Today’s Podcast
Today’s Bible reading plan:
Read it in a year – Matthew 8-10
see the whole year’s plan [here](http://www.bible-reading.com/bible-plan.pdf)
Today’s Devotional
Matthew 6:19-21
Jesus: Some people store up treasures in their homes here on earth. This is a shortsighted practice—don’t undertake it. Moths and rust will eat up any treasure you may store here. Thieves may break into your homes and steal your precious trinkets. Instead, put up your treasures in heaven where moths do not attack, where rust does not corrode, and where thieves are barred at the door. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?
Well, to see if Jesus words hold true, I took a look at the stock markets from a year ago today. Google is up from a year ago. That’s good news if you have stock in Google. Almost everything else is down from a year ago today. Over the last couple of weeks, everything has taken a nose dive. It’s only a drop of five or six percent, but that represents trillions of dollars of investments for people who planned their retirements or some big windfall on the continuing rise of the stock market. So much for storing up your treasures in stocks. In the long run, it just doesn’t work. It finally runs out and you can’t take it with you.
How about gold and silver and precious gems? Well, it sounds good, but someone has to buy it, right? So if you have a few pounds of gold sitting around your house it sounds like a great investment. But what happens if the economy really crashes? Do you think your local grocer will accept a hunk of gold for your groceries? He might, but probably not. I doubt if he wants to worry about figuring out the purity of the gold, weighing it, storing it, figuring out how much it’s worth, and providing security for it. Gold is really a pain to have on hand in any quantity. Ask Fort Knox!
When the economy goes kapluey, who’s going to buy your gold, anyway? Who can afford it? What will it be worth? You’re stuck with a lump of gold that you’d happily give away for a scrap of food if someone would give it to you. But ask the Argentinians who a few years ago went through run away inflation what gold was worth to them. Those things will be meaningless to you.
So if gold and silver and stocks and priceless jewels and all those earthly treasures are meaningless, what are we to store up? What treasures can Jesus be talking about when He says to store them in heaven?
If we back up to the beginning of His discourse on the mountain, I think we begin to understand His meaning. Jesus has talked about attitudes being right. He’s talked about thoughts set on goodness and love. He’s talked about keeping your mind out of the gutter and instead offering simple meaningful praise to God. He’s talked about giving to others generously without fanfare. He’s talked about faithfulness to spouses, friends, even enemies. Jesus talked about a new lifestyle from that seen in most circles of society.
From the previous sixty verses Jesus has already laid out a kind of living that turned the general thinking of the religious community upside-down. He has already said enough to cause the Pharisees to hate Him and want His blood. Jesus has already declared their practices shallow, vain, and worthless. He tells those who will listen to His sermon that God has a better plan for them. God has ushered in a new covenant with all humankind. Salvation has arrived, not from doing good deeds. It didn’t come from obeying all the rules. Salvation didn’t come from being religious.
Salvation comes from a change in attitude. It comes from our relationship with God and particularly our relationship with His Son, Jesus the Christ. Through these sixty verses, Jesus has talked about things that affect our relationship with God and others. God wants a vibrant, living relationship with us. He wants our attention. Just like your spouse or your best friend wants your attention to keep your relationship strong, so does God. He wants to talk to you through His word and He wants you to talk to Him through prayer. God wants to communicate with you so you learn of Him, not just about Him.
Everything Jesus tells us to this point leads us toward building our treasure in heaven. It’s not brownie points of doing good, but rather it’s loving God with your all your strength, mind, soul, and spirit. It’s loving your neighbor as yourself. It’s building relationships with others. It’s sharing God’s love with everyone you meet. It’s telling others what God does in your life, witnessing to His amazing grace. That’s your real treasure. Everyone of those people you introduce to God’s kingdom, those are the real treasures you put away in heaven. Eternal friends and family. Those relationships will go on forever.
So, like Jesus says, “Instead, put up your treasures in heaven where moths do not attack, where rust does not corrode, and where thieves are barred at the door. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved. In accordance with the requirements for FTC full disclosure, I may have affiliate relationships with some or all of the producers of the items mentioned in this post who may provide a small commission to me when purchased through this site.