Where Is Your Treasure?

This is an old story of a cobbler who mended shoes with songs of joy, every day. He loved God, and life. He had a wonderful wife and obedient children. Every day, he would sing praises to God while he was making shoes. He was not poor, but not rich either. He had enough to live and provide for his family, and was very happy.

His neighbor was wealthy man. Every day he would look out of his window and see this cobbler singing with joy while working. The neighbor could also hear this cobbler’s singing voice throughout the day, and he found it very irritating! So, the neighbor thought very hard – how to silence this cobbler.

Finally, he had an idea. He said to himself, “Tomorrow, I will give this cobbler a bag full of money, and he will stop singing.”

So, this rich man went to see the cobbler in the morning. He gave the bag of money to him, saying, “Every day I hear you singing. Today, I decided to give you this present for all your singing. Have a nice day! Goodbye!” And the rich man left.

The cobbler was shocked, but only too glad to receive a bagful of money. So he kept the money safely in the cupboard. And that afternoon itself, he was very quiet while working. Every now and then, he would go and check if the money was still there. He kept thinking about the money, and somehow he stopped singing.

The rich neighbor thought to himself, “My plan has worked! Now, the cobbler is quiet!”

But the cobbler’s wife was a wise woman. After a week of watching her husband’s silence, she told him, “Do you realize that you have become very quiet? You are not happily singing and enjoying your work like you used to. It’s because of that bag of money isn’t it? You used to love God and sing with joy. Money cannot buy happiness. Go and return it. I want my happy husband back.”

So the cobbler, being a teachable man, went and returned the bag of money to the rich neighbour. When he sat down to work, he started singing again! He thought about God’s goodness and kept praising God with songs. His wife and family were all happy together again.

The Bible says, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will also be.”

The cobbler’s treasure was God before he had that bag of money. That’s why he could sing and praise God. But when that bag of money came in, the money became his treasure. He thought about it day and night – his heart was on the money. It stole God’s place from his life. The cobbler found his happiness when his treasure was God once again.

Many people blame ‘religion’ and equate the rich with evil, and the poor with God. But this is not true. Wealth is a blessing that comes from God, and God certainly loves the poor. There are rich people who love God as much as the poor love Him. And there are poor people who hate God as much as the rich hate Him.

Wealth is generally associated with evil because of one problem. When humans have EVERYTHING, it becomes our treasure and it steals our heart. Jesus is left to stand at the door of our heart and knock.

The poor keep seeking God and believing in Him, as they want a better life. Their heart is focused on God as they work and put it effort, and God does bless them. They experience miracles which we average or the well-to-do may never believe. When the poor receive the blessings, they give the credit back to God. This is where the difference lies, with some of the ‘already rich’ – they think they did it all by themselves without God – because their treasure lies in their wealth. They just continue working hard for money without seeing any importance about God.

Why do people work so hard to serve Money instead of GOD? Can’t they see – at the end of the day, when their working life is over, and their age keeps catching up, they will be left with nothing! Just money & no one to share their life with when they are old and their loved ones are gone! No one to care about their feelings to be there to love them. Even the wealth that they worked so hard to save will go to someone else when they die.

Money CANNOT give us God, happiness & love. Money can only buy us treasures that we can't take to our grave, temporary pleasure that fleets and sex that does not completely fulfill.
Money doesn't care about us, but JESUS HAS ALREADY GIVEN US EVERYTHING (life, wealth, health and love). He even died for our sins.

Everything is vanity. Only God loves us while we are alive and even after we die.

Jesus said in Matthew 6:21:
For where your treasure is, there your heart will also be.
And in verse 24:
“No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.

Where is your treasure? Who will you serve? Only you can decide.

-JJ-