They Have Their Reward: Matthew 6 and the Applause Trap
Short answer: When Jesus says of the hypocrites, "Most certainly I tell you, they have received their reward" (Matthew 6:16), he is describing a closed account. Their giving, praying, and fasting were performed to be seen by men, and being seen was the whole payment. Nothing is left over for the Father to reward, because the Father was never the audience. This is not a warning against visible obedience, since Jesus also commands, "Even so, let your light shine before men" (Matthew 5:16). It is a warning about motive and aim. Devotion aimed at human applause gets human applause, and that is all it gets. Devotion aimed at the Father gets the Father, and his reward is not exhausted in a moment of notice.
The Setting: The Sermon on the Mount Turns Inward
Matthew 6 sits inside the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus has been describing the character of the kingdom and the righteousness that exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees. Having corrected anger, lust, divorce, oaths, and retaliation, he now turns to three central practices of Jewish piety: almsgiving, prayer, and fasting. These were not fringe activities. They were the recognized pillars of a devout life, and Jesus assumes his disciples will keep doing all three. He does not say stop giving, stop praying, or stop fasting. He says be careful how you do them, because the direction of your aim determines the nature of your reward.
The opening verse sets the frame for everything that follows: "Be careful that you don't do your charitable giving before men, to be seen by them, or else you have no reward from your Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 6:1). The issue is not public visibility as such but the purpose of being seen. A person can give in public without performing for the public. What Jesus targets is the deliberate staging of devotion so that observers will be impressed. The warning is severe because the loss is total: a life of religious activity can be spent entirely on an audience that will not remember it.
Notice the phrase, your Father who is in heaven. Throughout this chapter Jesus keeps pressing the disciples toward a relationship, not merely a code. The one who sees is a Father, and the reward he gives is a Father's reward. That changes the entire calculus. If God is a distant inspector, then human witnesses become the only warmth available to the religious performer. But if God is Father, then his unseen attention is worth more than any crowd's approval. The hypocrite settles for less because he does not believe the Father is watching, or does not value what the Father gives.
It helps to remember who was listening. The crowd included disciples, curious followers, and likely hostile observers. Jesus spoke openly about motives in a culture where honor and shame were public currency. To be seen as righteous was nearly as valuable as being righteous, and sometimes more useful. Into that world Jesus says the quiet thing out loud: the performance is its own payment. This is not cynicism about people; it is honesty about how reward works. Whatever we aim at is what we receive, and no one receives two rewards for the same act.
Theatre Religion and Its Receipt in Full
Jesus describes the hypocrites sounding a trumpet before giving, praying on street corners to be seen, and disfiguring their faces while fasting. The details are vivid and slightly exaggerated, which is typical of Jesus' teaching. He is not giving a rule about trumpets or street corners; he is painting a portrait of devotion turned into theatre. The actor wants an audience, and the audience delivers. The reward is applause, reputation, the quiet satisfaction of being thought devout. It arrives immediately, and it is real. That is precisely the tragedy: the payment is not nothing. It is simply not the reward of the Father.
The word Jesus uses is decisive. In the fasting passage he says, "Most certainly I tell you, they have received their reward" (Matthew 6:16). The verb is in the past tense, a completed transaction. The account is settled. There is no future installment, no additional blessing held in reserve, no Father's smile waiting on the other side of the deed. What they wanted, they got. If a person's deepest desire is to be admired as generous, devout, and disciplined, and that admiration arrives, then nothing has been withheld. The loss is not that they were punished; it is that they were paid in the only currency they asked for.
This should not be read as a prohibition on all public Christian action. Jesus himself taught and healed publicly, and he told his disciples to let their light shine. The difference lies in the aim. Public good done so that people will glorify the Father is obedience. Public good done so that people will glorify the doer is theatre. Same action, opposite direction, opposite reward. The heart can turn the most generous deed into a subtle advertisement for itself, and it can also turn a quiet, unremarkable act into worship that the Father sees and treasures.
Pastorally, this is one of the most searching passages in Scripture because the sin it exposes hides inside good behavior. No one announces, I am praying so you will think well of me. The motive operates below the waterline, and only God sees it clearly. That is why the passage should produce humility rather than finger-pointing. The moment we use it to congratulate ourselves on our own purity of motive, we have joined the very performance Jesus is describing. The right response is not self-congratulation but honest prayer: Father, purify what I cannot fully see in myself.
Secret Deeds and the Father Who Sees
Three times in this passage Jesus promises that the Father who sees in secret will reward. The contrast is deliberate. The hypocrite performs where eyes are watching; the disciple performs where only the Father sees. The secret place is not a location so much as a direction of the heart. It means doing the good thing without arranging for anyone to know, without dropping hints, without keeping score of who noticed. It means that if no human being ever learns of the deed, the deed remains fully worthwhile because the Father saw it. This is freedom, because it removes the exhausting work of managing appearances.
