Twice over in the Sermon on the Mount are recorded the pregnant words—“Thy Father which sees in secret shall reward thee openly.” There is a world of meaning enshrined in these ten words.
First God sees in secret. We all believe this, but do we all act as if we did? We often let ourselves go, when no earthly restraining eye is upon us, and forget our Father, who sees in secret.
If there is one Christian virtue that is wholesome and safe it is sincerity—to be real, true, without veneer, in all places and at all times. This will be so, if we are consciously in the presence of God.
To this end the reverent study of God’s Word is most helpful. Have you ever noticed in Hebrews 4:12, where we are told that the Word of God is living and powerful, searching us through and through, that it is followed by verse 13, which passes from the book to the Author, from the Scriptures to God Himself, as if the book and the Author were one and the same, and speaks of all things being “naked and opened to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.” We may deceive and hoodwink our Christian parents, or our Christian brethren, but we cannot hoodwink God. If we are deceitful as between man and man, so much the worse for us as in God’s presence, for everything we do is “naked and opened” under His eye.
There are two classes in Matthew 6:1-8, who get their reward. There is the hypocrite, who gives his alms ostentatiously and publicly, who advertises his piety in prayer by the blare of the trumpet. Our Lord says succinctly and ominously, “Verily I say to you, They have their reward,” a saying twice repeated (vv. 2, 5).
Then there is the other class. Happy is the man that will do his good deeds in secret, not letting his left hand know what his right hand does, who will enter his closet and pray to his Father in secret. Of such we are told they shall be rewarded openly.
This is a principle that has its application in many ways. There are instances of its working in the Scriptures.
Take Joseph. Think of all the years he glorified God in the weariness, pain and unhealthiness of an Egyptian dungeon. See him rewarded openly, when he became the mighty food controller of Egypt, riding in the second chariot of the land, next to Pharaoh himself in power and rank, and he a young man of only thirty years.
Take Moses, who was content, after having been reared in the palace of Pharaoh, to be in the backside of the desert, tending sheep for forty years. See him rewarded openly as he stands before Pharaoh, and calls for plague after plague on the land that was persecuting God’s people.
David is another example. See him in secret slaying the lion and the bear, and God honouring him in public, as in the very sight of the king and the armies of Israel, terrified by the challenge of the mighty giant, he stepped into the breach and with the smooth stone from the brook slew Goliath, and in time became king over Israel.
Take Saul of Tarsus living in seclusion for three years in Arabia, stepping forth to be the Apostle of the Gentiles, and to make his mark upon the world to this day, though well nigh a score of centuries have rolled by.
We earnestly appeal to young Christians to live a life in secret with God. If that is done, the public life will be sweet and straight and honest.
It is reported that a clergyman once asked a theatre manager, if there was a door into the theatre, through which he could pass unobserved. He received a well-merited rebuke, “Sir, there is no door in my theatre through which you can pass unseen by God.”
These are days of slackness, increasing worldliness on the part of Christians. Scripture warns us of these days. They tell us of professing Christians “having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof” (2 Tim. 3:5).
It is almost inconceivable that these professing Christians should be characterized as self-lovers, pleasure lovers more than lovers of God, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, without natural affection, despisers of the good, etc., etc., truly an alarming list, yet so it is.
What are wanted today are serious, earnest, true Christians, living a life in secret with God, and the open reward will surely come. Will you, my reader, by the grace of God be one such?