How Christ-Followers
Are to Approach Everyday Life
It was
clear from the last section of the sermon that people are capable of taking
something as good as godly religion and using for selfish purposes. Jesus
confronts this mentality and shows that religion (whether giving, praying, or
fasting) must truly be about God. In this section, He shows that everyday life
must also be about God. People often struggle to integrate faith with their
daily experience. Author A.W. Tozer pinpoints the tendency for many to separate
their religious life (praying, Bible reading, church attendance) from their
secular activities (work, eating, etc.), feeling that their religious actions
please God, while their day to day activities are spiritually worthless. He
states:
This is the old
sacred-secular antithesis. Most Christians are caught in this trap. They cannot
get a satisfactory adjustment between the claims of the two worlds. They try to
walk the tight rope between two kingdoms and they find no peace in either.
Their strength is reduced, their outlook confused and their joy taken from
them.
I believe this state
of affairs to be wholly unnecessary. We have gotten ourselves on the horns of a
dilemma, true enough, but the dilemma is not real. It is a creature of
misunderstanding. The sacred-secular antithesis has no foundation in the New
Testament. Without doubt a more prefect understanding of Christian truth will
deliver us from it.
The Lord Jesus
Christ Himself is our perfect example, and He knew no divided life. In the
presence of His Father He lived on earth without strain from babyhood to His
death on the cross. God accepted the offering of His total life, and made no
distinction between act and act. “I do always the things that please him,” was
His brief summary of His own life as it related to the Father. (Tozer, loc.
1083–1093)
For
the Christ-follower, Jesus sets the example and teaches that all of life is to
be lived in recognition of God. Specifically, He addresses here the issue of wealth
and possession, which is certainly a large focus of our everyday lives.
Finding Your Ultimate
Satisfaction in Wealth
“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.
(Jesus, Matthew 6:19–21)
The
first problem in relation to possessions is that humans have a tendency to seek
ultimate joy and peace in material things. Jesus speaks of laying up treasures
for ourselves. Present-day fixation with making more and more money and
acquiring bigger and better things certainly exposes our insatiable capacity to
lay up treasures for ourselves. The problem with seeking satisfaction in such
things, as Jesus notes, is that they will not last. Jesus told a story that
graphically illustrates the fleeting nature of wealth:
“The ground of a
certain rich man yielded plentifully. And he thought within himself,
saying, ‘What shall I do, since I have no room to store my crops?’ So he
said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build greater, and there I
will store all my crops and my goods. And I will say to
my soul, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years; take your ease;
eat, drink, and be merry.”’ But God said to him, ‘Fool!
This night your soul will be required of you; then whose will those things be
which you have provided?’
“So is he
who lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.”
(Luke 12:16–21)
Jesus
did not pull punches in showing people that it is foolish to live life in a
materialistic, self-centered manner, without regard for God. This is what is
being brought out here in the Sermon on the Mount as well. He does not say that
it is wrong to be rich, but that these treasures are not to be laid up for ourselves. Rather, we are to lay up
treasures in heaven, and the truth is, we can use earthly wealth to do so. The
crucial question is not whether it is permissible to have wealth but rather how
we use that wealth. As J. D. Greear says,
Quit thinking so much
about the amount you’re giving and think instead about the kingdom you’re
pursuing. Following Jesus means seeing your life as a seed to be planted for
God’s kingdom.
So ask yourself: What have you done with the majority of your
resources up to this point in your life? How are you leveraging your talents
now for God’s kingdom? What have you spent the majority of your money on thus
far? Where does the bulk of your treasure lie? (Greear, 142)
Those are probing
questions, but they help us to discern whether we are following Jesus’
injunction to lay up treasures in heaven rather than for ourselves on earth. “For
where your treasure is,” Jesus says, “there your heart will be also.” This
statement reveals the interconnectedness of our heart and our treasure.
Treasure both reveals where our heart is at (if it is set on this world or on
God) and also influences our heart (the more we store up on earth, the more we
will love this world; the more we store up in heaven, the more we will love God’s
kingdom).
Works Cited:
J. D. Greear, Gospel: Rediscovering the Power that Made
Christianity Revolutionary (Nashville: B & H Publishing Group, 2011).
A. W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God (Kindle edition;
Harrisburg: Christian Publications, Inc., 1948),
All Scripture quotations are taken from the New King
James Version. Copyright © 1979, 1980, 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
