Your Choices Make You!
- Jul 12, 2024
- 6 min read
Updated: Jul 19, 2024
What we love determines how we live!
William Borden was born into one of the wealthiest and most powerful families in Chicago. In 1904 he graduated from school. As heir to an estate, he was already a millionaire. For his graduation present, his parents gave 16-yr-old Borden a trip around the world. As he travelled through Asia, the Middle East, and Europe, he felt a growing burden for the world’s hurting people. Bill Borden wrote about his desire to be a missionary. Others began to say he’s “throwing himself away.” In response, Bill wrote two words in the back of his Bible: “NO RESERVES.” During his college years, Borden made one entry in his journal that defined him: “Say NO to self and YES to Jesus every time.”
Upon graduation from Yale, Borden turned down high paying jobs. In his Bible, he wrote two more words: “NO RETREATS.” After graduating he sailed for China, hoping to work with Muslims, but he stopped first in Egypt to study Arabic. While there, he contracted spinal meningitis. Within a month, 25-yr-old Bill Borden died.
Before he died, he’d written two final words in his Bible: “NO REGRETS.”
In his biography.
“Borden gave away himself, in a way so joyous and natural that it seemed a privilege rather than a sacrifice”
What if our lives reflected such a heart: NO RESERVES; NO RETREATS; NO REGRETS.
Who or what has the first place in our lives?
What are the real priorities of the disciples of Jesus?
Jesus answers, those who have submitted to His reign and whose hearts are righteous.
Your choices make you!
Your Choice - Your Treasure… Verses 19-20 talks of two treasures - earth or heaven?
Jesus tells us how to handle treasure: verse 19 gives us the negative command; verse 20 gives us the positive command; then verse 21 gives us the reason.
Basically it’s down to our heart affections:"don’t store up" (v19). There's nothing wrong with having savings, etc. It’s talking about the things that become the object of our lives and heart affections.
What we love determines how we live!
In Jesus’ day, wealth was found in 3 areas: the amount of clothing you owned; the amount of food stored up; and the amount of gold you had. Jesus is referring to the desire to acquire. He clears up the common thinking that if you have a lot, it’s because God is blessing you, and if you don’t, you must not be right with Him. But notice, He highlights problems of earthly treasure and their vulnerability to deterioration and theft.
Jesus is not out to make sure He gets your stuff; Jesus is concerned that your stuff doesn’t get you! Direct your life towards the eternal He says.
Your choices make you! You cannot hold two treasures!
"For, as I have often told you before and now say again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things." (Phil 3:18–20).
Your treasure - Your vision.
Bonhoeffer said, “Everything which hinders us from loving God above all things and acts as a barrier between ourselves and our obedience to Jesus is our treasure, and where our heart is.”
Jesus is calling for unswerving loyalty to the Kingdom of God. He’s calling for a single purpose in the hearts of the disciples. The way that we look at life and what it consists of is an indication of our spirituality.
Jesus uses the metaphor of the human eye to talk about priorities. Double standard living doesn’t work. Neither does double vision.
It’s simple, we all have two sights - 'Heartsight' (v22) or 'I Sight' (v23).
“The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!" (Matt 6:22–23).
Is Your Vision ‘Heartsight’? (v22)
Jesus starts out, “The eye is the lamp of the body.” Rather than light coming in from the outside, light comes from the inside. So how you really see depends entirely on your inner spirit. The eye is the lamp/window of the body. The eye “illumines” what the body does.
Jesus is comparing 'heartsight' to ‘eyesight.’ He wants us to realise the importance of having eyes that are sound and healthy.
We need to be able to visualise God’s vision for our lives.
What I focus on will impact my life. Jesus, says, if your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. When Jesus talks of good eyes He uses a word that is difficult to translate. Its various meanings are 'healthy, undivided, generous or single'. Here the “good” eye represents a single focus. In the Greek, the word actually means ‘unfolded’ – without folds.
Whatever we focus on, gets us.
Paul says in Colossians 3:1,"Since you have been raised to new life with Christ, set your sights on the realities of heaven, where Christ sits at God’s right hand in the place of honour and power. Let heaven fill your thoughts. Do not think only about things down here on earth. For you died when Christ died, and your real life is hidden with Christ in God."
F. Filson:“A person who divides their interest and tries to focus on both God and possessions ... has no clear vision and will live without clear orientation or direction.”
If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light (v22). Or, as the NLT version states…"A pure eye lets sunshine into your soul." I like that!
Is Your Vision ‘I sight’? (v23)
Advertising has two basic messages:
You do not yet have all the things you need to make you happy.
2. The things you do have are not good enough.
'I sight' says, “Nothing is ever enough.” Ecclesiastes 2:10 says, "I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure. My heart took delight in all my work, and this was the reward for all my labour."
When our eyes are focused on material concerns, they are blind to spiritual concerns. And that, Jesus says, can plunge us into moral darkness. So Jesus says, "If your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness" (v23).
It is clear that Jesus was not speaking simply of the physical eye. His concern was for the spiritual health of His disciples. When another priority takes over in a disciple's life, it cuts out the lamp of the gospel and it turns to darkness. It's the spiritual equivalent of trying to look in two different directions at once.
If the eye of your soul is not functioning, then you are in the dark about everything. You are simply lost. You don’t know where you are or where you are going. Jesus says, “If the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!” (v23). If where there should be light, there is only darkness, it must mean there’s a complete lack of vision. The only cure for
spiritually blind eyes is to surrender to Him.
To ponder! What we love determines how we live!
You reveal your loyalty to God by the allegiance of your will (v24a). Who will you serve? One heart cannot serve two masters!
Jesus represents a person as a slave to either God or money (v24). Although it is possible to work for two employers, it is impossible to serve two masters.
Jesus encourages us to look to Him so that our eyes will reflect His presence within us. Then our vision will not be distorted by our own preconceptions.
The problem with a preoccupation with things is that it will take our focus off Jesus Christ. We never ever want that to happen. Either God is served with single-minded devotion, or He is not served at all!
2 Corinthians 4:18: "So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."
If we want to know where the centre of our being is, all we have to do is honestly admit where our treasure is.
Hebrews 12:2: "Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith".
NO RESERVES – NO RETREATS – NO REGRETS.
What we love determines how we live. I have found this so encouraging and find myself smiling for Jesus. I know where I want to be and where my joy is, but I struggle with this too, so I am learning to reset my mindset and remind myself of the goodness of God, where He has shown up in my life and focus upon His promises. What I know is life without Jesus is not a nice place to be.