A Messiah Who Gives
Text: Matthew 6:1-4
Introduction
1. Illustration: A mother wanted to teach her daughter a moral lesson. She gave the little girl a quarter and a dollar for church "Put whichever one you want in the collection plate and keep the other for yourself," she told the girl. When they were coming out of church, the mother asked her daughter which amount she had given. "Well," said the little girl, "I was going to give the dollar, but just before the collection the man in the pulpit said that we should all be cheerful givers. I knew I’d be a lot more cheerful if I gave the quarter, so I did."
2. People often get turned off by church because they say all we ever really talk about is money, and all we’re really concerned about is getting in their pocket.
3. Well there is a reason for that because the Bible talks a lot about money. “In fact, 15 percent of everything Christ said relates to this topic (money and possessions) – more than His teachings on heaven and hell combined. Why did Jesus put such an emphasis on money and possessions? Because there’s a fundamental connection between our spiritual lives and how we think about and handle money. We may try to divorce our faith and our finances, but God sees them as inseparable.” (Randy Alcorn in The Treasure Principle, 2001, p.8).
4. Here in Matthew 6, of the 34 vv., 19 of them talk about possessions, finances, and giving. In these first 4 vv., Jesus tells us about:
a. The caution of giving
b. The danger of giving
c. The reward of giving
5. Read Matt. 6:1-4
Proposition: Jesus tells us that the secret in giving is the motivation of our heart.
Transition: First, he talks about...
I. The Caution In Giving (1)
A. Watch Out!
1. You might be asking yourself, "How can there be a caution in giving? As long as we give isn’t that enough? I mean it’s the bottom line that counts, right?
2. Not according to Jesus. You see, "this verse connects righteousness with the disciples intentions" (Turner, Cornerstone Biblical Commentary: Matthew, 99).
a. Giving is not just a physical act; it is actually more spiritual that it is physical.
b. If we think that God needs our money we are sadly mistaken.
c. You see, he doesn’t need our money, but we need his blessings!
d. 1 Corinthians 8:6 (NIV)
yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.
3. Jesus tells us to “Watch out! Don’t do your good deeds publicly, to be admired by others, for you will lose the reward from your Father in heaven."
a. The phrase translated "watch out," means to hold, or take hold of, something and pay attention to it, especially in the sense of being on guard (MacArthur New Testament Commentary – Matthew 1-7).
b. He is telling us that we need to be careful about our motivation when we give. You see, the reason we give is because we need God’s blessings, and if we are not careful we can lose God’s blessings even when we give.
c. Jesus warns his disciples that obedience in the public arena does not guarantee a reward from God, because motive is more important than simple activity (Wilkins, NIV Application Commentary, New Testament: Matthew, 271).
d. The reason we give is more important than the giving itself.
e. The NLT’s "good deeds" is lit. "righteousness," which refers to practical or functional godliness - that is, obedience to God’s laws (Tuner, 98).
f. Again, it is more spiritual than it is physical.
4. Some people give because they love God, and some people give because they like it when people think they’re a wonderful person.
a. The phrase "to be admired by others" is related to the term from which we get theater.
b. It has in mind a spectacle to be gazed at. In other words, Jesus is warning about practicing a form of righteousness whose purpose is to show off before people.
c. This king of spirituality is like a play; it is not real life but acting.
d. It does not demonstrate what is in the minds and hearts of the actors, but is simply a performance designed to make a certain impression on those who are watching (The - MacArthur New Testament Commentary – Matthew 1-7).
5. If our hearts are not right in giving, we can actually loose the benefit of giving - God’s blessing.
a. This verse is the flipside to Matt. 5:16. There we are to do good deeds only for the Father’s glory, here we are not to do them for our own glory (Turner, 98).
b. Are we doing it because we love God, or because we like when others tell us how wonderful we are?
c. That is the caution of giving.
B. Motivation
1. Illustration: Augustine said, "The love of honor is the deadly bane of true piety. Other vices bring forth evil works but this brings forth good works in an evil way."
2. Giving can be spiritual or it can be unspiritual.
a. If we are doing it to please God, it brings a great reward that is eternal in nature.
b. However, if we are doing because we love the praise of others it will bring us a temporary reward.
3. Giving can be productive or it can be counter-productive.
a. Done with the right motive, giving can bring us closer to God, make us better people, and be a link to his blessings.
b. Done with ulterior motives, it can produce pride, self-centeredness, and deceit.
4. Luke 11:35 (NLT)
Make sure that the light you think you have is not actually darkness.
a. How terrible it would be to have others think that you were a godly, spiritual person, but in actuality, you had fallen into the trap seeking personal gain.
b. How terrible it would be to have others think you are a wonderful, giving person, and on the day of Judgment have God say "away from me, I never knew you."
Transition: The caution that Jesus gives about giving is to keep us away from...
II. The Danger In Giving (2)
A. Don’t Do As the Hypocrites Do
1. Developing a system to help those in financial need is nothing new.
a. By the first century, there was a well-organized system of relief for the poor based in the synagogues, providing something of what our modern state-sponsored welfare systems aim to offer.
b. The funding of the system depended on contributions from members of the community, some of them laid down under the regulations for the ’tithe to the poor,’ but also involving a great deal of private initiative (France, NICNT: Matthew, 235).
c. In other words, some of the giving was based on religious duty and some of it was over and above their duty.
d. However, some would do it for their own gain.
