The Secret Place (Matthew 6:1-6) Series

THE SECRET PLACE

Morning Lent Prayer, Day 4

INTRODUCTION

There is a place God keeps calling you toward. Not a stage. Not a platform. A room with a closed door, where no audience exists except the Father. Jesus did not say, "If you pray." He said, "When you pray." Prayer is assumed. The question is: who are you praying for?

In Matthew 6:6, Jesus gives one of the most precise and personal instructions in the Gospels. He tells you to go into your room, close the door, and pray to your Father who is unseen. Not your pastor. Not the congregation. Your Father. This is the architecture of authentic faith. Built in secret, rewarded by the One who sees everything.

The word "reward" in this text is not accidental. Jesus uses the word deliberately. The Pharisees had their reward already. They stood on street corners, lifted their voices for the crowd, and received their applause. And nothing more came to them. Nothing. But Jesus tells you there is another kind of reward, one flowing from a Father who does not grade by appearance. In 1 Samuel 16:7, God reminds us plainly: "The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Lent is the season where you stop performing and start praying. In a culture of likes, comments, and public validation, this passage calls you to a spiritual discipline where the only audience worth impressing is God. The secret place is not only a physical location. The secret place is a posture of the heart, where you are fully content with God alone seeing you.

1. MOVING PAST PERFORMANCE

"Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven." Matthew 6:1 (NIV)

"Am I now trying to win the approval of human beings, or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ." Galatians 1:10 (NIV)

Ask yourself a direct question today. If no one ever knew you gave the offering, prayed the prayer, or fasted the day, would you still do the same thing? The question is not comfortable. The question is necessary.

Jesus uses a strong word in Matthew 6. The original Greek behind "hypocrites" is the word for a stage actor wearing a mask. Jesus looked at the religious leaders of His day and called them out plainly: you are actors. You built an entire spiritual life around managing your image. And He warns you today not to fall into the same trap.

Performance-based religion is exhausting. When your spiritual life runs on the approval of others, you never rest. You keep checking who is watching, adjusting your volume based on the audience, editing your testimony for maximum effect. Paul confronted this directly in Galatians 1:10 when he wrote that you are not a servant of Christ if you are still in the business of pleasing people.

Moving past performance does not mean abandoning sincerity. Moving past performance means measuring sincerity by a different standard. Not the approval of the room. The attention of the Father. Proverbs 21:2 says, "A person may think their own ways are right, but the Lord weighs the heart." God is not grading your presentation. He is examining your motive.

This Lenten season, strip the mask off. Give in quiet. Fast without announcing anything. Pray without needing an audience to confirm you were there. When you practice your righteousness before the Father alone, you step out of the theater and into the temple.

2. CLOSING THE DOOR TO DISTRACTIONS

"But when you pray, go into your room, close the door..." Matthew 6:6a (NIV)

"But I have stilled and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child is my soul within me." Psalm 131:2 (NIV)

The instruction to close the door is not passive. Closing the door is an act of aggression. Jesus does not say drift into a quiet moment when the time feels right. He says go into your room and close the door. That is a decision. A deliberate declaration of spiritual warfare.

What is behind the door you are closing? The noise of endless demands. The pull of notifications. The opinions of people who have never been inside the secret place themselves. Closing the door is your announcement to the world: for this moment, you do not have access to me.

Elijah understood this truth. After the fire and the earthquake and the wind, God was not present in any of those things. He was in the still, small voice. 1 Kings 19:12 tells us God spoke in a gentle whisper. You will not hear a whisper in a room full of roaring. Psalm 131:2 paints the portrait of a quieted soul. Like a child resting in its mother's arms, no longer striving, no longer demanding. Present. At peace. That is the condition God is calling you into.