Tuesday 26th August – Tuesday of week 21 of the year

Reflection: Matthew 23:23-26

HYPOCRISY

Many Christians and ministers of God have been condemned by allowing the virus of hypocrisy to take root and spread in their ministries. They cover up sin and vices and end up deceiving those that God has entrusted to them. They die slowly in their spirit man as they fail to acknowledge the fact that our God is all knowing and can discern the depths of man’s heart. Is this not applicable to you and me when we seek to become acceptable to men at the expense of pleasing God?

Beloved, anything born out of falsehood cannot be pleasing to God even when it seems right to man. The message of truth which we must witness as children of God must be done with all sincerity and truth so that we would not be condemned just as the teachers of the law in our reading today. JUSTICE, MERCY and HONESTY as pointed out in today’s reading (Matthew 23:23) must prevail;

JUSTICE is doing unto others what we want them to do to us. (Matthew 7:12)

MERCY is showing compassion and having a kind heart to forgive and accommodate those that have caused us pain. This is practically keeping God’s great mercy in view and availing ourselves to its grace to reciprocate it in own little way.

HONESTY is standing for the truth and never covering up falsehood but exposing it to the light of Christ.

Let us therefore strife to never entertain falsehood in our journey of faith but seek to be pleasing to God and then to man.

PRAYER: Lord Jesus, help me to be pleasing to you in my heart, my utterance and my deeds. Amen.

KNOW YOUR FAITH: YOUCAT 455– What does it mean to be truthful?

Truthfulness means that one acts sincerely and speaks honestly. The truthful individual guards against double-dealing, misrepresentation, malicious deception, and hypocrisy. The worst form of untruthfulness is perjury.

 HIDE A TREASURE: “Clean what is inside the cup first, and then the outside will be clean too.” Matthew 23:26 GNB

Readings for Today: 2 Thessalonians 2:1-3a. 14-17; Ps 96:10 -13; Matthew 23:23-26