The Sermon on the Mount (Matthew): Our Heart's Treasure: Money or God

Well, we're making our way to the core of Jesus' teaching in the Sermon on the Mount, which is in the book of Matthew.

A lot of you have been with us the last few weeks and you know that, but I want to kind of set where we are in Matthew 6 in the context of what's been going on, Matthew 1 through 5, because Matthew is placing this teaching, the Sermon on the Mount, very systematically, an argument and a story that he's laying out.

And so even yesterday, I just flipped through Matthew 1 through 5 and looked at, you know how sometimes in your Bible they do those little subheadings?

And so I just looked at the subheadings of like what is Matthew doing up to Matthew 6?

And here's just real quick what the Bible just sort of lays out for us what Matthew's doing.

Matthew 1, we get a genealogy of the understanding of Jesus, right?

This guy came from this guy, from this person, from this person, from this person, on and on and on and on.

And this is this building this understanding that Jesus was from Abraham and King David's lineage.

So to the Jewish reader, we would know this was a fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy.

So this is Matthew's way.

Like for us, we read that, we're like, what's that even about?

For this is Matthew's way from the very first verse of his book to say, yeah, this teacher we're going to talk about, this really wise teacher, he's more than a teacher.

He's actually the Messiah.

He's actually God from the beginning that's coming to us as our rescuer and as our Savior.

Matthew 2, Jesus is born.

Matthew 3, John the Baptist prepares the way for the ministry of Jesus.

Matthew 4, Jesus is tempted, begins his ministry, calls his disciples.

And then Matthew 5, he begins to teach.

So Matthew lays out this argument in the story.

This Jesus is more than a teacher.

So yeah, we're going to hear him teach, but he's more than a teacher.

So we're in Matthew 6, and Jesus begins to teach us about money.

Jesus taught a lot about money.

Because we all deal with money.

Money affects all of us, pretty much all of the time.

We have to deal with money.

We have to use money, spend money, save money, steward money, probably waste money, right?

Like we are all dealing with money.

You dealt with money probably this morning in some way at some point already.

Matthew 6, 19 through 21 says this.

So point number one is this money and materials, because that's what he's talking about.

He's talking about more than just money.

He's talking about money and materials can be a resource, or they can take over your heart.

So the text is implying that we will all always have a treasure.

Remember how idols work.

We repeat this over and over and over in our church.

Here's how money idolatry or materialism idolatry would work in our hearts.

If I have that amount of money or that material item, then I will finally be safe, fulfilled, or affirmed.

So it also means in reverse, it works against you, if I don't have that amount of money or that material item, then I won't be safe.

I won't be fulfilled or I won't be affirmed.

I can't be any of those things until I get that.

So money moves past a resource and becomes a treasure.

That would be how money operates as an idol or a functional savior in our life.

I love this quote by Richard Rohr.

He's a mystic priest.

He's kind of all over the place theologically, but he has some things nailed down when it comes to materialism.

Here's what he says: the more we project our soul's longing onto things, the more things disappoint us.

Happiness is an inside job.

When we expect to find happiness outside of ourselves, we are always disappointed.

We then seek a higher or more stimulating experience, and the spiral of addiction and consumption continues.

Right?

I mean, we're all like, yep, that's my story.

Like, I've done that, I've done that.

I still do that, right?

But there's also this part of me that says, great, great, Richard Rohr, fantastic, Jesus.

Thank you for this great teaching.

But I really do need to save because I need a really big, secure safety net underneath me.

And I'm 42, and it took me to my late 30s to realize I will never have a big enough safety net underneath me.

Like it took me to having a little bit of a safety net to realize, oh, there's no safety net big enough for me.

Maybe you work like that, or maybe you don't.

Or maybe you own Facebook stock, and this week you're like, uh-oh.

Right?

You're like, ah, I don't know how that's gonna go.

Or have you ever had a bad day?

You just have a bad day, you're feeling, you know, you're just not feeling good about yourself.

Just want just a ho hum, just you're not sure about your place in life and what you're doing.

