SPEAKER_02: Jesus gathered his disciples and walked to a high spot as a crowd swelled with students.
SPEAKER_02: Curious onlookers and possible enemies wanting to hear this religious leader who seemed different.
SPEAKER_02: Could it be the Messiah they have been waiting for to save them from their enemies?
SPEAKER_02: Could the old kingdoms of this world be passing away?
SPEAKER_02: Was this Jesus finally ushering in the kingdom of God?
SPEAKER_02: And then he spoke a verbal attack on unrighteousness and self-righteousness.
SPEAKER_02: An assault on I'ma get me and mine.
SPEAKER_02: And it was a message for the broken.
SPEAKER_02: Blessed are the poor spirit, the spiritually bankrupt, those who recognize desperate need for God.
SPEAKER_02: And starting with this deep truth, he dispensed world-changing, life-rearranging understanding.
SPEAKER_02: Love your enemies, be generous to everyone.
SPEAKER_02: Come on, for real.
SPEAKER_01: You will never be good enough by working harder.
SPEAKER_01: Pray this way.
SPEAKER_01: You are the light of the world.
SPEAKER_01: Do not worry about your life.
SPEAKER_02: Be realistic, Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Ask, seek, knock.
SPEAKER_01: Stop performing.
SPEAKER_01: Enter through the narrow gate.
SPEAKER_01: Build your foundation upon something that lasts.
SPEAKER_02: Today, many likers of Jesus listen to these words and they say, He probably didn't mean that, but if we truly assume Jesus meant what he said, a better kingdom would shine brighter in a darker world.
SPEAKER_02: Together we can look to the Savior on the mountaintop and soak in the teachings of life.
SPEAKER_02: Join us for uncommon sense, joyfully living out the challenges of Jesus' sermon on the mount.
SPEAKER_02: On the mount.
SPEAKER_00: Amen, amen.
SPEAKER_00: Can everyone go ahead and stand on their feet?
SPEAKER_00: If you guys have been blessed by the worship, can you guys go ahead and give the Lord a hand clap of praise?
SPEAKER_00: Welcome, welcome.
SPEAKER_00: If you guys can do me a favor, I've been instructed for those of you guys on this side.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, my right, your left.
SPEAKER_00: Can you squeeze on a little bit if you can?
SPEAKER_00: There's if there's seating for those who might be coming in late, if you guys can do that, um, praise God.
SPEAKER_00: Real gangster, nobody move.
SPEAKER_00: I love that's why I love being here.
SPEAKER_00: Y'all just literally looked at me and said, We not moving.
SPEAKER_00: That's in the house of God.
SPEAKER_00: Thank God that rebels are invited in the house of God.
SPEAKER_00: We love Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: If you guys can uh go ahead and open up your Bibles, we will be continuing guys a series on the greatest sermon ever.
SPEAKER_00: I will be reading from uh the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 6, verses 5 through 8, and then from 16 to 18.
SPEAKER_00: If you guys are there, can you guys say amen?
SPEAKER_00: If you need time, say hold up.
SPEAKER_00: Let's go.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: If you guys on your devices and you say hold up, that we we're gonna pray for you guys after.
SPEAKER_00: Because that should just be automatically.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and if you I know I said it again.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us, I see kids in never mind, but if you're willing and able, please out of respect for God's word.
SPEAKER_00: I'm reading from the CSV and it says this whenever you pray, everybody say whenever you must not be like the hypocrites because they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by people.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody say, Seen.
SPEAKER_00: Truly, I tell you that they have their reward.
SPEAKER_00: But when you pray, everybody say when again, go into your inner private room, shut your door, and pray to your father who's in secret.
SPEAKER_00: And your father who sees in secret will reward you when you pray.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody say when.
SPEAKER_00: Hopefully, y'all are catching that um so far.
SPEAKER_00: Um, don't babble like the Gentiles, since they imagine they will be heard for their many words.
SPEAKER_00: Don't be like them because your father knows the thing you need before you ask him.
SPEAKER_00: Let's jump to verse 16.
SPEAKER_00: Whenever you fast, don't be gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so that their fasting is obvious to people.
SPEAKER_00: Truly, I tell you, they have their reward.
SPEAKER_00: But when you fast, everybody say when?
SPEAKER_00: I gave if y'all notice I gave y'all a break in verse 16.
SPEAKER_00: Praise God.
SPEAKER_00: Put oil on your head and wash your face so that your fasting isn't obvious to others, but to your father who's in secret, and your father who sees in secret will reward you.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray, dear Lord Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for this Sunday.
SPEAKER_00: God, thank you for this church.
SPEAKER_00: God, thank you for what you're doing.
SPEAKER_00: God, thank you.
SPEAKER_00: And first and foremost, God, on behalf of Pastor Dale and Ashley and his family, thank you for City Life Church for allowing them to get away.
SPEAKER_00: That's such a blessing, God.
SPEAKER_00: So many people are not able to do that, Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And this church has been kind enough, God.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for the volunteers that serve those coming up early that I saw, setting up the lyrics, the chairs, getting everything prepared for people to receive.
SPEAKER_00: God, and it's such a blessing to the church.
SPEAKER_00: And so I just pray over Dale and their family.
SPEAKER_00: Would you bless them?
SPEAKER_00: Would they come refreshed?
SPEAKER_00: God, will they come with a new just understanding of your love and your mercy, God, a new sense of vision and direction for this church going into the summer and into the fall and into next year?
SPEAKER_00: And Spirit of the Living, God, we just ask God that you would continue to show yourself in this place, God.
SPEAKER_00: I know through worship, God, you were here, Lord, you are still here.
SPEAKER_00: God, as we come, God, with all walks of life, all types of trauma, God, brokenness.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us are healing, some of us are already healed.
SPEAKER_00: Wherever we may be on the faith journey, God, would you meet us here today?
SPEAKER_00: God, we had you Saturday, we had you Sunday morning, but we need you still right now.
SPEAKER_00: So would you meet us, Holy Spirit?
SPEAKER_00: Would you captivate our hearts in this time?
SPEAKER_00: Would you, God, speak even to the children, Lord?
SPEAKER_00: There is no junior Holy Spirit in the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: Whether we're young or old, it's the same Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: So as you minister to the students, as you minister to us, God, through songs, through worship, later through communion and prayer, God, we just pray that you would meet us in a fresh new way, Lord.
SPEAKER_00: God, I selfishly, I know I need it, Lord, today.
SPEAKER_00: May I not be the guru, God, that the one that's selling the master course that's got it all figured out, Lord.
SPEAKER_00: I I'm God, I want to be that OG, like like um Israel like Jacob, God.
SPEAKER_00: I want to have a limp in the kingdom of God because I've wrestled, I've fought.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not a perfect man, I'm a broken man, but I'm a rescued man, I'm a transformed man because I've met Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And I pray that over this community, Lord, today.
SPEAKER_00: And so would you be honored through the proclamation of your word?
SPEAKER_00: God, would you be glorified, Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Your word says, if I be lifted up, that's you, Jesus, you would draw people.
SPEAKER_00: Not the band, not the team.
SPEAKER_00: You, Lord, your Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: So, God, I move myself like a Lecrae's old song.
SPEAKER_00: God, I just play the background.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna move to the side, Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Would you show yourself strong today?
SPEAKER_00: We love you, we thank you.
SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name I pray.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: You guys may be seated in this presence.
SPEAKER_00: That's the that's what they say back in the day.
SPEAKER_00: If you know, you know.
SPEAKER_00: Alright, if you guys are taking notes, hopefully you guys are.
SPEAKER_00: Um, the title of my message this morning is Who is Your Audience?
SPEAKER_00: Right, and I I think you guys, how many guys are familiar with this passage just by showing hands?
SPEAKER_00: Just so I know how to gauge the room.
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
SPEAKER_00: How many guys have never heard this passage before?
SPEAKER_00: Okay, a couple of us.
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
SPEAKER_00: Um, so we'll we'll go through this.
SPEAKER_00: You guys are in a series that's called The Greatest Sermon Ever.
SPEAKER_00: I've been privileged to speak on a couple of them.
SPEAKER_00: Today we're gonna talk about um really what Dale wanted me to um just to speak on is this the showiness of prayer and just to be seen by people.
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
SPEAKER_00: Today we uh I in in Jesus' name and in the Holy Spirit, I'm I'm coming like Floyd Mayweather and I'm throwing haymakers.
SPEAKER_00: If you know what if you know, right?