2. Jesus says, "When you give to someone in need, don’t do as the hypocrites do—blowing trumpets in the synagogues and streets to call attention to their acts of charity!"
a. The word "hypocrites," originally referred to an actor, in other words, someone who pretended to be someone else.
b. Later it came to describe anyone who deceived himself or others, and at times both (Horton, Complete Biblical Library: Matthew, 103).
c. The danger is that in trying to fool others into thinking that your giving is a spiritual act, when it is actually far from it, you can eventually begin to believe it yourself.
d. "These religious show-offs are "actors" in that they aim to impress others, but at the same time their behavior demonstrates how far they are out of touch with God’s understanding of ’righteousness’" (France, 237).
3. Jesus talks about these people "blowing trumpets in the synagogue and streets."
a. This is similar to the phrase "blowing your own horn."
b. Their hypocrisy is doing right things for the wrong reasons.
c. They perform external religious acts of charity in order be "honored" by people and the religious establishment (Wilkins, 272).
4. However, look at what Jesus says about their reward, "I tell you the truth, they have received all the reward they will ever get."
a. The word translated "received" conveys both a sense of receit in full, and the threat of nothing still to come (France, 237).
b. These hypocrites received exactly what they wanted - praise from people. They will not, however, receive anything from God.
c. It is clear that the desire for rewards becomes wrong when one forgets that true blessings and ultimate rewards come from God alone (Horton, 105).
d. James 1:17 (NLT)
Whatever is good and perfect comes down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow.
B. Being Genuine
1. Illustration: He made free use of Christian vocabulary. He talked about the blessing of the Almighty and the Christian confessions which would become the pillars of the new government. He assumed the earnestness of a man weighed down by historic responsibility. He handed out pious stories to the press, especially to the church papers. He showed his tattered Bible and declared that he drew the strength for his great work from it as scores of pious people welcomed him as a man sent from God. Indeed, Adolf Hitler was a master of outward religiosity--with no inward reality!
2. Proverbs 19:17 (NLT)
If you help the poor, you are lending to the Lord— and he will repay you!
3. If you are seeking the praise of men, that is all you will get.
a. You won’t get rewards that will last.
b. You won’t get rewards that matter.
c. You won’t get rewards.
d. You will get a reward that is temporary, fleeting, pointless.
4. If you are seeking the praise of God, you will receive His blessings.
a. They will be blessings that money cannot buy.
b. They will be blessings that will never run out.
c. They will be blessings that will not spoil.
d. They will be blessings with eternal benefits.
Transition: However, if you motivation is to please, you will understand...
III. The Reward In Giving (3-4)
A. Your Father...Will Reward You
1. Rather than tooting your own horn, Jesus says, "But when you give to someone in need, don’t let your left hand know what your right hand is doing."
a. In the phrase, "don’t let you left hand know what your right hand is doing," the emphasis is on secrecy (Turner, 99).
b. The right hand was considered the primary hand of action, and in a normal day’s work the right hand would do many things as a matter of course that would not involve the left hand.
c. Giving to help those in need should be a normal activity of the Christian, and he should do it as simply, directly, and discreetly as possible (The - MacArthur New Testament Commentary – Matthew 1-7).
2. Instead, Jesus says, "Give your gifts in private, and your Father, who sees everything, will reward you."
a. Instead of giving in a flashy public manner, disciples are to give secretly so that the Father, who is aware of secret actions, will reward them (Turner, 99).
b. A true disciple does not give so that others will notice him, but simply so that they will notice and glorify God.
c. Matthew 5:16 (NLT)
In the same way, let your good deeds shine out for all to see, so that everyone will praise your heavenly Father.
d. This goes against the grain of our culture which says, "If you have it, flaunt it!," and this attitude has crept into the church just as it did the synagogues in Jesus day (Turner, 102).
e. The principle is this: if we remember, God will forget; but if we forget, God will remember.
f. Our purpose should be to meet every need we are able to meet and leave the bookkeeping to God, realizing that "we have done only that which we ought to have done"
3. Giving in this way assures two things.
a. First, they will praise the only one worthy of praise - God.
b. Second, we will be rewarded by God.
c. Now, I don’t know about you, but I would rather be rewarded by God than to be praised by men.
4. Does this mean that if we do something simply out of obedience to God that we cannot testify about it?
a. Not as long as your intent is to glorify what God did and not what you did.
b. Whenever we testify, we want to do so in a way that God’s actions are lifted up.
c. We want people to see what God has done, not what we have done.
d. "Look what the Lord has done!"
B. Honored By God
1. Illustration: Charles Spurgeon and his wife, according to a story in the Chaplain magazine, would sell, but refused to give away, the eggs their chickens laid. Even close relatives were told, "You may have them if you pay for them." As a result, some people labeled the Spurgeons greedy and grasping. They accepted the criticisms without defending themselves, and only after Mrs. Spurgeon died was the full story revealed. All the profits from the sale of eggs went to support two elderly widows. Because the Spurgeon’s where unwilling to let their left hand know what the right hand was doing, they endured the attacks in silence.
2. Hebrews 4:13 (NLT)
Nothing in all creation is hidden from God. Everything is naked and exposed before his eyes, and he is the one to whom we are accountable.
3. The reward we want comes from God.
a. It is a reward that is eternal.
b. It is a reward that is enduring.
c. It is a reward that is enormous.
4. The praise we want comes from God.
a. The praise of people is like the wind; here today and gone tomorrow.
b. The praise of people and $1.50 will get you a cup of coffee at Denny’s.
c. The praise of God won’t run out, wear out, or fall out.
d. The praise of God won’t change like the weather; it is constant.
e. Hebrews 13:8 (NLT)
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
Conclusion
1. What motivates your giving?
a. Is it the praise of people?
b. Is it the praise of God?
2. Why do you give?
a. So that people will notice you?
b. So that people will notice God?
3. It doesn’t matter if the neighborhood knows, as long as God knows.
