Experience The Treasure

This message series called The Treasure intrigued me before it ever started.  For months I prepared for it with this one guiding question at the top of my research page:  Besides heaven, what are the perks of salvation?  I put the “besides heaven” in there not because it is minimal but because it is familiar.  Everyone knows that heaven is a primary perk of salvation.  Avoiding hell is a primary incentive often teased out by preachers and evangelists, especially by those who sweat and beat the pulpit.  And it is no slouchy perk.  Hell is a real and terrible place, and heaven is apparently going to be much more relaxing and a lot cleaner.  But everyone knows that and many want to know why salvation is so great for this life, the one on earth.  As I thought about that, I noticed a whole herd of believers who couldn’t articulate much of an answer to such questions.  Which, for me, meant they probably weren’t living in the perks themselves.  That seemed like a sad thing.  Sort of like inheriting an amusement park but being told you can’t ride the roller coasters until you die.  What a bummer.

So The Treasure series was a way for me to understand better about salvation’s true worth and a way to teach and inspire others not just to know about it but also to revel in it daily.  You should listen to the podcasts if you didn’t hear each message.  But, to catch you up, we learned some phenomenal things about salvation.  My stack of research has a lot more perks than the five we covered, but these are major.  First, transcendence is something everyone is seeking and it comes with salvation.  God gives believers the ability to escape the physical world and encounter the spiritual world and literally, personally enjoy a relationship with him, the one and only God.  Second, when we are unsaved, we carry around a tremendous amount of guilt and shame, which we deserve because we are sinful.  Salvation provides freedom from that as God forgives us.  Freedom is a beautiful experience that most people never fully appreciate.  Friendship is a third perk.  With salvation we gain the ability to experience intimacy with others at a needed and wonderful level.  We also discovered that God values us.  This is the fourth major benefit—that we are significant.  Since he is the one who determines what is and what is not valuable, we find through a love-relationship with him that we are truly significant, something we long to believe and feel.  It is possible to feel valuable when you are saved, believing the truth that God uniquely and wonderfully created you.  Finally, salvation allows us to be good and to do good because one of the great perks is that the Holy Spirit dwells inside of every believer and empowers him or her to do whatever God wants.  Empowerment to be all that we are supposed to be is a perk that only comes with salvation.  All of these things show why Jesus would call salvation a “treasure” and why he would say it is worth selling everything you have to get it (Matthew 13:44).  It is truly worth more than anything in the world.

Don’t make the mistake, however, of thinking you can buy it.  You don’t have to sell anything to get it.  Take your stuff off eBay; you can’t earn enough, and you can’t be good enough.  Salvation is a free gift that we simply must receive by confessing our sin and committing our life to Christ.

As we wrap The Treasure series, you may be ready to receive The Treasure:  God’s gift of salvation.  You probably don’t have all your questions answered.  A relationship with Christ ultimately requires faith, but you will have enough answers to take that important step of faith.  Maybe that is today.  If so, you need to seriously pray and in your own words tell God these ABC’s:  (1) ADMIT that you have sinned against him and that sin has caused you to be separated from him; (2) BELIEVE what the Bible teaches about Jesus, that he is the Son of God who died for our sins, the perfect sacrifice for us; and (3) COMMIT your life to Jesus, telling him you are ready to do everything he tells you to do because you believe he deserves your life and he provides the best life.  When you confess and commit to Christ, you enter a relationship with him, you receive the Treasure of salvation with all it's perks.  And when you do this, please let us know so we can celebrate with you and equip you for your next steps.

Please feel free to email me or “comment” on this blog to talk about The Treasure and you.

Comments

[Dean W. Parker]

Rodney: Thanks for this series. I really enjoyed it. It seems to me that the Christian life has often been critiqued by those who don't want to live it as only a "pie in the sky" mentality of living. That would go along with your illustration of the amusement park and the rides. I have been thinking much about this as well.

First is a comment about Hebrews 11 and the English pastor Charles Spurgeon. Somehow we as Christians must have a clear view of the end (heaven); that ultimately God has made us for his possession and to have eternal fellowship with Him (2 Corintians 5:1-9). Hebrews 11 reflects on those saints who made a great difference in this life. One of the reasons they did is that they were conscious of the fact the real life and city was somewhere else. That gave this life meaning for them as everything they did had a spiritual reflection and meaning to it.

Spurgeon said that in order for a Christian to have a joyful and fulfilled life on earth, he/she must have a clear view of heaven.

What has helped me recently in this is reading a number of books by John Piper, a pastor and theologian from Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis. He has written 25 plus books and I have read about half of them to date.

A central theme of John's is the credit he gives to Jonathan Edwards, who was probably the greatest American theologican to date. The premise is this. God takes delight in being Himself and takes pleasure in us. Our lives here on earth only have meaning as we take pleasure in Him. He speaks of the treasure and that if Christians do not have true inner joy that can only come from Christ, we are not living the type of life Jesus wants from us. Where that gets all messed up is not just our own sinful nature and wanting to stray from God and His ways, it is a rejection of Him and a buying in to the culture in which we live, which bears no claim to honoring the Lord. We often think, and I catch myself often doing this, that joy, entertainment, having fun and pleasure can some how be sustained in a secular environment. Quite the contrary.

Now, I'm starting to preach, so I better quit here. But, if we truly believe Romans that, "from Him and to Him and through Him are all things", we would have a joy and delight in the Lord alone. Any other pleasure is but a fragmented splinter of the real pleasure found in Him.

That is why then two things can be ours and can come into clear focus: The abundant life in this life (John 10) and realizing our citizenship is really in heaven (Philippians and Hebrews 11)

Thanks for reading my ramblings. Dean.

[Rodney Combs]

Dean- These are great insights. Thanks for articulating them so clearly. It is amazing how easily we settle for second-rate joy and pleasure when God has so much more to offer.