Mastering Your Money

Matthew 6:19-24

Many ,Cameroonians are more cynical today than ever before. We don’t trust politicians or the economy and many are suspicious of the church. I realize that our topic this morning may create additional cynicism for some of you. One of the raps that churches have today is that they’re always asking for money.

Since I know what I’m up against when tackling the topic of money in church, I hope to persuade you that it’s important to hear what the Bible has to say. You see, according to Jesus, money is a spiritual issue. And, since it’s a spiritual issue, we need to address it for at least three reasons.

1. The Bible has more to say about money than almost any other subject.

2. Giving will help us get to where we’re going as a church.

3. There are incredible benefits to giving.

The topic of money is both personal and theological.

1. Poverty Theology. This imbalanced view teaches that we should have a disdain for possessions. Some who hold this position would say that it’s wrong to have excess money and things.

2. Prosperity Theology. This teaching wrongly assumes that prosperity is the reward of the righteous. This cause and effect relationship implies that if God is happy with you, He will bless you financially. If He’s not pleased with you, you won’t be blessed with possessions.

[Oh, I’m sorry. I just forgot something. My sister and brother-in-law are here today and we wanted to take them out for lunch. This is really embarrassing. I don’t have any money on me. Could someone give me 1000 Fcfa? Thanks a lot. I appreciate it.]

3. Proper Theology. The proper way to view our possessions is that they are a trust given by God that we are responsible to manage. Everything belongs to Him and we are to serve as stewards whether we are blessed with a lot or with a little. Now, I can tell that many of you are wondering why someone would just pop out of their seats and hand me 1000Fcfa. Do you know why he did it? It’s because it wasn’t his money. It was mine. I gave it to him before the service.He was simply returning it to me.

That’s exactly what we do when we practice the joy of biblical stewardship ­ we give back to God that which is His in the first place. Friends, we’ve never given God one thing. When we make an offering or a tithe, we’re giving what He already owns. We’ve spoken about this last Sunday.

Jesus realizes that most people struggle with managing money -- that’s why He devoted much of His teaching to this critical area of life. He dealt with money matters because money matters.

Sermon on the mount

While Jesus taught on many different topics, his most famous message is called the Sermon on the Mount, found in Matthew 5-7. I’m sure there were some cynics who were listening to Jesus that day. They probably wondered who this new teacher was. They were impressed with His insight and His practical teaching. He covered many of the subjects of life: how to treat others, how to forgive, how to handle lust, how to handle worry, the importance of keeping your word, and the difference between true and false prayer.

Eventually he came to the subject of money. That really shouldn’t surprise us because money is a big part of what life is all about. Many people work for money, many live for money, we think about money, we wish we had more, and worry that we don’t have enough. Please turn in your Bibles to Matthew 6:19-24. In this passage, Jesus challenges us with the question, “Where is your treasure?”He helps us find the answer by giving four tests.

1. The Durability Test. The first test is found in verses 19-20 and asks the question, “How long will it last?” Verse 19 is a negative command: “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.” Verse 20 is the positive: “But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven…”

The first word that leaps out at us in these verses is the word “treasures.” Jesus did not say, “money” because while everyone does not have a lot of cash, we all have things that we treasure. Our treasure may be a home, a car, a computer, our clothes, or even a position that we hold or seek after. While Jesus is not saying that it is wrong to have treasures, He is telling us that our focus should be on laying up treasures in heaven, not on earth.

The first life-skill that Jesus wants us to develop is to stop living just for today. This command is in the present tense. It literally means to “stop storing up.” We’re to stop doing something that by nature we’ve been doing for most of our lives.

That doesn’t mean that we can’t have material possessions, or own property, or save for the future. The key lies in the little phrase, “for yourselves.” Jesus is forbidding the selfish, self-centered accumulating of goods as the major end of life.

If you try to store your wealth, the moths will find it, or rust will consume it. If you try to hide it for yourself, thieves can steal it. Jesus is saying that earthly wealth is very insecure. It either decays over time, or it disappears altogether.

Job 27:16, 20 provides a vivid description of this process: “Though he heaps up silver like dust and clothes like piles of clay…he lays down wealthy, but will do so no more; when he opens his eyes, all is gone.”

Earthly treasures are fleeting and futile but heavenly treasures are secure. 1 Peter 1:4: “And into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade -- kept in heaven for you.” Treasures that we send on ahead are mothproof, rustproof, and burglarproof. Verse 20: “But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.”

The issue is not whether we will store up wealth. That’s a given. The only question is where we will do our banking. Since earthly treasures are unstable and insecure, Jesus challenges us to make long-term investments that are permanent and guaranteed. Deposits made in the First National Bank of Heaven will not decay or disappear. They are protected  and insured by God Himself.

That leads to a question: How do we make deposits on earth that yield dividends in heaven? Let me answer that in just one sentence: You store up treasures in heaven by investing your money in that which lasts for eternity. I know of two things that will last forever:

The Word of God
People

Friends, everything else will decay or disappear. Cars, boats, homes, clothes, jobs, salaries, vacations, books, and buildings will all pass away. They wear out, rust out, blow up, or fall apart. Nothing that is material lasts forever. That’s the way God set it up. 1 John 2:17: “The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.” I love what Jim Eliot said, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”

2. Heart Test. The second test asks the question, “Where are you investing your time and money?” and is found in verse 21: “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

To put it plainly, Jesus is saying that your heart follows your money. That’s not the way most of us think. We tend to think our money follows our heart -- if our heart is right, we will spend our money wisely. That’s not the way it works because your heart always follows your treasure.

