KEEPING A TREASURE HOUSE

 
Do not store up for yourselves treasure on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal. for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
(Matthew 6: 19-21 – NAS)

 
Jesus wants us to hold the objects of this world very lightly. He tells us this because He knows our capacity for caring about things deeply. 

It is built into our nature to cherish something, almost anything. We are creatures who invest our hearts in things, and He does not consider this tendency a bad thing. Note that He does not tell His followers to avoid treasuring anything. Instead, He tells them to “store up treasures in heaven.” 

What does He mean by that? 

Well, first He reminds us that the things of this world are transient. They are not going to last, one way or another. Moths and rust can destroy objects. Of course, those are not the limits of erosion and corrosion. But He’s not trying to give us a full list of all the natural ways objects can be worn down; He’s just trying to get us to recall that nothing this side of heaven is permanent.  

But beyond the natural wearing-away of things, He also reminds us of human nature. Thieves can break in and steal those objects we hold precious. Someone can simply take away our treasures, snatching them out of our hands. 

Once again, Jesus makes it clear that His followers will not be living in a perfect world here. He’s warned them that they will be persecuted. He’s told them to be peacemakers – which means there will be conflict. He’s instructed them to resolve their conflicts before worshipping – indicating that even among themselves their human natures will still clash from time to time. And here, He reminds them that there are those around them who might steal their belongings. 

He conveys all this quickly, in order to get to the important thing: where your heart is, that is where your treasure is.  

If your heart is settled in the objects you possess, when those things are broken by age or stolen by a thief, what then happens to your heart? You are broken and devastated by the loss. And if your attachment to the object is so great that you cannot recover, what does that do to your relationships with other people? 

That is the challenging thing in His words here. He tells His followers to store up treasure in heaven. But what does that mean? What can we possibly store up in heaven? It is clear that He is implying that the things of this world are not likely to be in that heavenly storehouse. How can we convey that family heirloom chair into heaven? What moving service will do that for us? 

We have to look back and consider what He has said about the kingdom of heaven. 

When we do that, we start to realize that what He is talking about is our relationship with God, and after that, our relationships with others. For that is where the kingdom of heaven lies. And the kingdom of heaven is eternal (“for Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever”). 

Why do we find it so easy to invest our hearts in objects? 

Well, for one thing, they do not intentionally hurt our feelings. They are not willfully contrary and they do not challenge us or jeer at us. If they are beautiful, we enjoy their beauty and that fills our hearts with pleasure. That’s not a bad thing in itself.  

God created a universe filled with beauty and when He was finished doing it, He said “It is good.” And He stopped and gave Himself a space to enjoy His creation. When we look at scripture and see that this is how God began His own interaction with creation, how can we believe that He does not want us to appreciate the beauty of created things? 

Where we get into trouble is when we begin to invest such intense feelings for the objects in our lives that we care more about them than we do about the people in our lives. Objects cannot return love to us – they have no love to give. Love is a reciprocal activity. It needs interaction. It needs give and take. An object can do neither of those things, not really. 

I have four pieces of inherited furniture. They are lovely pieces. 

One piece is a graceful table, which had been made by a great-aunt, the sister of my father’s mother. A single woman, that I don’t know all that much about. My understanding is that one of the ways Aunt Dot earned a living was by taking the pre-cut pieces and assembling them. She would do the finishing carving, sand it and stain the wood and put the sealing finish on it. Whenever I consider this table, I’m reminded of the challenges single women faced in the past, the limits of what they could do to take care of themselves, and Aunt Dot’s response to that circumstance. It seems a streak of independence runs in my family. This beautiful table came into our household when I was still very young. 

The second piece is a sideboard with a hutch which I inherited directly from another great-aunt, Aunt Lucy (from whom I got my middle name). I remember it in her house when I was tiny, and so I connect her presence with the object. Since I was still very young when she died, the sideboard was put to regular use by the family. It often served as a buffet for holiday dinners when we entertained. My understanding is that it came from Lucy’s own parental home, giving it a history that reaches back to the late 1800s. 

The third piece is an armchair from my grandparents’ home, one that I remember my father’s mother sitting in when we would visit them. My memories of her picture her sitting very lady-like in that chair, in a pool of light by the window of their living room. 

The fourth piece is a carved chest that was given to my parents as a wedding present. All the sides of it, except the bottom and back, are carved with intricate panels of people in an oriental garden. There were many Saturday mornings where my dusting duties included giving close attention to the chest, dusting into the crevasses of the carving, for there were many tiny places for dust to lodge. 

Each of these pieces hold many memories of the past, of my personal experiences with them, of the people associated with them, of the family history attached to them. They are precious to me. 

But they are precious to me mostly because of the people. They are lovely in their own right, of course, and so they would be very hard to part with on those grounds, for I do love things of beauty. But what truly makes them “treasures” to me are the connections to my family – my Aunt Dot, who I met only once or twice, who met the challenge of her single life by creating something of grace and beauty; my Aunt Lucy, who also lived single and who spent most of her adult life serving as a missionary in India; my grandmother Winifred, who always seemed to me the model of a lady and yet who never was anything but delighted by her rambunctious grandchildren when we invaded their house every other year; and my parents, who had an amazing partnership of love and appreciation for each other. These are the true treasures I hold in my heart. The pieces of furniture, much as I do love their beauties, are only touchstones for the real treasure. They are, for me, physical manifestations that quietly and constantly invoke the beauty of the people associated with them. 

Our relationships, with God and with each other, are the treasures Jesus wants us to store up. Relationships between souls are eternal things. True treasures give our love back to us in relationship. 

Objects can give us pleasure, yes, and there is nothing wrong with pleasure. God takes pleasure in His creation. But pleasure is not Love, it is not the interactive connection of hearts to each other. Why do we give our hearts to objects that are not only transient, but cannot return love to us? 

Love is the most precious treasure we can have, and it is the one best protected by being kept in the storehouse of heaven.