Spiritual Depth Requires Spiritual Discipline (Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21)

Hello, friends.

This is Pastor Creighton.

Thank you for tuning in to Newsong Church's Sermon Podcast.

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This is the holy gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to Matthew.

Glory to you, Lord Christ.

Jesus said, Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.

Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others.

Truly I say to you, they have received their reward.

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, and your father who sees in secret will reward you.

And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites, for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others.

Truly I say to you, they have received their reward.

But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your father, who is in secret, and your father who sees in secret will reward you.

And when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces, that their fasting may be seen by others.

Truly I say to you, they have received their reward.

But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others, but by your father who is in secret, and your father who sees in secret will reward you.

Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in and steal.

For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

This is the gospel of the Lord.

Praise to you, Lord Christ.

Working together with him, then, we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain.

Let's pray.

Gracious Lord, you are full of compassion and mercy.

You are long-suffering and of great goodness.

We come to you mindful of our dependence upon you, upon your grace to sustain us, to meet us exactly where we are right now.

And I pray that it would be so.

Let our hearts be so gripped by your grace so as to be changed more and more into the likeness of your Son, our Lord.

It's in Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

Please be seated.

So there's a uh it's a single panel far side cartoon.

These are always so much more funny when someone describes it, right?

Single panel far side cartoon, and what you have is the starting line for a marathon, and a number of folks in their athletic gear with their numbers on, not particularly looking ready to go.

Over top is a banner that reads Annual Instant Gratification, Zero Mile Fun Run.

And to the side, there's a sidesperson pointing to a pile of t-shirts, and the caption goes like this Runners to your mark, get set, go.

Okay, come get your t-shirts.

I don't really run any marathons.

I haven't run any marathons.

I suspect I could run this marathon.

But I think we grasp the humor pretty quickly.

A marathon like that is hardly worth doing.

Marathon like that requires nothing of us.

No practice, no discipline, no preparation.

Just come get your t-shirt.

We live in a moment, I think, where things happen so rapidly, where gratification is so instant, it's easy to go flittering back and forth towards the next most available, let's say, t-shirt.

This is uh a quote from Richard Foster.

I was recently reminded uh of this quote.

Richard Foster is one of the spiritual giants in the last 50 years or so, and this is a book of his called Celebration of Discipline, and if you haven't read it, it's well worth the read.

He introduces his book on spiritual disciplines like this.

He says, superficiality is the curse of our age.

The doctrine of instant satisfaction is a primary spiritual problem.

The desperate need today is not for a greater number of intelligent people or gifted people, but for deep people.

Is that how you expected him to finish that?

The need today is for deep Christians.

So, of course, in a book on spiritual disciplines, we might want to ask: well, what's the solution here?

What's the solution to superficiality and instant satisfaction if we can agree that this is accurately describing the world in which we live?

A mile wide and an inch thick, so to speak, or an inch deep.

Well, writing on the disciplines, Richard Foster says the classical disciplines of the spiritual life call us to move beyond surface living into the depths.

They invite us to explore the inner caverns of the spiritual realm.

They urge us to be the answer to a hollow world.

Do you long to go beyond surface living and into the depths?

See, spiritual depth requires spiritual discipline.

And spiritual discipline is the intentional cooperation with the grace of God such that growth results.

We can show up at a zero-mile fun run of instant gratification and get our t-shirt.

Or we can run the race worth running in such a way as to get the prize.

But it requires something of us.

It requires a willingness to submit ourselves to spiritual discipline.

We might ask, well, where do we begin with that?

And I think Ash Wednesday in the season of Lent is a wonderful place to start.

Our reading, the reading traditionally associated with Ash Wednesday, is from Matthew chapter 6.

Matthew 6 · chapter mention

And it introduces us to three spiritual disciplines in particular, and invites us to go further up and further in to the grace of God through these disciplines: prayer and fasting and giving.

And this is an invitation.

It's an invitation to go deeper.

It's an invitation we can shrug at if we really want to.

But if we're tired of living on the surface, if we want to discover real spiritual depth, if we're willing to apply ourselves to costly discipleship, I wonder if this is where our Lord Jesus would have us start.

Ash Wednesday is an invitation to go deeper, deeper in prayer.

Pull out your order of service.

Track along with me.

Verse 6.

Jesus says to the crowd and to his disciples, When you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who's in secret.

What is prayer?

John of Damascus famously said that prayer is the raising of one's mind and heart to God.

I like that definition.

Raising one's heart and mind to God.

Sometimes that comes with words.

Sometimes that comes with silence.

But John of Damascus challenges me here to consider where is my mind?

I think the Pixies asked that question in the 90s, right?

What's my mind so often set on?

Set on whatever Creighton's about, really.

Whatever Creighton's got on his mind, whatever Creighton thinks is best for Creighton, that's generally speaking what you can count on being on my mind.

Prayer is something that lifts us out of that sort of self-centeredness that maybe we're so often inclined to.

Prayer displaces self-centeredness by practicing ongoing dependence on God.

This is why someone like Martin Luther can say to be a Christian without prayer is no more possible than to be alive without breathing.

