Seek The Things Above — Westlake Bible Fellowship

0:00 The suitcase to heaven

So a wealthy businessman accepted Christ during his life. And on his deathbed, he lay there getting ready to die, and he had a suitcase next to him. And he spoke to God and he said, God, Lord, I got this suitcase. Please let me bring, as I die, this suitcase to heaven. Of course, God said, no.

No. You can't bring the suitcase to heaven. He heard it. Right? Right.

You know, people people on their deathbeds sometimes hear things, and they have a special special visions of God, and God said no. The man pleaded with them. Went back and forth. He wrestled like Jacob. And finally, God said...

He he bled it. He said, you can bring your suitcase. In fact, he said, you're gonna close your eyes in a moment. And when you open your eyes back up, you're gonna be in front of the pearly gates with the suitcase in your hand, feeling good. Sure enough, closed his eyes, boom.

Sitting there right in front of the pearly gates, Saint Peter's right there. Saint Peter looks at him, woah. Says, welcome to heaven, but you're not allowed to bring a suitcase with you. He says, no, I worked this out with God. He said I could bring a suitcase with me.

So Saint Peter says, well, I'm going to verify that. It's the first time I ever heard of that. So he calls up God and... Or talks to him directly. I don't know how it works in heaven like that.

But Saint Peter, for sure, probably had that direct connection. So he verifies. And sure enough, God says, yeah. Yeah. Said he could bring the suitcase with him.

So Saint Peter says, Hey. You can bring the suitcase with you, but I gotta ask. What's in there? Could you show it to me for a second? Know, it's like, I've never seen this before.

So, the man says, he's looking pretty pleased with himself. He thinks he's he's done something special. And he takes this heavy suitcase and kerplunk on the ground, opens it up. And you look at that thing, and he's very pleased. I mean, he's smiling.

And Saint Peter kinda looking at that smiling too, like, kinda squinting a little bit. And in the suitcase, it's nicely stacked, these beautiful bullion bars. And the guy is, see? Look what I did, you know? And the guy's like, you know, Saint Peter was like, well, I mean, I see why God let you bring these.

You know, he's he's letting you bring pavement. You know, I don't know what he has for you, but it's not a lot of pavement. You know, maybe you'll be a a not very good paver in the kingdom of God. That's okay. You know, even even a lowly paver in the kingdom of God is worthy.

When you wake up, you're gonna see his face and be satisfied. And and so, I mean, obviously, not true.

It's not even in the Bible.

The point is clear. The comparison is here. The best things that we can think of, the most precious, you can compress it all into a small amount and look at that's the best that we can find. All that is is pavement in the kingdom of God, in heaven. We don't go outside and start collecting and breaking up the little bit of asphalt in the driveway.

We don't hoard that. If there's anything common in heaven, it's going to be the pavement. I don't think there is anything common in heaven. Right? But, when we see his face, we will be satisfied.

The currency in heaven is not going to be the wealth we acquired here, but it is going to be the Lord Jesus Christ, number one, And it's going to be measured in the worship, in the increase of worship of him, number two. And in Luke fifteen ten it says, In the same way I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents. The transfer of wealth from the physical here to the spiritual there is what's important. Indeed, the smallest of things done here on the earth will have a rippling generational effect and impact over time here on earth and then from earth into heaven. I think of just the cup of water given in Jesus' name, you know, and that is an amazing thing.

It's a small thing. When souls are transferred, when people are cared for, these are the valuable things. It's not always so easy to see. And so today, we're going to be reading the passage Luke twelve twenty two-thirty four and most Bibles label this do not worry or don't be anxious. I would actually say the better name for the passage would be seek the kingdom of God because really the entire passage is built kind of illustrating the importance of seeking the kingdom of God using both logic and metaphor.

5:38 Prayer before reading the passage

So, starting Luke 22, I'm sorry, twelve twenty two, in verse. I'm reading in the n s... NASV. It's not my normal, but we'll do NASV in the 1995 version. I hear that the later versions are not as good.

So I'm gonna start on verse 22. And he said to his disciples, for this reason I say to you, do not worry about your life as to what you will eat, nor for your body as to what you will put on. For life is more than food, and the body is more than clothing. It's the first reason why you shouldn't worry. Consider the ravens.

This is the second reason. For they neither sow nor reap. They have no storeroom nor barn, and yet God feeds them. How much more valuable you are than birds. Remember those valuable souls.

