Where Your Treasure Is (Part 2)
Matthew 6:19-24
Last time we began to look at Matthew 6:19-24. The issue is treasure: material possessions or money. The reason Jesus teaches about this subject is that He is concerned about our hearts. Jesus gives the overriding principle in Matthew 6:21, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” This principle is the foundation of what Jesus said in Matthew 6:19-20. He will expand on this principle in Matthew 6:22-24. It is the main point. Jesus is concerned about where we store our treasure for one reason: He is most concerned about our hearts. Your heart is the very center of your being, the seat of your emotions, desires, and will. Our heart is the part of us that loves a “treasure” so much that it moves our entire being to seek after it. Your heart follows your treasure.
1. Consider your treasure: Where are storing up? (6:19-21)
We saw last time that where you store your treasures shows where your heart is. Our hearts are naturally inclined toward our treasures. If our treasures are on earth—that is where our heart is. If our treasures are in heaven—that is where our heart is. That’s why Jesus gave the prohibition, “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth” (Matt. 6:19), but instead, gave the prescription, “but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven” (Matt. 6:20). Look at where your treasures are stored up, and you will find where your heart has been.
If you treasure up your treasures on earth, not only will they be destroyed in the end, but they will also pull your heart away from God. We saw the example of the rich young ruler who could not follow Christ because his treasure had already stolen his heart.
Today, in Matthew 6:22-24, Jesus continues teaching on this subject by giving us two lessons by analogy—first in the area of sight (Matt. 6:22-23) and second in the area of service (Matt. 6:24). These also will help us to evaluate our hearts.
In Matthew 6:22-23 Jesus teaches you to,
2. Consider your vision: What are you seeking? (6:22-23)
Jesus said, “22 The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. 23 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!” (Matt. 6:22-23).
What does Jesus mean when He says, “The lamp of the body is the eye”? Let’s think about this. What does a lamp do to a room? It brightens the room so that you can see more clearly. Why is the eye like this for the body? It is with the eye that we observe, recognize, and seek. John Stott comments, “Almost everything the body does depends on our ability to see. We need to see in order to run, jump, drive a car, cross a road, cook, embroider, paint. The eye, as it were, ‘illumines’ what the body does through its hands and feet.”[1] This is what Jesus means when He says, “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,” (Matt 6:22-23). The eye lets light into the body and allows us to use all the other members of our body. With good eyes, our whole body can operate in the realm of light. Without good eyes—if our eye is bad—we will stumble around in the dark. I think we all can understand that picture.
Now Jesus is not just concerned here about physical eyesight. He is using this as an analogy to talk about our hearts. Remember, the subject is our hearts in relation to treasures on earth or treasures in heaven, our hearts in relation to God and money. Jesus has just given the principle, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” He is teaching about the heart. Not infrequently in Scripture, the ‘eye’ is equivalent to the ‘heart’. That is, to ‘set the heart’ and to ‘fix the eye’ on something are synonyms. In Psalm 119:36 the Psalmist writes, “Incline my heart to Your testimonies, And not to covetousness.” In the next verse, He writes, “Turn away my eyes from looking at worthless things, And revive me in Your way” (Psa. 119:37). To incline your heart to God and His word is to turn your eyes away from covetousness and the worthless things of this world.
In the scriptures, a good eye is a picture of a generous heart. Proverbs 22:9 says, “He who has a generous eye will be blessed, For he gives of his bread to the poor.” A “generous eye” is literally a “good eye.” Pro 11:25 says, “The generous soul will be made rich, And he who waters will also be watered himself.” In that verse, the word “generous” means “blessing” and is translated into the Greek Old Testament using the same word that Matthew uses to describe a “good” eye in Matthew 6:22. The good eye is one that is clear. The for “good” is haplous, meaning singleness, simplicity, and describes an eye that does not see double as it does when it is infected.
In the New Testament, the noun form of haplous often means “liberality” or “generosity” (Rom. 12:8; 2 Cor. 8:2; 9:11), and the adverb form means “liberally’ or “generously” (James 1:5). A good eye is the picture of a generous heart.
On the other hand, the bad eye indicates a stingy, selfish, and covetous heart.
Moses writes in Deuteronomy 15:9, “Beware lest there be a wicked thought in your heart, saying, ‘The seventh year, the year of release, is at hand,’ and your eye be evil against your poor brother and you give him nothing, and he cry out to the LORD against you, and it become sin among you.” The man with the evil eye does not help the poor or give generously. Proverbs 23:6 says, “Do not eat the bread of a miser, Nor desire his delicacies” (the word miser literally is “one who has an evil eye”). The next proverb says about the man with the evil eye, “For as he thinks in his heart, so is he. “Eat and drink!” he says to you, But his heart is not with you.” (Pro. 23:7). He has an evil eye, a stingy heart. Proverbs 28:22 says, “A man with an evil eye hastens after riches, And does not consider that poverty will come upon him.”
Jesus used this figure of speech in the parable of the workers in the vineyard who complained that they worked all day and got the same pay as those who worked just one hour. The master of the vineyard said to these workers, “Is it not lawful for me to do what I wish with my own things? Or is your eye evil because I am good?” (Matt. 20:15). The evil eye cannot see the goodness of grace and the brightness of generosity. “It is a worldly eye. It sees money and material reward as more to be desired than a beautiful display of free, gracious, God-like generosity.”[2]
So, how is your sight? The man who only seeks the things of God with his heart, will therefore only want the things of God with his eyes. If your eye is only looking for the things of God; if your eye is only looking for opportunities to serve God; if your eye is only looking for opportunities to grow the kingdom; if your eye is only looking for opportunities to give generously—then rest assured your heart is clean, “your whole body will be full of light.” If all you are looking for with your eyes is spiritual treasure, then you can know your heart is in the right place.
