Seeds for 06/01/2023 - Matthew 6:5-6
Scripture: 5 “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 others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. 6 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.”
Observation: Next up in Jesus’ series on how we practice acts of devotion (our “practice of righteousness”) is prayer. Here again we see Jesus making a point about what constitutes our reward and not only the specifics of our practice itself.
Anyone who’s responsible for leading public prayer—pastors, priests, lay leaders, etc—knows the tension around wanting to pray well and wanting to pray authentically. This warning rings in our ears, or ought to. What are we to make of it?
One point I find interesting is that Jesus says the hypocrites who “love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners” have the motivation of wanting “to be seen by others” (emphasis mine). Whether with our words or any other way we are garnering attention, it’s again about being noticed and wanting others to approve of us. This is poison to the soul. “Reward” is the right word. That’s what it is. Long before we knew the names of the chemicals our brain rewards us with when someone notices, likes, or affirms us, Jesus taught that our susceptibility to human attention can get in the way of finding our reward in God alone.
The nature of prayer is to be aimed toward God. When we draw attention to ourselves, that change of aim means that we’re no longer praying, we’re performing.
The New Testament is full of examples of people praying with one another and even leading the church community in prayer. Jesus’ prescription here seems less as a universal instruction about all prayer everywhere and more like medicine for this particular malady of the soul. Sometimes what are classically termed “spiritual disciplines” can be called “spiritual workouts.” This is a good example. Practicing private prayer can break us of the need to impress others and train us to seek the face of God and Him alone in our praying. In private, our audience can only be God, so we are freed from the temptation to perform and freed for authentic engagement with the Lord.
Application:
When can you practice private prayer if you don’t already or are out of the habit?
If you have occasion to lead prayer publicly or with others, how does/can private prayer help you do so with spiritual integrity?
What else might the Holy Spirit be speaking with you about in the text today?
Prayer: Lord, break me of the desire to use practices for engaging you as methods to gain the affirmation of others. Draw me into prayer for your sake. Amen.
“But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.” (Matthew 13:23)
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