A Word in Season: Treasure in Heaven (Matthew 6:19–21)

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Where is your treasure? The old joke is that some people used to keep all their money in a rolled up sock or something under the bed or they'd hide it around their home.

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But for us, maybe our treasure is in a bank account, our treasure may be in real estate, our treasure may be our car, it might be our property in other respects.

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Maybe our treasure is people and relationships that we have with them, things that we esteem precious.

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But our precious things are easily lost. The Lord Jesus spoke about that in Matthew chapter 6.

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He said, do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal.

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That's one of the particular challenges of earthly treasures. They rot, they can be corrupted, they get destroyed, they can be taken away from us.

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So think about your treasures for a moment. How secure are they?

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What are you investing in and what are you relying on? There are other warnings in the scriptures about some of the dangers of building everything in this life.

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We're told that riches take wings and fly away. We're reminded often, for example, in the book of the

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Psalms, that when we die, the things which we tend to value in this life will pass away from us and pass on to others.

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We cannot take them with us. We cannot in any way preserve them. The Lord Jesus is telling us there in Matthew 6 that the things upon which we tend to rely, the things which we often call precious, that those things are very difficult to preserve, even in this life, let alone at death.

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So what are you investing in and how secure are the things in which you have invested?

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If all your investments are in this world, then you are very insecure and you have nothing really substantial upon which to build.

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But the alternative, as the Lord describes it here, is to lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.

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Our Lord's point here in Matthew chapter 6, verses 19 and 20, is that heavenly treasures are incorruptible, indestructible and cannot be taken away from us.

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That there is nothing to decay in heaven. There is no one who can rob us from what is stored up in heaven.

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And so where our treasures are, there our heart will be also.

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What we count as precious, what we count as our treasure, reveals something about our priorities.

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It reveals something about our heart. If our heart is all taken up with the things of this world, it shows that this is where we're living.

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This is what we're living for. Now, a Christian, though he lives in the world, lives for heaven.

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His best things are there. His chief joys are there.

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His sweetest delights are there. His great prospects are there because his

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God and his Saviour is there. That is what makes heaven heaven to every true believer.

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It is first and foremost the presence of God in Christ Jesus, the sweet realities and the fullness of joy and blessing that is found in the presence of our

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God and our King. And those are treasures which cannot decay or corrupt.

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Those are treasures which cannot be taken away from us. And the heart follows its treasure.

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So if we're Christians, we'll be looking to heaven. We'll be investing in glory.

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Our chief concerns and our great delights will be in the world which is to come.

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And that will then inform the way that we live here. It will make a difference to what we value.

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It will make a difference to how we serve. It will make a difference to what we think about, what we feel about, what we speak about and what we work towards.

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If you don't know God and the treasures of heaven, then you will live for this world.

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You will die in this world and all of the things that you valued here will be swept away.

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But if you trust in Jesus Christ and if you lay up treasures in heaven where your heart then will be, then you have something sweet and precious that will last and outlast anything that this world has to offer.