25. In which of you, by worrying, can add a single hour to his lifespan? This is the third reason, I think. Maybe I'm not counting right. If then you cannot do even a very little thing like this, why do you worry about other matters?

Consider the lilies, how they grow. And the fourth reason or example, they neither toil nor spin, but I can tell you, not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these. But if God so closed the grass in the field, which is alive today, tomorrow, is thrown into the furnace, how much more will he clothe you? And then he... A little rebuke here.

He says, you men of little faith, do not seek what you will eat and what you will drink. And do not keep worrying. There's a repetition here. For all these things the nation of the world eagerly seek, but your father knows that you need these things. But seek his kingdom and these things will be added to you.

Do not be afraid, little flock, for your father has chosen gladly to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give to charity. Make yourselves money belts, which do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven where no thief comes near nor moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. So in verse 22, he starts with...

And he says to his disciples. So, it appears that it's like his disciples are sitting there, and I believe that he's teaching to a whole group. It appears to... He he publicly refers to them. Kinda turns over a little bit.

For this reason, I say to you... Almost like he's... Well, For this reason I say to you, do not worry about your life. In other translations, says, therefore. You know, and of course, anytime you see therefore, you have to refer back a little bit.

This section is actually a smaller section in a bigger section. John covered two weeks ago the earlier section in Luke here. Very specifically, earlier, he starts to talk like verse eight, I tell you the truth, everyone who acknowledges me publicly here on earth, that some man will acknowledge. He's starting to talk about... Well, he has been talking about the kingdom of God.

He talks about... He refers to possible persecution and the way that we deal with that. And as he's talking about the things of God, the kingdom of God, and trying to illustrate the importance of all these things, he's interrupted by someone wanting him to make this judgment, and John talked about that. He's somewhat unreasonable because it's as if he just shouts out from the crowd, it actually says. He calls out from the crowd.

And, he wants just the the... Through the sheer power of him, his his actual place in the crowd as if somehow that obligates Jesus, number one, to be a judge and two, to judge without any knowledge that a judge would need to judge. He says, tell my brother, divide our father's estate with me. It seems to be that he's so consumed that he can't even see the obvious, which is kind of ridiculous to ask a... Not a random stranger, but a man to judge out of nowhere.

Certainly, he will be a judge at some point, but that wasn't the position he was choosing to fill at this point. And it's kind of like almost this man was a plant in the crowd. You know, a good comedian can play off the hecklers, you know, and make their point even better and make things funnier. For Jesus, this man's like... Is making his point for him.

How hard hearted the whole crowd was oriented toward. Later he even says, you know, he... I I I called it out. He says, where is it? He says, don't...

He really rebukes him. He says, don't be foolish. I forgot which verse that is. But essentially they... This guy kind of makes the point.

In one sense, you're like, oh, come on. Don't you get it? But it was like from that, he was able to say, okay. This is exactly what I mean. You know?

13:26 The parable of the rich fool

But, in the end, the key here is that it was a focus on this world. Jesus says, not to worry. Right? It seems to be that when we focus on this world, we worry and we forget about who God is. I think it's easy to think, you know, you could look at the crowd here.

This is an agrarian society. In other words, they farmed a lot. I actually googled it. Possibly as much as nine out of 10 people in that society had to directly participate in the growing of food and the preparation of food versus today one in 10 are in the production of food. So we live in a society today where maybe you would think it doesn't apply to us as much.

Why do we have to care so much about food? No one here probably in this room has ever once experienced not being able to purchase enough food to satiate their hunger at any time in their life. We've had generations of wealth that's never been set in the world before. But here's the funny thing. You'd think it doesn't apply as much, but it seems like we worry even more.

It's like the more stuff you have, the more you worry. Right? And this ends up really kind of illustrating the point that he gets to at the end where he says, seek the kingdom of God. You're seeking the things here on this earth. But...

And because of that, you worry. Here on this earth, that is all you will have if that's what you focus on. And he goes through in a very logical, persuasive argument using, again, multiple reasonings and some really, really interesting metaphors. His first reason he starts with is that life is more than food, and the body is more than clothing. It's easy to be purely humanistic and to say, all I see is all I am.

And that kind of makes sense. We've grown up in a physical world. And it's our experience that the food I eat and the clothing I have makes a difference. You know? I like to have clothes and I like to have nice clothes.

I like food. Some food makes me feel better than those. Right? I mean, these are all reasonable in one sense. You could say it's reasonable under the sun, if you will.

