Sermon: "Religion is for an Audience of One"

Fifth in the "The Authentic Life" series.
Delivered November 6, 2005 by Rev. John Schmidt.
Other sermons in this series - 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7

Theme: Love is more than words. Our witness to the world has to be more than words. The actions in our lives that have most impact in witness are our righteousness and integrity in all our dealings, more than expressly 'religious' activity. That's not saying we have to hide our religion. Far from it; but let's never think that 'religion' is the leading edge of what convinces the world that Jesus is real.

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Sermon Notes are at the end.

There is this recognition that love is more than words. It doesn't matter whether we take it from the 80's. Some you really you know that's when you were listening most to the radio, but you could take it from the 60's, the 70's, the 50's. There is a recognition that in human relationships that we need more than words. And, in fact, there are some things that we already know if you just act right. And that's true in our relationship with God too. We are not going to be focusing so much on that, as on the issue of what are the actions that are supposed to support our words of witness? We are called to be a light to the world. That's what we celebrate with this evangelism candle. We celebrate the light that comes in to someone's life when they make a commitment to Jesus Christ. And so we light this every time that through the witness of this congregation in some fashion a person has made a commitment to Jesus Christ. And so I am lighting it today, because three people have in the last week turned their lives over the Jesus Christ. Amen. Two of them were middle-schooler's and one is involved in this church, and one was a friend. They made a commitment at the break away 2005 conference. Then a college student at a Inner Varsity conference also made a decision to commit their lives to Christ. So this light is to commemorate that light that's in their lives, but it's also a light that shows us that we are a part of God's light in the world.

And I like the fact that it's just a little candle, because we are just a small part of the light of God, of the witness of Christ to this world. And there are other churches and other Christians and other places that are a part of that witness, and we just contribute the little bit of light that God has given to us to that witness. And that witness is first and foremost this incredible message we have to proclaim about Jesus Christ. But in addition to that, our witness is our actions and we are going to be seeing that in the Sermon on the Mount. But the question is, when we sing with the children, "This little light of mine, I'm going to let it shine" what is that light? There is no better place to look or to get an idea of what our light is and what our actions are supposed to be than Jesus on teaching. We've been looking in to the Sermon on the Mount for a period of weeks, taking a look at what he's saying about what a life that is right before God really looks like; what a truly authentic human life looks like. What a life that reflects the kind of longings that are expressed even in secular music, the kind of person that lives to fulfill the longings that people have. We can look to Jesus for a description of that and a description of what our actions are in our witness. But anybody who looks at the Sermon on the Mount and looks at the words of Jesus to get an idea about what our light is all about is going to have a snag as they study the sermon, because Jesus says two opposite things.

I want you to first look at Chapter 5, Verse 16, before we go to today's passage. Chapter 5, Verse 16. It says this:

"In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven."

Let your light shine so that people may see and then praise God. Got that clear in your mind? Let's now go to Chapter 6, Verse 1.

"Be careful not to do your 'acts of righteousness' before men, to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven."

Do you see the tension involved in that? In some other English translation the tension is even greater. In the New Century Version it comes up this way:

"Live so they will see the good things you do and will praise your Father in heaven" and then in Chapter 6 it says: "When you do good things, don't do them in front of people to be seen by them."

So Jesus is saying what you do shines out to the world, everybody is going to see it and praise God and then he's telling you, don't do things in front of people or to be seen by them. Now is Jesus inconsistent? Well, I think for me, we can safely say no he is not. You know, this is in the same sermon. Even I can be consistent in one sermon. Certainly Jesus is not going to have a problem. So whatever he is saying in Chapter 5 is totally consistent with what he is saying in Chapter 6, just a few words later. Matthew put it in to one collection in the gospel of Matthew. Matthew had no problem with what Jesus was saying.

So it's not that Jesus isn't consistent. Let's take a look at the issue of motives. Is what Jesus is getting at is sure our light is going to shine in front of people, but let's make sure that in our motives we are not doing things to impress people, but we are doing them out of a right motive to relate to God. There is certainly truth in that. Our motives are important and so whenever we are dealing with what we do in front of people, we've got to examine our motives and motive is an important part of what Jesus is driving at in this part of the Sermon on the Mount. But I think that it's even more than that. I think there is something that Jesus is saying about the kind of actions that are the forefront of our witness to other people. Let's take a look now at Chapter 6, and read Verses 1 to 18.

"Be careful not to do your 'acts of righteousness' before men, to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven. So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. This, then, is how you should pray: 'Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins. When you fast, do not look somber as the hypocrites do, for they disfigure their faces to show men they are fasting. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it will not be obvious to men that you are fasting, but only to your Father, who is unseen; and your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you."

