“The Instagram Generation” – FBC Morning Light (10/21/2024)

The Sermon on the Mount and the Greater Righteousness of the Kingdom

Well, good Monday morning to you. Hope you had a good weekend yesterday, and I hope you have been able to join us for our heaven tour that began yesterday at our church. Brad Zockel speaking on the subject of heaven for a total of five messages yesterday morning, last evening, and then tonight and tomorrow evening as well.

So, if you're able to get out this evening at seven o 'clock, I encourage you to come for these special services. Well, today in our Bible reading, we're reading the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew chapters five, six, and seven, and then also reading a good chunk of Luke chapter six.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus makes a statement in chapter five, verse 20, that really kind of controls what he's going to talk about in the rest of chapter five and most of chapter six. He says in verse 20, I say to you that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.

So the followers of Jesus need to have a righteousness that exceeds. It's got to be a greater righteousness than the scribes and that of the Pharisees. In the rest of chapter five, Jesus really discusses what a righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes looks like.

They had this very good ability to limit the impact of the law. Jesus talks about a fuller understanding and application of the law than what the scribes did. He has these series of, you've heard it said, but I say unto you, and each of the things that you've heard said has some connection to the Mosaic law, and Jesus' I say unto you clarifies the intent and the heart of that law.

Practicing Righteousness Before God, Not for Human Approval

What I really want to zero in on is his comments regarding the righteousness that exceeds that of the Pharisees in chapter six. He begins in chapter six with this statement. He says, take heed that you do not your righteous deeds, your righteousness, before men to be seen by them.

Otherwise, you have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. I'm sure I don't need to inform you that we live in the Instagram generation. I saw a video not long ago that illustrates this very well.

Somebody was videoing a woman on the beach with a garbage bag in one hand, and the woman with the garbage bag was dressed up very nicely, very inappropriate for the beach. Out in front of this woman who's collecting the trash is a guy who's got his phone out, and he's either taking pictures of her or making a video of her.

She'd go along the beach and stoop down, pick up a piece of trash, throw it in the trash bag, all the while this guy is, I'm assuming, videoing her. After doing that a couple of times, the guy taking the pictures or the video stops, and he comes over to where she is, and the two of them look at the camera, look at the phone, at what he's captured on the phone, and they nod at each other like, oh yeah, this is good.

Satisfied with what was captured on the phone, the woman literally dropped the garbage bag there on the beach, and the two of them walked away. What was going on there? Clearly, this woman was capturing some positive of her videos to post on her Facebook account or her Instagram account, because she wanted everybody to look at her and see how virtuous she is.

If they had any idea what she just did, they'd think anything of her, but that she's virtuous. This is typical of our society. We're living in this day where everybody is taking pictures of themselves and posting pictures of themselves, saying, look at me, look at me, look how good I am, like me, approve of what I'm doing, approve of who I am.

I preached on this passage a couple weeks ago in our Sunday morning service, and pointed out that the Pharisees had camera phones and Instagram been around at the time. They would have been early adopters, and they would have been very diligent about having photos taken of them as they gave their alms, or as they prayed, or as they fasted.

These are the things that Jesus addresses in chapter 6. He says, when you give your alms, in verse 2, he says, don't be like the hypocrites who sound a trumpet. Give secretly. Give in such a way that your right hand doesn't know what your left hand is doing.

What's he saying? He says, don't pay any attention to who you are, to what you're doing, and to get accolades of men. Then he says in verses 5 and following, when you pray, don't be like the hypocrites.

They love to pray standing in the synagogues or on the street corners, so everybody will see them and say, wow, what a pious prayer warrior this guy is. No, Jesus says, they have their reward when they pray like that.

He says, when you pray, go to your room, shut the door, and leave it up to your Father in secret to see you. When you fast, you get dropped down in chapter 6 to verse 16, don't be like the hypocrites who mar their faces.

Let's see what he says. He says, they have a sad countenance. They disfigure their faces that they may appear to men to be fasting. These are Instagram guys, aren't they? Look at me. Like me. Approve what I'm doing.

Approve who I am. What's Jesus say about all this? He says, forget about yourself. When you do deeds of righteousness, whether we're talking about the spiritual disciplines of prayer, Bible reading, Bible memory, going to church, giving, whatever the spiritual discipline, don't do it so that you'll be seen by men.

Don't care about being seen by men. Do it for the glory of God. Give is unto the Lord. Pray to the Lord. Fast, because you have a burden on your heart that only the Lord can solve. You don't care about anything else but taking that thing to the Lord.

Make it all about your God, not all about you. This is what Jesus is saying. These are the key ways of overcoming life in the Instagram generation, where we want everything to be all about me. Like me.

Give me a thumbs up. Approve me. Approve what I'm doing. Our only concern must be what our Father sees as we do our righteous deeds, if you will, before him. Let's have that kind of a heart. Our Father and our God, I pray that you would deliver us from the self-centered, self-focused, self-absorbed way of life that even distorts and corrupts what would otherwise be good deeds, we pray.

In Jesus' name and for his sake. Amen. I hope your week gets off to a good start. Maybe if you're in the Sog Valley area, come see us tonight, seven o 'clock, for the third message in the Heaven Tour.

Or fourth message, actually, in the Heaven Tour. Hope you can make it. God bless.