Physical reasoning, this makes sense. But he's making the point. Says, listen, you aren't just a body. Your life is both physical and spiritual. And the spiritual part of you can have residence in the kingdom of God or not.

His next verse, 24, it says, Consider the ravens. Now, ravens are mentioned many times in scriptures. Usually, they're not mentioned positively. They're a member of the crow family. They're loud, obnoxious, proud, argumentative, if you will.

Crows can have a personality, that's it. In Leviticus, they are considered an unclean animal. And so the Jews for sure, as they learned about ceremonial law, this audience found the animal itself to be abominable and disgusting. They would regard this animal and they would push it away. They would look at it and they would have a sense of disgust when they thought about this animal.

And so, this animal this animal is... Says it neither sows nor reaps. It has no storeroom nor barn, which is in direct comparison to the man that labored for stuff in this world just previous, and he built up barns, he said soul, you know, party here. No, Raven didn't have to do that. He he finds food, and a lot of times it's just a dead body here or there.

But the Bible says that God feeds them. Okay? And even a unceremonally clean animal, God cares for. Right? How much valuable are you than the birds?

And that's an interesting question. In fact, it's not the first time he he talks about our value in comparison to birds. In verse seven, this is the sections that John talked about. It said five sparrows are sold for several dollars. Aren't you more valuable than that?

Those were clean birds. They were more of a food. So five sparrows, you could get on the market and said five five silver coins, I've heard that they thought... I mean, copper coins. I've heard that that would be...

If you could make an equivalent, it might be something like 5 to $10. And that might not very big. They're very common. And that might might make a meal for somebody. There wasn't a lot of food on those.

But you could put a dollar equivalent to those. And he said, you're a lot more valuable than that. Here, he's saying, this is such a low animal. In fact, you'd find these disgusting, but God cares for those. If he cares for those, how much more does he care for you?

Obviously, he answered that question. Now, that question was to make a point, but Christ with his life answered that question. How much more valuable are we? And he says, you're so valuable, I will die for you. You are so valuable that I will go to any lengths, including giving up my very life to have a relationship with you.

That's part of my joy. And so, it's from the lesser to the much greater. I think in science or math you would call that a factor above. So, every factor above is 10 times. And so, it's like the idea that it's a multiple.

In comparison, it's not like, well, this is a little bit higher. Is like way bigger. Huge, huge difference. Not even comparable. This is a spec.

This is... That greater value is way, way, way, way higher. It's not even comparable. But when we see all of the many things that God cares for, and then you see how he values us, you think he cares that good for something of this value, and yet we're this many times more valuable. How much more does he care for us?

And the answer ends up being, some people would try to take that reasoning and say, well, that means I'm gonna

be filthy rich. I'm gonna be

a billionaire. That many more times. But the point is is that the care has to do with something spiritual. And the wealth has to do with what we're going to receive in terms of what is really valuable in God's economy. Okay?

And when we see that it changes how we think about this economy. The anxieties here. Okay? He he moves from this... That that really interesting comparison in verse 25 and...

22:39 Which of you by worrying can add an hour?

Or a little bit to your lifespan. Not sure how those could be the same thing. It is interesting. Think almost... I almost wonder because of how not clear it is that it was meant to be not clear.

Like it could be both. Because those kind of relate somehow to your body and your life and some of what's being talked about here. Regardless, the point is that for you to worry... Like, I've talked about... I've talked to people about worry, and most people kinda cling onto their worry.

As much as they don't enjoy the feeling, it's one of those things for which you think if you don't feel worry that something bad is going to happen, as if my worrying makes the world better somehow. Right? What mother hasn't felt that way? Somehow, don't know how this works, what dad has. I mean, sometimes worries a little bit.

Right? Somehow, I don't know how this works, but you're at... You're up at 1AM in the morning thinking, where is my son? And the worry is somehow gonna do something to make him safer. Now, obviously, the one thing you can do is pray.

But probably staying up and worrying doesn't help. And so the point's pretty clear. Nothing significant can be done. It says, if then you cannot do even a little thing like that. A lot of people don't think that's a little thing.

A lot of people would pay a lot of money if they could increase their stature by a little bit or even for another hour. I mean, what wouldn't you give for another hour? Comes Right? The very end of your life and says, I'll give you one more hour. You can spend that however you want.

You know, with your life. I take it. That's not little to me. You know? But he says that's a little thing.

It's a little thing. And if worry can't do that little thing, what what else... I mean, it's not gonna do anything big. And certainly, I think you could even go further and say, not only does it not do anything for you, there is a lot of evidence that it can actually... It might even decrease your stature.

