Find Your Treasure

April 27

The story is told of a young man who received a Bible from his loving, godly father upon his graduation from college. The young man was so upset and disappointed at not having received a gift of substantially higher monetary value from his very wealthy father that he stormed out of his father’s house and did not return until being notified of his death decades later.

While going through his father’s possessions, all of which he had inherited, he came upon the faded package containing his Bible. Guilt and remorse flooded him as he finally understood his father’s complete devotion to him and the love in his heart that motivated his giving of a gift so significant to his own faith. But the package also contained a surprise.

Tucked into the Bible, on the same page as the verse that inquires, “What does it profit a man to gain the whole world but lose his own soul?" (Matthew 16:26) his father had placed a check for an enormous amount of money, the deed to a lavish beach-side mansion and the title to one of the most esteemed automobiles of the day. The man was broken with grief as he finally understood that his father’s intent was to not only give him great wealth and fine gifts but to give him the one book where he could find the eternal treasure his father so highly valued.

He understood that his father had wished him to have not only temporal treasure but treasure that spends in heaven. Like so many parents who realize the futility of attempting to impart their faith to their offspring, the wealthy man knew his son had to seek it out for himself. By placing the worldly wealth his son valued so much in such close proximity to the eternal treasure, he trusted his son would, “…seek the Lord your God and find Him by searching for Him with all your heart” Deuteronomy 4:29. Your Heavenly Father’s heart longs for you to find your treasure. Don’t disappoint Him.