SPEAKER_00: And and this was convicting for me.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna I'm a I'm gonna snitch on myself.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna be honest when I go out because I was reading that, I was like, oh idiot, that's me.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not calling y'all, I'm calling myself.
SPEAKER_00: I can do that because I'm me.
SPEAKER_00: Uh but I there's so many moments when I went through this text, I always said, Lord, forgive me because oh my god, I do those things all the time.
SPEAKER_00: And so uh just by way of uh uh introduction, I want to say, share a story.
SPEAKER_00: There's uh there's a young man he was praying at his church, the church was done, and they they asked this young man to pray.
SPEAKER_00: And so as he came up to pray, they all gathered up together, and man, his his theology, it wasn't a prayer, it was it was it was a theological uh just message and sermon.
SPEAKER_00: He was just showing everybody how awesome he is.
SPEAKER_00: You know how we do when we get in prayer circles, like you just ready.
SPEAKER_00: You hear somebody say Jehovah Nisi, you call them five names, Jehovah Rapha, right?
SPEAKER_00: Jehovah Shalom, Jehovah, you just keep going to outdo one another.
SPEAKER_00: So in this prayer meeting, this guy, they were all praying, and he just kept, and there's nothing wrong with that.
SPEAKER_00: He was just praying uh preaching, he wasn't praying.
SPEAKER_00: And really, why he did it was he just wanted to show everybody how knowledgeable he is.
SPEAKER_00: And so he would just pray everybody would and then you know what happened?
SPEAKER_00: This is how you know the difference between if you're praying to your father or you're praying to be seen by people.
SPEAKER_00: Um, not I'm not saying that this doesn't happen, but when he prayed, everyone came up to him after like, bro, that prayer was fire.
SPEAKER_00: You uh you really know the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, thank you, God bless, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so he did that, and then later on, a few days later, this young man gets a call, and they tell him, they're like, Hey, bro, grandma is not might not make it.
SPEAKER_00: She was an accident.
SPEAKER_00: And so as they're driving, he's with his friend, and his friend asks him, Hey, and do you can you pray?
SPEAKER_00: And he and this is where the prayer really gets real because he was like, I I don't know what to say, I don't know how to pray.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, Just pray.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what he prayed?
SPEAKER_00: He said, Lord, I don't know what to do.
SPEAKER_00: Would you help me?
SPEAKER_00: Do you see the difference between when you just I'm not saying you can't call on his name.
SPEAKER_00: We God wants us to say those things, but the difference was the first prayer, it was showiness.
SPEAKER_00: He wanted to show all everyone around him how amazing his theological prowess is and how educated and how knowledgeable he is in the text.
SPEAKER_00: That moment was a real son committing communicating to his father.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what to do.
SPEAKER_00: Would you help me?
SPEAKER_00: That's some of the most realist prayers I ever prayed in my life, right, parents?
SPEAKER_00: Kids going crazy, renting's due, you ain't got no money, the bank account, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's just dusty, amen.
SPEAKER_00: Nothing in there.
SPEAKER_00: Just like, you know, just cotton webs.
SPEAKER_00: You like, my God, Lord, bless it, bless it, bless it.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what to do, right?
SPEAKER_00: You just get real Pentecostal, apostolic, and you just Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe that's just me.
SPEAKER_00: I'm in church planning, so I need that.
SPEAKER_00: And so the first prayer, right, sounded impressive, but the second prayer was more intimate.
SPEAKER_00: The first prayer received compliments for people, the second prayer was spoken only for God.
SPEAKER_00: That that was a difference, that was a real moment.
SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna get into that.
SPEAKER_00: And and so the question that Jesus puts before us in our text is this in Matthew 6 when we pray, who is your audience?
SPEAKER_00: Let me just snitch.
SPEAKER_00: I I I love just showing how broken I am because it makes Jesus look more better.
SPEAKER_00: I'll add that to myself.
SPEAKER_00: For city group leaders, worship leaders, pastors, and preachers, who's your audience when you're worshiping, when I'm preaching, right?
SPEAKER_00: Or when you're leading groups.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, this is not in the Bible, so you don't have to listen to this.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna move here.
SPEAKER_00: This is my story.
SPEAKER_00: This is really happening.
SPEAKER_00: I remember when I was coming up, bro, I'm 34 years old.
SPEAKER_00: When I would do ministry when I was single, there was a girl that I liked.
SPEAKER_00: I promise you, when they call me to preach, my haircut right now, I look homeless.
SPEAKER_00: Like, I don't care, I'm married now.
SPEAKER_00: I'm married now, it's all it's all good.
SPEAKER_00: I don't gotta press nobody.
SPEAKER_00: But that day when I when I that day when I preached, shoes was brand new.
SPEAKER_00: Tags popped, you know, when we went to H M and Zara, clothes was nice, cologne was hitting, shower brush, floss, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: Cologne spray, everything.
SPEAKER_00: And so when I went, I was on her side too.
SPEAKER_00: Hey man, you know, you see me, you see me, you see me, right?
SPEAKER_00: I was really trying to impress her, and God's like, You're an idiot.
SPEAKER_00: God, and you know, crazy thing, God would still use my foolishness, people still responded to the message, but in that moment, it wasn't about glorifying Jesus, it was like, Let me impress this girl, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so I want to censor myself as I go in the message, it's not like to shame us, but let's just keep it a buck and be honest.
SPEAKER_00: And so that's what Jesus is getting at.
SPEAKER_00: Who is your audience?
SPEAKER_00: And I know the context is I want to be faithful to the passage, is on prayer, but I still wanted to be honest and be, you know, keep it abuck because some of us we we super saved, we act like we ain't broken.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: And so are we again, are we talking to our father, or are we talking to people?
SPEAKER_00: And so here's some real life examples what that what this looks like.
SPEAKER_00: About there's something that we do as humans, when people is watching, we switch up, we start acting, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: Hollywood, that's what we say in the hood, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: Like people are watching us.
SPEAKER_00: Like you ever been to the gym, right?
SPEAKER_00: And then, like, you know, some of us, and someone comes, maybe a bodybuilder, maybe you're a guy, you try to impress a girl or ladies, whatever, you just add extra weights, you can't even lift it.
SPEAKER_00: But because they watching, you the hulk out of nowhere, right?
SPEAKER_00: You just start lifting stuff, or maybe like a child is playing, and mommy dad, look, look, look, you know, recording them looking, and then they start acting up because they're on camera.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, this is for a lot of us.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us, we what the Bible says everything you do in Colossians due to uh to the glory of God, right?
SPEAKER_00: For his name.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us, right?
SPEAKER_00: All are working people, when the boss walks by, we we get real productive.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: If you can't say amen, say ouch, right?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, what are those numbers, Joseph?
SPEAKER_00: What you know?
SPEAKER_00: And he, oh, thank God.
SPEAKER_00: He just go back to TikTok, you scroll, you just waste.
SPEAKER_00: Amen, right?
SPEAKER_00: I'm just telling you, this we in the we in the house now, okay?
SPEAKER_00: We're being honest, and so that's how we act, and that's how what we do.
SPEAKER_00: And there's something again about having this audience, and Jesus is gonna show us today that this can happen spiritually too.
SPEAKER_00: We can begin begin to perform spiritually because we know people are watching us, right?
SPEAKER_00: You pray, oh man, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: You're like, bro, what are you doing?
SPEAKER_00: Out of nowhere.
SPEAKER_00: We switch up.
SPEAKER_00: We can pray in a way that sounds spiritual, we can fast in a way that makes us look committed to God.
SPEAKER_00: We can serve, give, worship, speak about God in ways that cause people to admire us.
SPEAKER_00: And what makes us particularly dangerous is this if you're taking notes.
SPEAKER_00: We can look like we are worshiping God while actually worshiping the approval of people.
SPEAKER_00: My God, that that is my testimony, if I'll be honest.
SPEAKER_00: Because God is, or at least God the Son, right?
SPEAKER_00: We believe in a triumph, God the Father, Son, Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: The Son, he has a human body, right?
SPEAKER_00: But he's not here on earth.
SPEAKER_00: So I want God, I want somebody attaboy.
SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: I I I like that.
SPEAKER_00: God doesn't sometimes speak, and I still believe God still speaks, but it's just different when a human, you can see him, you can smell him, you can touch him.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, bro, you know, it just you know, it puffs us up.
SPEAKER_00: We want to do those things, and that's the danger that we can get into.
SPEAKER_00: We can pray to God while secretly speaking to the people listening.
SPEAKER_00: We're just watching, oh, did they see me?
SPEAKER_00: Did they notice me?
