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Matthew 13:44-46
44 “The kingdom of heaven is like 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.
45 “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, 46 who, on finding one pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it.
(ESV)
Redeemer exists to celebrate and declare the gospel of God as we grow in knowing and following Jesus Christ.
Morning again. Let's try that one more time. Make sure you guys are still with us. Good morning. Good morning.
Collin Hansen:Thank you guys. This week, we will be continuing our look at some of Jesus' parables and as we've seen over the last few weeks, Jesus' parables usually have one main point. That through these parables, we're meant to catch a glimpse of what the kingdom of heaven is like. That is the place where Jesus rules as king. This morning, we'll be looking at 2 closely related parables that focus on the joy of discovering the kingdom of heaven.
Collin Hansen:We'll be looking at the parable of the treasure hidden in the field and the parable of the pearl of great price in Matthew 13. So if you have your Bibles and can turn to Matthew 13 verses 44 to 46 or read them in your worship guide, Love for you to follow along with me and listen closely for these are the words of the lord. 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. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls who, on finding 1 pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it.
Collin Hansen:I very much, sorry. This is the word of the lord.
Connor Coskery:Thank you, Jesus.
Collin Hansen:I very much appreciate Joel letting me preach on this parable or assigning it to me because it's hard to screw this one up. Even a child can understand Jesus' basic point here. When we truly grasp the preciousness of the kingdom of heaven, the only reasonable response is that we would joyfully sacrifice all that we have that we would obtain it. Or as Saint Augustine famously said, our hearts are restless until they rest in thee. Let's pray.
Collin Hansen:Our father, your people are here this morning not to hear the words of a mere man. We are gathered here together because we're here to hear from you. It is your name and your renown that is the desire of our hearts. So with one voice we say, like Simon Peter, where else would we go, Lord, because you have the words of eternal life? So we ask this morning that by your spirit, you would speak to us, that you would give us ears to hear, that you would give us minds to understand, and that you would give us hearts to obey you no matter what the cost is.
Collin Hansen:We pray these things in the name of the father, the son, and the holy spirit. Amen. We're going to be unpacking these 3 short verses this morning under 3 headings. 1st, the universal quest for joy. 2nd, where joy is found.
Collin Hansen:And 3rd, where to get it. 1st, the universal quest for joy. 2nd, where joy is found. And 3rd, how to get it. So first, the universal quest for joy.
Collin Hansen:A couple years ago, a psychologist at Harvard named Dan Gilbert published a book called Stumbling Upon Happiness and the basic premise of the book is this, that the underlying reason why you and I do anything, why some of you work really hard at work, why others slack off, why we pursue certain relationships or why we break them off, why we go after certain hobbies, is that the reason underneath every other reason is that we have a desire to be happy. Now I know what you're probably thinking. It did not take a Harvard degree. It did not earn a professorship to be able to figure that out, that all of us want to be happy. What Gilbert's research pointed out, which was really interesting, is that in spite of this universal drive for us to be happy, we're actually really terrible at knowing what will and won't make us happy.
Collin Hansen:Now, why is this? Why are we so bad at knowing what will bring us joy? Well, there's many reasons, but the first of which may be that we simply don't know what it is that we want. I remember in the first couple years of our marriage when Aaron and I would wanna go out on a date night, I would narrow our list of restaurants from like 10 to 2 and then Aaron still wouldn't be able to choose between those 2 and asked me to make the choice, so I would and we'd start driving to a restaurant, and then about half the time, I would look over at her in the passenger seat and just see this look of disappointment on her face. I'd say, what's wrong?
Collin Hansen:She'd say, I I wanted to go to the other restaurant. Like, why didn't you say that beforehand? Because I didn't realize that's what I wanted until we started going to this other restaurant. Thankfully, we've gotten a lot better at our system of picking out restaurants and where we're gonna eat, but you understand the point, that many times, you and I both don't understand what it is that we really desire. 2nd, our desires and our dreams, they often, don't play well with one another.
Collin Hansen:Right? Your desire to get ahead in a particular field is going to come in contact, going to come in conflict with a desire to be with your family or to start a family or to pursue a particular relationship, a desire that you may have to be at peace with the people around you is going to inevitably come in conflict with a desire to live by your principles and convictions. And if that wasn't enough, our feelings and desires and dreams are constantly changing. I mean, how many of you, if you were honest with yourself and you could remember, are still pursuing the same dreams that you were even 5 years ago? 5 years ago, Aaron and I were headed overseas to Australia to do college ministry, we thought, for a long time.
