Seven

    "Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward 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 the others. Truly I tell you, they have recieved their reward in full. But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what the 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."   - Jesus Christ -Matthew 6:1-4
   
    The needy, who are the needy? I have often looked at this verse and let it burn itself deeply into my soul. Is Jesus talking only about the poor? I prefer to believe He is talking of anyone in need. The NLT says, "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." I think that says it very plainly. I have always looked to the 6th chapter of Matthew to guide me in the things that I must do to try and maintain my path with following the teachings of Christ. In that, I fall very short every day. I stumble, scrape, scrap, and scratch, my way through the day. I forget, and look past some of these things often, but I do put my best foot forward in that.So, basically to me, when you do good deeds, it's only for you and God to see.
     In my work, I see many people who work with other people and then proceed to say 'LOOK WHAT I JUST DID!!!', it often reminds me of an old character from the late night sketch comedy 'Mad TV'. His name was Stuart, he was characterized as a say 8 year old, who would shout, 'Look what I can do!!!', and then proceed to do nominal tasks or skills. Is it pride? Is it desperation for acknowledgement? Is it the need for advertising for fundraising? Is it American culture? Is it a conglomeration of all of the above?
     We are called to serve, we are called to share the love that we were so freely given. I mean, this is the right in the middle of the sermon on the mount. I like to think of Jesus as any modern day speaker, in that there is an order to speaking, just like a meal. There is the appetizer, something to get people into whatever is being said. There is the meat and potatoes, which is the stuff that is supposed to stick to your ribs. Then finally there is desert, the topping to it all, to settle in and finalize it.
     In that, there is, right in the middle, the meat and potatoes, 'Don't do your good deeds publicly , and yet time and time again, we choose to be Stuart, 'LOOK WHAT I CAN DO!!!'. Screaming to the masses, as loudly as we can, just so that we can be possibly heard above the ascending crescendo of the world. Time and time again we take pictures, videos, or any other type of shameless self plug so that we can try to bee seen, Yet, the only one that wants to see it, is God Almighty himself.
     In the times that this was worded, there were mostly the ultra rich, and the ultra poor. In that, here's some perspective, if you have any change in your pocket, you are in the top 8% of the world's wealthy. I know you may say, well, I don't have any change in my pocket. Do me a favor, next time you go out, look on the ground, I'm sure sooner or later, you will find a penny. That's the American perspective, we leave a coin on the ground that if we pick it up, we are among the top 8% wealthiest. Yeah, think on that for a while. I did.
     So many in that day would make a display of what they were doing to show just how much they 'believed', to show how devoted they were, and yet, they were the ones that John the Baptist called a 'Brood of Vipers', and Jesus chastised on multiple occasions. How many of us do that today? I know I have been guilty of it.
     Whatever we do in life, God knows it. And yet, we still continue to say, 'Look what I can do!'. Today as I was making sure I placed my quotes and so on, I like to check everything that I quote, usually in various sources, just to make sure I get it right. I looked up a couple of 'Stuart Mad Tv' videos on Youtube, and I have to wonder, When we do make a display of our deeds, is that how we look to God?


                     I just have to wonder.