“Do not be seized with alarm and struck with fear, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom! Sell what you possess and give donations to the poor; provide yourselves with purses and handbags that do not grow old, an unfailing and inexhaustible treasure in the heavens, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” Luke 12:32-34 [AMP]
The BITE in yesterday’s post was that we should “Seek the Kingdon” and now we are seeing here that “its the Father’s good pleasure to give us the Kingdom”. Then Jesus tells us what that looks like.
Jesus again discussing the comparison of earthly and heavenly riches. He teaches His followers to concentrate on the ‘real’ riches, Heavenly Treasure. This can look like selling our earthly possessions or even giving them or the proceeds away. However, we should not take away a message that Jesus requires all His followers to sell all their possessions. Jesus was entertained by Martha and He later set watch of His own mother under the roof of one of His disciples. Jesus is not set on the mission to create a class of holy paupers; this would be to sin against love because those holy paupers would become a load on their hardworking neighbors. In neither one of the cases of Martha or the disciple that took His mother in, did Jesus rebuke His follower because they had possessions. Jesus and His followers had money to buy food and give alms.
I think it is pretty clear that Jesus is not excluding private ownership; but he is placing emphasis on the fact that believers must not be dominated by their possessions.
“Trust in riches prevents trust in God.”
When ‘trust in riches’ takes place, the things we own become a deadly barrier to the life Jesus wants for us (His Kingdom). Real riches are a treasure that does not fail, found in purses that do not grow old. These riches are safe from thieves, from rot, and from moths (which eat away at some forms of earthly riches, e.g. clothes). The heart and the treasure go together. Anyone’s heart, the concentration of his energies and interests, is always with his treasure; in other words, the things he values most.
Application:
If I look deep down -> what do I treasure? What possessions do I have that I don’t have loose hands with? What earthly material am I chasing? Having just sent Bella off for a 9-month missions trip where all she has fits in a 65-liter backpack, can I grow to a place that when she returns, I too have made movement to have Kingdom.