Collin Hansen:If our feelings and dreams aren't always clear, if our desires are often in conflict with one another, and if they are often changing, how do we know which dreams and desires we should be pursuing? What is it that will actually make us happy? I was born in 1984 which means that like every boy that I knew, I idolized Michael Jordan. I grew up with a MJ poster over my bed. I drank Gatorade because MJ drank Gatorade.
Collin Hansen:I wore Nikes because MJ wore Nikes and I even once tried Wheaties, they were terrible. I still know every word to the Space Jam soundtrack. I would always I would I would spend hours every summer in my driveway trying to imitate MJ's game winning shots, but inevitably because I was terrible at basketball, it always involved some like super late whistle so I could get another shot to make the final game winning shot. During this, quarantine season, one of the things that I most looked forward to was watching The Last Dance. If you guys don't know, that was ESPN's 10 part documentary series on Michael Jordan's last championship season And it definitely showed Michael Jordan the champion, but it also showed just how ruthless and petty MJ could be.
Collin Hansen:I mean, you saw his cutthroat nature on the on the court, but you also heard him admit to inventing slights just so he would have motivation to get on the court. And some of the absolute best moments in the documentary were simply when the director handed MJ an iPad and let him watch and respond to some of his teammates. Every single time, he would respond in the exact same way. You would see this enormous smirk come across his face, and then as soon as it was over, he would put it down, he would shake his head, and immediately dismiss anyone who dared to speak about their own contributions or skill. And it reminded me a couple years ago, the sportswriter Wright Thompson wrote this about Michael Jordan on his 50th birthday.
Collin Hansen:He wrote, quote, his whole life has been about proving things to people around him, to strangers, to himself, and this has been successful and spectacularly unhealthy. Most people live anonymous lives, and when they grow old and die, any record of their existence is blown away. Yet for the few people in each generation who reach the very pinnacle of fame and achievement, a mirage flickers. Immortality. Even after MJ is gone, he knows that people will remember him.
Collin Hansen:Here lies the greatest basketball player of all time. That is his epitaph. Jordan couldn't have known that the closest he'd get to immortality was during that final walk off the court. He still knows how to play. He could shut down LeBron if only his body wouldn't betray him, if only he could hold off time.
Collin Hansen:Now all that could happen in the days years that follow is for the shining monument he has built to be chipped away and eroded. His self esteem has always been, as he said, directly tied to the game, and without it, he feels adrift. Since retiring, Jordan has been running, creating distractions and distance, end quote. Jordan built his entire existence upon proving everyone wrong, on proving to everyone, including himself, that he was, in fact, the greatest basketball player of all time. And when he retired, he could lay claim to that title, but as the last dance clearly showed time and time again, Jordan is so consumed with the thought that his legacy might be slipping away, that someone might forget just how great he really is, that he is willing to bury his friends and teammates who might, in his mind, diminish his greatness.
Collin Hansen:You see, Jordan had gotten exactly what he always wanted, but it wasn't enough. As Ravi Zacharias once said, the loneliest moment in life is when you receive that which you thought was the ultimate and it lets you down. For some of us, we imagine that lasting joy will finally come when that right girl or guy comes along or when our lives finally slow down or when our work is finally recognized. Other of us might think that, when we start our families or finally buy that house or when COVID is finally over, that our hearts will finally be at rest. We'll stop running.
Collin Hansen:But the problem is when those things come, it doesn't deliver the promise that it seemed it held out and so we remain restless. And then some of us become convinced that the problem was that we were fixated, we were focused on the wrong thing, That if only we had a better job, if only we had better friends or better hobbies or, God forbid, a better spouse, then the longing of our hearts would finally cease. We would be at rest. It's not that there was something wrong with me, it's that I had my attention on the wrong thing. Others of us respond by blaming the things in themselves.
Collin Hansen:You know, I I would've just been satisfied if I had done this. If only I had done this in the past and we resolve saying, I'm gonna try harder from now on to achieve the things that's going to bring me joy and satisfaction. But that joy and satisfaction remains just out of reach because that's the nature of sin. That's the nature of idolatry. In his masterpiece, The Confession, St.
