Three times in this passage Jesus gives the same instruction in three keys: when you give, when you pray, when you fast. Each follows one shape. A warning against doing it like the hypocrites. A command to do it in secret. And the same promise, nearly word for word: 4"your Father who sees in secret will reward you."
"Hypocrite" is a stage word, borrowed from Greek theater, where it named an actor speaking lines behind a mask. Jesus applies it to those who sound a trumpet when they give, 2"that they may be praised by others," and to those who love to pray 5"that they may be seen by others." Everyone in earshot knows what was given and how devout the giver is.
Jesus says of such people, 2"Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward." The Greek word for "received" was used on receipts for bills paid in full. Applause given, applause received, account closed. That is the tragedy in one detail. The performance works exactly as intended and empties out the moment it succeeds. Compare the disciple who gives so quietly that 3"your left hand" does not know what the right is doing. The Father's reward is in the future tense. The account stays open.
Prayer gets the same treatment. 6"Go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret." That was probably the one room in an ordinary house with a door. Fasting follows the same pattern: 17"anoint your head and wash your face," as on any ordinary day, and skip the disheveled look that advertises the hunger. Look normal. Fast anyway. The only witness is a Father who is himself in secret, met in the place a crowd cannot follow.
Earlier in the sermon Jesus told the disciples to let their light shine before others (Matthew 5:16), and here he warns against practicing righteousness 1"in order to be seen by them." The difference is the aim. The same act can be a light or a performance depending on who it is for.
Jesus also keeps returning to one word in this passage: Father. "Your Father who sees in secret" comes back again and again. The secret place is a family room, and the reward is a Father's attention. Jesus says "when you give," "when you pray," and "when you fast," and assumes all three. These are the ordinary furniture of following him, and the only open question is who they are for.
Jesus is protecting intimacy here, the kind that exists only once nobody else is watching.
Pick one of the three and consider how much of it is visible. It may be that a gift has been mentioned, or a fast announced, or a prayer written in a way meant to be read. Then do one thing this week that only the Father sees, and leave the account open.
Prayer
Father, thank you that you are present in secret, waiting to meet us where no one else can see. Forgive us for performing our faith for an audience when we should have brought it to you alone. Teach us to give, to pray, and to fast as Jesus taught, quietly and without keeping score, trusting that what we do for you in secret you are already keeping account of. In Jesus' name, amen.