Whatever you invest your time and money in will become very important to you. Too many of us spend all that we have on the things of this world and then we wonder why we have trouble concentrating on the things of God. Our problem is that we’ve invested everything down here and hardly anything up there! Our money has kept our heart tied to the earth. You’ll never be able to get your heart focused on heaven as long as your attention is on material things.

3. The Mind Test. The third test asks the question, “Where is your focus?” and is found in verses 22-23: “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!”

The eye is a symbol for the mind. Jesus is saying that there are only two possible ways to look at things. If our minds focus only on things down here, we’ll be full of darkness. The natural eye focuses on our physical existence but the spiritual eye locks into what really matters. When money becomes our #1 obsession, it can put blinders on our eyes and ruin our spiritual life. If our thoughts are filled with how we can deposit treasures in heaven, our bodies will be full of light.

4. The Master Test. The fourth and final test focuses on our will and asks the question: “Whom do you serve?” Let’s look at verse 24: “No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.”

The word Jesus uses here for money is the word, “Mammon,” which is a proper noun, or a name. Jesus viewed Money as a rival for preeminence. Attachment to money leads to a detachment from God. The Bible is absolutely clear about the venomous nature of money. It fights for supremacy in our lives and it has many of the characteristics of deity. It promises security, freedom and power.

To love God requires service and even sacrifice. This type of allegiance cannot be rendered to two parties. Whatever we devote ourselves to becomes our God. The tension that many of us experience when we try to love both God and money will sooner or later begin to show where our real loyalty lies. Only one master will win out.

Money is not just a neutral medium of exchange, but a “power” with a life of its own which seeks to control, and even consume us. The goal of this Money Master is total domination of your value system, without you even being aware of it.

If you’re serving the Money Master, Jesus says you will be unable to fully serve God.He doesn’t say, “you better not” or “it would be unwise to serve both,” He says, “you cannot serve both God and money.” As such, how we handle our money has a lot to do with how serious we are about obeying God. His words are unsettling. If you love money, you will end up hating God. If you are devoted to the pursuit of possessions and the making of money, you will find yourself despising the things of God.

I suspect that most of you do not want to hate God. In fact, you’re here because you want to learn how you can get to know Him better. Let me put it right on the table. You will never be able to fully love God if you are in love with money and all that money can buy.
We’ve all heard the expression “Money Talks. Or Na money di talk” Have you ever listened to what it says?

“You hold me in your hand and call me yours. Yet may I not as well call you mine? See how easily I rule you? To gain me, you would all but die. I am invaluable as rain, essential as water. Yet I do not hold the power of life -- I am futile without the stamp of your desire. I go nowhere unless you send me. My power is terrific. Handle me carefully and wisely, lest you become my servant, rather than I yours.” As someone has said, “Money is a wonderful servant, but a lousy master.”

4 Tests Illustrated

When Jesus was asked a question about a money matter, He told a story that illustrates how easy it is to fail these four tests. Please turn in your Bibles to Luke 12. Let’s start by looking at verse 15: “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.”



Jesus then tells a parable to show us what can happen if we take a short-term approach to life: “The ground of a certain rich man produced a good crop. He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’ Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I’ll say to myself, ‘You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.’”

Did you notice how many times this man uses the words, “me”, “myself” and “I”? I counted them: 12 times in 3 verses! His greed is unchecked. Do you see the deception? He was storing up treasures on earth with no long-terminvestment strategy for the next life. Notice what happens next in verse 20: “But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?”

Our society values people who make much money on this earth. God, however, has a different view of this man. Because he was laying up treasures for himself on earth, and had made no eternal investments, God calls him a fool. When he dies, all his possessions and his shiny new barns will disappear and be given to someone else. He failed the durability test, the heart test, the mind test, and the master test.

Jesus concludes this parable with an application for eachof us in verse 21: “This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God.”

Are you storing up things only for yourself? Are you just focused on this world? If so, you’re in trouble. If I’m not rich toward God, God says that I’m a fool.

Friends, let me encourage you to take this four-part test on a regular basis.

1. The Durability Test. How long will my things last? Are they temporary or will they last forever in heaven?

2. The Heart Test. Where am I investing my time and money? What excites me the most, earth or heaven? Which place makes my heart beat faster?

3. The Mind Test. Where do I focus my goals? Am I committed to materialism or spirituality? Do I operate according to God’s priorities, or my own?

4. The Master Test. Is Jesus my master or is something, or someone, else? Will I serve money on earth and allow it to be my god, or will I serve God in heaven with my treasures, which are really His in the first place?

A rich man died and went to heaven. As he went through the Pearly Gates, Peter came to greet him and said, “Welcome to heaven. Let me show you where you’ll be staying.”

That suited the rich man just fine, because as he looked around, he saw mansions stretching out in every direction. They were beautiful! They appeared to be constructed of gold and silver and precious gems.

As Peter and the rich man began to walk along the streets of gold, they came to an ornate home. As they paused to gaze at it, the rich man said, “Who gets to stay here?” Saint Peter replied, “That’s for your janitor. He was a godly man who loved Jesus and served Him all his life. This is his reward.”

They continued to stroll past other mansions, until they stopped in front of an extremely large one that seemed to be made of emeralds and rubies. The rich man asked Peter, “Is this mine?” Peter answered, “No, this one belongs to your maid. On the little bit of money you paid her, she raised six children and gave to her church every week.”

They continued to walk and came to a different section of homes. Only these houses weren’t as nice. As they walked up a small hill, they stopped in front of a shack made of tar paper and used sheet metal. The front door was cut out of an old refrigerator box. It was held together with bailing wire and twine.

After pausing for a moment, the rich man asked, “And whose is that?” Peter responded, “Why, it’s yours!” The rich man couldn’t believe it. There must be some mistake. Peter bowed his head and said, “No, there’s been no mistake -- we did the best with what you sent ahead!”