TRASH OR TREASURE
Several years ago, Millard Fuller of Habitat for Humanity addressed the National Press Club on public radio, on which he recalled a workshop on stewardship he conducted at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary with 200 pastors in attendance. Conversations about the Church and it’s effectiveness quickly turned to the pastors pointing towards poor stewardship, wrong mindsets and the inability to sacrifice as some of the reasons why the church never had enough money to accomplish its mission in the world.
Millard then asked this seemingly innocent question: Is it possible for a person to build a house so large that it’s sinful in the eyes of God? Raise your hand if you think so. All 200 pastors raised their hands.
Okay, said Millard, then can you tell me at exactly what size, the precise square footage, a certain house becomes sinful to occupy? Silence from the pastors. You could have heard a pin drop. Finally, a small, quiet voice spoke up from the back of the room: When it’s bigger than mine. WE’VE LEARNED TO LIVE BY CIRCUMSTANTIAL CRITERIA.
David Livermore, in his book, Serving with Eyes Wide Open, talks about a friend of his, Ashish, who came from Northern India to visit him in Chicago. They were eating at Gino’s Pizzeria, and there they ran into a youth pastor David knew, along with his youth group. The group had just returned from Central America and they were debriefing.
Ashish, David’s friend from India, asked some of the kids, So what did you learn from your trip? The majority of the them shared how they were overwhelmed at the depth of poverty they witnessed.
After they left, Ashish asked David, Why do they think those kids think the people visited are so poor?
David replied, you are poor compared to any of those kids. It’s hard to get their minds off their consumerist passions. I’m glad they experienced some tension, conflict, struggle.
To which Ashish said, Why is it that Westerners think we’re poor because we don’t have more stuff? What does more stuff have to do with happiness? If consumerism has helped America why do people think it’s the solution to poverty? WE ARE INFLUENCED BY OUR OWN CRITERIA.
Cyprian shared this thought, Their possessions hold them in chains…chains which shackle their courage, choke their faith, hamper their judgment, and throttle their soul…If they stored up their treasure in heaven, they would not now have an enemy and a thief within their own household. They think of themselves as owners, whereas it’s they who are owned: enslaved as they are to their own things, they are not the masters of their possessions but their slaves.
Jesus spoke of two treasuries—one on earth and one in heaven. The treasury of this earth is filled with the temporal, those things that are destined for dust. The stuff of heaven – that which remains eternally, has a criterion of spiritual significance.
FILLING THE BUCKET OF EARTH, Matthew 6:19
We all fill buckets, we all store up. . .question is with what and for where?
FILLING THE BAD BUCKET
Read this article a while back about a person seeking spiritual insight and inspiration who interrupted a busy, lucrative life to spend a few weeks at a religious retreat. On arriving this conversation occurred, I hope your stay is a blessed one, said the caretaker who showed the visitor to his his living space. If you need anything, let us know, and we’ll teach you how to live without it.
The world comes after our hearts early on. We learn at a pretty young age a life long phrase, MINE. Ecclesiastes 27, the eyes are never satisfied. We become enticed with possessing and possession.
Security is commendable; it’s even reasonable. I acknowledge that the Word of God instructs us to provide for our own families. However, when security masks the desire to accumulate for the sake of accumulating, we must be confronted and reminded that we are moving toward divine scrutiny. Jesus and the rich young ruler really is about being challenged about our criteria up against God’s criteria. What has our grasp? FOUR PIECES HERE:
IDEA OF BUCKET: Jesus is challenging us with what we fill our lives with. Life is a bucket, we get to fill it. We contribute it to it daily. Bucket filling involves time and effort which are both indicators of what we do treasure. . .not what we think we treasure. . .but in fact what we do treasure. Take a look inside your bucket. What’s in it?
STORING UP THINGS OF EARTH: is basically keeping count. It is saying this phrase. . .I HAVE and then making a list. It is consciously or unconsciously thinking this is mine. It’s okay to enjoy, it’s not okay to indulge. Indulgence impacts focus and loss of focus obstructs what you should be seeing and what you should be doing. The shift from the earth is the Lord’s and all it contains to, this is mine is slippery. The mindset shift begins with what’s our:
IDEA OF TREASURE: Jesus is challenging our definitions, He’s confronting our concept of the word VALUE. What would a man give in exchange for his soul? STUFF? Gold, money, possessions, wealth?
THROW THINGS IN EARTH BUCKET
Jesus introduces the image, example of what really matters: a godly marriage, a spiritually invested family, significant eternal friendships, a biblically based Church/ministry, an enduring faith. Without stuff why do people think we’re so poor?