Collin Hansen:Augustine's defined sin not just as breaking the rules, but as having disordered loves. In other words, instead of setting our hearts' affections on God primarily, we take the good things that God has given us and we elevate them into ultimate things, things that we treasure above all else, things that we worship. And you and I as human beings, we need to know this. It is impossible for us not to treasure something above everything else. It's impossible for us not to worship.
Collin Hansen:But when we place infinite expectations on created things, even if like Jordan we get everything we thought we wanted, we are doomed to disappointment. Our longing is so deep that no lover, no career, no achievement, even the very best possible ones could ever fully satisfy. And not only will they never fully satisfy, the more completely that we give ourselves to them, the more those things will actually eat us alive because they are only empty chests and fake pearls. But what if I told you that it doesn't have to be this way, that your desire, your inmost desire for joy not only can be satisfied, but it was meant and designed to be satisfied, that the disappointments that you feel when you place these expectations upon created things and they let you down, that it is not some cosmic cruelty. It is meant to be to you a signpost in a strange land pointing to something greater.
Collin Hansen:So what is that? 2nd, where joy is found. Let's look back at this passage in Matthew 13. Jesus said, the kingdom of heaven is like 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.
Collin Hansen: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 for most of human history, people spent their entire lives in a 5 mile radius. This means that that man who found this treasure in the field, he was likely very familiar with this field. He'd probably been around this field his entire life and we don't know why he's in this field on this particular day, but on this day, he finds a treasure beyond his wildest dreams. In his entire life, his priorities, his evaluation of the worth of this field, his evaluation of the worth of his own things are radically altered.
Collin Hansen:They are forever changed. Now, I know some of you have grown up around church all of your lives. Maybe your dad was a deacon, maybe your mom played organ, maybe, you were even a shepherd in the live nativity at your church. You probably have heard the question, do you know that Jesus died on the cross for your sins? Do you know Him as your personal Lord and savior?
Collin Hansen:So many times that it may ring to your heart just as if somebody asked a question about the weather. But something happens. Maybe one day it hits you like a bolt of electricity, You see that you knew before, but you didn't really know. It was like the difference between the knowledge that honey is sweet and having it on your lips. I had been around church a long time when it finally hit me.
Collin Hansen:In fact, I was even leading small groups for some younger guys and helping lead worship. And I was on a mission trip in Mexico where we were supposed to be telling people the good news about Jesus, And I went off in a field, and I remember yelling at God, asking him how if he claimed to love me, like everyone said that he did, my life looked the way that it did. And it was like in that moment, even though I had heard about the cross a 1000 times, it gripped my heart. It was almost as if Jesus spoke to me in those moments saying, love you. I could not possibly love you any more than I do.
Collin Hansen:The cross proves that even though you don't understand what's happening in your life right now, that there's no length that I wouldn't go to show you how much I love you. I will never leave you. I will never forsake you. And it melted my heart. See, I had been around that field, but I had missed the treasure.
Collin Hansen:And when I found it, it was like scales fell off my eyes. And I looked at it and I said, this was here all along? This is the gospel? This is amazing. Now unlike that man who finds his treasure in the field, the merchant doesn't stumble upon the treasure.
Collin Hansen:Right? This man has spent a lifetime actively seeking. He has evaluated countless pearls for their beauty and for their worthiness. He woke up that morning with a particular purpose. He knew he was going to go down to the marketplace, he was going to search high and low, he was going to ask whoever he needed to to find and acquire the best pearls.
Collin Hansen:But get this, he had never come across a pearl so precious that in the end he wasn't willing to trade it. But this day, he finds a pearl that so defies his expectations, so remarkable, that he resolves he has to have it no matter what it costs him. And I want you to imagine, just for a moment what it would have been like for these 2 men coming home. Right? Imagine their wives hearing this noise rustling from the garage later at night, turning on the light, coming in saying, hey, honey.
Collin Hansen:What's going on? Oh, we're having a yard sale tomorrow. Oh, okay. Feel like we should have prepared a little bit more for this, but that's that's okay. Why is my grandma's ring out here?
Collin Hansen:Oh, we're selling it. Okay. Why is your granddad's World War 2 memorabilia out here? We're selling it. Oak okay.