Let's pray. God we pray that you take your word and help us to understand and to believe, to obey, for we ask it in Jesus Christ, Amen.

In this section Jesus talks about three areas of religious life, areas of religious life that the Pharisees called Acts of Righteousness. This had to do with expressing their relationship with God. These were things that they thought were important in showing that they were truly earnest in their faith. And so Jesus addresses each one of these areas giving prayer and fasting and in ease case, Verse 2, Verse 5 and Verse 16, in each case, Jesus specifically tells us not to do these things in order to be seen by other people. So there are these things about the expression of piety that Jesus is saying - this is dangerous if your motive is to be seen by other people. He begins this section with a summary statement. Chapter 6, Verse 1 where he says, "Be careful not to do your 'acts of righteousness' before men to be seen by them." And then, the next verse says, "So when you give to the needy..." So there is this connection, Verse 1 is a summary statement that then deals with these three areas where Jesus explicitly says, don't do this in order to be seen by people. Do it in a way that's unseen, and God who sees what was unseen will reward you. They are all religious things; prayer, fasting and giving through the religious organization.

Now in Chapter 5, Verses 14 to 16 where Jesus talks to us about being the light of the world, that begins a very different section. He says here in Chapter 5, that you are the light of the world. You don't hide a light. You put it on a lamp stand and in the same way, let your light shine and what Jesus begins by saying there is a section that has to do with the things that we have been looking at for the last few weeks; things that have to do with our righteousness, our integrity, our behavior with other people. So in Chapter 5 he talks about the things that people will see and then praise God. What are they? That we control our anger. People will see that we control our anger. People will see that we reconcile our relationships. People will see that there is no adultery, that we control our lust, that there is no divorce, that we keep our word that we don't take vengeance, that we love our enemies. Now naturally, we don't do any of these things perfectly, but what Jesus is saying is that a community that lives like this and does this is a light in a world.

And then he says, that there are things that are not to be seen, that are not the forefront of how we try to impress people with what it means to be God's people. We give. We pray. We fast. These are the things that are not to be seen. This is a strong challenge to the way we think about the world sometimes. I believe that the structure of the Sermon of the Mount shows us that Jesus isn't being consistent and he's going beyond just motives; he's talking about different parts of our lives. So what people may see is our righteousness. What's not to be the forefront of what we are showing people to impress them is our religion, our piety.

So God's made us to be a light for the world and God expects part of that is that we share this incredible message about Jesus Christ. The words we speak are always part of our witness, but they are supposed to also be a compelling demonstration of his power in our lives; a demonstration of power that people will see and understand. But what leads those who don't yet know Christ, to begin to praise God in heaven, is not our religiousness, but our righteousness.

There was a woman who went to a church that I was a part of in Baton Rouge and she used to be a waitress in a fine restaurant there. One day a customer came in and it was the wife of a prominent pastor in the Baton Rouge area and she came with a number of her friends. They had their Christian jewelry on, quite noticeably, and although I can't swear to it, I am sure that at the beginning of their time there in the restaurant they prayed and gave thanks over their food. But the fact is that this group of people were really difficult customers. "Oh, this is not hot enough. Please take it back." "This isn't seasoned the way I expected it to. I want to order something different." All kinds of small and big things came up the entire meal and ran this waitress ragged trying to meet their needs. They were so demanding that the other employees noticed and were starting to make comments about it. And then at the end when they were finished and they leave, they left a tiny tip. Now since this woman was a Christian and a mature one, and was related to a pastor herself, thankfully no one in my family, okay? She decided to confront her about it, because she caught her alone for a moment in the restroom. And what she said was, she said, "Look, it doesn't matter what you did today, because I am a Christian and it's fine with me. I just want to help you reflect about your witness in the future." She said, "It's customary and it's part of the basic livelihood of the people who work here that you give 15% at least as your tip. So please keep that in mind because people will notice and people will notice also that you are Christians whether you do it or not." Well, that young waitress lost her job that day, because the woman complained to the manager and the manager to deal with the fallout fired her.

Now I want to ask you to just reflect in your own mind, what was the stronger witness to the person on that day? Was it their Christian jewelry and the fact that they were willing to pray openly in front of other people or was it the way they treated the employees? That is the basic issue that I think Jesus is driving at. We've got to watch our witness.