Like, what am I doing?

But then your investment statement shows up.

And you open it up, and all of a sudden you're like, you know what?

I'm I am pretty good.

Life is pretty good.

Like it's okay.

Like that's how we felt the last two years, right?

Like you could open that thing up, you'd be like, Yeah, it's alright, I'm okay.

Every once in a while you open it up and you're like, no, this confirms everything I feared.

I'm nothing.

I still have nothing.

I have no money.

I still don't have any money.

We know these feelings, and when it affects us on a deep level, it's well, maybe money is more than money.

Three weeks ago, I tapped on an advertisement on Instagram for some new jeans.

I'm looking for some new jeans, just to let you know, just let you in on my life.

So I'm looking for some new jeans, popped up, clicked on it, a little tap.

So you know, it goes over to the store and they record that.

They know I'm looking for jeans because ever since last three weeks, it is really good-looking, rustic looking men in jeans with like a like a truck in front of like a mountain range and like a river.

Like they know me.

They know all I follow is like national parks, bears, fly fishermen, and so like they place the gene guy in front of everything else I love.

And there is this part of me, like deep in my heart, there is this part of me that does think, like on a Tuesday afternoon, or I just not thinking too great about myself and my life, that thinks if I buy these, it's very possible, very possible I will feel fulfilled, right?

You ever felt that?

And there is this, I'm pretty sure I'll feel new if I buy the genes, right?

Or at least I'll feel powerful.

You know that feeling.

Maybe money's more than money, right?

Maybe you naturally have a good attitude toward people with money, and you have a bad attitude toward people without money.

You would never say that.

Or maybe reverse, and you wouldn't say this either.

Maybe you naturally have a bad attitude toward people with money and you have a good attitude toward people without money.

And you wouldn't ever say that either.

But maybe it's true.

See, the imagery here is all this stuff.

Money and materials.

Okay.

An imagery here is like it will be eaten by worms and vermin.

It will go away.

And Jesus' reminder, what a good reminder for us is we need a deeper currency.

Like we need a currency for our hearts that is more profound and lasting and eternal.

And this isn't Jesus saying seek treasures in heaven and like you're getting merit, and you that's not what it is.

This is this is you are made for heaven.

You are headed toward heaven.

Everything that we accumulate and use here, we're gonna leave it.

We're gonna leave it.

So remember that.

Matthew 6, verse 22.

Matthew 6:22

The eye is the lamp of the body.

So if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light.

But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness.

If then the light is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness?

No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other.

You cannot serve God and money.

Point number two is this everybody's heart falls under the lordship of some greater treasure.

All of us, every human being on earth falls under the lordship of some greater treasure.

The I here is a window into who we really are.

If we want to know who we really are, you can't just look at what we say, look at what we cast our gaze upon.

So last week, Fat Bear week concluded, we celebrate Fat Bear Week every year in our church, this time of year.

If you've been around, you know that I'm sure you were following it.

I'm sure you were thrilled the last few weeks if you'd watched this.

And so to catch you up, if you haven't been in our church, uh, this is just part of our fall liturgy, uh, official liturgy.

And what this is is in Catman National Park in Alaska, this time of year, they've been watching all the grizzly bears who've been feeding at Brooks Falls.

They start in June, they feed all summer into October, and they've been watching these bears.

There's some of us do this, not like me, probably not you, but I do.

And we watch these bears feed at Brooks Falls over the whole summer to get fatter and fatter and fatter.

All summer, they sit there at this Brooks Falls and they just eat all this salmon.

It's thrilling, it's thrilling entertainment.

In the end of the summer, there's a tournament set up by the National Park Rangers of who got the fattest?

What beard?

All the bears have numbers and names, it's very organized.

Well, this year's finals was Otis versus Walker.

So this is Walker.

So this is Walker, beginning of the summer, end of the summer, beginning of this summer, end of this summer, okay?

He accomplished this in one summer.

Now this is Otis.

So this is Otis.

