musings.from.the.porch

Once again Jesus is after our heart condition and what is the motivation behind our actions. While Jesus is the ultimate expression of love of the Creator God to His creation, the tough thing about Jesus for me is that He does not allow compromise or human rationalization or justification for deviation from God’s standard of our heart, mind, and actions. It is a perfect love and a perfect standard.

The good news is He is about us being honest with Him and seeking forgiveness. I note that Jesus is not saying if we give, but that as we give, (an implication that we are to give), adding to be careful about the attitude in which we give. One aspect of his message is that we cannot please God and men at the same time.

I had to ask myself is this true in all cases? I don’t know but Jesus is clear it is certainly true about giving. To please man is to ignore God and to please God is to ignore impressing man. Why would this be true? Impressing men ultimately is “all about me”, the focus is on myself, what I get from giving, instead how does the giving help God’s kingdom and work with Jesus’ mission on earth.

Another aspect from His word is that we tend to define (or rate) our spirituality by what we think our peers think of us. Hence if they know what we do we think we look more spiritual in their eyes. These people Jesus was referring to were giving and obeying scriptural requirements to give to those less fortunate. They desired validation of their spirituality in their countrymen’s eyes.

It seems to me that Jesus says OK, but you have just negated the purpose for the law, your giving wasn’t for God and others, but for yourself. It was a means to an selfish end. I think we tend to believe if we keep quiet about our giving we are OK. So let me ask, if we didn’t have a tax deduction for charitable giving, would we give or give as much? I think that is a modern example of checking our motivation for giving.

Lastly, keeping the left hand from knowing what the right hand is doing may be hyperbole but it may also be Jesus saying not to take ourselves too seriously when we give. In other words, not being impressed with our own giving. All that we have is from God, so we are only passing along that which he has given us ability to receive.

What do you think?

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