You know? Proverbs seventeen twenty two, A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones. Okay? That's from the Bible. Studies show that anxiety in childhood and adolescence can actually interfere with normal growth patterns.

So it could actually make you shorter, in development anyways. They say even old people sometimes lose a little stature, so who knows? It could hurt you, hurt your body. Studies suggest that men with anxiety disorders may experience a reduction in life expectancy of about ten years, while women may experience a reduction of about seven years. So, while it won't add an hour, it might easily, if you average to two, between men and women, on average, it's eight and a half years if you experience significant anxiety on a daily basis.

So that's the third argument or the second argument, third, I don't know, anyways, it's the third point. Doesn't help you, it does hurt you. And then he says, well, and I think he's speaking maybe to vanity here a little bit more. Verse 27, consider the lilies, how they grow. They neither toil nor spin.

But I tell you, not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these. We have a lily here. Right? Yeah. You know, I don't normally make comments about other women.

My wife is beautiful. He's talking about flowers, right? I googled... What's that?

That's a good start.

Yeah. Yeah. She's the lily of my eye. So the the... He's talking about flowers, right?

And I actually googled the lily. And there's a lot of different kinds. They all look different, but they're all beautiful. Okay? And I kinda...

I thought, you know, looked at the flowers like, oh, it's amazing how that works. I was like And to some extent, like, when you're trying to describe it, like, what does it mean to be beautiful? All I know is that's beautiful. That really is when I consider it. And different colors.

But just the arrangement of that is wonderful. And I'm sure that's how you got your name. But it's an interesting thing because we do, you know, it's a good point, Solomon in all his glory. He was the pinnacle of success at his time. At that time, a wealthy, wise individual of high stature society, they would use their wealth and they would show it on their body.

It was all about opulence and splendor. Right? You think of like the Disney show. I I... Whenever I think of it, I think of the, you know, the only picture I've really seen is that, you know, that entrance of Ali about...

Like, what's that song? And they got the genies spinning around and all these people dancing and you got got hit, you know, the beautiful clothes and the purple outfit and the gold and all that. And, you know, that was something they did back then to show their splendor. But he says, like like Solomon was the pinnacle and here was a man that was like no other. And he says there's millions and billions of lilies.

Every single one of them was granted a greater amount of splendor than Solomon. Not even a comparison. Only a comparison, the littler to the smaller. You're comparing the smaller to the bigger, but he's saying the lilies, which are smaller, is actually more splendor... Had more splendor than this man who who had all the resources and all the wisdom and put his mind and heart into his own splendor.

And if God does that for this thing... And you talk about lifespan. Right? Talk about the body and the lifespan of the body. This says, you know, this is...

Today, it's beautiful with the splendid that God gave it. The next day, it's dried up, and we take it, and we just throw it into the fire so we can clear up our lawn. Right? We can have a nice green lawn or whatever. Open up the field and, you know.

And if he does that for that, just for a moment, he just did it to be extravagant. That's who God is. Right? He did it that much more than Solomon, just to be extravagant. Then what does it mean?

30:39 God knows you need these things

Right? Just, that's why you don't need to seek him. Because he knows. Right? And you don't have to worry about it.

God is an extravagant God. He's a good God. He cares about the littlest things. He knows about you. And also, sometimes he knows some things that we don't know, that we don't fully understand.

Our hearts are too hard and to even grasp. And he drives the point home. You can see Jesus and his patience in this section. He drives that point home patiently and with pictures that are from this world that he shows to make a spiritual point. In verse 29, he says, he gets to kind of the point of this all, and do not seek what you will eat and what you will drink, and do not keep worrying.

Okay? Again, he adds that phrase, don't worry. Though these things come together. When you seek these things, you will worry. Do not do either.

Okay? They come together. I will make a point here. Whenever I started reading this passage, I immediately thought of that song. You know there's a little kid's toy, a little fish, and it kind of...

You press a button and it comes out and sings you a song that says, here's a little song I sing. Don't worry, be happy now. You know, it's written by a guy. I I researched. I forgot the guy's name.

It's in my notes, but I... Somewhere deep, I've already gotten way off my notes. It's written by a guy in the eighties and actually won a a Grammy apparently, or the album did. And he goes through all these bad circumstances. You know, your landlord not paying, you're gonna have to litigate.

And don't worry, be happy. That's it, right?