SPEAKER_00: We can say all the right words about God while our hearts are asking, did they notice me?
SPEAKER_00: Did I sound spiritual?
SPEAKER_00: Do they think I know the Bible?
SPEAKER_00: Do they think I'm mature?
SPEAKER_00: Do they think I'm close to God?
SPEAKER_00: And so, in in in the context, the Sermon on the Mount, what it deals with is Jesus is really describing this is what his followers in the kingdom looks like.
SPEAKER_00: This is what their characters like.
SPEAKER_00: I've shared a last time I was here, and I'm sure pretty sure uh Pastor Dale and those who speak have mentioned those things.
SPEAKER_00: This these are the conducts to those who belong to the kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: He's not giving them a list of rules that they have to follow, he's showing them what life looks like when the kingdom of God transforms the human heart.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus is repeatedly moves from beneath the outward behavior and he dresses the inward desires.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus really cares about the hearts, he really wants us to be honest about that.
SPEAKER_00: And it's not nearly enough to avoid a murder, we must also deal with anger in our hearts because that's what's gonna lead to murder, right?
SPEAKER_00: You see that Jesus takes it even further further, right?
SPEAKER_00: If you've heard, like, oh, oh, if you look, right, commit adultery if you look lustfully at a woman, like Jesus puts it up and all of us we fell miserably.
SPEAKER_00: None of us are gonna reach that standard, but that's why Jesus had to come, that's why the gospel is so beautiful.
SPEAKER_00: And so when you arrive in our text in Matthew 6, Jesus shows us that it is possible to do the right thing for the wrong reason.
SPEAKER_00: Somebody help me.
SPEAKER_00: It's so especially one of my mentors.
SPEAKER_00: There's a program called City City.
SPEAKER_00: Tim Keller started a church planning network.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and basically he says, We if you've been in church long enough, you can become a professional Christian.
SPEAKER_00: Like you can know all the right things to say, you can know all the right prayers, it just sound right and do the right things while inside, internally, marriage is falling apart, kids falling apart, right?
SPEAKER_00: You're not serving nothing, but you know how to play church.
SPEAKER_00: We know how to it just I'm just keeping a bug.
SPEAKER_00: We read it, if you watch podcasts, it's easy.
SPEAKER_00: You could just mention and share stuff, but your heart is just broken, it's rotten, it's putrid, it's disgusting.
SPEAKER_00: And Matthew 6 provides a controlling principle.
SPEAKER_00: This is Matthew 6 1, it says this this is really important for us to understand the text.
SPEAKER_00: It says, Be careful not to practice your righteousness, your right relatedness.
SPEAKER_00: That's what that means with you and God in front of others to be seen by them.
SPEAKER_00: Otherwise, you have no reward with your father who is in heaven.
SPEAKER_00: And so the problem is the motivation behind the spiritual practices.
SPEAKER_00: Let me say this.
SPEAKER_00: This I've never forgotten this, I don't remember who said it, but it says, People see what you do, God sees why you do it.
SPEAKER_00: You can do stuff in front of people, oh, that's awesome.
SPEAKER_00: And God, like you know what I'm saying, someone throw 10, you throw a hundred.
SPEAKER_00: And you just want people to see you.
SPEAKER_00: God sees our heart.
SPEAKER_00: And so the big idea today, right?
SPEAKER_00: What I want us to get at is this true devotion is not performed for approval of people, it flows from a relationship with the Father who sees, knows, and rewards.
SPEAKER_00: And so, three points for us today is this the false devotion performs for people, true devotion seeks the father in secret.
SPEAKER_00: Lastly, childlike trust replaces religious performance.
SPEAKER_00: So, point number one, and so if you guys can keep your Bibles open, we're gonna be in verse five.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna walk through this verse by verse by the grace of God.
SPEAKER_00: So, point number one again, it says false devotion performs for people.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what it says again.
SPEAKER_00: Whenever you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites because they love to pray standing.
SPEAKER_00: Notice the just the language, right?
SPEAKER_00: If you have a Bible, underlying circle standing.
SPEAKER_00: Are y'all a church that take notes?
SPEAKER_00: I see some of us.
SPEAKER_00: Everywhere I go, I just know we don't carry physical Bibles no more.
SPEAKER_00: I'm 34, I'm not that old.
SPEAKER_00: There's just something about keep just keep the text.
SPEAKER_00: I love smelling it, touching it, twist it, bop it, flip it.
SPEAKER_00: If you know that that commercial, you understand?
SPEAKER_00: Um, but just keep the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: If you have your notes, just take notes on your.
SPEAKER_00: I want to encourage you guys.
SPEAKER_00: Come, um, this is just the pastoral side of me.
SPEAKER_00: Come ex ready to receive, expectant.
SPEAKER_00: If you don't come with an appetite, you're not gonna receive.
SPEAKER_00: It's just come ready to listen to what God, even through worship, through communion, not just me because I'm the preacher.
SPEAKER_00: God is always speaking.
SPEAKER_00: The question is, are we listening?
SPEAKER_00: So I want to get encourage you guys, pull out your phones, iPad, tablets, devices, not, and please just follow along.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: So don't be like the hypocrites, crazy follow-up, but okay.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, because they love to pray standing, right, in the synagogue.
SPEAKER_00: Notice the location, right?
SPEAKER_00: And on the street corners, again, very public.
SPEAKER_00: Notice that to be seen by people.
SPEAKER_00: So Jesus is warning us, right?
SPEAKER_00: Again, in the context of the greatest sermon, the Sermon on the Mount, the greatest sermon ever, what the people of God look like in this context.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Do not be like the hypocrites.
SPEAKER_00: You know what a hypocrite is?
SPEAKER_00: Is it a theoretical theoretical, no, theatric, there you go, background.
SPEAKER_00: It could refer to an actor who performed a role in front of an audience.
SPEAKER_00: I just watched the Odyssey fire movie.
SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
SPEAKER_00: It was really good, really good.
SPEAKER_00: You guys should you guys should watch it.
SPEAKER_00: And if you guys come from a household like movies are evil, I am so sorry I sit in front of you for saying that out loud.
SPEAKER_00: But it's like those actors are not real.
SPEAKER_00: They had the Cyclops, they had all this mythology gods and Poseidon.
SPEAKER_00: It was all actors.
SPEAKER_00: It was not real.
SPEAKER_00: It was for our entertainment.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus says, don't be like those people who act and are not really being real.
SPEAKER_00: You know, it's a good example.
SPEAKER_00: I always love Luke 18, where it talks about the Pharisee and the tax collector.
SPEAKER_00: You know that story when they pray?
SPEAKER_00: The Pharisee comes there, God, I'm thankful I'm not like that dude right there.
SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: I give, I pay, I'm not as bad as them.
SPEAKER_00: And the and the standard is not the word of God and the holiness of God is other people.
SPEAKER_00: It just does something to us when we make ourselves feel better compared to other people.
SPEAKER_00: We need to be like the tax collector.
SPEAKER_00: Like you know how sinful and broken you are.
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't even look up to heaven, he beats his chest, he said, I'm not worthy.
SPEAKER_00: And God says one of them goes away justified.
SPEAKER_00: Who do you think it was?
SPEAKER_00: The actor who's trying to put on a show before God's like, bro, I bro, you beat your wife before you came here.
SPEAKER_00: What are you trying to pray, right?
SPEAKER_00: Maybe I'm in somebody's house.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: Like you just put on the show, you serving, you leading, but like your household is really broken.
SPEAKER_00: So, right?
SPEAKER_00: An actor wears a costume, an actor presents an image, an actor appears to be someone he is not.
SPEAKER_00: And for me, maybe some of you guys in uh in the um Latino-Mexican community, like you know, uh, I'm I'm Ethiopian, African, Haitian, like we we have an honor shame culture, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's not individualistic.
SPEAKER_00: If you do something and you embarrass the family, you're gonna get the shankla, right?
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna get the belt.
SPEAKER_00: So some of us we have to we've been taught to perform.
SPEAKER_00: Be on your Ps and Q's, say everything right.
SPEAKER_00: That you know, my Ethiopian church is literally right here down the street, Ocean View Boulevard.
SPEAKER_00: Like, I know what that's like to go because your reflection, not just you know, the American West individualism, but on community corporate.
SPEAKER_00: And so you sometimes you you broken, but you gotta be put together.
SPEAKER_00: You got you can't come there and show your brokenness because it's gonna put shame on the family.
SPEAKER_00: Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_00: And so maybe you guys, some of you are in the room, that's my story.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us, I know there's a lot of us culturally that that's part of our testimony in our story, and so we cannot be honest.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus is describing someone who turns spiritual devotion into a stage.
