, but not look at this one. If you're motivated by that, it's
the wrong attitude. And that's not the reward the Savior's talking
about. The reward that our master is talking about is the reward
of grace. There's a valuable reward. And
every believer has it. Every believer. Every believer
has the exact same, great, exceeding great reward. It's the Lord Jesus
Christ. It's his righteousness. It's
to be made like him. It's to be with him. Now there
can't be a better reward than that. It's the reward that Christ
earned for his people. It's Christ himself and God's
already given it to every believer. Now, I tell you what my attitude
is. I say with Isaiah, Lord, here am I, send me. After everything
he's given me, Lord, what can I do? Would you use me in your
service? Because I can't, I don't even
know how to say thank you for this great blessing, this reward
of grace that you've given me. The reward for having the right
attitude about others. You know what that reward is?
It's having the love of God shed abroad in my heart that enables
me to love others and have the right attitude for them. God
already has given me the reward. It's his love in my heart. The
reward of grace is that almighty God would hear the prayer of
a wretch like me. That's a blessing. That's a blessing
to be able to call God our father. That's a blessing. The reward
for having the right motivation and prayer is God's already forgiven
my sin and he's already forgiven me the ability to forgive others. That's a blessing. The reward
for having the right attitude about myself, the reward for
knowing that I'm nothing. I am worthless. I'm unable to
do anything to please God. You know what the reward for
knowing that is? You'll seek Christ and you'll find him. Girl, what more can I want? I mean, really, what more could
I want? To seek Christ and to be found
in him. You seek Christ, you'll find
him. and you'll be found in him, not having your own righteousness,
which is of the law, but that which is through faith, the righteousness
of Christ, which is ours by faith. You can't find a greater blessing
anywhere than being saved by the Lord Jesus Christ and to
be found in him. You know what it means to be
found in Christ? That when the father looks at me, you know
who he sees? He sees Christ. He doesn't see Christ, the perfect
holy, immaculate son of God. And then me down here in him
that just, you know, this kind of little spot, you know, this
doesn't really belong. That's not what he sees. When the father
looks at me in Christ, all he sees is perfection. All he sees
is holiness. All he sees is that one in whom
all of his love resides. He loves me that way. He accepts
me that way because I'm in Christ. There's no greater reward than
the reward of grace being found in Christ. And here's the thing. Where did all that originate?
Where'd all that come from? It originated in God's grace,
didn't it? It's God's grace that gave us
the right attitude. We don't have it perfectly ever. Seems like we seldom have it,
you know, very much. But if from time to time we find
ourselves having the right attitude about ourself and our right attitude
about God and the right attitude about others, well, God's grace
gave it to me. He's the one who enabled us to
do those alms, to do a good work, to help somebody else. He's the
one that gave us the right attitude in prayer so that he heard our
prayer. He's the one that gave us the
right attitude about ourselves so that we seek Christ. God's
the one that gave us all, he gave us the reward, didn't he?
And then he blessed us for having it. It's all of ye. It's all of grace. And that's
the right attitude in our religion. All right. I hope the Lord blessed
that too.