Beginning of the summer, end of this summer, right?

This is this is devotion.

This is what this is about devotion.

So these are the two, they were in the finals.

Otis versus Walker.

Well, Otis won.

He's our champion.

Otis is our champion.

The thing about Otis is, and we have seen it every year, third year, so third year, if you've been following us, we always see it about our champions.

Otis just sits.

That big old fat bear just sits.

I mean, look at him in the top right.

This is literally, he does this all day long.

He sits and sits and sits.

He barely moves.

That's also a joke I can't resist every single year.

So Otis's, like two people laughed.

I don't appreciate your lack of laughter.

Otis's eye, his eye is on the water.

He gazes on the water for the salmon.

It's very clear what his treasure is.

It is not up for debate.

He cares ultimately about one thing.

This is where Jesus is leading us, this idea of where do we cast our eye?

Where do we cast our heart?

Where are we gazing at?

Where is our gaze for our heart's fulfillment and peace?

And Jesus says, you can't have two masters.

There's this story in Luke 18 where a ruler comes to Jesus and asks, What must I do to inherit eternal life?

Right?

He's saying, What makes me right with God when I die?

How do I get to heaven?

What makes all this right and good?

Jesus replies, Why do you call me good?

It's Jesus' way of saying, like, do you understand I'm not just a teacher, but I'm actually God for you?

Do you get that?

And then Jesus says, You know all the commandments.

The guy says, Yeah, I know them, I've kept them.

Okay, so not only is he rich, like he's like rich in the world, but apparently he's like rich in religious performance.

And then it's then Jesus, when he's past that, just like performance stuff, and he says, You can't obey enough, you can't you can't perform enough.

See, Jesus goes into his heart.

Listen to the text, Luke 18, starting in verse 22.

When Jesus heard this, right after the guy said, I've kept them all, I've kept all the commandments, he said to him, One thing you still lack, sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven.

And come follow me.

But when he heard these things, he became very sad, for he was extremely rich.

Jesus, seeing that he had become sad, he said, How difficult it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God.

For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of the needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.

Those who heard it said that who could be saved?

But he said, What is impossible with man is possible with God.

So this phrase, easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, is it's an idiom.

Right?

We have these in our language.

It would be like verse 25 in American translation would be uh, when pigs fly, a rich man could enter the kingdom of heaven.

That's how we would say it.

It'd be the same thing.

Right?

The point is that it's God's grace to us.

It's not our performance or our worldly wealth.

Those things will never work to make us right with God.

This man has it all together.

He's got both.

He has the worldly wealth and the religious wealth.

And he's still wondering.

He still shows up to Jesus.

Isn't that interesting?

He's got it all, and he is still wondering.

He still knows something is missing.

Right?

We can build our whole lives.

We can build our whole lives.

We can build a family or a career or investment strategy or material that we can build our whole lives.

We still know.

Don't we don't we?

Don't we?

We still know something's missing.

And Jesus goes straight to this guy's heart, the idol in his heart, the thing that this guy rests upon for significance and identity and justification.

And he says, you gotta lose that.

Lose it.

That's how you'll find life.

Give away everything.

Now, this isn't a call for some universal call for all of us to own nothing.

No, this is a call for our hearts to be owned by nothing.

To be so lavished, so lavished by the grace of God, the grace of the forgiveness of sin, all of your righteousness, your very identity secured as a child of God, that nothing can own you.

It's interesting that the man became sad.

That he grieved he couldn't let go.

That's like the saddest thing about the story.

That he knew he needed to let go and then he couldn't?

Like he was sad about not being able to do the thing he knew he should do.

I think it has something to do with the fact that to let go of one treasure that is functional for you, where your sense of identity and security and maybe righteousness is coming from, to let go of that feels like a huge risk.

To lose that, to lose that, to stop using that for safety or security, for a sense of identity or significance, to let go of that can feel impossible.

It can feel like you've lost your foundation of yourself.

But Jesus is saying it's not, and you'll be okay.