SPEAKER_00: Prayer is supposed to be communion with God, but the hypocrite turns prayer into a performance for people.
SPEAKER_00: It's their Netflix, it's their like going live on IG.
SPEAKER_00: It's like everybody watch me and what I can do.
SPEAKER_00: This is my time to shine.
SPEAKER_00: Standing is not the problem.
SPEAKER_00: I know how you guys underline that.
SPEAKER_00: Many people, when they prayed, their posture, they did stand.
SPEAKER_00: That was not the issue.
SPEAKER_00: But the text tells us why did they stand?
SPEAKER_00: To be seen by God, no, by people.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is not condemning standing while praying.
SPEAKER_00: It was a normal posture in the ancient world.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is not forbidding all public prayer.
SPEAKER_00: Charlotte just prayed when she led worship.
SPEAKER_00: Does that mean, oh, you you you cannot do that?
SPEAKER_00: Go pray in the closet.
SPEAKER_00: You're doing it wrong, right?
SPEAKER_00: Like we got to be contextual and ask those questions.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is not forbidding public prayer.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible tells us pray at all times for all people and all places in the church and all those things.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus prayed publicly, and the early church prayed publicly.
SPEAKER_00: The problem is revealed in the phrase to be seen by people.
SPEAKER_00: The problem was not that people happened to see them praying, the problem was that being seen was why they were praying.
SPEAKER_00: That's that's what really what it was.
SPEAKER_00: They were not simply praying in public, they were praying for the public.
SPEAKER_00: That was the issue.
SPEAKER_00: They had two audiences in front of them: God and people.
SPEAKER_00: We all do, everywhere we go, even when no, even when no one else is watching, you alone in your house, hotel, vacation, rife, marriage, whatever that may look like, kids, you're at school, mommy, dad's not around, there's always an audience.
SPEAKER_00: You have the kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of light, the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: I remember Pastor Miles when I used to go to Iraq, he always said, When you go to bed at night, who says, Well done, good and faithful servant?
SPEAKER_00: Satan or God?
SPEAKER_00: I never forgot that.
SPEAKER_00: I was like, there's some there's some dang.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't say the other word I had to clarify because I know we're recording, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: Um, dang, let me enunciate.
SPEAKER_00: You know, I struggled as a kid.
SPEAKER_00: Um Ethiopian, so it's okay, forgive me.
SPEAKER_00: Um God and people, the approval to truly be seen by that.
SPEAKER_00: And then we'll jump real quick to verse 16 because I think it it connects to this.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus then identifies the same problem with fasting.
SPEAKER_00: Whenever you fast, don't be gloomy like the hypocrites.
SPEAKER_00: For they make their faces unattractive.
SPEAKER_00: Again, that that phrase so that in the original language is a is a hinah, is a purpose clause.
SPEAKER_00: It explains why.
SPEAKER_00: Or if you ever taken, you read the Bible, you know, you study in depth, the word for F-O-R is explanation.
SPEAKER_00: Explains this is explaining why it says, for why don't do the why they be gloomy for their faces to be unattractive?
SPEAKER_00: Purpose so that they be can be obvious to other people.
SPEAKER_00: Fasting was ordinary associated with humility, mourning, repentance, and seeking God.
SPEAKER_00: But these individuals or these hypocrites, these actors or perform performers, they alter their appearances.
SPEAKER_00: Like this, literally, so we do it even now on social media.
SPEAKER_00: Like you literally filters, like people, like this one dude shredded, right?
SPEAKER_00: He's like, Oh, my morning routine, shirt off, shorts in his boxes, and just on it.
SPEAKER_00: Like you literally have to set up the camera and press record.
SPEAKER_00: Diabolical.
SPEAKER_00: Open up the and I'm not saying like to reach the next generation, we can do online.
SPEAKER_00: I think God uses those things, but literally, I'm not God.
SPEAKER_00: So let me move.
SPEAKER_00: This is not Bible, this is just Yoni.
SPEAKER_00: I question when you do those morning routines, get out of bed.
SPEAKER_00: Like you literally have to get the camera, lighting gotta be right.
SPEAKER_00: And you just kind of show my this is what I'm doing, my flow, my routine.
SPEAKER_00: I feel like most people who do that, they just turn the camera off.
SPEAKER_00: Ah, all right, bet.
SPEAKER_00: Next, next thing.
SPEAKER_00: There's no communion with God.
SPEAKER_00: They alter their appearance.
SPEAKER_00: Like you go out with, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: You I got I'm a young adult pastor and church panel.
SPEAKER_00: We do young adults, people, oh, you eating?
SPEAKER_00: Nah, well, I'm fasting.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, bro, just move.
SPEAKER_00: Like, what you like?
SPEAKER_00: Like, why don't I?
SPEAKER_00: Like, I don't, bro, okay.
SPEAKER_00: It's like they want to be seen, you know, they oh man, water, water fast only.
SPEAKER_00: You know, we're just trying to impress people.
SPEAKER_00: They look, it's very obvious they want you to ask them so they can tell you what they're doing.
SPEAKER_00: They made sure their face, um, their discomfort was visible.
SPEAKER_00: They want people to say, wow, that person is deeply spiritual.
SPEAKER_00: Because people would do that, they'll give you what they want.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says, right, we'll get into it, they have their reward.
SPEAKER_00: They must be incredibly oh man, I've never fasted.
SPEAKER_00: They must really love Jesus more than I do.
SPEAKER_00: I wish I had their level of devotion.
SPEAKER_00: And they leave and they feel good about themselves.
SPEAKER_00: Then they go home and drive in the car and they hate themselves.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: That own family, that's temporary praise, don't last.
SPEAKER_00: Their bodies were fasting from food, but their hearts were feasting on attention.
SPEAKER_00: This is that that's the danger of spiritual performance.
SPEAKER_00: Spiritual performance is when we use the things of God to build an image of ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: Uh I think it was Andy Mino or Lecrae, they said, like, one of their deepest fears is that they talk more about God in their songs, in their concerts, more than they talk to God.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Some of us, if you if you guys are leaders and you gotta lead for the sake of the ministry, you gotta do the thing.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta have a word.
SPEAKER_00: So you go up there and just find it, but then during the week, there's there's nothing.
SPEAKER_00: You know how to say all the right things.
SPEAKER_00: You you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_00: You can say the phrases, you can sing the songs, but our hearts are desperate for the things of God, we're not connecting with Him.
SPEAKER_00: That's the danger that we can have.
SPEAKER_00: We're not merely sharing what God is doing, we are managing how people perceive us.
SPEAKER_00: So, what does this look like today?
SPEAKER_00: We may pray differently when a pastor or a leader comes up to us.
SPEAKER_00: Just because it's a pastor, you want to be seen.
SPEAKER_00: We may say suddenly use public prayers, use words that we never use when we pray alone.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Like your family knows.
SPEAKER_00: You just like you ain't never used that word ever in your life.
SPEAKER_00: What are you talking about?
SPEAKER_00: The propitiation, right?
SPEAKER_00: Substitutionary atonement, or that the God, Trinity Father, so you just all did you just like use Chat GBT before you like?
SPEAKER_00: Like, you people know when they look at you, right?
SPEAKER_00: People who really close to you, they're like, bro, that's right, they just that's not you.
SPEAKER_00: And you're just doing that because they're asking you.
SPEAKER_00: We may post every spiritual discipline online.
SPEAKER_00: We announce that we're fasting, we make sure people see our Bibles open.
SPEAKER_00: We suddenly mention how early we wake up in the morning and pray.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying again, there's nothing wrong with those things, right?
SPEAKER_00: But again, the the heart and the motivation, and only God knows that is if you're like just encouraging people.
SPEAKER_00: When I disciple people, right?
SPEAKER_00: Like they come out, hey, I wake up at five, we're gonna get in the word together.
SPEAKER_00: It's not like, oh, I wake up at five, we're gonna get no, it's just like this is my routine.
SPEAKER_00: If you're with it, like this is what we're gonna do.
SPEAKER_00: There's nothing wrong with that.
SPEAKER_00: My intention is not to impress them, it's just to disciple and spend time with people.
SPEAKER_00: So that God's not against those things and praying out loud and being bold and praying boldly and loud and all that, if that's how you are.
SPEAKER_00: But again, it's the issue is to be seen by people.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus says, right, I tell you the truth, they have their reward.
SPEAKER_00: If you're looking from praise for people, that's what you're gonna get.
