Virtue and Reward

 Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.  Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward.  But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. -- Matthew 6:1-4

I have always thought of virtue as something that God approves of, perhaps even something He has led me to do.  The Lord enables and empowers us to act righteously, and He often gives us opportunities to exercise virtue, to meet the needs of those around us.  

Virtue does not require consensus.  All the right people don't have to agree about what is good.  Not in God's universe -- maybe it's different over in the twitterverse.  I don't know.  

Jesus tells us here that we should not seek to curry favor with the public by our acts of righteousness.  We should keep them quiet, and do good, as much as possible, privately.  Do good out of humility.  Pride is always something we have to guard against.  As the  Lord told Cain, "[I]f you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door.  Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it" (Genesis 4:7).  Pride is the foundational sin, and it can be subtle, insidious, lurking.  I'll be doing all right and suddenly find myself thinking that I really am something, after all.  

Keeping our virtue quiet is one way to avoid having other people brag on us and inflate our sense of worth.  Not that you shouldn't have a sense of worth, it should just be based, not on works, but on the love Christ has for us made manifest in the Cross.  

And, in light of the Cross and all that has been done for me, to what do my acts of righteousness amount?