Insightful Musings on the Scriptures

by

Raymond P. Sparre
Northwest University class of '67

Greetings, dear ones.

When I’ve gone out in the morning darkness to scan the area with a flashlight in search of glowing yellow eyes, none have appeared. Of course it could be related to the fact that we’ve been shutting the doors of the chicken house of late so the raccoon bandits don’t have such free access.

Becki is making biscuits and egg gravy—one of my favorite breakfasts—to put on before she taxis Kaden to his school bus stop. He spent one night again following his day at school yesterday. We took the boys last evening to the new Cabela’s store at Tualatin. Big interesting place. We also did something I’ve not done in years—ate in a Burger King. If we ate primarily for taste and pleasure, I suppose I could be eating Whoppers all the time. But we’ve come to be rather paranoid of popular processed foods in general. To gather some reason for that paranoia, all I need to do is observe the size and shape of many, if not most, of the people who dine in those kinds of places. And I think there may be some worthwhile parallels between this kind of being careful with being careful over what we consume as food for thought—psycho-spiritual food. We definitely need to be consumers of the Word (Matt. 4:4).

Wish you could join in our fairly natural breakfast—with raw milk, raw fruits, raw honey, and whole wheat biscuits from scratch. Even the eggs are from scratch. You should see the chickens scratch around all over the place as they free-range.

Be blessed. Love, Dad/Ray.

From our reading of the previous chapter, we established that acts of righteousness are not the standard God uses for allowing access to His heaven. That’s where Jesus affirmed “…that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:20). But let’s not over-react and throw out acts of righteousness as non-important. In the passage before us Jesus helps us to balance out the matter with added clarification. Let me attempt to capture that clarification with three simple points:

1. ‘Acts of righteousness’ are important to perform and pursue as a continuing lifestyle for believers. But heart motivation makes all the difference as to whether or not those acts are of the right quality in the view of the Father. And, of course, absolutely nothing is outside His view.
2. ‘Acts of righteousness’ must be motivated from an attitude of service to God and others rather than trying to win points with God and others—as a means to attract attention to oneself and build one’s selfish image.
3. ‘Acts of righteousness’ do win rewards, consequences, or nothing in the administration of God’s Kingdom.

I’m pondering Colossians 3:22-25 where Paul is inspired with these instructions: “Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything; and do it, not only when their eye is on you and to win their favor, but with sincerity of heart and reverence for the Lord. Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for his wrong, and there is no favoritism.”

Notice the first couple words of the FOCUS VERSE—“Be careful.” There may be those who sense some discouragement with this kind of talk—as though the successful Christian life is so complicated and technical so as to be beyond their reach. You have to be careful about this and that, and this and that, and this and that—whew! I, for one, find a great deal of encouragement in the simple standard of a HEART AFTER GOD. Perhaps the most simplified and fundamental premise of that heart condition is this: THE PURPOSE OF MY VERY EXISTENCE IS TO SERVE AND PLEASE MY MAKER. I judge that if I can be careful about pursuing and maintaining that, everything else will fall into acceptable order so as to be qualified for His approval, blessing—as well as the incredibly wonderful by-product benefit of heaven.