SPEAKER_00: But that's it.
SPEAKER_00: You're paid in full by people.
SPEAKER_00: God is not gonna give you.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says, My glory I share with no one.
SPEAKER_00: So if you if you get it from people, go ahead, get your little cute little praise.
SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: Get your little adoration.
SPEAKER_00: That's that's good.
SPEAKER_00: I got rocks worshiping me.
SPEAKER_00: I got the sun and the moon to worship me.
SPEAKER_00: If you if you want to take it, you take it.
SPEAKER_00: Don't matter.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna get my glory out of you, anyways.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: So God don't don't matter.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter to God.
SPEAKER_00: The phrase carries the idea of receiving payment in full.
SPEAKER_00: They wanted people's attention, they received people's attention, they wanted applause, they received applause, they wanted to be admired, they received admired, they received their admiration.
SPEAKER_00: But that's what they got.
SPEAKER_00: God owes them nothing because God was never the one they were truly seeking.
SPEAKER_00: The clearest evidence of who you are is not always what you do when everyone's watching, it's what you do when nobody is watching.
SPEAKER_00: False devotion asks, how do I look?
SPEAKER_00: True devotion asks, is my father pleased?
SPEAKER_00: That's it.
SPEAKER_00: You know how hard how hard that wrote.
SPEAKER_00: Second question is like I want people to say how awesome it was.
SPEAKER_00: I want it to be really liked and posted, and people tell me.
SPEAKER_00: Like I'll share with my team.
SPEAKER_00: I want to be invited to the conferences to speak and stuff.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it makes, you know, there's just a brokenness in me, and I think God is doing the work that's a lot better than it was before when I was younger.
SPEAKER_00: But oftentimes, is how does it look, right?
SPEAKER_00: And you know, sometimes we do staff meetings and people you talk, what and there's nothing wrong with this language, I don't I don't want to get into that, but like, how do people what they feel, what do they experience?
SPEAKER_00: It's like, no, no, no, was Jesus glorified?
SPEAKER_00: Were people say, What was the gospel proclaimed?
SPEAKER_00: Now I'm I'm a structure, I'm very organized person, so we're gonna talk about other stuff and check-ins, procedures, and all that that has their place.
SPEAKER_00: But oftentimes, I wish it was number two.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it's like, how does it look?
SPEAKER_00: Because then I can gauge it, it makes me feel better.
SPEAKER_00: Instead of saying God looking at me and saying, Hey, hey, you're my son, I love you.
SPEAKER_00: Don't worry about it.
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_00: Point number two true devotion seeks the father in secret.
SPEAKER_00: Verse six of Matthew six.
SPEAKER_00: But when you pray, go into your inner room, shut your door, and pray to your father who's in secret.
SPEAKER_00: Now Jesus moves from public performance of the hypocrite to the private communion of a child with his father.
SPEAKER_00: The private room was probably like a bedroom, right?
SPEAKER_00: They didn't have what we have here.
SPEAKER_00: You just go like if you watch um The Chosen, right?
SPEAKER_00: You can't probably something like that, how it looks.
SPEAKER_00: Just go into a place that's not visibly open that people can see.
SPEAKER_00: It was a it was a place from the activity away from the activity of the household.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus says, What?
SPEAKER_00: Go inside, close the door, remove the audience, get alone with your father.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm not saying Jesus is not saying this is what you have to do, it's a command to do these things that we have to do for prayer, but literally he's teaching us to cultivate a relationship with God that does not depend on human observation or to be seen by people.
SPEAKER_00: Like that's really what he wants to get at.
SPEAKER_00: That you just get alone, you alone with with the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: I remember when I was young when I would pray.
SPEAKER_00: I still pray this day, to this day, when I pray, I'm like, God, I'll play my I need Spotify music.
SPEAKER_00: I need my word.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know about y'all, I need my worship in the background.
SPEAKER_00: It's a must for me and good coffee.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm playing and I'd be like, Lord, and I literally look like a I look like a fool.
SPEAKER_00: I walk around and I'm like, God, there's nobody here.
SPEAKER_00: It's just me and you in these walls.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not trying to impress nobody.
SPEAKER_00: God, this is just for you.
SPEAKER_00: Would you speak?
SPEAKER_00: I want to meet with you.
SPEAKER_00: I've been praying that since I was 17 because inside I wanted people to see me.
SPEAKER_00: I want people to look at me.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, God, I've been praying this since I was a kid.
SPEAKER_00: Would you put your eyes on me, God?
SPEAKER_00: I'm not doing it for nobody else.
SPEAKER_00: I just want you, Lord.
SPEAKER_00: I want to cling to you, I want to hold on to you.
SPEAKER_00: I there could be the tension and desire for the things of man and the praise of man, Lord.
SPEAKER_00: If those come, praise God.
SPEAKER_00: My professor in seminary used to always say, if you always pre- if you preach and someone's blessed, oh, that was awesome.
SPEAKER_00: Don't be like, oh, glory to God, brother.
SPEAKER_00: Don't give that to me.
SPEAKER_00: Like, you know, you just he said in your heart, just like, that's you, Lord.
SPEAKER_00: That's not me, right?
SPEAKER_00: Just be say thank you and do your thing and move about.
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm always remembering those things.
SPEAKER_00: The secret place reveals the heart.
SPEAKER_00: The secret place is where there's nobody to impress, there's no microphone.
SPEAKER_00: If you ain't got AC, I know it's a little hot, it's hot in there.
SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: It's musty.
SPEAKER_00: That that real call on the Lord, laboring prayer.
SPEAKER_00: You know what's interesting?
SPEAKER_00: The Bible side note, Paul.
SPEAKER_00: The apostle Paul says, labor with me in prayer.
SPEAKER_00: That's work.
SPEAKER_00: It's can I get an amen?
SPEAKER_00: Is it hard to pray?
SPEAKER_00: But it's easy to watch movies for like three, four hours or binge watch, right?
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that interesting?
SPEAKER_00: The spirit's willing, but what?
SPEAKER_00: Help me preach it.
SPEAKER_00: The flesh is weak.
SPEAKER_00: It's hard to pray when your marriage is falling apart, when you didn't get that job and someone else got it.
SPEAKER_00: When you be you you're single, right?
SPEAKER_00: Kids going horror, like you're trying to buy a house and you and someone else bought it because they have more money than you.
SPEAKER_00: And you've been faithfully serving the Lord with your whole life.
SPEAKER_00: You're praying for a child and you can't get one.
SPEAKER_00: And people just hooking up on Tinder and you're popping kids.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: That that's I keep it a buck with Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Like, I'm not, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: I'm not, I'm not there, but I know if I was there, I'll be mad.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, they they inscend every gift, it's a gift from God.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says children are a gift from God, and we've been trying and we enjoy the work at it, but the baby that we're not producing the fruit.
SPEAKER_00: If you've married, amen.
SPEAKER_00: That's what the Bible says, you know.
SPEAKER_00: Prophet Beyonce, if you like it, you should have put a ring on it, amen.
SPEAKER_00: Um does that make sense?
SPEAKER_00: Like you really work it, and then you look outside, and the Bible's full of people, like the Psalms, people lamenting, God, why is it when I look at them, they're having you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: Like that when you gotta pray like that, there's no plot, no, but you're just keeping it real with the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: No compliments, no attaboy, no one, oh, that was amazing.
SPEAKER_00: I love the way you guys did that.
SPEAKER_00: That prayer was amazing.
SPEAKER_00: It's just you alone with the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: There's nobody to admire.
SPEAKER_00: How about this?
SPEAKER_00: Our our brothers and sisters in Nigeria literally being per like heads being cut off.
SPEAKER_00: You gonna pray then?
SPEAKER_00: I promise you, you're gonna be a secret service Christian that day.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us will be hypocrites.
SPEAKER_00: God, I just you go, God, I'm just you're gonna be like, You might even some of us might switch up and be Muslim because we're afraid, because we're not that committed.
SPEAKER_00: All got real quiet, real quiet on that part.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us we're gonna switch up because it's difficult and it's hard what we're dealing with.
SPEAKER_00: People are literally, like they were trying to sign an act to go and help the people of Nigeria.
SPEAKER_00: Hundreds of thousands of followers of Jesus being literally persecuted and killed.
SPEAKER_00: I promise you, when they pray, they're not saying, God, look at me.
SPEAKER_00: They said, Abba Father, would you please just show up?
SPEAKER_00: Please help us to forgive, help us to love.
SPEAKER_00: Those are real prayers.
