How's it everyone and welcome to church
today! We're so excited that you decided
to join us
right here um and wherever here is for
you. We pray that you would
experience God today and that you'd know
His presence with you wherever you are
and we're in for a great treat we've got
a great message today and we're going to
have a great time of worship
and so we really pray that you'll engage
and you'll have a great time today.
Just a few announcements this coming
Wednesday we're having our first ever
online
133 meeting which is our church meeting
and that we do it's a time to have a bit
of a family conversation
and so we want you to be there with us.
If you're a member please do be there we
really need your presence to make some
important decisions
and but anyone is welcome to come and
see what's happening in the life of the
church and what God's been doing
um over the last six months and in three
weeks time we're going to be starting
our online Alpha course
which I am incredibly excited about. I'm
looking forward to great
engagement great discussions um as we
answer questions and grapple with things
about God and church
and so if you've got questions why don't
you join us for Alpha
it's a perfect place to be to bring
whatever questions you have
and if you know of someone who has
questions about God or faith or life
why don't you invite them to Alpha this
year.
We're going to hand over to Barry he's
going to lead us in some worship
and I really pray as I said before that
you would engage
with God today.
How's it church family. So good to be
with you again today in our online
service
um also we've got Evan here so it's
first time you're seeing Evan on our
online service since like the start of
lockdown so thanks for being here Evan.
I've got a scripture as we start our
worship this morning or this afternoon
actually.
Psalm 95 it says this come let us sing
for joy to the Lord let us shout aloud
to the rock of our salvation
let us come before him with thanksgiving
and extol Him with music
and song for the Lord is the great
God the great King above all Gods
in his hand are the depths of the earth
and the mountain peaks belong to him the
sea is his
for he made it and his hands formed the
dry land.
The word I want you to concentrate on
today as we worship is that word come.
Jesus came on the clouds and that's what
we're going to sing about but then also
we've got to come
to the altar as we bring in our worship
and our sacrifice.
Like this says come let us sing for joy
unto the Lord, so that's what we're going
to do.
Right Evan. one, two, three, four
God we are here this morning to come to
You and worship
and to bow down and to lift You high
and to thank You for the sacrifice that
You came
and brought to us Jesus we love You
That scripture continues
in verse 5 it says in verse 6 it says
this
come let us bow down in worship
let us kneel before the Lord our maker
for He is our God and we are the people
of His posture
the flock under His care.
I remind you that scripture started at
the starts come let us sing for joy unto
the Lord
now it says come let us bow down in
worship.
For those who want to read that later on
in your worship time
Psalm 95 1-7
Compassionate Father, thank You that You
are our strength and our song.
You fill our hearts with joy, may we give
our offerings to You with gladness
and joy. Everything we have belongs to
you and we rejoice to give some of your
abundant gifts back to you.
Hey guys so here I am at our charity
shop,
it's called Hidden Treasure and it's on
Maryvale road at Salamanca center. Today
we're going to be hearing
about the parable of the hidden treasure
and that's what our charity shop
is named after and so here it is
and we sell all sorts of stuff and all
the proceeds go to charity
to missions and to CAST and it's
something that you can get involved in
if you've got something in your house
that you're not using anymore pack it in
a box
and bring it over here to the charity
shop or you can drop it at church and it
will get sold
and it will go to a new home we've all
heard the saying
one man's trash is another man's
treasure this definitely is the case
here at Hidden Treasure.
You can also get involved by
volunteering and if you're keen
you can contact Rona whose contact details
will be on the screen right now but
won't you get involved
at Hidden Treasure.
One day a man discovered some treasure
hidden in a field.
He was so excited!
He was very happy to
find the treasure.
He then went and buried it again.
He quickly hid it again.
He sold all he had to get enough money
to buy the field.
How much will you give me for this?
How much money would you give me for
this?
When he had enough money, enough money he
took the money
and bought the field. He went to the
owner
with the money and bought the field.
He then went back to the field, back to
the field
and took his treasure and took the treasure.
The second parable says one day a very
rich merchant,
rich merchant went out looking for fine
pearls,
but he could not find what he was
looking for, what he was looking for,
but then he found what he was looking
for.
The most beautiful pearl, the most
beautiful
pearl in the whole world. How much is
this pearl?
How much is that? 1 million rand
What i'll be back to buy it,
back to buy it and so
she sold all she had so that she could
buy
the pearl. The moral of the story is, the
moral of the story is,
somethings are worth the sacrifice, are
worth going the sacrifice for.
