Can you imagine this man? Perhaps he’s ploughing a field, just a paid worker, but he suddenly comes across a great treasure, just below the surface. He can’t believe his luck! But what’s he to do? He knows he can’t just take it. The field doesn’t belong to him. Perhaps it’s too big to dig up and take away in any case. But he’s filled with joy at the thought of owning this treasure.
So he covers it up again, goes home and sells up absolutely everything he owns, so he can get enough cash together to buy the field. You can imagine the champagne flowing as he celebrates his good fortune with his family. He’s set up for life.
Then there’s the merchant, a trader in precious pearls. He really knows his stuff! One day he comes across a superb pearl. It’s huge; its sheen is almost translucent and he realises that this specimen could make his fortune in the right market. And again he’s overjoyed at this discovery. He too is so overjoyed that he quickly goes home and sells absolutely everything he can lay his hands on so he can afford this perfect pearl.
Now can you see that the major theme in these two parables is joy? The joy of discovery, the joy of owning something that’s priceless, a joy that makes everything else fade into insignificance. This is a joy that’s life changing. These men have found a treasure that’s so great they’re willing to give up everything to get their hands on it.
Joy is an interesting thing isn’t it? Some people go searching for joy and never find it, while others find it in the simplest thing. And one of the most interesting thing about joy is that you can’t actually find it by looking for it. You won’t make someone joyful by just telling them to be joyful. You have to first point them to something that’ll be a source of joy for them.
C. S. Lewis in his book "Surprised by Joy" describes his pilgrimage towards a knowledge of God, which he describes as a search for Joy. At one stage of his description he talks about discovering that he’d been looking for the wrong thing. He says "I perceived that … I had been … wrong in supposing that I desired Joy itself. Joy itself, considered simply as an event in my own mind, turned out to be of no value at all. All the value lay in that of which Joy was the desiring."
His problem was that he was looking for something that he noticed other people had: this joy. The problem was, he hoped to find it outside of Christianity, which he could only think of, at that stage, as mere mythology. He tells how one day as he travelled alone on a bus he was presented with a choice. He suddenly became aware that he was holding something at bay or shutting something out. He says it was as though he was wearing some sort of stiff clothing like a corset, or even a suit of armour, as though he were a lobster. He felt himself at that moment being given a choice, to unbuckle the armour or to keep it on; to open the door or shut it. It was a completely free choice, without threat or promise.
Well, he chose to open up, to remove the armour. But still that wasn’t it. He still hadn’t found the source of joy. All he’d done was take a step in the right direction. He still had to encounter Jesus Christ, God incarnate. It was when that happened, he says, that his life was changed around. And ironically, from that point on, joy itself became unimportant. It was valuable only as a pointer to something other and outer.
So what is it in this parable that gives these men such joy? What is this great treasure that Jesus is referring to? Well, he says, it’s the Kingdom of Heaven. That’s a start. But we can say more about it than that. Paul takes up this idea of treasure in Colossians 2, our first reading today. He says: "I want their hearts to be encouraged and united in love, so that they may have all the riches of assured understanding and have the knowledge of God’s mystery, that is, Christ himself, 3in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." You see, the treasure of the Kingdom of heaven is tied to Jesus himself. With a knowledge of Jesus comes a knowledge of God, and hence all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. But there’s more to it than even that. Let me remind you of a passage from Isaiah 55: 1Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you that have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. 2Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food. 3Incline your ear, and come to me; listen, so that you may live. … 6Seek the LORD while he may be found, call upon him while he is near; 7let the wicked forsake their way, and the unrighteous their thoughts; let them return to the LORD, that he may have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. 8For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the LORD."
Do you see what the treasure is in that passage from Isaiah? It’s what we sang about in the kids song a moment ago. It’s peace with God. The great treasure of the Kingdom of heaven is the forgiveness, the righteousness that Jesus offers freely to all who come to him. That is, it’s all those things proclaimed in the gospel. The offer is for us to come and buy wine and milk, - that is, all that we need to live in comfort, - without money. In fact money can’t buy this treasure. It can only be gladly received as a free gift.
Now don’t miss the paradox here in these parables. The treasure that Jesus is talking about is a free gift. But the men in the two parables go and sell everything they have so they can possess it. Remember, this is a parable about the kingdom of heaven. So how do we resolve this paradox? Well, isn’t this how it is in the Kingdom? The treasure of God’s free gift is of such value that when you find it everything else becomes secondary. Like the man in the first parable you get carried away by the joy of your discovery and everything else that you thought was important is suddenly shown up as worthless by comparison. All our human pursuits are put into perspective. To put this another way, the enjoyment of the grace of the gospel leads to a desire to obey God, to do good works. That’s what we saw in Ephesians 2 wasn’t it? In fact this is the way it’s always been in God’s purposes. Even from the first giving of the law, obedience was meant to be a response to God’s goodness. Do you remember how the 10 Commandments in Exodus 20, begins? "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery."