SPEAKER_00: Now I want to be faith.
SPEAKER_00: That's not our context, that's not what we're dealing with.
SPEAKER_00: Not all of us are called to live that life, right?
SPEAKER_00: God has placed us, the Bible says in Acts, right?
SPEAKER_00: He has placed us the borders and boundaries of every man and human person.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm not saying, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: I want to be faithful to what we're dealing with.
SPEAKER_00: But there's a difference of like, would you we really pray when no one's wife and when it's difficult, when like prayer is costly and might ruin things for you in a human perspective.
SPEAKER_00: There's no one to admire your vocabulary, there's only you and your father.
SPEAKER_00: And that's where the uh the um the authenticity of our devotion is revealed.
SPEAKER_00: Public prayer reveals how we pray around people, private prayer reveals whether we actually want God.
SPEAKER_00: If you're the first one, always pray in public, but then just like this is an old thing.
SPEAKER_00: I always say in youth ministry and young adult ministry.
SPEAKER_00: If you were put on trial for being a Christian, would they have enough evidence to convict you?
SPEAKER_00: Like if they just took this whole week and we went one by one, sister so and so come on there, show, put your life on there.
SPEAKER_00: You know, if you watch a Black Mirror and a crazy show like that, AI, just and they just record and they put your life.
SPEAKER_00: Would people be able to see Jesus from how you live your life?
SPEAKER_00: I'll be fair.
SPEAKER_00: I won't say next week.
SPEAKER_00: I'll just say all of 2026 so far, would they get Jesus is the most important thing in your life?
SPEAKER_00: When your public spiritual life is much larger than your private spiritual life, your soul will eventually become hollow.
SPEAKER_00: You can uh you can maintain an appearance for a season.
SPEAKER_00: You can learn Christian language, you can memorize the right phrases, you can learn when to raise your hand, you can learn how to sound humble, but eventually, public ministry without private communion will exhaust you.
SPEAKER_00: The secret place is where God frees us from our addiction to an audience.
SPEAKER_00: Like prayer is the most neglected ministry.
SPEAKER_00: Worship night packed.
SPEAKER_00: You know where the power is in prayer.
SPEAKER_00: That's why we get attacked by it.
SPEAKER_00: I feel like I'm I get bamboozled, hoodwinked by the enemy all the time.
SPEAKER_00: I don't pray when I know I should pray.
SPEAKER_00: That's where the power is.
SPEAKER_00: That's where the healing, that's where God speaks, right?
SPEAKER_00: Obviously, through his word too, but through prayer, where we're just pressing in and just close and seeking the Father's face and asking God to move on our family, maybe our unsafe spouse or family member.
SPEAKER_00: We just gotta be pressing in and praying.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us we just pray once and we get slapped by the end.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, okay, God, and we just don't continue.
SPEAKER_00: There's some man.
SPEAKER_00: So everyone who's in ministry, let me just tell if you don't have that secret place with the Lord, it will destroy you.
SPEAKER_00: I promise you.
SPEAKER_00: If it's not Jesus that's sustaining you, it's a platform or position, eventually that's gonna fade.
SPEAKER_00: It's hollow.
SPEAKER_00: It's an illegitimate God that you have set up to give you something it was never intended to give you.
SPEAKER_00: And then you know what you're gonna do?
SPEAKER_00: Okay, I'll stand to your life church.
SPEAKER_00: Then you're gonna go to another church.
SPEAKER_00: Guess what?
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna do the same thing there.
SPEAKER_00: You know what the common denominator is?
SPEAKER_00: You.
unknown: Ouch.
SPEAKER_00: I'm just I'm just like I'm just trying to be honest.
SPEAKER_00: I'm trying to help, I'm trying to help us, not y'all, because I'm me too.
SPEAKER_00: You need that's why I'm always telling my team when we meet and we huddle.
SPEAKER_00: I said, Man, we need to get our souls right before we get on that stage.
SPEAKER_00: Before I preach, before you greet people, we we need to be broken before the Father as we lead other broken people to the Father and get out the way, let him do his work.
SPEAKER_00: And he still he uses us to do those things, yes.
SPEAKER_00: But the tension is supposed to be on him.
SPEAKER_00: And notice the repeated phrase pray to your father who's in secret.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus doesn't merely say go perform the same prayer in a different location, he places prayer in the context of relationship.
SPEAKER_00: Prayer is primarily, uh not primarily a presentation, prayer is communion between a child and the father.
SPEAKER_00: You don't enter the private room to earn your father's love.
SPEAKER_00: You enter because through Christ, you have been welcomed into the Father's presence.
SPEAKER_00: Prayer is not merely something you have to do, it's something you get to do.
SPEAKER_00: But we we broken, sinful people.
SPEAKER_00: Let's give it a buck.
SPEAKER_00: We flip that.
SPEAKER_00: It's something I have to do, it's a check in a box, and that's okay.
SPEAKER_00: Can I can I let everybody look at me?
SPEAKER_00: Can I just free you?
SPEAKER_00: I there's so many, I always when I disciple people when they pray, and I don't want to pray.
SPEAKER_00: When you pray, tell the Lord that.
SPEAKER_00: When I was like my wife were like dating, I said, God, I want to be with my wife right now, just cuddling, watching Netflix, chilling.
SPEAKER_00: I don't want to pray.
SPEAKER_00: I told the Lord that.
SPEAKER_00: And I just said, Lord, would you help me to fix that?
SPEAKER_00: There's nothing wrong.
SPEAKER_00: You think God's surprised how broken you are?
SPEAKER_00: You know, I always tell people, right?
SPEAKER_00: That's not me.
SPEAKER_00: Um I think uh Paul David Tripp or Matt Channel, one day they said that, like, you and I, we are sinful people, right?
SPEAKER_00: And let me just you are more trash and sinful than you think.
SPEAKER_00: And then you are more loved than you could ever imagine.
SPEAKER_00: You may think, oh man, God, I'm just this, this.
SPEAKER_00: You're I can't infinitely worse than you think.
SPEAKER_00: But you are infinitely more loved than you can imagine.
SPEAKER_00: Those two tensions, those truths, they are both true at the same time.
SPEAKER_00: Prayer is it's a joy, it's it's good to be seen by people.
SPEAKER_00: Like even when I'm preaching, people watch, it's good.
SPEAKER_00: God uses those the means of grace through preaching and prayer and worship.
SPEAKER_00: Those things are beautiful, but the secret place, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: Some of us, like, you know, this is my be my, I say I'm a Bapticoistal, right?
SPEAKER_00: Gospel center.
SPEAKER_00: I love theology, love God's word, but like just something to that oil.
SPEAKER_00: You know, they talk.
SPEAKER_00: If you you know, if you know, you know, right?
SPEAKER_00: The apples charismatic, like that.
SPEAKER_00: You just you look at somebody, you see their life, you you don't know how much pressing the Lord did in their life.
SPEAKER_00: You you want the anointing, you want the oil.
SPEAKER_00: Let me just say this, just the teacher of me.
SPEAKER_00: We're all there's no one more anointed, that's not biblical.
SPEAKER_00: We're all have the priesthood of believers.
SPEAKER_00: So I just for theology, I don't know where everyone's in the room.
SPEAKER_00: I just want to clarify that there's no one's more anointed than you are.
SPEAKER_00: That's not biblical.
SPEAKER_00: We all have different gifts and the same God, right?
SPEAKER_00: One giver of the gifts.
SPEAKER_00: Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_00: Okay, sorry, I had to say that someone walk away because people, oh, she's anointed.
SPEAKER_00: I wish they had this not.
SPEAKER_00: We are all, if you're in Christ, you're anointed, you've been sent apart by God.
SPEAKER_00: But we look at other people, back to the story, right?
SPEAKER_00: And we want to be like them and the H E double hockey sticks that they've been through.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: You you just seen the testimony, but you ain't seen the the depressing and and the fighting and and the wrestling that they have, and this is a joy.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm let me say this sometimes God has to get us in a place.
SPEAKER_00: I was just sharing this with this team this morning, our devotion, because we we are stronger than we think.
SPEAKER_00: You know why you don't pray?
SPEAKER_00: Because you think you're Superman or Supergirl.
SPEAKER_00: Like, let's let's tell the truth.
SPEAKER_00: Why don't you pray?
SPEAKER_00: Because you feel like you can handle it on your own.
SPEAKER_00: You don't need God, that's why you don't pray.
SPEAKER_00: You know how to you know who knows how to pray?
SPEAKER_00: Pray with poor people that gotta provide for their family.