Collin Hansen:Why are all of our wedding photos out here? Oh, I I didn't realize those were out here. Do you think somebody would pay for those? You can imagine the wife would immediately slink back into the house, start calling friends, family, maybe even the family doctor to check-in and see if her husband is okay, to make sure that he hasn't lost his mind. And you can imagine the responses of the neighbors the next morning when they see everything that this family has held precious out on the front lawn, all affixed with post it notes that say, make your best offer.
Collin Hansen:But are these men crazy? No. These men have not lost their minds. In fact, according to this parable, theirs is the only rational response to their discoveries. They have done a quick cost benefit analysis.
Collin Hansen:They weigh everything that they have, everything that they could potentially earn on one side. They see the treasure on the other and they say, this is a no brainer. I know what I have to do. And what was the final cost for these men? Don't miss this.
Collin Hansen:For both of them, it cost them everything. If the man was to have the treasure, if the merchant was to have the pearl, they had to lay everything on the line. And the same is true for us. For the disadvantaged and for the privileged, for the rich and for the poor, the kingdom of heaven will cost you everything. Jesus put it this way in Luke chapter 14.
Collin Hansen:If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple. In Mark chapter 10, there was a very moral and wealthy and respected young man who came to Jesus and said to him, good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life? Jesus asks him a series of questions, but the young man doesn't get the hint.
Collin Hansen:And the bible tells us something really remarkable. Says, Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said one thing you lack, sell all that you have, then come and follow me. Now, for you and I, do we have to sell all that we have to come and follow Jesus? I'm gonna let you ask Joel that when he gets back from his vacation. Regardless of whatever Joel's answer is, don't miss this.
Collin Hansen:The Bible tells us that Jesus loves this man so much that he puts his finger on the one thing that this rich young ruler doesn't want him to touch. And the question is essentially this, what is more precious to you? What is your treasure, your earthly possessions or eternal life? And the Bible tells us these heartbreaking words that this man walked away sorrowful because he had great possessions. And so my question to you and my question to myself this morning is this, if Jesus were to come to your house later today, sit down, and say, it's going to cost you x to come and follow me, What is the one thing that you hope he doesn't say?
Collin Hansen:Don't escape today without wrestling with that question. And then second, even more importantly, would you do it? Would you lay it down? What is the kingdom of heaven worth to you? Because Jesus will not share top billing in our hearts with anyone or anything else.
Collin Hansen:As he said plainly elsewhere, no one can serve 2 masters. Either he will love 1 and hate the other, or he will cherish 1 and despise the other. If we would have the kingdom, we must sell off all the other disordered loves of our hearts, anything that would compete with our heart's affections for Him. But we also have to realize that this isn't merely a selling off, that these are the terms of surrender, Because entering the kingdom of heaven means coming into the place where Jesus is King. So we surrender our right to determine where we will spend our time, how many hours we will put into our work or leisure or kids activities, where we are going to spend our money and energy.
Collin Hansen:We surrender our right to determine for ourselves what is right and wrong, where we will work, who we will sleep with, and who we will marry. Everything must come on the table because Jesus is king over everything. To enter the kingdom of God, get this, to become a Christian, you must, as Jesus said in Luke 14, renounce all that you have. Nothing less than this will do. And if we don't, what we're effectively saying is, Jesus, you can have this portion of my life, but I don't want you to be king over here.
Collin Hansen:I would prefer to rule this part. And Jesus says, no, all or nothing. Without this selling, there is no possessing. Without repentance, that is turning away from all the other things that we've looked to for our life, for our purpose, for our joy, there can be no faith. And I know that this sounds drastic, but this parable is saying, once again, that this is the only logical conclusion to finding something so precious.
Collin Hansen:If we aren't willing to sell all that we have to buy this pearl of great price, it's only because we don't recognize just how precious this thing that we found is. This is what C. S. Lewis was arguing in his great sermon, The Weight of Glory. When he wrote that, quote, If we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised us in the gospels, it would seem that our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak.
Collin Hansen:We are half hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at sea. We are far too easily pleased, end quote. Make no mistake. Infinite joy is offered you. Verse 44 tells us that this man who finds the treasure, he doesn't sell off everything, but grudgingly, he doesn't sell it off angrily or sorrowfully, but in His joy.
Collin Hansen:Now normally, if you told a man that tomorrow you're gonna lose everything that you have, he would be distraught. But this man is overwhelmed with joy because he grasps the riches of his reward. So how do we get that? How do we take hold of this infinite joy? How do we see this treasure for what it really is?
