<p>6:18<em>&nbsp;So you will not be seen by men to fast, but by your Father who is unseen; and your Father, who sees in secret</em>- Gk. &lsquo;the One who is in secret / hidden&rsquo;. The hiddenness of God is in the sense that He specifically looks at the hidden man of the heart (1 Pet. 3:4). This is the sphere in which He operates and sees.</p>
<p><em>Shall reward you- </em>&quot;Openly&quot;. Who we will eternally be in the Kingdom, is who we were secretly in this life. What we think about as we fall asleep, as we travel, walk down streets&hellip; this is the essence of the life in Christ. The change of nature we will experience at the Lord&rsquo;s return will simply be a physical manifestation of who we are in spirit in this life. We will be made manifest [s.w.], declared openly, at the day of judgment (1 Cor. 3:13). This means that we will be preserved as we spiritually are in this life. This means that the development of our spiritual person is of paramount importance, because that is how we shall eternally be. The Lord goes right on to warn against materialism (:19,20). But that is in the context of the paramount need for the development of spiritual mindedness. It is petty materialism which is the greatest enemy of this development- the cares of this life and the attainment of material wealth are what crowd out spiritual thinking. The treasure, the most important thing in our life, is our &ldquo;heart&rdquo;, our thinking (6:21; &ldquo;the good treasure of the heart&rdquo;, 12:35). Building up spirituality is placed in opposition to building up material wealth.</p>