SPEAKER_00: I promise you that prayer life, they them and God, they they ones.
SPEAKER_00: Because they're fully dependent.
SPEAKER_00: And they know, God, if you don't show up, me and my babies, we ain't eating.
SPEAKER_00: But some of us, you're 401k, praise God.
SPEAKER_00: You got a little investment, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: Got your little house on the beach, and you go out vacation, and you can, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: You don't want to add guac.
SPEAKER_00: Get guac for everybody.
SPEAKER_00: You just got extra money at you know, Chipotle.
SPEAKER_00: It don't hurt you.
SPEAKER_00: You don't want to check, you just buy the clothes.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you, some of y'all maybe doing that well.
SPEAKER_00: You're not dependent, you're not needy, and that's why you don't pray.
SPEAKER_00: And so sometimes God in his grace either will allow circumstances in your life so you will become dependent and you'll be reminded.
SPEAKER_00: Or two, God will also allow you to be given over to your brokenness.
SPEAKER_00: That's what Romans 1 says.
SPEAKER_00: If God, oh bet, you don't need me?
SPEAKER_00: You think you got it?
SPEAKER_00: Read Romans 1.
SPEAKER_00: Go ahead.
SPEAKER_00: Get everything you want.
SPEAKER_00: Have it, take it.
SPEAKER_00: Those are two things that God will do in His grace to draw you to Himself.
SPEAKER_00: So what you don't pray as you need to pray, but you we need to.
SPEAKER_00: And so the Bible says, bring your fears and your brokenness to the Father.
SPEAKER_00: You get to bring your disappointment to God, you get to bring your temptations to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Lord.
SPEAKER_00: You get to bring your questions to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: You get to bring the things you are ashamed of to admit publicly.
SPEAKER_00: You know, I love that.
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to impress the Lord when you pray.
SPEAKER_00: You can just be really you.
SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm God, I'm angry.
SPEAKER_00: I'm frustrated.
SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm upset.
SPEAKER_00: I'm mad at you.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not like you like you ever told the Lord, like God, you you did me dirty.
SPEAKER_00: So right now I'm reading through the book of Exodus.
SPEAKER_00: If you know the story, God meets Moses at the bush.
SPEAKER_00: Who am I?
SPEAKER_00: What do I say?
SPEAKER_00: You I am that I am, I'm gonna send you.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, Bro, I can't talk.
SPEAKER_00: You know my uncircumcised lips, my speech is not good, and God in his grace, I'm gonna give you a brother.
SPEAKER_00: All these things.
SPEAKER_00: And guess what?
SPEAKER_00: He does exactly what God tells him to do.
SPEAKER_00: He goes to Pharaoh, he talks to Pharaoh, and then Pharaoh intensifies the slavery and the work on his people.
SPEAKER_00: The people before that, they worship God, they're like, Man, God has spoken, they're happy, they're like, Praise the Lord, God has not forgotten us.
SPEAKER_00: Moses is here, big Mo, right?
SPEAKER_00: And his brother Aaron, and they go and they do, let my people go.
SPEAKER_00: And Pharaoh says, All right, bet.
SPEAKER_00: Make the work harder.
SPEAKER_00: And then the you know how people do they switch up on their pastors and leaders, man.
SPEAKER_00: Why'd you guys do this?
SPEAKER_00: And you know, all that.
SPEAKER_00: And Moses goes to God.
SPEAKER_00: Why did you tell me?
SPEAKER_00: Why did I look like an idiot?
SPEAKER_00: You ever say that to God?
SPEAKER_00: I did what exactly you told me to do, and I caused trouble, not in foolishness on myself, but on other people.
SPEAKER_00: Like, why would you do this, Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Like, where are you at?
SPEAKER_00: You ever prayed like that to God?
SPEAKER_00: Like, I trusted you.
SPEAKER_00: I quit that job.
SPEAKER_00: You told me to do that.
SPEAKER_00: I was in community.
SPEAKER_00: The elders prayed over me.
SPEAKER_00: I trusted in faith.
SPEAKER_00: You know, got you an entrepreneur or move to this to come to this community.
SPEAKER_00: It's difficult, it's hard.
SPEAKER_00: I did everything I felt like you called me to do, and you played your boy.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I encourage y'all to go home.
SPEAKER_00: Some of y'all need to pray like that to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: God's gonna meet you in a unique way.
SPEAKER_00: And have those real honest prayers with God.
SPEAKER_00: That's what real prayer does.
SPEAKER_00: God, and I love this.
SPEAKER_00: The text says, He already sees everything, and he invites you to come to him, right?
SPEAKER_00: That's what the text says in verse 8.
SPEAKER_00: Don't be like them because your father knows the things you need before you ask him.
SPEAKER_00: And verses 17 through 18, as I'm getting ready to close in a bit.
SPEAKER_00: I know y'all got one service, and Isaiah said, Don't worry about time.
SPEAKER_00: I'm being faithful, I got a timer, don't worry.
SPEAKER_00: This is I'm I'm like ballpark where I'm normally at.
SPEAKER_00: Y'all still with me though?
SPEAKER_00: Okay, good, good, good.
SPEAKER_00: Don't encourage me too much because it would be like it'd be an African church.
SPEAKER_00: We'll be here for two hours.
SPEAKER_00: Matthew 6, 17 through 18.
SPEAKER_00: If you guys pick up your Bibles, I think it'll be on the screen again.
SPEAKER_00: But it says, But when you fast, put on oil on your head and wash your face so that your fasting isn't obvious to others, but to your father who's in secret.
SPEAKER_00: Putting oil on the head and washing the face was ordinary acts of grooming.
SPEAKER_00: Praise God, we got lotion today.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: I I I I think about dumb things like that when I read the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: We got, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_00: We got mouthwash, praise God, toothbrush, wipes, amen.
SPEAKER_00: We love the Lord, amen.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, Jesus is saying, don't advertise your sacrifice, don't make everyone else carry the weight of your fasting with you.
SPEAKER_00: Don't walk around looking miserable so that people can ask what's wrong.
SPEAKER_00: Go about your normal day.
SPEAKER_00: That's all Jesus is saying.
SPEAKER_00: Fasting is not about showing people how much we are giving up, it's about showing God how deeply we need Him.
SPEAKER_00: Again, it's all about motivation.
SPEAKER_00: That's why we fast.
SPEAKER_00: I want to be honest.
SPEAKER_00: Remember, I told you I'm gonna snitch on myself, Allah continue.
SPEAKER_00: When I was young and I started fasting, you know, I your boy's like 220 plus.
SPEAKER_00: I lost a little bit of weight when I saw the scale.
SPEAKER_00: That fasting motivation really changed at that moment.
SPEAKER_00: It was not about Jesus, it's about let's drop a few more pounds.
SPEAKER_00: Anybody with me?
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
SPEAKER_00: I I like you.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00: When I plan, I'm gonna take you with me.
SPEAKER_00: I'm joking, I'm joking, I'm not gonna do that.
SPEAKER_00: If the Lord leads you, amen.
SPEAKER_00: Um in fasting, temporarily we deny a legitimate physical hunger to give focused attention to a greater spiritual hungry.
SPEAKER_00: We're saying, God, I need you.
SPEAKER_00: Those are right, right, again, motivation.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus repeats the phrase to your father who's in secret will reward you.
SPEAKER_00: People may not see your private prayers, but Father, the Father does.
SPEAKER_00: People may not know about why you're fasting, the father knows.
SPEAKER_00: And so it's again, it's that and it's hard.
SPEAKER_00: Again, it's attention.
SPEAKER_00: You're praying, you're seeking.
SPEAKER_00: It seems like God's not answering.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says, Well, keep seeking, keep what, knocking?
SPEAKER_00: The door will be open.
SPEAKER_00: God will do it.
SPEAKER_00: If you search for me with all your heart, God is not lost, we're lost, right?
SPEAKER_00: He's not where's Waldo?
SPEAKER_00: He's there, he's present with us.
SPEAKER_00: And oftentimes, when he seems quiet, God isn't working.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: This is what I said, I shared at our uh worship night.
SPEAKER_00: The two words that encourage me the last um few weeks is the word, two words is meanwhile.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody say meanwhile, and then um suddenly.
SPEAKER_00: So, meanwhile, the first part is like you're praying and seeking God, and it's God is nowhere to be found.
SPEAKER_00: You're doing everything right.
SPEAKER_00: Can I encourage you guys?
SPEAKER_00: You're doing everything right that you need to do, and you don't see God working.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna say, Meanwhile, God is working behind the scenes doing stuff you cannot see.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: When you cannot see God's hand, trust his heart.