IDEA OF VANITY: Time will ultimately take all that is temporal. Moths, Rust, Thieves are the indicators of this idea. The earth is a place where what was will at some point be no more. Where are all the empires, palaces, possessions, positions of the past. The earth constantly presses on building what’s next, who’s next with the hopeful idea that it will create something that will last. . .it can’t be done. Moth, Rust and Thieves are a reality. However you grapple with that idea, at some point, everything upon this earth will be no more save people.
FILLING THE BUCKET OF HEAVEN, MATTHEW 6:20,21
FILLING THE GOOD BUCKET: Treasure in Heaven
1 Timothy 6:7, For we have brought nothing into the world, so we cannot take anything out of it either. You read that, at some level you get it. . .but we don’t live like that. We get hung up the criteria of when it’s bigger than mine. Example:
Zacchaeus: changed buckets. Why? The true emptiness of his bucket up against the bucket Jesus was offering him to fill. Jesus filled his bucket on earth with PEOPLE. Jesus invested in people. . .period.
Church, Christianity, a life lived like Christ is interested about filling our buckets with relationship spiritual significance, relational prolongedness.
LISTEN:
I don’t care as much about WHAT’S in heaven as much as I do WHO’S in heaven.
SO. . .shouldn’t I care less about WHAT’S on earth versus WHO’s on earth.
Several years ago I had a couple visit me who were struggling on multiple levels. Emphasis on struggle. The issue in this case and many other cases was you have two people investing in two different buckets. The bucket of eat, drink and be merry (earth) and the bucket of faith, hope and love (heaven). Does this reality give you the license to walk away. No. Does this reality give you the freedom to mistreat the other person. No. Listen; even when you’re both pouring into the same bucket of faith, hope and love doesn’t mean that your relationship is tension, conflict and struggle free. . .but it does mean you know where you’re both going.
I took this couple up the steps and to place them in front of the cross. I basically told the husband, look at the cross, look at Jesus and tell him you can’t do this. Tell him you can’t change buckets. Tell him you’d rather have a bucket that’s filled with the worthless stuff of this earth than the bucket of heaven that has your wife and kids in it.
I don’t know why, I don’t know what happens in those moments. But he changed buckets. The picture he had produced up to that point wasn’t pretty. But the picture of his life today has something eternal to it. The picture today sure looks like hope. It sure looks like love. It sure looks like faith.
WE WEEP AT THE LOSS OF THINGS
WE SHOULD WEEP OVER PEOPLE CHOOSING TREASURES ON EARTH
Heart is used in Scripture as the most comprehensive term for the authentic person. It is the part of our being where we desire, deliberate, and decide. It has been described as the place of conscious and decisive spiritual activity, the comprehensive term for a person as a whole; his feelings, desires, passions, thoughts, understandings and will,” and the center of a person. The place to which God turns. WHY? Because it’s the place where God sees our real treasure because of what’s been stored up. Where your heart IS!
CLOUDED OR CLEAR, MATTHEW 6:22-24
VERSES 22,23 ARE THEN THE CONCLUSION, THE PERSPECTIVE GAINED. Healthy eyes indicate a biblical perspective (light), unhealthy eyes indicate a worldly perspective (darkness). Your perspective obviously dictates how you live, what you live for. . .the temporal (wrong master) and the eternal (right master). These perspectives are what causes the buckets to collide throughout our lives. One having an empty sound, the other the sound of fullness.
SO HE SHARES
You cannot serve God and wealth
LEAVE YOU WITH A PICTURE OF THE GOOD BUCKET
Winter of 1980 I was finishing up my freshman year at Manhattan Christian College in Manhattan, Kansas. My folks were still living in Clovis, NW where I graduated High School. Hadn’t been home since I left in August (played a basketball tournament over Thanksgiving at Cookson Hills Children’s Home). Long Trip, about 650 miles, 9/10 hours. Rode in the back of a pickup with a camper shell and two other guys bundled up in blankets.
Across Kansas, Oklahoma Panhandle, Texas Panhandle, got to Amarillo, 100 miles out, a feeling begins to form inside you. Closer we got the more the feeling grew. Could see the lights of Clovis and familiar pieces and places began to appear more and more. The edge of the city, my side of town, my neighborhood and then. . .turning on my street, Clairmont Terrace. Lights of Christmas all around, neighbors houses (memories start to flood). Pulled into my driveway. Let me out. Walked up the sidewalk, stood outside the big picture window, saw my mom, dad, brothers. Stood there for a little while. Just took it in. I was home.
Put my hand on the door knob, turned it and opened the door. My brother yelled, MARK’S HOME!
Wasn’t the house. Wasn’t the stuff in the house. Wasn’t even my stuff left at the house. It was the people in the house (my family) that made coming home what it was.
Heaven is a coming home.
Heaven is people.
That’s where the treasure is.
That’s where your heart should be.
GET THIS RIGHT PEOPLE