We are all reward seekers at the core. We all seek attention. The difference lies in where we look for these two. As we craft our Facebook updates, we sometimes have the ‘like’ button in mind. We catch ourselves looking at the number of YouTube views to validate our worth.
The world says appearance is gold, and thus the cost of being authentic is high as the pressure to please the public we do not even know mounts on us daily. The Dotcom generation craves for instant rewards.
Matthew 6:16-18 suggests that the pressure to please the public is not new. The text tells a tale of two ways to a reward, and which way is more satisfying.
Living to Please Men is the Way of the Hypocrite
In Matthew 6:16-18, Jesus talks about two approaches to be rewarded for a good deed. He takes it for granted that we all desire rewards. And He does not suggest this is a bad thing.
According to this text, what distinguishes the two ways to a reward is motivation. The discussion was not whether people should fast, but why and how. It was not whether the disciples should expect a reward, but from who.
Some Jews fasted to be seen by men. And Jesus called these hypocrites.
Hypocrites are pretenders, or actors, who put up a show for the world to see. They act in ways that attract human eyes, pretending to be righteous when in reality they target men’s praises. In Jesus’ time, they disfigured their appearances, perhaps smearing some ash on their faces to attract the world’s attention. They sought a reward from men for their acting (v16).
And Jesus suggests that because they fasted to put up a show before the world, they are rewarded by the world. By this Jesus does not mean that the world gathers to honor them, but that since all they wanted was to be seen by men, they received their reward when men saw them.
No one sees them being rewarded, and no one seeks to repay them. The sense of being seen by men is their reward. A retweet is sufficient for them.
You may think of people whose motivation to give to a charity is so that they may be known as generous. Some churches have names of the givers engraved on chairs or things they gave so that they may be remembered.
Others are angry when their virtuous acts are not recalled to memory. To them, being talked about is a reward they expect. Jesus calls these ‘hypocrites.’ They are actors on a stage where appearances matter more than authenticity.
Is it wrong to be remembered for the good we do? Not necessarily. I think that being remembered is not the problem in this text. The issue is our inward hunger for the praise of man.
Let us know that the reward for those who live to please men is short-lived, unsatisfying, and costly. The men we live for do not care whether we are rewarded or not, and they will forget us as soon as our acting ends. Jesus suggests that if we want to gain a lasting and satisfying reward, we must live differently.
Living to please God is the Way of the Disciple.
In contrast to stage-acting-fasting is true fasting to which Jesus calls His disciples.
Jesus does not want His disciples to be like the hypocrites. He does not prefer the desire for a hundred Facebook post likes to determine whether we post or not. That Instagram account should not be the source of our identity, for only God must be the reason for our actions.
Actors have two different faces with one worn in public and the other in private. The idea of fasting in private is a call to live in the audience of One and not edit your public picture.
Jesus teaches that if the Disciples focus on pleasing God, God shall reward their private devotion (v18). The underlying assumption here is that is it better to be satisfied by God than by men. But it is also true that if you seek your reward from men, you have no reward from God.
You may think again about the times you do good things. Could you have given anonymously? Is it possible for your left hand to be unaware of what your right has given to the church or charity?
The seeds that grow to produce fruits are those buried in the ground and from the sight of passersby and birds of the air. Because of this, we should seek a lasting reward in God while avoiding living in the court of public opinion.
Jesus is more concerned with the disposition of our heart than the number of your Twitter followers. Remember that your soul shall remain long after your tweets and deeds have been forgotten.
Think about the person holding the mouse more than his clicking the ‘love button’ and do not let your WhatsApp status define the source of your reward. The profit of pleasing God is that He intentionally rewards you with a lastingly satisfying recompense.
Conclusion
There shall be daily pressure on us to want to please men, to put up appearances to appear more spiritual than we are. We must not cave-in.
We must not sell our soul in the market of public opinion. Think again about why you are posting that picture on Instagram, why you are crafting that Facebook post. Shall you cast your pearls to the swine?
Shall you bury your seed in the fertile ground or cast it by the wayside for passersby to see and trample on?
This text gives us only two ways to a reward for our good deeds. It tells of a tale of two ways to a reward. One is very unsatisfying and temporal; the other is eternal and rich. One leads to the destruction of a soul, the other to its salvation.
May we examine our motives before that tweet ruins our reward.