SPEAKER_00: When you cannot see what God is doing, go back to who his character is.
SPEAKER_00: That's what you told uh uh uh Moses.
SPEAKER_00: I am Yahweh your God, by my right hand, by my power, I will deliver you.
SPEAKER_00: I've got you out of Egypt, I've done these things.
SPEAKER_00: And so when you forget and you get on your high horse, go back to the character of God, the goodness of God, and remember who he is and what he's done and what he's accomplished for you in your life.
SPEAKER_00: The next word is suddenly as you're you're doing in a moment the right message, the right lyric of a song while you're driving, the right podcast, do the word of God as you're reading and confessing, suddenly God can do what he needs to do in that moment.
SPEAKER_00: What takes us in turning to do, God can do in one moment, one word, one phrase.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: And so that's what God begins to do.
SPEAKER_00: And so, as I get um, let me just give my last point your secret history with God will sustain your public ministry for God.
SPEAKER_00: Point number three childlike trust replaces religious performance.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 7 When you pray, don't babble like the Gentiles, since they imagine they will be heard for their many words.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus now moves from the motives, right?
SPEAKER_00: Public performance to motives now to the methods of prayer.
SPEAKER_00: So when you pray, I'm just gonna say this real quick, and I've been saying it the whole time.
SPEAKER_00: God, the Gentiles, the people are not, they they would pray and they would just use a lot of words because they they felt like that would impress their deity or their God.
SPEAKER_00: If you read it, remember Ephesians for two hours, like Artemis, our great God.
SPEAKER_00: They just kept repeating it because they thought it would impress them.
SPEAKER_00: You think about uh Elijah the prophet and they're they're praying out to the God, and he's you know, he's making fun of them.
SPEAKER_00: Keep louder, keep screaming, and they think sometimes that's how we think when we pray to God.
SPEAKER_00: God, if you just you know, I'm just God, I need you, Lord.
SPEAKER_00: You know, Romans, the Bible says it just that like this that prayer, we don't know what that means.
SPEAKER_00: The Holy Spirit takes that, interprets it, and gives it to the Father and makes it make sense for us, and you just that the ugly tears, and you can you just weeping before the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Like, you know, Hannah with her son, right?
SPEAKER_00: And the priest thought she was like just crazy, and she was caught, and God knew what that was.
SPEAKER_00: That's what the idea is.
SPEAKER_00: It's not to have empty, empty, random thoughts and prayers and words that we think we heard a pastor pray or someone else said in a sermon, I'm gonna use that, that's gonna impress God.
SPEAKER_00: Like that's not again the motivation, verse 8 for the sake of time.
SPEAKER_00: Don't be like them, right?
SPEAKER_00: The hypocrites, the actors, the performers, because your father knows the things you need before you ask him.
SPEAKER_00: If you read the Bible, a great follow-up question is if God is all-knowing, omniscient, why do I need to pray if he knows?
SPEAKER_00: You ever pray like that?
SPEAKER_00: Maybe not rebellious like me.
SPEAKER_00: I ask those questions.
SPEAKER_00: Why do I gotta pray if he knows?
SPEAKER_00: Because it uh praying really produces dependence and humility.
SPEAKER_00: We just gotta confess to God and let him know because we're not educating God what's happening in our life.
SPEAKER_00: We're just being honest about where we are, we are sharing that with God.
SPEAKER_00: He's your father, and your father already knows.
SPEAKER_00: And so if K of you come up, I think we're getting ready to close and just go into the community.
SPEAKER_00: She's gonna play.
SPEAKER_00: I'm just gonna say this.
SPEAKER_00: This will help me um wrap up something about the music just kind of like tells me I gotta get it going.
SPEAKER_00: So here's the difficulty and truth of our message.
SPEAKER_00: Every one of us has performed.
SPEAKER_00: We we have we're performance people.
SPEAKER_00: We're always trying to perform and impress other people.
SPEAKER_00: We are not everyone in the same way, but we all want to impress people and for people's approval.
SPEAKER_00: We have tried to look better than we really are.
SPEAKER_00: We want to be viewed as spiritual, we want people to know how holy and how godly, how amazing we are.
SPEAKER_00: But Jesus is the one who didn't do for performance.
SPEAKER_00: We did to be seen by people.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus did the opposite, he did it for us, you and I.
SPEAKER_00: He went on the cross where he didn't get praise, and he got a crown of thorns.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't get, man, you know, one day, Hosanna, we love you, and the next day, crucify him.
SPEAKER_00: There's a difference.
SPEAKER_00: They put him on that cross, right?
SPEAKER_00: They stretched him, they abused him, they ridiculed him, they mocked him.
SPEAKER_00: He wasn't looking for approval.
SPEAKER_00: When we were seeking approval of people and people, uh people pleasing, he was seeking to approve the father, to be seen by the father, to be loved by the father.
SPEAKER_00: He was publicly mocked, stripped naked, ridiculed.
SPEAKER_00: Leaders laughed at him, the soldiers humiliated him, the crowd rejected him.
SPEAKER_00: But yet Jesus remained, the Bible says, even to the point of death.
SPEAKER_00: And through his resurrection, everyone who trusts in him is forgiven and brought into the family of God.
SPEAKER_00: The gospel does not say perform so that the Father will accept you in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: The Father has accepted you, therefore, you are free to stop performing.
SPEAKER_00: You don't gotta you didn't gotta perform today.
SPEAKER_00: I know after this, we're gonna go into communion.
SPEAKER_00: I just pray even now before we get there that you will, if there's anything that I've said, anything that was spoken through the prayer, through the worship, and you feel like God, the Holy Spirit is tugging on your heart, handle that now.
SPEAKER_00: You don't even gotta look at me.
SPEAKER_00: Just close your eyes and get with the Lord and just deal with some of those stuff.
SPEAKER_00: Confess before you get onto that communion, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's a reminder what Jesus has done and say, God, you know what?
SPEAKER_00: Why am I performing?
SPEAKER_00: You you took care of everything.
SPEAKER_00: I I can come willingly, broken, knowing that I'm accepted because of what Jesus has done on my behalf, and we can receive freely from the Father without performance, no Photoshop, no filters, no amazing catchphrases, trendy things, just you, the real you, all of you coming to the Father.
SPEAKER_00: So can we all just stand as we close in prayer if you guys are able to do that, Lord?
SPEAKER_00: We thank you for this time, Father.
SPEAKER_00: Man, I just I just pray for the performer.
SPEAKER_00: God, I and I throw myself under the bus, me.
SPEAKER_00: God, I pray for those who just want to be seen as organized, as put together.
SPEAKER_00: God, we don't want to seem weak.
SPEAKER_00: We want to be the strong one.
SPEAKER_00: We don't want that one that needs to we don't want to be seen as the one that needs to be rescued.
SPEAKER_00: We want to do the rescuing, we want to be the hero of the story.
SPEAKER_00: But Jesus, would you forgive us, Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Would you help us, Father?
SPEAKER_00: God, under the sound of my voice, there's people here today, God, as we prepare our hearts who do not know you, Lord, who are broken and desperate, may they be reminded, God, as we take communion.
SPEAKER_00: I know the bread has already been put together, but as they break the bread, as they take the wine, the blood that was shed for us, God, the body that was broken for us, God, you're the only one that did not perform.
SPEAKER_00: You said, Whatever the Father's doing, I'm about my father's business, that's what I'm doing.
SPEAKER_00: You didn't seek to please man or please people, but to be pleasing to your father.
SPEAKER_00: And so I pray over every person, Lord, here today, who are struggling, God, with brokenness and just trauma, whatever it may be, Lord, would you meet us today, Lord?
SPEAKER_00: God, if there's anything that I've said that that took away attention off of you and it made it more about me, Lord, would you forgive me?
SPEAKER_00: I just confess that in front of everybody.
SPEAKER_00: May they not remember it in Jesus' name, God.
SPEAKER_00: But whatever that is of the kingdom, of your word, that is faithful to your word, Lord, would they where they stick to their bones, Lord, may they marinate on it, where they reflect on it.
SPEAKER_00: God, we we need you, Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Forgive us performers, God.
SPEAKER_00: May we worship boldly, may we respond in humility and with gratitude in our hearts, may we be thankful, Lord, and saying, Jesus, would you give me just you, Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Just Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: That's all we need.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody else or nothing else in this world would do but just you.
SPEAKER_00: We love you, we thank you.
SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name I pray.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_02: Amen.