In North Carolina
a couple went for a walk on their
property with their dogs
and they found a tin can sticking out of
the ground
on the path they were walking on and
they drew closer to the can and then
they
started opening it up they dug up the
can they discovered that the can was
filled
with gold pieces this is a true story
and
they kept digging and they found more
tin cans and they ended up finding over
1400
gold coins hidden treasure gold coins
there was
buried away ages ago and as that stage
worth over 10
million dollars. One of the coins in the
collection was worth
was so rare and so valuable that it was
worth over a million dollars.
Another man in the Philippines was a
fisherman he found a pearl,
also a true story, he found a pearl and
he kept it
as a lucky charm not knowing what he had
and how much it was worth. Eventually
when he decided
to get this thing valued um they
discovered that it was worth over a
hundred
million rand. This pearl was so big it
weighed over 34
kilograms. He kept it as a lucky charm.
Can you imagine stumbling across a
treasure like that
walking around along a road and
discovering
over 10 million dollars convert that to
rand
see how much that is worth discovering
that on the road
or discovering this 100 million dollar
pearl
what sort of relief would that bring to
you what sort of joy
would that bring to you how much of your
worries would that
take away. What you do for a moment just
experience that feeling
dream a little bit have some fun with
that.
We're in week three of a series called
moral of the story and we've been
looking at some of the parables that
Jesus taught and we're going to do the
same thing today.
So i'm going to read you two parables
and they awesome because they are very
short
and Matthew 13 verse 44 says this
the kingdom of heaven is like a treasure
hidden in a field
which a man found and covered up
then in his joy he goes and sells all
that he has
and buys that field
verse 45 again
the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant
in search of fine pearls
who on finding one pearl of great value
went and sold all that he had and bought
it.
Now Jesus is describing what the kingdom
of heaven is like
and it appears that both of these
parables are making the same point in
both of these parables there were there
was an exceptionally
um valuable treasure priceless treasure
in both of these pearls there was a man
who sold
everything that he had to acquire
this treasure and when i started
studying this passage and
and looked at it i was convinced that i
knew what it meant i was convinced i
knew
what the treasure was and i was
convinced i knew
who the man was in the parable i thought i
knew
who Jesus was speaking about and what he
was speaking about but the more
i studied the scripture the more i
discovered that there's a dual
meaning to this passage
and as i was preparing i remember
thinking to myself
Jacques you chose the wrong parable
because which which
which definition are you gonna go with
because which one is right because what
happens if you go the one but actually
someone discovers that it actually means
something else and
now you're on youtube and the whole
world's gonna see that you messed up the
meaning
of a parable that Jesus told. So what i
decided to do was i was going to share
the dual meaning with you today i'm
going to unpack both of the definitions
of both of the meanings of these
parables
and i really trust that god would speak
to you and bring transformation
on the inside of you and hopefully
that'll overflow into a transformed life.
So just some background Jesus whenever
he told a
parable he he used the context
to illustrate something he spoke
directly to something that his listeners
would understand
and know about. So when he spoke about a
hidden treasure
even though it's foreign to us his
listeners understood
what he was talking about. Hidden
treasure for people in that time
was very common for example um cities
would often be overthrown by armies
and then the victors would take their
spoils and then they would
take all the treasure they could find so
to protect your wealth
you would hide your treasure
in the field you would bury it so that
if something like that happened
you won't lose everything.
People understood what Jesus was talking
about. So then when he says a man
finds a treasure like this in a field
we see this field didn't belong to this
man and the question that it
that it raises is did this man act
unethically
because he found this treasure Jesus
says then he covers it up again
then he runs home sells all that he has
then goes to the owner of this field
purchase it from him
and then he's got this um super pricey
super that's word i'm looking for barry
valuable look
this man finds a super valuable treasure
in this field that he bought so the
question then is did he act
um unethically. So jewish rabbinic law
was very clear on this he did not
act unethically it actually states that
if you found a hidden treasure something
like this
anywhere on someone else's property that
was even on the threshold of the owner's
house
the owner was not the owner of the
treasure
you could even find something of value
inside the wall
of that person's house if it was at the
center line
closer to the outside i could for
example
lay claim to it and it did not belong to
the owner.
We also know that this treasure did not
belong to the owner because when the man
came to the owner and said i want to
purchase this field
the owner did not go and dig up the
treasure because it did not actually
belong to him so he didn't act
unethically.
So here is the question what
do these parables mean?