Collin Hansen:Well, you see, taking up your cross to follow Jesus, it's going to cost you a whole lot. For some of you, it's already cost you relationships, or it's cost you standing with your friends or with your family. It's probably cost you some money or your reputation, or maybe even advancements in your career or some of your political convictions, or what you thought your future was going to look like. But Jesus had a treasure too. A treasure that had been lost a long long time ago.
Collin Hansen:And gaining his treasure cost Jesus far more. The Bible tells us that he was betrayed into the hands of sinners, that he was abandoned by his closest friends, that he was mocked by religious leaders and soldiers alike, that he was beaten with rods, that he was whipped, that he was stripped of his clothes, and that a crown of thorns was thrust into his scalp. And he was marched through the streets while people mocked him. He was carrying his own cross, where he would be left to hang until the breath left his body, with nails through his wrists and through his ankles. And on that cross, not only did Jesus experience the very worst cruelty that humanity had ever invented, But in the midst of that, he turned his bruised face towards all of humanity, to the past, to the present, and the future.
Collin Hansen:And And he was willing to take everything that we would throw at him. All of the very worst of us, he took upon himself. So that second Corinthians 521 would say that he made him, God made him who knew no sin, Jesus, to become sin, that we might become the righteousness of God. That the worst part of the cross is that the father's wrath fell upon Jesus, so that Jesus got on the cross what we deserve for our sins. In Hebrews 1211 and 2 says these alarming words, that Jesus, the author and the perfecter of our faith, for the joy set before Him endured the cross.
Collin Hansen:The author of Hebrews is telling us that when Jesus, from eternity past, looked out upon what his life was gonna look like, when he looked out on the cross and all the suffering that he was going to have to endure, when he thought about the moment when the wrath of God was gonna fall upon him, he could say, that is a joy. How? Because at the back end, Jesus got his treasure. What did Jesus get by selling off all that he had and by surrendering all? He got you.
Collin Hansen:He got you. By being cast off, we were brought in. Jesus was stripped of his clothes so that you and I could wear a robe of righteousness. He felt the wrath of his father so that you and I who were orphans could be brought in as the sons and daughters of God. He cried out on the cross, I thirst.
Collin Hansen:So that you and I could know that we will forever be satisfied. This is why Jesus came into the world, to find God's treasure and to pay the price to bring us back. And Jesus was willing to do it even though it cost him everything that he had. And, when we catch the smallest glimpse of the treasure chest of God's love for us, it radically realigns all of our priorities, it radically realigns our evaluation of the worth of everything that we have and the worth of the kingdom of of God. We're able to say like Paul, I count everything as lost compared to the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord.
Collin Hansen:In whose presence there is fullness of joy, that His steadfast love, it's better than life, that our souls will be satisfied as with rich and fat food. What if, as part of our lives, we we meditated just for a moment on God's love for us. If we spent some quiet, unhurried time considering God's heart towards us, what would come on the table? What would we be willing to do? What would we be willing to sacrifice?
Collin Hansen:The cost is real. Right? The cost of following Jesus, it will cost you everything. But listen to this. After the rich young ruler walked away, Peter turned to Jesus and he said, See, we have left everything and followed you.
Collin Hansen:And Jesus said these comforting words. Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house, brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands for my sake and for the gospel who will not receive a hundredfold. Now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands and with persecutions in the age to come eternal life. Jesus is here this morning offering you himself as that treasure, as that pearl of great price. Would we have them?
Collin Hansen:There's only 2 roads in the end. Either we will sell everything that we have in a yard sale, or moth and rust will destroy everything that we have. And whatever's left over will be sold in an estate sale. What do you want? Jesus comes to satisfy.
Collin Hansen:Let's pray. Our father, this morning, we confess Christ's worth in our own unworthiness. Jesus, we are so grateful that though we deserve nothing good from you, nothing good from your hands. You instead of leaving us to our own sin and destruction, by your blood you ransom men for God. So we pray that you would fix all of our eyes on you, the author and the perfecter of our faith, that you would turn our hearts away from lesser loves, that you would break the spell that those things have over us.
Collin Hansen:And Lord, we pray that you would bring us to joyful rest in you alone, willing to say that we will gladly consider all things lost if it means that we would gain Christ because our souls will be restless until they rest in me. Pray these things in the name of the father, son, and holy spirit. Amen.