Last week I was at a Christian Book Store and I saw on a bumper sticker that said it all. It said this, "Yes, I pray. Get used to it." I think that bumper sticker has it exactly wrong- being rude about something religious. It's something we all struggle with. Being religious, we need to face it right now folks, being religious is usually not very impressive. You know if people find out we go to church, they don't fall on their knees and say praise God, there is a God in heaven because you go to church. It's usually not impressive. In fact, when you got to church it puts people just a little more on their guard because what they start to think is "okay, is there any life to back this up?" So what they are looking for is "okay, if you are religious, do you act differently, particularly in your relationships with one another and your relationship to me?" And the word that is always hiding behind there if we fall short is that word hypocrite. But you know, that's the word Jesus uses three times in this passage about people who are living out of religious life, out of the wrong motives. And so they have a certain amount of justification to carry around that wariness. And so we've got to remember that although our religious expression if it's natural and people notice, that's okay. Let's never think that this is how we witness to other people, because it isn't.

One night Debbie was hosting an evening meeting at our home for women who like to knit, and this lady from our neighborhood came. And it turns out that someone from our congregation lives next door to her. And over the years this woman has watched this member of our church go to church week after week and she likes this person and they have a good relationship, but the fact that she went to church every week didn't really touch her that deeply, but then this person got too old to get to church on their own and then someone from our congregation, a deacon, began going there every week to pick her up, to escort her out the house and get her into the car and take her to church. That made an impression on the neighbor. How those Christians love one another. There must be something special God is doing at Central Presbyterian Church. It's not going to church that tells people there is something special, it was the love and the special care and the tenderness that one person was showing for another person.

I remember when I was a campus staff member having a talk with a student and they were all distraught because they had wimped out, the day before they were having a meal with their roommate and they didn't give thanks to God openly at the meal and they thought that they had shot their witness to their roommate. I have blown it, God hates me. Well, first we worked on being honest and saying, "okay if you do pray go ahead and pray." You do have to be courageous you know. If this is your life, you can't start running from the fact that your roommate might think you are weird. So we had to deal with that for a moment. But then we had to deal with the issue that praying in front of your roommate is not the primary way you witness to them; that there were more fundamental things; yes they needed to be sharing about Jesus Christ with them, but the more fundamental actions to support the reality of that message about Jesus had to do with for example, the way he treated women, the respect he had for women, keeping his temper in check, telling the truth, working hard, really caring about his roommate and having the ability to have fun too. That these were the foundational realities that were either going to show there was something to his Christian life or not to his roommate and then he had to have those words about Jesus to explain the change in his life.

So our witness there, our actions, are open righteousness, open integrity and a more hidden religion or piety and that's not saying we have to hide our religion. Far from it, but let's never think that that's the leading edge of what convinces the world that Jesus is real. Our words are important and the actions that stand behind that are important are our morality, our decency, our honesty and our love. What stands behind our proclamation and is part of a light we show on our world is our marriages. It's the way we treat our parents; the way we treat our kids. It's how we handle anger and lust. It's how we treat our neighbors and the needy people in our community. It's the respect we show to people that we don't know. It's how we handle our relationships with one another in the church. So this little light of mine, I've got to let it shine, what's the light that has to shine with the proclamation of Jesus Christ? The light that has to shine is the character we have and the quality of the relationships that we bring to the world.

Now since our relationships are so important, it's something we need to reflect on as we come to this table today. Directions about our unity as Christians in our relationships come up again and again in the Bible. I have picked out a list of them for us to reflect on for a few moments as we prepare our hearts to come to the table. I want to read to you these passages and then I will give you some directions about what we are going to do.

First, from Colossians, Chapter 3: "Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them altogether in perfect unity".

From Philippians, Chapter 2, Verse 14 "Do everything without complaining and arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out the word of life in order that I may boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor for nothing."

Ephesians 4:25: "Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one body. "In your anger do not sin": Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold."

And now from the Sermon on the Mount, "Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the alter and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the alter. First go and be reconciled with your brother; then come and offer your gift."

Sermon Outline Notes:

• Matthew 5:13: In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.
• Matthew 6:1: "Be careful not to do your 'acts of righteousness' before men, to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.
• Live so that they will see the good things you do and will praise your Father in heaven. When you do good things, don't do them in front of people to be seen by them. (NCV)
• That they may see
  Not to be seen
• We control our anger
  We give
  We reconcile our relationships
  We pray
  No adultery
  We fast
  We control our lust
  No divorce
  We keep our word
  We don't take vengeance
  We love our enemies
• That they may see
  Not to be seen
  righteousness
  Religion (piety)

© 2005, Rev. John Schmidt
Central Presbyterian Church, Baltimore, MD 21204 410/823-6145
www.centralpc.org