Treasure

Saturday

Matthew 6:19-24  ‘Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

Most people would do anything to protect what they treasure the most. There are times in our life when everything is of value, so much so, that when we are asked or forced to give something up it’s very difficult to accept. For years I valued my childhood in a small town in Maryland. The entire town was essentially a playground for learning with fields of corn, long patches of wild blackberry and honeysuckle bushes, backyard streams and rainbows after every rainstorm. I still remember my excitement when a rainbow ended just across the stream behind my home and my disappointment that there was no pot of gold, at least not one that I could see. I always hoped to raise a family in a town that offered that kind of out door adventure. Thirty-plus years later I visited my childhood home only to find that the stream that flowed behind my home had been filled in and cemented over for a basketball court, the cornfield was home to new housing and there wasn’t a blackberry or honeysuckle bush to be found. Oddly enough, that was a very difficult day. I never anticipated the change. For me, everything had just disappeared. Over time, we realize that the constant in this physical life is change, even in the things that we treasure. Sometimes we see change and respond. Other times change catches us completely unaware. The good news is that the physical life isn’t all there is. I am very thankful for the memory of the place I once called home. More importantly, that pot of gold that I couldn’t see then, I suddenly found.

James 1:17-27 Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change