Think about that for a moment who is
the person who finds the treasure or the
pearl
and what exactly is the treasure what
exactly is
the pearl with great value? What is Jesus
talking about here?
and i thought i knew i thought i
understood exactly what i was going to
speak about today
then i discovered it has a dual meaning
now let's look
at these meanings. First thing i want to
highlight so what i'm going to do is i'm
going to i'm going to
describe the dual meanings by looking at
the two different parables even though
they have the same
meanings i'm going to illustrate it by
looking at the two different parables.
So let's look at the one
about the treasure the hidden treasure
okay.
So the first thing we need to highlight
about this parable is that the treasure
is in fact the kingdom of God
and the man in this parable is you.
So what Jesus is describing in this
parable is the kingdom of god
and that when you discover the kingdom
of god you realize with great joy that
it is so
valuable that you should in essence sell
all your belongings
get the money and buy and do anything
you can to get hold of
this treasure. So the treasure in this
parable refers to the kingdom of god
that's the first meaning.
Refers to the kingdom of god i want to
highlight a few things about this
kingdom.
The first thing is that this treasure
or this kingdom has immense value
or it is priceless okay. What Jesus is
illustrating here is that
everything that this world has to offer
is pure loss
compared to Christ and knowing Christ
and being part of his kingdom.
Everything this world has to offer
that's why the man sold everything
considered as pure loss if you could
gain Christ
and step into his kingdom. Paul says in
Philippians 3
verse 78 whatever gain i had i counted
as lost for the sake of Christ
indeed i count everything as loss
because of the surpassing worth
of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord
for his sake i suffered the loss he
uses the word loss again i suffered the
loss
of all things and count them as rubbish
in order that i may gain Christ. So Paul
here in Philippians says
that everything this world has to offer
he says
is rubbish compared to gaining Christ.
So Christ is making a pointer he's
saying the kingdom of heaven
is that valuable kingdom of heaven is
valuable because it offers
salvation to anyone who needs it it
offers freedom
it offers abundance it offers healing
it offers restoration the kingdom of god
offers joy. Look at what that parable
says
second part of verse 44 it says then
in his joy he goes and sells all that he
all that he has
to buy the land in his joy. Christ is
speaking about an immense joy here.
Now i've been a christian for
15 to 17 years or so and i've come
across
many believers who have zero joy in
their lives
i remember many years ago i belonged to
a church and there was this
man who invited us to his home our
pastor and we went to visit him
and my pastor and i were telling jokes
and he said what are you joking about
he says the kingdom of god is a serious
thing
and i agreed that yeah definitely a
serious thing
and to this day i can remember that
man's face
there was a grumpy face i can't remember
ever seeing this man have a smile on his
face
ever. You don't have to be embarrassed
about experiencing joy god wants you
to experience joy this parable
illustrates that the kingdom of god
brought this man so much
joy that he sold everything to gain the
kingdom.
Joy is from god and he wants you to have
and experience
joy. John 10 verse 10 makes it clear to
us it says the thief
comes only to steal kill and destroy
okay
the enemy comes to steal kill
and destroy and Jesus says but i have
come
that you may have an abundant life
that's god's desire it's Jesus saying
this okay.
How true is that for us in this time?
How much is the thief stealing your joy
killing your passion your peace
destroying relationships
finances that's what the thief does
but Jesus says i have come to give you
an abundant
life. So it's important to note
this joy especially during this time
this word may even be a prophetic word
for you
that Christ wants to restore your joy
and your brokenness that you've lost
during this time.
I remember having to redefine my
definition of blessing the word blessing.
I went on a mission trip and the place
we went to was extremely extremely poor
and the people who we ministered to you
were extremely poor as well
and we went to their church and they
didn't actually have a church building
they met
in a in a tent and their homes were huts
and i remember the thing that stood out
for me about this group of people
was the incredible joy that they had
they were
always smiling and always laughing and
always enjoying
life and they always spoke about
the blessing of god they threw around
around the word
i'm blessed all the time the blessing of
god was the words that they used
all the time and my definition of
blessing up at all this stage
was not what they had seen blessing to
be
my my definition of blessing came from
the
things god had given you and i remember
forming this theology very early in my
my christian
life um i remember meeting a person who
who
shared with me that their friends and
family were becoming jealous of them
because god was blessing them so much
financially and she gave a list of
things that god had given them and
blessed them with
one of the things that he gave them was
remember her saying that
god gave them an Audi A3 that they won
they they didn't actually pay for it and
then and she said it's not our fault
god is blessing us
it's not our fault that god is blessing
us and i remember thinking
why is god blessing them and not me?
