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Hear current audio messages by Pastor Scott Burr at:
http://sermon.net/dayspringchurchag

Tuesday, July 27, 2021

Sermons that shape us: Where your treasure is! (Pt.1)

(Part 1)

“Don’t store up treasures here on earth, where moths eat them and rust destroys them, and where thieves break in and steal. Store your treasures in heaven, where moths and rust cannot destroy, and thieves do not break in and steal. Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of your heart will also be. “Your eye is like a lamp that provides light for your body. When your eye is healthy, your whole body is filled with light. But when your eye is unhealthy, your whole body is filled with darkness. And if the light you think you have is actually darkness, how deep that darkness is! “No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other; you will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and be enslaved to money.”-Matthew 6:19-24

One of the things that I love about the Sermon on the Mount is how it shifts the way we look at everything around us. Jesus was revolutionary in the way that he approached religion, social issues, and morality. He was able to look at culture and see dangerous trends and address them by showing us the value of investing in that which is eternal versus that which is temporal.

That is what we see happening here in Matthew 6. Jesus is unveiling a new way to look at money and possessions. Jesus never condemns having money and possessions, but rather uses this moment to shift our perspectives on the purpose of our possessions. 

I think it’s interesting that when Jesus begins the discussion about money and possessions, he doesn’t begin the discussion talking about what kind of things we should be storing up. I would think that would be the natural place to start. What are we to be storing? Jesus, however, starts with the “where” before the “what.” 

“Don’t store up treasures here on earth, where moths eat them and rust destroys them, and where thieves break in and steal. Store your treasures in heaven, where moths and rust cannot destroy, and thieves do not break in and steal.”-Matthew 6:19-20

Before defining for us what he considers to be treasures, He carefully defines the benefit of choosing the right storage conditions. In vs. 19, Jesus begins by pointing out how that treasures stored on earth are susceptible to being eaten and destroyed by moth and rust or stolen by thieves. In vs. 20, He contends that treasures stored in heaven are immune to moths and rust and are unable to be stolen by thieves. 

We call storage facilities that house our treasures-banks. Think about this for just a moment. There are a variety of banks. You have financial institutions that we call banks, but there are also blood banks and food banks. When it comes to storing our possessions, typically, we look at our possessions and decide (based on what we have) where we are going to store it. We choose where to store based on what we have accumulated. That’s how things typically work.

However, what if we decided beforehand where we were going to store things. What if we decided the where before we decided the what. Wouldn’t that cause us to only pursue those things that could be deposited there. If we decided that we are only going to pursue those things that we can store in our heavenly account, wouldn’t that dramatically change the way we look at our possessions, but more so challenge us to evaluate what we are pursuing? 

Pastor Scott Burr


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