Do you want to honor Christ’s body? Then do not scorn him in his nakedness, nor honor him here in the church with silken garments [for the altar table] while neglecting him outside where he is cold and naked. For he who said: “This is my body,” and made it so by his words, also said: “You saw me hungry and did not feed me,” and “inasmuch as you did not do it for one of these, the least of my brothers, you did not do it for me.” What we do here in church requires a pure heart, not special garments; what we do outside [of church] requires great dedication. Let us learn, therefore, to be people of wisdom and to honor Christ as he desires. God does not want golden vessels [for the sacraments] but golden hearts.

Now in saying this I am not forbidding you to make such gifts [to the church]; I am only demanding that along with such gifts and before them you give alms. He accepts the former, but he is much more pleased with the latter. In the former, only the giver profits; in the latter, the recipient does too. A gift to the church may be taken as a form of ostentation, but [a gift to the poor] is pure kindness. Of what use is it to weigh down Christ’s table with golden cups, when he himself is dying of hunger? First, fill him when he is hungry; then use the means you have left to adorn his table. Will you have a golden cup made but not give a cup of water? What is the use of providing the table with cloths woven of gold thread, and not providing Christ himself with the clothes he needs? What profit is there in that? Tell me: If you were to see Christ lacking the necessary food but were to leave him in that state and merely surround his table with gold, would he be grateful to you or rather would he not be angry?

Once again, I am not forbidding you to supply these adornments [for the altar]; I am urging you to provide these other things as well, and indeed to provide them first. No one has ever been accused for not providing ornaments, but for those who neglect their neighbor a hell awaits with an inextinguishable fire and torment in the company of the demons. Do not, therefore, adorn the church and ignore your afflicted sisters and brothers, for they are the most precious temple of all.

–John Chrysostom, Homily 50 on Matthew.3-4

In this solemn piece, based on Matthew 25:31-46, Chrysostom warns us to keep our priorities straight in loving Christ. The “golden heart” of which he speaks is key to understanding the right motivation in which to help the poor. We do so not to earn our salvation, an impossibility, nor as a bean counting activity. Rather, we do so because our hearts have been transformed by Christ. We love him and want nothing more than to please him. We remember the inexpressible gift of healing and life we have been given by Christ. We remember we were lost, helpless, and hopeless, but that we were rescued from our alienation from Life by God himself who loves and pursues us madly. This grace allows us to see ourselves in the desperate plight of others and we reach out to help them in love and compassion because we understand the hopelessness and despair of their situation and we desire to do for them, albeit in a much less complete way, what God has done for us in Christ.