Here i am on my red scooter that dies in
the rain every time it rains i drive on
my scooter i'm in this i'm on a scooter
first of all
in the rain why did i not get the free
Audi
A3 i was thinking and i started
wondering why would god bless some
people and not bless other people
and i limited my definition of blessing
to things god gave me. That cannot only
be
what blessing is and this group of
people understood blessing to be much
richer than just the things god gave
them
they understood blessing to be
inheriting or discovering this treasure
namely the kingdom of god namely god
himself namely Jesus
Christ. They understood that they were
blessed not because they had things
but because they had a relationship with
Jesus Christ.
They once were orphans just like you and
i but now they've met
their father and they were reunited with
their heavenly father god
through Jesus Christ they understood
they were blessed because of
Jesus Christ because they had a
relationship with the creator of the
universe
and that's why they had this immense joy
even
in the midst of this poverty they had
the most
exceptional joy and i remember their
smiling faces to this day.
Jesus was not saying okay
he was not saying that the kingdom of god
can be bought
very very easy to think that because
he's saying
there's this treasure and it's the
kingdom of god and a man
sold everything he had got money for it
to buy this treasure Jesus was not
saying that the kingdom of god can be
bought with money or earned
with your good works. He was not saying
that how can i know that for sure
how can we know that we need to look at
what other scriptures say about
salvation
and how we acquire or gain the kingdom
of god i'm going to
quote one verse Ephesians 2 verse
8 says this for it is by grace
you have been saved through faith and
this is not from yourselves okay
you cannot purchase this it's not from
yourselves you cannot earn salvation
because it's not from yourselves.
Then Paul says it is the gift
of god so he's saying salvation is the
gift of god that we receive
through grace by faith.
So Jesus is not saying you can purchase
the kingdom so what is he saying then
what is he talking about?
What's clear through this passage is
that the man
had to let go of something
he held on to. So in the story it's
physical
things many possessions but i think what
Jesus is highlighting here is he is
saying you need to let go of an old
system an old kingdom an old way of
thinking and old theology
leave that all behind and then come
and completely take on the treasure
because it will bring great joy and all
those lists of benefits i just mentioned.
He's not saying you can purchase it he's
saying let go of
an old way of thinking that is what
repentance is it is to turn away
completely from something
and take on to some and take hold of
something new namely the kingdom of god.
Your my challenge and your challenge is
that we
hold on to this old lifestyle old way of
thinking old philosophy old theology
we discover the treasure on this side
and we don't let go of either of them
we hold on to both of them and it pulls
us
into both directions and it will
eventually tear you apart.
Jesus is saying don't do that he's
saying let go
of the one grab hold of the other grab
hold of the kingdom of god
because it is priceless.
What are you holding on to?
What theology are you holding on to
that's not part of the kingdom of god
what philosophies of life are you
holding on to right now
that's not part of the kingdom of god
that you need to let go of
to step into properly the kingdom of god
and experience all of its fullness
and joy i want to challenge you and
encourage you to let go.
Everything this world has to offer is
rubbish according to Paul
compared to what the kingdom of god has
to offer.
The second meaning i hope you've been
trying to work out what this what a
second meaning could be
so the first one i said the treasure is
the kingdom of god
and the man is you and me okay
needing to find the kingdom. What is the
second meaning?
I mentioned in the beginning a dual
meaning and i was going to highlight a
dual meaning two meanings
of the same parable today.
Have you thought of another one some
people would argue there's more than
just two meanings they would say there's
two or three or four even
i'm not going to go into four i'm gonna
highlight the second one.
So to do that i'm gonna look at this the
second parable
so i'm gonna read it to you again verse
45
and 46 again the kingdom of heaven is
like a merchant
in search of fine pearls who on finding
one pearl of great value went and sold
all that he had and bought it.
So it's essentially the same story
except you're speaking about a merchant
here
there's a slight difference between
these two stories okay
not only because the one is a merchant
the other one we don't know actually
what this man was doing in the field but
this merchant
didn't just stumble upon the treasure
this merchant was in search
of a treasure this merchant was in
search of fine
pearls. Now pearls was a great way
to store up wealth i mentioned earlier
on there were no banks back in the day
so you couldn't put your money in a bank
to keep it safe when an enemy army came
you had to either invest properly in
real estate
or you would bury money or you would
invest in pearls so it was a great way
to have your money in a portable format
but to get these pearls is really
difficult they had none of the modern
gear that we have there were no snorkels
there were no goggles there were no
air tanks there were no proper weights
what these people did was they had to
dive very deep
under the water often had to tie rocks
onto them
to get these pearls it was very
dangerous many people died.
