What Are You Investing In?

Where is Your Investment?

Hebrews 11:1-11:16

(Intro)

A preacher named Ray Stedman traveled across the country for a week of meetings. The only problem was, his baggage didn’t make it. He needed a couple of suits so he went down to the local thrift shop.

When he told the salesman, "I’d like to get a couple of suits," the man smiled, led him to a whole rack of them and said, "Good, we’ve got several. But you need to know they came from the local mortuary. They’ve all been cleaned and pressed, but they were used on stiffs. Not a thing wrong with ’em. I just didn’t want that to bother you."

Stedman said, "No, that’s fine." He tried a few of the suits on and finally bought two of them for about $25 dollars each.

When he got back to this his room, he began to get dressed for the evening’s meetings. As he put one on, he tried to put his hands in the pockets, but couldn’t. Both sides were all sewn up! The suits looked as if they had pockets, but they were just flaps on the coat. He thought about that for a second. “Of course! Dead people don’t carry stuff with ’em when they die.”

What are we going to need when we die? We won’t need our billfolds, we won’t need our keys, pictures, credit cards, debit cards, or money - we will not need them!

The more I think about it, I don’t have to be a slave to those things now while I am alive. This is a temporary stay, yeah I have to get buy, like Rally’s slogan says, “You Gotta Eat!” But is my life about money and things or am I just passing through? Looking forward to the day when I finally get home!

All this just helps me to remember that:

I am an alien in this world, therefore all that I am and all that I have is invested in God and His kingdom!

(Me)

You know for me I have to be constantly reminded of what it means to be an alien.

I grew up in the era of ET. I loved that show. I can still see the scenes where ET phones home and he rides off. ET was not from here, he was different. Who he was and what he had was not a part of this world.

I also remember shows like Alien and Cone heads. They were weird movies and if you have not seen them don’t run out and rent them or buy them but they are constant reminders for me that I am not a part of this world. When I think of an alien, I think of someone or something that is just visiting here – they have no stake in anything here and they certainly don’t own anything here. They are just passing through.

So when I think of myself and I think about how I have given all that I am and all that I own to God – I am just a visitor, just passing through. God has set me apart, I am one of His. I changed my allegiance when I gave my life to Him. I am a citizen of heaven.

(We)

Now you may be wandering what does this have to do with me? Why is this important?

We all know many people who live for this world. They are doing just fine. We know people with money and lots of things, who clearly live for the world and all its things and they seem happy, after all they can buy all they want when they want.

You may be sitting here this morning wandering where you citizenship is. Are you an alien? Are you a citizen of this world or are you a citizen of heaven? Can you be both or maybe you are just trying to understand what this all means!

I propose that if we do take this seriously and we live our lives like we are aliens, strangers in this land that we will not be enslaved by it any longer. We will be free to live for the God who gave His all for us. We will no longer invest in this world but we will need to invest in God and His kingdom.

Transition: The awesome thing about this is God tells us all about it in His word. We are not the first ones dealing with this issue:

(God)

Look at Hebrews 11:1-16 with me. READ

The writer of Hebrews lists 4 of the greatest heroes of the Old Testament: Abel, Enoch, Noah, and Abraham. They were aliens in this world, all they had and that they were was invested in their real home and in their God who they would be with throughout all eternity! They were just passing through this land. They invested in God.