The promise is that the Father rewards. Jesus does not specify the timing or the form of that reward, and we should be careful not to reduce it to money, health, or visible success. The reward of the Father is first of all the Father himself, his approval, his pleasure in his children. It is also the quiet fruit of a life that is not enslaved to human opinion. Sometimes the reward is evident now, in peace and integrity; sometimes it is stored up for the resurrection, when hidden things are brought into the light. Either way, it is not forfeited, and it is not small.
Consider how this reframes ordinary obedience. A person who quietly serves a difficult family member, who prays for an enemy with no one listening, who gives when no appeal is made, is doing exactly what Jesus describes. There is no audience, no recognition, no story to tell afterward. From the outside, nothing appears to be happening. But heaven is not silent. The same Father who numbered the hairs of the disciples' heads sees the hidden deed and does not forget. The secrecy is not a sign that the act is unnoticed; it is the guarantee that the reward will come from the right source.
There is also a warning here about the kinds of recognition we quietly chase in church life. Titles, platforms, being asked to pray publicly, having one's generosity mentioned from the front, the reputation of being a person of deep prayer: these are not wrong in themselves, but they can become the payment we are working for. When they do, the hidden place loses its appeal because no one is watching. A useful test is simple: would I still do this if no one ever knew? If the honest answer is no, the reward we are seeking is probably already being paid out in full.
When the Paycheck Is This Life Only
The principle Jesus teaches is broader than religious practice, and Luke 6:24 states it in stark terms: "But woe to you who are rich! For you have received your consolation." Here the comfort of wealth is itself the consolation, the payment, and it comes in this life only. The rich are not condemned for having money but for having their comfort entirely in it, so that their full reward is exhausted by the present. Jesus is not saying every wealthy person is lost; Abraham was rich, and many faithful believers have resources. He is warning that an all-consuming pursuit of present comfort can quietly settle the account before eternity begins.
This reading connects directly to the message of the Sermon on the Mount, where treasure is stored either on earth or in heaven. If our whole reward is on earth, then we have chosen a perishable payout. A person can be rich in the praise of a congregation, the respect of colleagues, the admiration of a community, and be poor toward God. The applause was the reward. It was received in full. Nothing remains but the haunting question of what the life was actually for. Jesus presses this not to make his disciples miserable but to make them far-seeing.
The same logic shows up in the parables of the banquet and the wedding, where guests who scramble for the best seats receive the humiliation of being moved. In those stories, the one who takes the lowest place is honored by the host, while the one who sought honor has already received it. This is a consistent pattern in Jesus' teaching about reward: the quest for immediate honor forecloses the possibility of a later honor from a greater source. The humble path is not self-hatred; it is the deliberate refusal to collect payment from the wrong payer.
Applying this honestly means asking what we would still be doing if every visible payoff were removed. Would we still serve the church if no one thanked us? Would we still give if no plaque carried our name? Would we still pray if no one heard our eloquence? These are uncomfortable questions, but Jesus intends them to be liberating. Once we stop working for the applause of people, we are free to work for the Lord, and his judgment is far more generous, far more patient, and far more accurate than any crowd's.
Working for the Lord and Not for Men
Colossians 3:23-24 gives the positive counterpart to the warning: "And whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord, and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance; for you serve the Lord Christ." The reward here is described as an inheritance, which is not earned in the way wages are earned but is given by a Father to his children. This is the deeper answer to the hypocrisy problem. We do not escape performance anxiety by trying harder to be humble. We escape it by belonging to the Lord, whose reward is secure and whose gaze is constant.
Working as for the Lord changes the texture of ordinary life. Housework becomes service to Christ. Study becomes stewardship of the mind. Employment becomes a place of honesty and diligence rather than a stage for self-promotion. A believer can be faithful in obscurity because the Lord sees, and can be faithful in public without performing, because the Lord is the audience that matters. The inheritance is not a wage that fluctuates with reviews; it is the settled possession of those who are in Christ, and it is worth more than every temporary approval combined.
There is freedom here for those whose labor is unseen. Many people serve in ways that will never be narrated: the intercessor who prays through the night, the caregiver who never receives a thank-you, the volunteer who shows up and disappears quietly. Jesus' teaching is a standing promise over such service. Nothing is lost. The Father who sees in secret will reward. The reward may not come in this calendar year, and it may not look like the world's recognition, but it is kept for you, and it will not be stolen by anyone's indifference.
Waiting for the Lord's Verdict
Paul takes the principle to its logical end in 1 Corinthians 4:5: "Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord comes, who will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and reveal the counsels of the hearts. Then each man will get his praise from God." The church in Corinth was already dividing over which leaders were more impressive, and Paul refuses to play the game. He does not even fully trust his own self-assessment, because motives are tangled and unseen. The final verdict belongs to the Lord, who will expose what is hidden and reveal the inner counsel of hearts.
