September 26

Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.—Matthew 5:16.

SOME are perplexed because after these words, our Lord said, Take heed that ye do not your righteousness before men to be seen of them. For so the mind of him who is weak in understanding is disturbed, as desirous to obey both precepts, and distracted by diverse, and contradictory commandments. For a man can as little obey but one master, if he give contradictory orders, as he can serve two masters, which the Saviour himself hath testified in the same Sermon to be impossible. What then must the mind that is in this hesitation do, when it thinks that it can not, and yet is afraid not to obey? For if he set his good works in the light to be seen of men, that he may fulfill the command, Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven; he will think himself involved in guilt because he has done contrary to the other precept which says, Take heed that ye do not your righteousness before men to be seen of them. And again, if fearing and avoiding this, he conceal his good works, he will think that he is not obeying him who commands, saying, Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works.

But he who is of a right understanding, fulfills both, and will obey in both the Universal Lord of all, who would not condemn the slothful servant, if he commanded those things which could by no means be done.

The very words of the gospel carry with them their own explanation; nor do they shut the mouths of those who hunger, seeing they feed the hearts of them that knock. The intention of a man's heart, its direction and its aim, is what is to be regarded. For if he who wishes his good works to be seen of men, sets before men his own glory and advantage, and seeks for this in the sight of men, he does not fulfill either of those precepts which the Lord has given as touching this matter; because he has at once looked to doing his righteousness before men to be seen of them; and his light has not so shined before men that they should see his good works, and glorify his Father which is in heaven. It was himself which he wished to be glorified, not

God; he sought his own advantage, and loved not the Lord's will. Of such the apostle says, For all seek their own, not the things which are Jesus Christ's. Accordingly, the sentence was not finished at the words, Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works; but there was immediately subjoined why this was to be done; that they may glorify your Father which is in heaven; that when a man who does good works is seen of men, he may have only the intention of the good works in his own conscience, but may have no intention of being known, save for the praise of God, for their advantage to whom he is thus made known; for to them this advantage comes, that God who has given this power to man begins to be well-pleasing to them; and so they do not despair, but that the same power might be vouchsafed to themselves also if they would. And so he did not conclude the other precept, Take heed that ye do not your righteousness before men, otherwise than in the words, to be seen of them; nor did he add in this case, that they may glorify your Father which is in heaven, but rather, otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in heaven. For by this he shows us, that they who are such, as he will not have his faithful ones to be, seek a reward in this very thing, that they are seen of men—that is in this they place their good—in this they delight the vanity of their heart—in this is their emptiness, and inflation, their swelling, and wasting away. For why was it not sufficient to say, Take heed that ye do not your righteousness before men, but that he added, that ye may be seen of them, except because there are some who do their righteousness before men; not that they may be seen of them, but that the works themselves may be seen; and the Father which is in heaven, who hath vouchsafed to endow with these gifts the ungodly whom he had justified, may be glorified?

They who are such, neither do they account their righteousness as their own, but his, by the faith of whom they live; even as the apostle says, That I may win Christ, and be found in him, not having mine own righteousness which is the law, but that which is of the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith. Whosoever then wish their good works to be seen of men, that he may be glorified from whom they have received those things which are seen in them, and that thereby those very persons who see them, may through the dutifulness of faith, be provoked to imitate the good, their light shines truly before men, because there beams forth from them the light of charity; others receive benefit, and God is glorified.