So when a great pearl was discovered
people knew
the effort that it took to gain one of
these pearls
and this merchant was traveling all over
in search of a great pearl and then he
found one then he found one.
What i love about this is Jesus is not
teaching us how to invest
well wise investors would diversify
invest in real estate bury some money
invest in pearls
this merchant sold everything sold all
his real estate
dug up all his treasure and purchased
this pearl of great great value so my
question is
what is the pearl?
Who is the pearl? Who is the man or the
merchant?
The second meaning is that the pearl is
you
You are the treasure of great value
you are priceless you are so valuable
in fact that the merchant god himself
Jesus Christ
gave up everything his life
he paid the full price to gain the pearl
which is you. Listen to this verse
Ezekiel  34 verse 11 thus this is god
speaking
thus says the lord god behold i myself
will search for sheep my sheep and i
will seek them out
just like the merchant god is saying i
myself will search for the sheep
and i will seek them out he's been
searching for you
and he paid a lot of wealth
for you his son. Luke 19 verse 10
for the son of man came to seek and to
save came to seek like the merchant
and to save the lost pearl
first John 4 verse 19
says that we love god because he first
loved us so it's clear that the second
meaning
from this parable is that you are the
treasure and the merchant Jesus Christ
is seeking for you
and he gave up everything he gave up his
life to gain you.
There's a story about a certain indian
tribe
who was going through an immense drought
and there was limited resources and food
and what was happening in the village
was people started stealing from one
another
to survive. The chief said that this is
not going to work we're going to kill
each other if we keep doing this
then he put in a new law he said that
the next person caught stealing
from anyone else will be taken to the
center of the village
tied to a pole and would be beaten.
The next day they caught a thief they
brought the thief
to the to the chief and this thief was
his own mom
and everyone saw it was his own mom and
everybody was saying what is he gonna do
is he gonna be a just ruler is he going
to break the law because it's his mom
surely if they beat her like he said she
might die she's old and she's frail she
may not make it
what is he going to do and he gave the
orders he said take her to the center of
the village
tie her to the pole and bring the
punisher.
Then before he gave the order for the
mom
to be beat to be beaten
he wrapped his arms around her covered
her completely
with his body and he said now you may
execute and pay she will pay the full
price
beat her now but i'm standing in the way
and he took
the full punishment for her
transgressions
he paid the full price for her
transgressions
Jesus Christ paid the full price
for your transgressions he nailed all of
your guilt and shame to the cross
and he doesn't want you to live in guilt
and shame
and the reason i speak about guilt is
because during lockdown
i'm discovering how often i feel guilty.
My whole family is at home my wife and
my kids they're not going to school at
this stage
um they're going to be going soon i
reckon
they're bouncing off the walls and they
are driving me crazy
but i found with myself that i'm losing
my temper with them often
i would snap often and i would treat
them in ways that i shouldn't be
treating them often
and what that does to me is it makes me
feel
an extreme amount of guilt and then
every time i pray every night when i
pray and i come to god
that's the first thing that comes up and
christ keeps reminding me
i have removed all of your guilt and
shame from you and i've nailed it to the
cross
please receive my forgiveness now and
the joy
that comes with that and love your
children the same way
i love you show them grace
and mercy the same way i show you
grace and mercy you are
the pearl and Jesus loves you so
what is the moral of the story? Moral of
the story is
that everything this world has to offer
is worthless
compared to knowing christ and
discovering his kingdom
and you are priceless to him
you are the apple of his eye and you
need to know it.
Let's pray.
Heavenly father thank you that when we
discover
this treasure of your kingdom we
get to let go of everything this world
has to offer
and take on and receive as a free gift
this treasure that you give us through
Christ Jesus lord thank you
for all the joy that comes with that
father my prayer is for our people who
are listening to this message right now
some of us have lost our joy and our
peace during this time and my prayer is
where the enemy comes to steal
and kill and destroy we come up against
that right now
in Jesus name and we declare thief that
all of your attacks are powerless
and worthless because even in the midst
of extreme poverty
we will experience the joy of the lord
because of who
we are in Christ Jesus and father god i
thank you that you are the merchant
who travels from city to city
in search of a fine pearl and you
discovered us
and you gave up everything Christ Jesus
your life
to gain us you paid the full price you
took the
the lashing on your back so that we
would receive
mercy in Jesus name. Amen