But if your eye is only looking for earthly riches; if your eye is coveting what others have; if your eye is stingy and selfish so that you cannot give to help others or advance the kingdom of God—then your heart is darkened. If your eye is bad, that is in an indicator that your heart is bad. And Jesus says, “If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!” (Matt. 6:23). If you think your heart is good, that you are right with God, but you are selfish, ungrateful, and stingy, you have an evil eye and a bad heart.
So, if what you thought was good was really bad, how bad are you? First, we learned that earthly treasure will pull your heart away from God. Here we learn that greed for it will blind you to your true spiritual condition. Not only will it lead you away from God but it will lead you away from God without you even realizing it. Paul writes in 1 Timothy 6:9-10, “But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.” You cannot desire riches and God at the same time.
So we need to ask ourselves, what am I seeking? Finally, Jesus wants you to,
3. Consider your master: Who are you serving? (6:24)
Jesus says in Matthew 6:24, “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.”
Jesus has presented us with a stark contrast between treasure on earth and treasure in heaven, between good spiritual sight and bad spiritual sight, and now between the masters of God and mammon. Storing up earthly treasures keeps us from storing up heavenly treasures. A bad eye keeps us from having good light. And having mammon as your master keeps you from serving God.
It’s not that people don’t try to serve two masters—they often think they can. “They assure us that it is perfectly possible to serve two masters simultaneously, for they manage it very nicely themselves. Either they serve God on Sundays and mammon on weekdays, or God with their lips and mammon with their hearts, or God in appearance and mammon in reality, or God with half their being and mammon with the other half.”[3]
Jesus declares this kind of compromise to be impossible. The word, “serve” here does not bring out to us the strength of the word it represents. This verb comes from the noun doulos (δοῦλος) meaning bond slave. We could translate it, “No one is able to slave for two masters.” A slave is owned and controlled by his or her master. The very nature of the slave/master relationship precludes it from being anything but singular for the slave. A master can have many slaves, but a slave can only do the will of one master.
Jesus put it in terms of hate and love, “for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other.” The apostle John also puts it in terms of love,
15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world–the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life–is not of the Father but is of the world. 17 And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever. (1 John 2:15-17).
The verse puts it plainly, if you love the world or the things in it, then the love of God is not in you, and what you love is going to pass away. But if you love God, then you will not love the world and you will abide forever.
Notice, Jesus didn’t say you couldn’t have money; He said you can’t serve it and God at the same time. What does serving money mean? Serving money means that you are consumed with money: you think about it all the time, you bring it up in nearly every conversation, and you are scared to death of losing it. Serving money means that money determines what you do. Does God and His word direct your actions, or are you directed by the fiscal bottom line? That’s His concern. His concern is about priorities. Who you serve shows who your god is. Is the Lord your God or is money your god? Money is a good servant but a poor master.[4]
There are countless examples of both slaves to God and slaves to mammon.[5]
Moses was a slave to God. Hebrews 11:24-26 tells us, “24 By faith Moses, when he became of age, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, 25 choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin, 26 esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt; for he looked to the reward.”
Demas was a slave to Mammon. Paul says of him in 2 Timothy 4:10, “Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world.”
Daniel was a slave to God. Scripture records several instances in which Daniel’s decision to serve God was in direct opposition to the easy choice of serving mammon. He would not eat the king’s delicacies but lived on a simple diet of vegetables to avoid unclean food and worldly lusts.
The rich young ruler in Matthew 19 was a slave to mammon. Jesus offered him the way to heaven and called him to follow him, but as Matthew 19:22 says, “But when the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions..”
The churches of Macedonia served God through their sacrificial giving. Paul remarks about them in 2 Corinthians 8:2, “that in a great trial of affliction the abundance of their joy and their deep poverty abounded in the riches of their liberality.” Though they were impoverished, they gave abundantly for the cause of Christ.
Judas was a slave of mammon. This was seen in John 12 when he protested about Mary anointing the feet of Jesus with expensive perfume, saying, “Why was this fragrant oil not sold for three hundred denarii and given to the poor?” (John 12:5). John says about Judas, “This he said, not that he cared for the poor, but because he was a thief, and had the money box; and he used to take what was put in it.” (John 12:6 NKJV). Though he had been with Jesus for three years, his love for money was greater, and he later betrayed the Lord for 30 pieces of silver.
The rest of the Apostles were slaves of God. They gave up their jobs and positions to follow Jesus and spread the Gospel. Matthew gave up a lucrative career as a tax collector and Paul, his position of high esteem among the Pharisees and chief priests.
Ananias and Saphira were slaves of mammon and it cost them their lives (Acts 5:1-11). They conspired together to lie about what they were giving to the Church. They were free to give or keep anything they wanted, but they lied trying to seek more acclaim among the brethren. They wanted the praise of men for being generous and godly, but they also wanted to keep their money.
Jesus wants us to ask ourselves, “Where am I storing up treasure?”; “What am I seeking with my eyes and my heart?”; “Who is my master?”
Let God search your heart today as we pray.
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[1] John R. W. Stott and John R. W. Stott, The Message of the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7): Christian Counter-Culture, The Bible Speaks Today (Leicester; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1985), 156–158.
[2] John Piper, What Is the “Bad Eye” in Matthew 6:23?, https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/what-is-the-bad-eye-in-matthew-6-23
[3] Stott, ibid, p. 158.
[4] Keith Krell, God or Greed? (Matthew 6:19–24), https://bible.org/seriespage/8-god-or-greed-matthew-619-24
[5] Scott L. Harris, Who’s Your Master? – Matthew 6:22-24, https://www.gracebibleny.org/whos_your_master_matthew_6_22_24 I adapted these examples from Harris’ sermon.
