"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness! No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money” (Matt. 6:19-24, NIV).
“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth…”
What is our “treasure”?
As God’s children, do we know what should be our real treasure?
The word “treasures” refer not just to money, or material wealth, but also to anything that we highly value, or we greatly enjoy or delight in.
Not only gold or our bank accounts, but we can greatly value our job, family, hobby, friends, ambitions, or whatever material possession. We can also treasure our own personal beliefs, behavior, lifestyle, or even our lifetime in this world.
Does it mean we should not appreciate the material blessings, or whatever favor God allows us to enjoy?
We should enjoy and be thankful for them. But we should not “store up” for ourselves those treasures on earth. We need to be content with whatever God allows us to enjoy.
For anything we treasure, we pursue or seek even relentlessly until we have it. Also, we persist to accumulate it as much as we can. And we are ready to sacrifice or to forego other things just to have what we really value.
God’s Word reminded us that whatever valuable thing on this earth would ultimately be lost – “where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.” The “treasures on earth” are fleeting, or temporary. We could not prevent them from being taken away from us. So, they could not bring complete, total, or permanent joy and satisfaction.
We also read in Job 20:20-22, “Surely he will have no respite from his craving; he cannot save himself by his treasure. Nothing is left for him to devour; his prosperity will not endure.
In the midst of his plenty, distress will overtake him; the full force of misery will come upon him.”
So, God’s Word tells us: “But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven…”
Just what do you mean by that? Should we send our valuables in heaven for safekeeping?
Notice the last part of verse 24, “You cannot serve both God and Money.”
Do you get it? “Treasures on earth” represent “Money,” while “treasures in heaven” represent God.
What we should regard as our “Treasure” is the Magnificent God. He is the “treasure in heaven” (Matt. 19:21; Mark 10:21). He is the “…treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys” (Luke 12:33).
Indeed, we need to value Him highly. And in Him, we ought to delight exceedingly, or to rejoice with Him with an unspeakable joy! Yes, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind” (Luke 10:27).
Now, notice how God wanted Abraham to regard Him.
We read in Genesis 15:1, “After this, the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision: ‘Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, YOUR VERY GREAT REWARD.’" He is our Great Treasure.
No wonder the Psalmist declared:
“Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has NOTHING I DESIRE BESIDES YOU. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever” (Ps. 73:25-26). He is the Treasure we should desire on earth.
We also read in Psalm 43:4, “Then will I go to the altar of God, to God, my joy and my delight. I will praise you with the harp, O God, my God.” He is the Treasure we ought to delight in.
Consider also what David proclaimed in Psalm 16:11, “You will make known to me the path of life; In Your presence is fullness of joy; In Your right hand there are pleasures forever” (NASU). He is the Treasure we can have pleasure forevermore.
Let’s listen to the Apostle Paul: “But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ” (Phil. 3:7-8).
Could we consider “rubbish” the treasures on earth compared to the true Treasure? Is it also our goal to gain it?
And could we say, “…I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me… But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 3:12-14)?
On our own human perception alone, unfortunately, we cannot regard Christ or God as our Treasure. We are unable to grasp the Supreme Worth of God. We tend to appreciate only the things we feel, see, or what our human faculties could experience.
We read in 2 Corinthians 4:4-6, “The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.”
Only by God’s mercy – through His Spirit – that we can behold “the glory of God in the face of Christ.” Through the Holy Spirit, we are given “the light” to see the Divine Value or Glory of God, or Christ.
Speaking of the Spirit, Jesus Christ said: “He will testify about me” (John 15:26) and “He will bring glory to me” (John 16:14). According to John Piper, “That means he will make Christ appear glorious to the hearts of his people. He will make him appear and be experienced as a treasure.”
And as His Spirit dwells in us, we will also realize that we have already the “Treasure” in us!
As Paul wrote, “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God?...” (1 Cor. 6:19.) And we read in 2 Corinthians 4:7, “But we have this treasure in jars of clay…”
Does the Spirit make His exceeding worth appear also in our hearts? Does He reveal Himself and let us savor Him as the “Treasure in Heaven”? “For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said: ‘I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people’" (2 Cor. 6:16).
If we really realize His Supreme Worth – indeed, the Treasure in Heaven – we’ll agree with these words in Isaiah 44:9, “All who make idols are nothing, and the things they treasure are worthless.” Like Paul, we’ll be prepared to lose all those things we once valued and “consider them rubbish,” so we could just gain the Great Treasure.
We will not grieve His Spirit, rather we’ll strive to be filled by Him.
We will seek intensely for God. We will really hunger and thirst for Him. We will focus and fix our mind on Him. We will rejoice every moment we invest in Him.
Truly, we will love the Lord God -- our Treasure -- with all our heart and with all our soul and with all our strength and with all our mind!
PRAYER: Our Sovereign God – our Merciful Father and Everlasting Treasure, whose Worth we cannot fully comprehend – once again, we lift Your Holy Name in our life and acknowledge Your Great Worth. Our heart greatly rejoice for by Your Grace You made us realize and experience Your Value. In Jesus’ Name, we pray. Amen.