And you'll be amazed how free you become as God becomes your center and your source rather than this stuff that's all gonna be eaten up.

Point number three is this as we come alive to God as savior and treasure, we grow free of money's tight grip on our hearts.

And I can just say, I make that point, still learning that point, right?

Like we make that point saying, yeah, I like I understand it, and I'm still I'm still learning this point of becoming free of money, free of the fear of losing it, free of not having it, free of the fear of giving it away.

Here are some possible implications toward our stewardship of money and material goods, that we could give joyfully and generosity, that our hearts could be freed up into generosity without greed toward the church and toward the poor, that we could save responsibly.

But you could save without fear.

You could save for your future without fear, but responsibly.

And you could spend appropriately without addiction for today.

Listen to this passage in 2 Corinthians 8, 1 through 5.

So Paul's writing to a church about grace and generosity, this connection between the two.

We want you to know, brothers, about the grace of God that has been given among the churches of Macedonia.

For in a severe test of affliction, their abundance of joy and their extreme poverty.

Okay, so just stop real quick.

Severe test of affliction, joy, poverty.

Poverty.

We don't usually put those together, okay?

Just a heads up, overflowed and a wealth of generosity on their part.

For they gave according to their means, as I can testify, and beyond their means of their own accord, begging us earnestly for the favor of taking part in the relief of the saints.

So they were begging to be more generous.

And this not as we expected, but they gave themselves first to the Lord, and then by the will of God to us.

So Paul is saying, there is this church.

There's this church.

Affliction, poverty, joy, begging to give.

How did this happen?

How does that happen?

That's not an equation we put together.

But I can tell you, it did not come by their pastor pestering them or giving a four-part series.

Like, that's not how this gets developed in our heart.

Paul tells us in verse 1.

He tells us in verse 1.

By the grace of God, it's an act of the grace of God in their hearts.

He's saying they've been freed.

Money's not their treasure.

They're not owned by it.

So they can let some go.

A breakthrough happened for them.

A breakthrough.

This prepares us to think about where Matthew takes us.

Matthew 6, 25, and 26.

We're gonna talk more about it in coming weeks.

Listen as I close with the message translation of these two verses.

If you decide for God, living a life of God worship, it follows that you don't fuss about what's on the table at mealtimes or whether the clothes in your closet are in fashion.

There's far more to your life than the food you put in your stomach, more to your outer appearance than the clothes you hang on your body.

Look at the birds.

Free and unfettered, not tied down to a job description, careless in the care of God, and you account far more to him than birds.

See, it's good news to us this morning.

Because Jesus doesn't just guide us with his teaching, but he absolutely crushes us, doesn't he?

I mean, you can feel it a little bit right now.

I feel it.

He crushes us into our need of him as a savior.

His sufficiency, his grace to us.

And none of us are ever going to be completely free of the lure of money to be safety or security or affirmation, identity.

But Jesus on the cross, all that love of money we have, he remembers it to know more.

And all of the treasures of his righteousness are given to you forever, permanently.

They're yours.

And that makes us an incredibly rich people because we are never condemned, always loved, always rescued, and we are led in the way of greater worship and greater freedom.

Let's pray together.

God, thank you for this good word this morning.

Most of all, for you, yourself, that is our great treasure.

That while you teach us and lead us, you definitely crush us into our need of you because we are a worldly people with hearts that just can't wait to buy the next pair of jeans that's gonna make us feel powerful or new or to use money or resources to hold on to it a little bit more, just to feel like we're gonna be safer and more secure.

Help us in your grace to be able to have affliction, to have less or more.

Enjoy toward greater freedom in you, greater generosity, ability to save without fear, ability to spend without addiction, ability to give without greed.

God, would you call us into this greater way of living that is a great freedom in your gospel?

Would you lead us of what it means for our hearts this morning?

Most of all, would we come to you to understand you are our Savior when it comes to this?

We are not perfect, we are in need of you.

You are sufficient and you are enough.

You are our great treasure of forgiveness and righteousness.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.