Prayer takes the form of increased Bible purchases and the search for that perfect book of Lenten devotion. It is no accident that the annual appeal for the homeless of Houston occurs during the last three or four weeks prior to Ash Wednesday. Christians see their Lord turn the corner toward Good Friday and Easter, and they become so excited, they just have to do something to show that excitement. So they take up all sorts of Lenten disciplines, including alms-giving, prayer, and fasting, in order to express that excitement and work it out of their bodies. In today's gospel Jesus warns what may happen when the discipline of discipleship becomes more important than the master the disciples seek to follow.
People can get so caught up in their piety that they lose sight of the One who evokes that piety.
Alms-giving is paraded in public for the sake of impressing other people. Prayers are uttered ostentatiously so that people overhearing us will be amazed at our spiritual prowess. And the results of fasting are provided to family and fellow-workers by daily announcements of our weight loss. Yet when all is said and done, only a fraction of those who undertake these Lenten disciplines will show up at the foot of the cross on Good Friday. By then they will have become so wrapped up in their devotion, or else so disillusioned by their failure to achieve what their devotion was supposed to obtain for them, that they will miss the main event which occasioned their devotion in the first place.