“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
Quick! Who can think of a song with the word “heart” in it? [Pause for answers.] Now for the most part, what kind of songs are these? [Love songs.] So is there a relationship between the word “heart” and love in our 21st century perception? Yes, for us, the heart is the seat of emotion—especially love. Now, is that good textbook anatomy? No, of course not. The heart is the muscled organ that pumps our blood. You know that. But you also know that when Tony Bennett split up with that certain someone in
So, what’s love got to do with it—with your treasure, I mean? “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Is Jesus telling us to love our money? Nah! Something way more radical.
But in order to see that, we’re going to have to travel back in time to the first century AD, to a tiny, backwater of a place called Israel, and then encounter this text with the ears of Palestinian peasants—the ones who sat at Jesus feet and listened to him, the ones who crowded around him, hundreds deep—just to hear him talk about the coming kingdom of God, a place where fortunes are reversed, where last is first and weak is strong. We need to land in the sandals of one of the first people to hear Jesus’ words, and understand those words as they did—when they could understand them, that is.
Looking out from that perspective two things become instantly clear. One—these people don’t make sense of wealth using the Dow Jones Index. And two, for them, the heart has nothing at all to do with romance and love.
Wealth—for us it is like the expanding universe, capable of infinite growth. How long ago was it that we were talking about the Dow hitting that historic high—12,000? A year? And now it’s gone above 13, and even 14 for a little bit. In this respect, wealth is a lot like time—there’s a never-ending supply right at hand, and no one is limited to a certain amount—there’s plenty more where that came from—if you’re shrewd enough to attain it.
Contrast that with our first century Palestinians viewpoint. They believed wealth was a closed system—like a jar of jelly beans. There’s a certain amount of wealth (jelly beans) in the world and becoming wealthier (getting more beans), can only be achieved within the system by divesting someone else of their wealth. In simple terms—the only way you, as a peasant, can achieve any semblance of wealth is if those with the wealth give some of it to you. And fat chance of that!
So, how do these people—the disciples and the thousands of others standing round them—how do you think they received Jesus’ teaching? Let’s review what he’s said in this chapter so far. He starts out with an exhortation to put your trust in God and acknowledge him as Messiah. Then a man asks him to arbitrate an inheritance dispute and he uses a parable to teach how we should live in God abundantly. Just before today’s reading, Jesus goes on in that vein, using nature—flowers and birds—to illustrate God’s care for all things living—including us, if we trust in him. Finally, Jesus puts the finishing touches on his teaching with a radical notion for his listeners—“sell your possessions and give alms.”
What? This is not where the crowd thought he was going with this. Make the rich give up some of their tightly held wealth—but them?! Weren’t they supposed to be the recipients in this redistribution? What gives?
Well…God gives. And God wants us to share in that sharing—to be givers, too. He calls us to use our wealth—regardless of its extent—in a fashion that mimics his generosity, trusts in his goodness, and points to the approaching
Which brings us to the second way the ancient Palestinian hears this passage differently. For them the heart is not the seat of emotions and love. For them the word heart, kardia in the Greek, in the Hebrew lebab—the heart is the seat of human understanding, knowledge, and will. The heart is the inner person. The true self. People look at each other’s outward appearance. God looks on the heart. And God wants you to know that your heart, your true inner self == So, if, instead of trusting in treasures you have accumulated (or bemoaning what you have not accumulated—which is the subtle flip side to the same coin, as it were), if indeed your treasures lie with God, via giving to the poor, then the inner you isn’t distracted by treasure, but is drawn by it to God, thus helping you lay claim to the you God made you to be. Which is—the recipient of the kingdom, cheerfully and lovingly given to you freely by the Father. So have no fear!
Have no fear, sell your possessions, give to the poor. Well, that’s easy for Jesus to say. After all, he can make wine from water and his prowess at divvying up leftovers is legendary. For the rest of us this “command” is a bit hard to swallow. We’re all for giving to the poor, it’s that selling of the possessions that stings a bit. My car, Jesus? My furniture? My house? (If I only could!) Not my favorite stuffed animal? Jesus, surely you couldn’t mean sell my guitars? Can’t I keep just one? I’ll only use it to play Kum By Yah. Sell my possessions.
Yes…and no. Yes, sell them and get rid of them. Because if you’re so attached to them and put all your faith in owning them—then you don’t possess your possessions, your possessions possess you. Better you liquidate the lot than go down that road. But no, what Jesus says here is hyperbole—an exaggeration for good effect. Like advising cutting off your hand if it causes you to sin. He wants you to be all you can be, God-wise, and so he gives you the over-the-top recipe for that you. Call it “Extreme Christianity.” Going to the extreme of selling everything you owned and giving it all away would definitely orient you to God and dust off God’s image on your heart. But there’s less extreme ways—God provides them for less extreme folk like us.
The question is how do we recognize them? How do we know that this or that use of our treasure is giving alms? The answer is—our hearts. Our hearts will tell us. Our tell-tale hearts.
The Tell-Tale Heart is a story by Edgar Allan Poe, if you remember. It’s a horror story, so you may wonder how it applies here. Well, let me give you a brief synopsis—that might help.
The Tell-Tale Heart is written from the first person perspective of a mad man who kills an old man because he didn’t like the way he looked at him with his one, pale-blue eye. He takes the old man’s remains and puts them under the floorboards in one of the rooms in the house. He is thinking he is going to get away with murder, he is cool and collected even to the point to where when the police come to investigate he entertains them right in the room where the man is hidden. But he hears something. Lub-dub. Lub-dub. The old man’s heart beating. And it gets louder and louder. Pointing like a beacon to his crime. Finally he can stand it no longer, and he tears up the floor, convicting himself.
The tell-tale heart gave him away. And, as macabre a comparison as it is, the tell-tale heart is what gives it away when it comes to deciding where to put our treasure. In other, much shorter and less convoluted words—uses of our treasure that are just and worthy and true cause our “hearts,” our innermost being, to resonate. Lub-dub, lub-dub. You’ve heard the expression “give from the heart?” Well now you have a way to explain it that will make you the darling of the cocktail party circuit!
How does it work, you ask? When a giving opportunity presents itself, the outer self—that practical, old, conservative you—thinks, “That’s interesting, but someone else will support it, I really don’t have the funds available.” And sometimes it ends there. But other times, as you listen to this request, you begin to notice something. A sound. Lub-dub, lub-dub. And you try to tune it out but as you hear about this need, the sound only gets louder and louder. Lub-dub, lub-dub. Lub-dub, lub-dub. Until something in you just gives way and you give—no matter what the cost.
That sound you heard is your tell-tale heart, the heart that convicts you of living a life of scarcity even amidst God’s abundance, the heart that regardless has been given the kingdom by the grace of God, the heart that bears the image of God, the heart that acts out of love, not fear, the heart that has been redeemed by the cross of Christ. When you hear that tell-tale heart pounding—pay attention! Your treasure is being directed.
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Lub-dub, lub-dub. Lub-dub, lub-dub. Amen
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