It's so foundational.

Ash Wednesday Lent is an invitation to pray.

We might want to ask, well, how do we begin?

There are many forms of prayer.

There's objects we can use, there are crosses or beads, there are set prayers, there's extemporaneous prayers.

But the bottom line is we have to take the time.

Prayer is like enjoying the fellowship of a best friend.

Sometimes that comes with a lot of words and sharing.

Sometimes it just comes with simply sitting in silence.

But we can't consider ourselves friends unless we take the time.

Isn't that the case?

Maybe this lent is an invitation to take the time.

Maybe prayer is something that's so easily neglected because it never seems urgent, does it?

I get to the urgent things in my inbox pretty quickly.

Prayer never seems to have that exclamation mark.

Maybe this Lent is an invitation to go deeper by taking the time to pray.

It's an invitation to go deeper through fasting.

Verses 16 to 18 here, Jesus says, When you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites.

He goes on to say, But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others, but by your Father who is in heaven.

Fasting is abstinence from worldly goods for the purpose of spiritual growth.

It's saying a temporary no to a particular gift in order to say a deeper and more resonant yes to the giver.

And that's an important distinction to make, don't you think?

Sometimes I wonder if we confuse the gifts for the giver.

Sometimes I wonder if I confuse the good gifts that I enjoy with the one who gives them.

See, it's easy to let good things become ultimate things in which I find the meaning and purpose of my life.

Fasting displaces a sort of self-satisfaction that comes with feeling like I got everything I need.

Fasting says no to the particular gift, to say yes to the giver, to find true satisfaction and the only one who can satisfy our soul.

Fasting might begin with something small.

Maybe it's food, maybe it's a luxury, but maybe you want to begin 24 hours at a time.

Maybe it's recognizing something that.

Maybe it's recognizing something that you'll miss.

I was struck by a quote in our uh Life Explored series recently.

Sin is not so much wanting to do bad things, but wanting things too badly.

We have things in our lives we want too badly, such that they become disordered.

Fasting is something we partner with prayer.

It's like a spiritual reset, a reminder, a calling out to God, because He alone is the one who can satisfy us.

And he alone is sufficient for us.

We go deeper by prayer and by fasting.

And finally, Jesus calls us to a third spiritual discipline, and that's giving.

When you give to the needy, Jesus says in verse 3, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret.

He circles back in verse 20, he says, Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in and steal.

For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

Let that land on you for a second.

We're not talking about dollar amounts.

We're talking about your heart.

What more important thing is there?

And Jesus is recognizing something, something so common in our flawed, fallen human nature.

Our hearts get caught up.

Our hearts get caught up in the things we enjoy or the wealth that we think we belongs to us.

If we're not careful, our hearts get so caught up in our prized possessions that they really end up possessing us.

Giving recognizes that all things, even the good things, well, especially the good things, come from God.

And it's in giving that we just give a portion back to Him.

All things come from you, and of your own have we given you.

So giving cures us of a sort of self-sufficiency that we can slip into.

When we feel like the money we've got in our bank is security enough, when we feel like our investments are gonna pay off, we feel like the things we enjoy are gonna give us a sense of well, sense of purpose.

Giving refuses to make a God out of our wallets.

Giving recognizes that God has entrusted us with these good things for the sake of others.

So what if this lent you made a conscious effort to see the means that have been entrusted to you, not so much as something you possess, but something to steward, something that God has given to you with which to bless the world.

Pray, fast, and give.

The secret to all this, friends, I think, and I speak to myself as much as anyone else here, is if we wait around until we feel like doing one or three of these things, we will never start at all, will we?

We will never start at all.

This is Ash Wednesday.

And we'll come to receive the imposition of ashes, which is for us a symbol of our heart's contrition.

We recognize the ways that we have been self-centered and withdrawn from God.

We recognize ways perhaps that we have been self-satisfied.

Perhaps we recognize ways that we have been self-sufficient.

When we come to receive these ashes, we come to receive a symbol of our ongoing dependence on God's grace, and He is abundantly graceful to us.

Spiritual disciplines are not about earning God's favor, they're not about courting God's, not about gaining merit, so to speak.

It's a response to the outrageous grace of God given to us in Christ.

This is what the Apostle Paul has to say.

He says, for our sake, he made Christ to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

That's God's initiative towards us.

Not contingent on our performance, how well we've done, but because of the great love with which he loved us.

And now he invites us to cooperate with him in this work of grace that renews our hearts.

Working together with him, Paul says, then we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain.

So this Ash Wednesday in this Lenten season is an invitation, friends, not to receive the grace of God in vain, but through prayer and through fasting and through giving, to cooperate with God in that renewing work that He is doing in your heart and in our worlds.

It's an invitation to go deeper, to go beyond surface living, and to find true communion with the only one who satisfies our hearts.

Amen.

Thank you for listening today.

We worship a generous God who calls us to follow Him in giving willfully, cheerfully, and sacrificially.

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If you'd like to offer a gift towards Newsong's ministry, please visit Newsongportperry.ca giving for more information on how to do that.

May God bless you and keep you today and every day.