The phrase, then each man will get his praise from God, is the hope that answers the entire warning of Matthew 6. The praise of people is unstable, shallow, and quickly spent. The praise of God is settled, true, and given at the right time by the one who knows everything. To seek praise now is to grasp at a counterfeit; to wait for it from God is to receive a verdict that no one can revoke. This is why Paul can be indifferent to human courts of opinion without becoming cold or indifferent to people. He has transferred his case to the right judge.
This also guards us from a quiet form of despair in ministry. Faithful servants sometimes live and die without visible fruit, and their work may look small next to more celebrated ministries. But the Lord is not measuring by visible applause, and his timing is perfect. What was hidden in darkness will be brought to light, and what was done from love for him will be praised by him. That promise is enough to keep a person faithful for a lifetime, and it is enough to make the present lack of recognition bearable.
Living Without the Applause
Putting all of this together, Matthew 6 does not call disciples into a grim, joyless secrecy. It calls them into a restful sort of invisibility, where the need to be noticed is broken by the reality of being known. The Father sees. That sentence, repeated in various forms throughout the passage, is the answer to the applause instinct. Once the Father sees, the person who is unseen by everyone else is not actually unseen. Once the Father rewards, the person who is unrewarded by everyone else is not actually unpaid. The gospel rearranges the economy of approval.
Practical wisdom follows from this. When you give, avoid the impulse to make sure someone knows. When you pray, resist the temptation to perform language for listeners. When you fast or practice any discipline, do it without announcing it. When you serve, let the deed go unrecorded and refuse the small bitterness that comes when it is forgotten. None of this earns anything from God; it simply stops blocking the reward he has promised. The point is not to become impressive in secret, but to become genuinely concerned with pleasing the Father rather than with being seen.
It is worth saying plainly that faithful Christians differ about how much visibility is appropriate in church life, and about whether public testimony and public generosity can be wise and edifying. Jesus does not forbid all public expression. The one thing he forbids is doing these things in order to be seen. A congregation that can celebrate generosity without turning it into a competition, and pray publicly without turning prayer into a performance, has grasped the distinction. Where believers differ on particulars, the aim is clear: do everything for the Father's eyes.
Biblical fidelity check
What this passage establishes is a moral principle about aim and reward: devotion performed to be seen by people receives its payment from people and not from the Father. It does not establish that all public religious activity is sinful, since Jesus himself ministered publicly and commanded his disciples to let their light shine before men. It does not establish that poverty or obscurity is automatically holy, or that wealthy people cannot be saved; Luke 6:24 is a warning about where consolation is placed, not a blanket condemnation of having money. It does not specify the exact nature, timing, or form of the Father's reward, and it should not be pressed into a promise of earthly prosperity.
A common misreading treats this passage as a rule against ever letting anyone see your good works. That reading contradicts Matthew 5:16, where Jesus explicitly tells disciples to let their light shine so that others may see and glorify the Father. The difference is not visibility but direction: whether the deed points observers to God or to the doer. Another misreading assumes the hypocrites were insincere unbelievers with no real devotion at all. Jesus' language is more unsettling than that; they were practicing genuine religious disciplines, and their reward was real, simply not the reward of the Father. The warning lands on all of us.
Other passages that speak to Matthew 6:1-6
The themes of motive, reward, and God's final verdict run through Paul's letters as well. In What Does 1 Corinthians 1:10 Mean? Context, Theology, and Application the focus is on unity rather than applause, but the same concern for the church's public witness before God is present. What Does 1 Corinthians 1:9 Mean? Context, Theology, and Application grounds the believer's security in God's faithful call rather than in human approval. For a broader survey of the letter's opening, 1 Corinthians 1: Called, United, and Boasting in the Lord traces how Paul redirects glory away from impressive leaders, and 1 Corinthians 10: Warnings and Freedom adds sober teaching about doing all things for the glory of God rather than for the praise of others.
Frequently asked questions
Does Matthew 6 forbid all public giving, praying, and fasting?
No. Jesus himself taught and healed publicly, and in Matthew 5:16 he told disciples to let their light shine so that people would see their good works and glorify the Father. The issue is not whether a deed is visible but why it is visible. If it is done to be seen and admired by people, that admiration becomes the reward. If it is done so that God is glorified, public expression can be faithful. The heart's aim, known fully only to God, is what the passage examines.
What exactly is the reward the Father gives to those who seek him in secret?
Jesus does not spell out the reward in detail, and we should be cautious about narrowing it. At minimum it includes the Father's own approval and the settled knowledge that he has seen and not forgotten. It includes peace and integrity in this life, and it points beyond this life to the resurrection, when hidden things are brought to light. It is described elsewhere as an inheritance, which is a family gift rather than a wage. It is not simply a promise of earthly prosperity.
How can I know whether I am serving for God's approval or for people's praise?
A practical test is whether you would still do the thing if no one ever knew. If the honest answer is no, then the approval of people has likely become the payment you are working for. Another sign is resentment when your service goes unmentioned, since that shows how much you were counting on acknowledgment. Since motives are tangled and partly hidden even from ourselves, the right response is not endless self-analysis but prayer that God would purify what we cannot fully see.
