Selfless as He is Selfless

Mat 6:1 Take heed that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of them: otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in heaven.


Selflessness not selfishness. Self-less.


We are NOT to promote self. If anything is becoming more and more clear about Jesus' teachings is that we are to be self-less. We are NOT to draw attention to ourselves. We are NOT to do good so that we can get credit for doing good. If we do good in front of others with the intention of being seen by them so they can note our good deed we have NO reward whatsoever, why? Does someone seeing a good deed negate its goodness? The good that comes from the deed still gets done. What's being talked about here is motive. What is our motive for doing good? If we only do good so that we can get praise from others then we are seeking to be honored and ONLY our Savior deserves honor! We have to take the focus off ourselves we are to give all glory to God. Our lives are candles pointing the lesser light to the greatest Light of all.


Mat 6:2 Therefore when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.


Hypocrites will make a huge show of their good deeds and the reward they have isn't the reward that the Father in heaven will give them - they will NOT receive the reward of eternal life in Christ- the only reward we should seek.


Mat 6:3 But when thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth:
Mat 6:4 That thine alms may be in secret: and thy Father which seeth in secret himself shall reward thee openly.


While some believe that it gives God glory to do their good deeds and point people towards God we have to really seek to understand what our Savior is saying to us.


Do not let our LEFT hand know what our RIGHT hand is doing.


This is NOT possible. Right? What we do is in our mind and what's in our mind is known. There is NO way our hands know anything anyways, period. Some might argue that a typist's hands automatically know where the keys are- or a gamer's hands know where the control buttons are on their controllers. The truth is…ONLY our brains know. Our brains control the actions of our hands - always. No one can slap someone and jump back defending themselves by saying their hand did it all on its own. No one would believe them- the person's mind controlled the person's actions. So what is our Savior telling us? He's telling us that we are to be SO incredibly secretive about doing good deeds for others that we don't even THINK about doing them to garner credit from others. God sees ALL we do, NOTHING is a secret from God. God knows every good deed we commit we don't need others to know. We don't need to brag about our goodness. We don't need to surround ourselves with accolades and praise. We need to be so careful about letting good deeds that are seen be given praise that goes to our heads. Praise and honor are addictive. That feeling of doing good and of having others know about that good we've done is something that is truly addictive and Satan will encourage us to seek it even just a little bit pleases him. We truly have to shun acknowledgement for the good we do. When it happens that the good we do is acknowledged by other we have to immediately give ALL glory to God. By the grace of God we are able to do any good and only by His grace. We have to realize that ALL good comes from God, ALL good.


Jesus wants to teach us selflessness as He is selfless. We MUST learn selflessness and learn it over and over and over again- learning it daily because at any opportunity our selfish natures will rear up taking over trying to destroy any selflessness we might possess through our Savior. Satan knows selfishness is a key towards gaining us as His trophies. We HAVE to be aware of this! We can't let this slip past us as unimportant, as something trivial. Nothing our Savior tries to teach us is trivial, nothing!


By the grace of God may we become so fully His we are selfless as He is selfless.


In His love!