And apparently, the story goes is that he got it from some some Indian guru from the sixties and the eighties, but he saw a quote from an Indian guru, and he wrote the song from it. And I'm thinking, well, he stole it from the Indian guru. The Indian guru stole it from Jesus. Unfortunately, left a few things out, right? Because it's...

Because right here we have the illustrations that show us why and how not to worry. Right? It's not as simple. It's simple, not easy necessarily. But, if we can enter into the truth of what he's illustrating using his his explanations, and especially like these illustrations that show something so much bigger, you know, we start to realize that the kingdom of God's worth seeking.

And also that we don't need to worry. And when those touch our hearts, they make a difference. When we choose to seek the Lord, they make a difference. And so, I'm going to read three verses here. And do not seek what you will eat and what you will drink, and do not keep worrying.

For all these things the nations of the world eagerly seek. This is the natural way we go about it. The nations of the world eagerly seek these things, but your father knows that you need these things. And that's something. He's been illustrating the goodness of the father through all of this by showing that he's good even to the little.

And we're that much more valuable. We're infinitely more valuable so he's infinitely better. Right? So he's trying to illustrate, to hire people, how good he is. And it's not easy because even, you know, even when we read through it, normally we miss it.

It's very easy to just come up with, well, don't worry. You might as well say, don't worry, be happy. You know? But that's not what he's saying. He is saying it, but there's more to it.

And so the real thing is that this... You're not gonna worry just for some... You're not gonna not worry for no reason at all. But he's given you clear reasons. And the biggest being who he is and how great his kingdom is, how valuable it is.

Right? And so, but your father, and he's invoking the familiar term, the father, the care of a father, knows that you need these things. But seek his kingdom, and these things will be added to you. This isn't saying that we don't work. And I think some people get that.

Let's just meditate and manifest. Right? Maybe the Indian guru thought that. I don't know. But I don't know that it works that good in India.

35:57 The rich fool's sin

I mean, sin wasn't that he worked. Right? In fact, God himself worked to create. And then he said it was good. And then he rested.

Right? His sin was that when he worked and God blessed, that he took it all for himself. And he said, this is all for me. You know? He...

And and and the whole crux, the whole thing that this this passage turns on is looking back right at the end of that story. He said, this person is a fool to store up earthly wealth but not have a rich relationship with God. And that's that's what this all comes to, is what do we value? Maslow, Abraham Maslow came up with this hierarchy of needs. Right?

And it actually makes good sense. You could call it wisdom under the sun. Right? He said that, and I can't even read because it was in color, the thing I printed out here, now it's black and white. But essentially, it starts with the base needs.

You need to have oxygen to live and food and the base things. Then you need safety and security, so like a house. Then you need to have some relational security like love and belonging, a sense that you're in a family or a community. He says you need self esteem after that, or you get that, you can achieve that after that. And if you look at the way it is, you can kind of see that maybe.

Maybe there's some value you could... After you've got your base needs, you can kind of start to think about yourself a little bit. And then he says, morality and spirituality are the very pinnacle. If you achieve all that, you go up. But Jesus is actually turning it up on his head.

By the way, by the way, it's not not all rhyme. It's it's it's observed and it makes sense. You even see it like in Nehemiah where Nehemiah starts out with no security. There's no walls. They're struggling to even protect their fields, and then there's no social security.

The rich are preying on the poor and and interest. And Nehemiah comes in and fixes that, and he fixes the walls, and suddenly they have security. And then the very next thing, what do you have? A movement of the Lord. So you can kind of see that progression of security.

God does sometimes work through that. Right? But, what Jesus is saying here is for you, for us, to seek something else first because God will take care of the security. And even in Nehemiah, that's what happened is God sent Nehemiah to take care of the security. Okay?

But for us, we don't seek the security. We seek God. He is our security. And so you'd almost take that whole pyramid and the very base is seek his kingdom first. Right?

All these things, and you invert it. The need for all these things, they will be taken care of. And they'll be taken care of... Now, to be honest, let's just be frank. Not all physical needs are always been taken care of for all ages of all Christians, at least in terms of the physical part of it.

Know? To be honest, many people have been martyred. You say, Well, what happened there? Right? And I think they are the people which I think the Bible says the world was not worthy of them, if you will.

You know? I love that phrase. I can see my dad smiling. It's a wonderful phrase. It shows a spiritual truth.

Right? The world was not worthy of these people. The... You can think of... And what he's saying is, they understood that God's kingdom was bigger.

