Wednesday of the Eleventh Week in Ordinary Time
Matthew 6:1-6,16-18

“And your Father who sees what is hidden will repay you.”

Today’s Gospel Reading has three parts, but all three have one thing in common.  In fact, these three parts have something in common with the Gospel Readings of several recent days.

When we first listen to today’s Gospel Reading, we might consider it a good program for our spiritual lives.  The first part concerns the performance of “righteous deeds”:  in the Church, we might call these the corporal and spiritual works of mercy.  The second part concerns the offering of prayers.  The third part concerns fasting, which is but one type of self-denial or self-sacrifice, many types of which are important to the spiritual life.

However, what these three have in common is that they’re not about what Jesus is talking about.  Jesus is not preaching to us here about righteous deeds, prayers, and works of self-denial.  What is He preaching to us about?

Go back to the preaching of Jesus that we’ve heard at the past few weekday Masses.  Within the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus in last Wednesday’s Gospel Reading declared:  “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets.  I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.”  Then He gave a series of examples, beginning each by saying:  “You have heard that it was said…”, and then declaring, “But I say to you: ….”

In that light, consider again what Jesus preaches about in today’s Gospel Reading.  Were any of these three—righteous deeds, prayer, and self-denial—unknown in the days of the Old Testament?  Of course not.  The Old Testament is full of a variety of examples of righteous deeds, prayers, and self-denial.

So in commanding His disciples to carry out righteous deeds, prayers, and works of self-denial, Jesus was not preaching anything new.  Instead, Jesus is preaching today about why we carry out these three.  Do we carry them out to impress others?  Do we carry them out to feel better about ourselves?  Or instead, do we carry them out from love for God the Father?  In tomorrow’s Gospel Reading, Jesus will give His disciples the only prayer He ever taught:  the Our Father.  This prayer crowns everything that Jesus has been preaching about in the Sermon on the Mount, and sums up everything we need to know about following Jesus and acting in His Name.