Tuesday, October 29, 2019

The Storehouse



Matthew 6:19-21

·       Some store treasures on earth

·       These are susceptible to attack

·       Instead, store treasures in heaven

·       Which is completely safe.

For where your treasure is, there will be your heart (motivation, dedication).


Thesario – storehouse – treasury


What are we sending ahead? What do I desire to most preserve for eternity?  The answer to the second question will reveal my heart and, subsequently, my path.  Motivation will determine the life I live: whether I live it for myself and my goals on earth or for God and his goals in heaven.


Treasures are often thought of as goods and wealth, and it may include the use of our goods and wealth, but only if those are involved in the pursuance of the things of heaven.  Jesus tells us much about heaven:  that it’s near us, (Matt 3:2, 4:17; Luke 10:8,9; Mark 10:34) is given to us (Matt 5:3), that we can enter it while still on earth (Mark 10:15; Matt 5:20), that it has arrived (Matt 12:28; Mark 9:1), that it belongs to us (Matt 18:3; 19:14), that it is seen (John 3:3-5) and that you can tell when someone is a disciple of heaven (Matt 13:52).  The treasury’s door is opened by the Kingdom of Heaven’s presence today.  


Through these teachings, Jesus describes what actions will be in the treasury:  repentance, healing, understanding, obedience, living in the Spirit, having the faith and humbleness of a child, realizing your need for God, even being persecuted demonstrates where our hearts are.  Casting out demons/spirits, power for life, knowledge, relationship with God’s people are the treasures which garner interest in heaven.  The treasury is filled with the stories and the life within the Kingdom’s presence today.


My storehouse in heaven needs more repentance – being able to own up and confess my sins to God and others.  It will hold the delight of honesty and the integrity of coming clean.  It will hold the healing which began on earth and will be completed in heaven.  It will be the full expression of how I have gotten right with myself, no longer burdened or held back by the offenses of others or my own sin.  Freedom will exist there like no other place.


The history of the places I have obeyed God’s commands and of Jesus’ measure of the enactment of love, including the love of my enemies, will fill the songs of heaven.  When I have been able to obey God and not the world, when love was acted out with purity of motive, heaven’s coffers brim with the contribution.


The Kingdom of Heaven has arrived with the casting (drive out, expel with force) out of demons (evil spirits, ministers of the devil).  Let great fear and awe come over you when the Spirit of God has overcome these evil spirits, whether illness or addiction, bad intent or sin.  The story will reverberate and be sung in the halls of your mansion.


Life in the Spirit will lay up memories of the obvious places where I was led, guided, taught and protected by the Holy Spirit, including when I got invited into the Kingdom and the veil was lifted about the Holy Spirit.  It is the story of the hole in my heart and how God filled it, of the places for prayer in my life and how the Holy Spirit directed the solutions.  Salvation’s story in me is awaiting its fulfillment in that treasury.


The power that became dynamically present and publicly displayed will have a heavenly display.  That power will be magnified by being in its proper home, where it originated.  What was thought to be the actions of people, will be fully seen as to its source and will glorify the One who shared it.  It will show itself by its true source, it will come into full view, in heaven.


The humbleness of a child – knowing my rightful place with God, my complete dependence on God – will electrify and grow the treasury.  When I could believe with innocence and dependence on God, the stories of the possibilities of letting God have his way will be fully explored and grown.  What humbleness stories will go ahead of me?  Maybe I could lay down my sword, my ego more.  Lay down myself so as to build the treasury’s hold. 


The obedience of my heart will be displayed for its motivation, not to preserve my own place but to allow God to have his way. The stories of deliberateness and willingness to live God’s way will be to his honor.  Whenever I could want and pray for God’s way is displayed in a prayer that says,  “Lord, do whatever it takes,” and then concede to his way.  That story is laid up in the treasury because it gives attention to God’s rightful claim to my path, my decisions.


In the relationships with God’s people, remember what lasts into eternity are the hearts and souls of godly men and women.  The stories you could tell of those you nurtured, those who nurtured you.  those who walked alongside you in darkness and celebrated the victory with you, those who taught you and whom you taught!  That annals of heaven will reverberate with our victory songs.  


Healing will be complete there. Healing of bodies, hearts, minds and relationships are the evidence of heaven’s presence.  I want to work for that reward!





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