They really understood that. And you see examples of faith like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego where they said, they recognized this even in their language. They said, Oh king, we understand that you can kill us. We choose to serve God. We believe he can save us.

We don't know if he will. But we value the relationship with him more than even our lives. And so, they weren't concerned so much. I'm not saying they didn't feel any anxiety. I might feel a little bit.

But I think there was probably a certain amount of supernatural peace in their hearts. And you saw a similar thing with Paul when he was in the dungeon and he was facing death the very next day. And what was he doing when the angel came upon him? He was sleeping peacefully. Right?

And so you think to yourself, Apostle Paul wrote the words. He said, to live is Christ and to die is gain. That this very life is Christ. To live... Remember he said life is more than food and clothes?

It's not just more than food and clothes. It is Christ to the Christian. That was in his heart and his mind. He equated the life here in Christ. That was where his security was.

And even when he faced death itself, well, he he was still saying to himself, I think, to live is Christ to die is gain. So when I go there, I'm going be able to say like David did. David anticipated or prophesied. He says, When I see his face, I will be satisfied. All these things in this world don't even satisfy.

Of course, they create anxiety. They don't even satisfy. They don't feel my deeper spiritual need that I already have. That itself is evidence of what Jesus is saying here. He said, I'm going to be satisfied when I see him.

And so for Paul, he could say that and it was evidenced by the fact that he was sleeping deeply at the time that an angel woke him up in the middle of the night and actually decided to rescue him, you know, from the physical issue there. And, of course, the ultimate example is Jesus. Jesus himself was the example of someone who obviously saw God's kingdom. He was doing that before he came to the kingdom of this world in bodily form. Of course, we know it says in Hebrews, For the joy that was set before them, he endured the cross.

His joy was the Father's will. His joy was to marry his bride, the Church, to commune with us, the Church, eternally. His joy the joy. His joy is our joy. And so, the very next thing...

43:18 Sell possessions, give to charity

And I believe that sell your possessions... Selling possessions was a thing that happened in the early church. Certainly, it says that they had no needs, and so they did as needed. Right? Because they were selling their possessions to serve God's people.

Also, I think that to some extent, he's talking about the importance of the kingdom of God. And so this would be a little bit similar to this this admonishment, or you could take it as admonishment, but I don't think it was quite hyperbole, if you will, that Jesus spoke when he said, pluck your eyes out. In other words, he said, pluck your eyes out. It would be better to lose a whole sense or a whole body part if it was something that caused you to go to hell. Now, we all know that it's in our own hearts and the sin that we have and our unrepentance that send us to hell.

So we knew that that wasn't the real issue. But his point was is that this was far greater, that going to heaven and avoiding hell, that the kingdom of God was something that was so wonderful and so good, that to let anything keep in the way would not be okay. And it's very similar to this in that, listen, your possessions are not yours, number one. And if you're keeping them up for yourself, and it's causing you to worry, it's causing you not to be able to enjoy the kingdom of God, not to anticipate it, not to think about it, then then you are essentially... You're yourself.

You're you're making a fool's bet. You're making... You're doing bad business, if you will. You're not doing the right thing with your money. He says, make yourself money belts which do not wear out.

He could also say, don't think that you can bring this money and this gold in that case to heaven. Right? The money belts that don't wear out is the equivalent of you're traveling. And you're gonna... In today's thing, we have money that's American currency.

We're kinda used to that being used everywhere. But in the local places, a certain money is used and its value is there. And you can't expect one currency over here to work over here. You have to translate it. You have to convert it.

And so it's a very similar thing. In the Kingdom of God, it's a different country than this world. And the money here can't be spent there. We have to go to the money exchanger. Right?

And when we spend it on the kingdom of God, when we spend it on souls, when we spend our time, talent, and treasure on the things that matter, we're buying up for ourselves these things. We're getting that money belt. We're translating it. Because the money here, well, the thieves come and they steal it. The IRS takes it out of our bank account.

We buy things and they break. Our kids break them. Moths eat them, apparently. Eternal wealth expands quickly. There's no tax on that wealth.

47:21 Where your treasure is, there your heart

What do you value? What's super important to you? What do you concern yourself with? Right? Just think on these things and just think about how wonderful Christ is.

Look through some of these thoughts on how he takes care of the little things. It shows us so much about how he takes care of us. And just look to that in faith. Who he is. What he is.

What's his kingdom like. You know? That's our hope. That's what we... We trust in him.

Seek The Things Above — Luke 12

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Seek The Things Above — Luke 12

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