When Faith Isn't For Show: Hidden Righteousness

the challenge is to check your motives before you act. Before you say something, check your motives. Before you do something, check your motives. Before you post something on Facebook, check your motives. Pause and ask yourself, who am I doing this for god or for people? Am I trying to get the approval of man or the approval from god? And if the answer is people, then guess what? You received your reward. So, this week, do something unseen, pray something real, and check your motives because in the upside down kingdom, what matters most isn't what people see, it's what god sees. [01:12:29] (41 seconds)  #CheckYourMotives

But here's what Jesus is doing. He's inviting you into this relationship with your father. Not a distant god, not somebody waiting to judge you but a father who sees you, a father who knows you, and a father who still wants you. And he doesn't want you to come here to try harder or to to to be better or to fix yourself. Jesus didn't come to start this religion. He came to forgive your sins, restore your relationship with god, and to give you a new life. [01:16:30] (32 seconds)  #RelationshipOverReligion

Basically, what he's saying is they're just a bunch of actors. They're just a bunch of phonies. They're just acting this out. So, you can pray and still be pretending. Here's what they were doing. They were public prayers. They had this impressive language. They were drawing this attention. They were saying, look at our eloquent words and look how holy we are how religious we are and god is going to listen to us because we have all of the right things to say. But they weren't talking to god. [00:58:39] (37 seconds)  #NoReligiousTheater

Do everything that we do for do everything that we do as Christians for god. Do it all for the glory of Jesus and we have to get ourselves out of the way. It's not about us. Your father who sees, your father who sees, that's the point, what matters most is that god sees. Not who notices, not who applauds, not who's impressed, but god sees. We want god to see the things that we do, not other people. [01:08:04] (36 seconds)  #DoItForGod

And last week, I said if if if life looks like everyone else, then something's off. If our lives look like the rest of the world, as Christians and something's off and then Jesus goes deeper. He starts talking about murder. He starts talking about these issues of murder and most of us in the room, we don't really have a murder problem, do we? I hope not. But what Jesus is saying, it says, more than just murder, it's anger. It's in your heart. The anger in your heart is causing you to murder people in your mind. [00:50:24] (33 seconds)  #HeartOverBehavior

This isn't for the proud. This is for the humble. This isn't for the ones that's got life all put together and you think that, you know, life is just perfect for you. This is for the broken and so the kingdom doesn't start with behavior. It starts with our heart. Jesus keeps wrapping around the heart issues and then he says things like this, as followers of Christ, as believers of Christ, you are the salt of the world, you are the light of the world and what he's telling us here is that we don't we're not supposed to blend in with the world. [00:49:44] (33 seconds)  #BeSaltBeLight

Go out and do one spiritual act that no one knows about. Maybe it's the giving, serving, help somebody but don't tell anybody about it. Now, here's the kicker to that though. If you're doing it because I told you to do it and you're like, you know what? I'm gonna kick rocks all the way doing this, then you're doing it for the wrong reason. Why? Because this is going to reveal your motive. If you feel the need to tell someone, fight that. Fight that feeling. Give it to the lord [01:10:31] (46 seconds)  #DoGoodInSecret

And maybe when you hear all of the talk about prayer given in faith, it sounds like religion rules and people trying to just be good enough. But here's what Jesus is actually saying in this passage. God isn't looking for performance. No, not perfect words, not perfect behavior, not a polished polished life. God isn't asking you to clean yourself up this morning. I hear all the time. I can't be a Christian because I can't be perfect. I can't live up to all of the expectations that god has for me. Well, guess what? No one in this room can. [01:15:52] (38 seconds)  #GraceNotPerformance