TRYING TO SERVE TWO MASTERS?
Matthew 6:19-24

For the past couple of Village Line chats, we have been studying what Jesus had to say about materialism.  We have noticed that He declared that materialism affected our hearts because where our treasures were, there would also be our hearts. 

Now, in verses 22 and 23, Jesus proclaims that materialism affects our minds.  The Jews regarded the eye as the window by which light got into the body.  We know that the amount of light that gets into any room depends upon the condition of the windows through which it passes.  Now a good eye came from the Greek word meaning generous, while an evil eye came from the Greek word meaning grudgingly.  Jesus is condemning the grudging person, the person who shares what he has with others only after great effort has been placed upon him to do so.  His spirit was not in his gift.  The truth Jesus would have us learn is this:  the way we look at and use our money is a sure barometer of our spiritual condition.  The great preacher, John H. Jowett, proclaimed that truth with these words:  The real measure of our wealth is how much we should we worth if we lost our money.

Finally, in that very familiar verse 24, Jesus states that materialism often affects our will.  He proclaims that we cannot serve two masters.  Now, that statement alone implies that we are slaves.  This we know about slaves:  they had absolutely no rights of their own and they had no time that was their own.  The word mammon came from a Hebrew word for material possession.  It was the wealth that a man entrusted to someone else to keep safe for him.  Eventually it came to be that which a man put his trust in, taking on the importance of a god. 

Friends, these two masters – God and Mammon – are opposed to each other.  Dr. John MacArthur expresses it this way:  The orders of those two masters are diametrically opposed and cannot coexist.  The one commands us to walk by faith and the other demands we walk by sight.  The one calls us to be humble and the other to be proud, the one to set our minds on things above and the other to set them on things below.  One calls us to love light, the other to love darkness.  The one tells us to look toward things unseen and eternal and the other to look at things seen and temporal. 

As we close our study today, friends, may I ask you where your treasure is?  Is it valued in dollars and cents?  Is it based upon those things you can see and touch?  Or is it in the lives you can touch for God?  These really are questions we need to ask ourselves daily, aren’t they?

Father, Again You have reminded us so pointedly that our real wealth is not to be placed in material things, but in the lives of those whom we serve.  Help us to view our money and our possessions as mere tools to be used to help others come to know and to experience Your love. That is what real treasure and real wealth is all about.  In Christ’s name we pray, Amen.

 

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