It was God’s deliverance of Israel that was the motivation for keeping God’s law. And so it is still. We find the treasure and the joy of its discovery leads us to sacrifice everything else so we can keep it.
But let’s not forget that this is the third of three sets of parables. Remember how they started? With the parable of the sower? What happened in that parable? Only a quarter of the seed actually grew to maturity and bore seed, didn’t it? The rest failed to grow beyond the first flush of new growth. For some there was an initial period of excitement but that soon faded away. So there are some who, having seen the treasure, choose not to buy it. Maybe they play with it for a while but then their eyes are distracted by some other flashy thing and they leave the real treasure behind. This is the terrible message of our next parable.
Jesus says the Kingdom of heaven is like a net that was let down into the lake and caught all kinds of fish. When it was full, the fishermen pulled it out, sat down and took out the good fish but threw the bad away. Just as in the parable of the wheat and the weeds, Jesus is talking about the church. The church is the kingdom net that gathers in all kinds of people, with all kinds of motives. There are plenty of people who come into the church because they recognise that there’s a great treasure here but who for one reason or another never take the next step of committing all they have to Jesus and his kingdom. You might be one of those people, still thinking about whether to make a final commitment of your life to Jesus. So this is a warning to us isn’t it? Just belonging to a church is no guarantee that we truly belong to the Kingdom. As we saw two weeks ago the church has all sorts of people in it, and their real motives won’t always be seen before the final day of judgement. So we’re left with a challenge: Have we given up everything else in order to possess this incredible treasure of belonging to God’s Kingdom? Have we committed all we are and all we have to serving Christ as Lord? Have we recognised just how precious this free gift of God is?
Finally, look at the last little parable Jesus throws in as he finishes his series of parables of the Kingdom of heaven: "Have you understood all these things?" Jesus asked. "Yes," they replied. He said to them, "Therefore every teacher of the law who has been instructed about the kingdom of heaven is like the owner of a house who brings out of his storeroom new treasures as well as old."
It’s as though Jesus has finished his lessons and this is the final examination. A few people here today can relate to that I guess. "Have you understood all these parables?" he says. When they assure him they have he gives them a final pep-talk before they go out to teach others. He says if you’ve been properly instructed in the Kingdom of heaven then here’s how you’ll go about teaching. You’ll be like a householder who has guests arriving and so gets out the antique silverware as well as the brand new dinner set. In other words, when you come to teach people about the Kingdom you’ll teach them the new things about Jesus and the new covenant, but as well as that you’ll incorporate the old treasures that come from the old covenant. Jesus doesn’t replace the old covenant, he simply expands and fulfils it. In fact it’s as we study the Old Testament that we come to fully appreciate what Jesus’ coming means to the world, and vice versa. When we study the OT in the light of our knowledge of Christ it comes alive for us. We suddenly finding meaning where before there was only confusion. We suddenly find hope where before there was despair. But as well as that, as we teach one another about the Kingdom, we’re continually finding new applications of old teaching. We’re continually seeking to work out how what we find in God’s word fits in our modern context.
So the task of the teacher, at whatever level you’re teaching, is to bring out of the storehouse treasures that fit your present circumstances. To understand the Scriptures so well that you can interpret them and apply them to the present time.
I guess this little parable sums up the reason that we can hear the parables of Jesus year after year and keep coming up with new ways of understanding and applying them. Their age doesn’t diminish their value, because the truth that Jesus brings is always being refreshed and renewed as we bring it to bear on our particular situations.
So we’re presented here with a series of parables that start and finish with the image of a great treasure. God’s gift of membership in his kingdom is a treasure that’s worth giving up everything else to possess. His gift of his revealed word is a treasure that we can bring out of our storerooms over and over again to apply to each new situation we find ourselves in. But in the middle is a warning and a challenge. Not everyone who gets drawn into the net of the Church takes hold of those treasures. Only time will tell who has failed to take hold of them; but for now, each of us is called to give up all we have to take hold of Christ. We’re called to take up our cross, that is to give up our right to live if necessary, in order to follow Jesus. That’s how precious this great treasure of the Kingdom of heaven is. It’s a free gift, but at the same time it calls for sacrifice of all we have.
So in the coming week, as we face hard decisions, particularly as we face temptation, let’s keep in the forefront of our minds the greatness of the treasure that God has given us, because none of the joys, none of the glitz and glamour, that temptations offer us can compare with the joy of knowing Jesus Christ. And like Paul, let us say: "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 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ." (Phil 3:8-9)
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