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"Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
"The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!
"No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon."
- Matthew 6:19-24
We are reading through the Sermon on the Mount. We began with the Beatitudes, then we read You are the salt of the earth, Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill, Whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment, Let your "Yes" be "Yes," and your "No," "No," Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven, and Pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly. In yesterday's reading, Jesus taught more about prayer, and gave us a prayer. He said, "And when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words. Therefore do not be like them. For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him. In this manner, therefore, pray: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses."
"Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. " My study bible tells us that by attaching themselves to treasures on earth, people cut themselves off from heavenly treasures. They instead become slaves to earthly things, rather than free in Christ. Here's the heart of discipleship, it says: we disentangle ourselves from the chains of earthly things, and attach ourselves to God, the true treasure. There is a correlation with what we think is essential in the heart -- what we love the best -- and forms of idolatry, where something else takes the place of the Kingdom for us. This is about what we treasure.
"The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!" My study tells us that the mind (Greek "nous") is the spiritual eye of the soul. It illuminates the inner person, and governs our will. So to keep our mind wholesome and pure, to watch and guide our own thoughts, is fundamental to Christian life. What gives us light? How do we see?
"No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon." If we serve two masters, we're slaves caught in the middle of a kind of trap, trying to maintain an attachment to both earthly and heavenly things. Jesus tells us that this is impossible, that both demand full allegiance. The points of view are poles apart, and everything depends on what illumines us, what gives us light so that we see a certain way. Jesus calls mammon ("riches") a master, says my study bible, not because wealth is evil by nature, but because of the control it has over people. He's speaking of a material viewpoint, without benefit of the light of God.
Jesus asks us to make a choice. Actually, He's trying to get us to notice that life is all about a choice. We've got a "worldly" point of view (mammon) and a faith point of view. What this means is that we live in a world created by God, via the Word (who is Christ). Here He is, as a human being among us, and He's trying to get us to open up our eyes. That's the point of discipleship. If we think the world is just strictly material, then we're on the wrong track, and we don't have the light that must illuminate the way that we see. And it all begins with what we treasure. That is, what we hold in our hearts as truly precious. There are things that are intangible, that aren't just materially graspable and measurable, but which live in the light of wisdom and truth. This is the treasure in heaven. These are things we know and feel in the heart, and carry with us. They make us truly rich. They add to who we are. Moreover, they give value to the whole of the worldly life around us, true value. That is, if we see our lives and whatever we have in the light that Christ gives us, then we see truly, we understand our world and what we're doing in it better than if we miss out on this light. But it all comes down to a choice. It's a world illumined by the light of God, or living in a kind of darkness that takes away and blinds us to layers and layers of meaning, value, treasure, love, richness. What are the treasures in heaven? How about learning what love is and practicing it? Escaping from the so-called law of the jungle to something better, we find ourselves free in ways that are impossible otherwise -- free to make choices for what is better, for what we will truly treasure, what we will choose to love. "Mammon" -- whether we think of ourselves in full control or not -- demands our allegiance and slavishness. Isn't it better to choose a loving Master? One who knows us better than we know ourselves, and always wants what's best for us? Isn't it better to be unlimited, and on a pathway to growth and wisdom? What's really to our best advantage? This is the light of a single, and unconflicted, vision. It's all about what we choose to serve. Do we slave to impress others with the stuff we have? Are we working for a car, a house, an image of ourselves in the eyes of the world? Or are we going to stick with what will lead us through everything and give us a bigger, broader vision that has some joy in it -- that doesn't depend on "the world" and that limited message of the purely material? He offers us a choice, His light, His treasure. With Him, there will always be something more. It all depends on what we idolize, what we worship -- it's up to us! If we really think about it, all choices come down to this, no matter what kind of conflict or confusion we seem to find ourselves in the middle of. The next time you need to make a choice, consider this spiritual paradox, the real dilemma, and see if that doesn't illumine the things you're choosing between. It may just open up new alternatives you haven't yet seen!
