Here’s My Heart

Luke 12:32-40

The Presbyterian Youth Triennium at Purdue University in July took as its theme, “Here’s My Heart.”  About 20 students and five adult sponsors attended from John Calvin Presbytery, traveling on a charter bus from Springfield, MO to West Lafayette, IN.  There we joined with youth from all over the world – from the US to Puerto Rico, from Canada to Hungary.  Through games, music, singing, meals, and small groups – it was a week that invited us to say to God, “Here’s my heart.”  And today, we bring that invitation from Purdue to this place, so that we too can join in that offering, saying, “Here’s my heart.”
 
Later this morning we’ll sing, “Come, Thou Fount of every blessing, tune my heart to sing thy grace . . . . Let thy goodness, like a fetter, bind my wandering heart to thee . . .”.  And then in the final line, “Here’s my heart, O take and seal it.”  Here’s my heart, Lord.”  In our gospel reading for today, Jesus teaches us to give our hearts to what matters most.  “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” 

Jesus repeatedly teaches his followers to tend to their hearts, to keep their hearts free from fear.  In Luke 12 alone, he tells his followers not to fear those who threaten them with harm.  He tells them not to fear losing their lives, since God knows the number of hairs on their head (which, in the case of some of you, isn’t all that difficult!).  He tells them not to worry when they’re hauled before the authorities and put on trial.  The Holy Spirit will give them what needs to be said.  Jesus’ followers aren’t to worry about the daily needs of life – what they’ll eat or what they’ll wear.  God will make sure they have clothes and food, just like God takes care of the birds of the field and the flowers of the field.

So that solves it for us, right?  Have all of your worries now disappeared?  Is my heart always pointing me to abundant life?  Well, maybe not.

This teaching about keeping your heart free of fear and directing your heart to what will bring you deep joy continues in our reading today.  “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom.”  It may come as a surprise that you have already been given God’s kingdom.  Not only have we already received it, but God takes delight in lavishing this gift upon us.  We all know that our lives are full of struggle and pain, that the world can be a cruel and violent place.  So what does Jesus mean when he teaches us that God’s kingdom is already here as a gift?

For Jesus, receiving the kingdom means living in the new light of God’s gracious rule.  And that rule is already on the scene.  We are already living in it, even though it is not yet here in its fullness.  It’s a little like smelling and tasting a meal that is still on the stove, even if it’s not yet fully cooked and the dinner table is not yet set.

The Father delights in flinging this newness into our midst.  It comes as a gift that washes over you and pulls you into its reality.  You don’t have to work for it.  You don’t have to achieve it, manufacture it, make it happen, or produce it from scratch.  It has already been given to you.  Just open your heart and receive it.

But we cannot receive the gift if we’re asleep or in the posture of passivity.  This gift calls us to action.  It comes to us and inspires us to make changes, to shift gears, to realign our priorities.  Jesus announces to us that the Father has given us a gift and then immediately calls us to the work of enacting that gift in a particular way.  Did you notice the verbs . . . sell, give, and make? 

Sell.  Sell your possessions.  Have a garage sale or take your belongings to a consignment shop.  Get on Facebook, or Ebay, or Etsy or whatever.  List what you have.  Put it up for sale.  Get rid of it.  Lighten what you have to carry.  Clean out all the closets, cabinets, basements, and storage bins you’ve got filled with stuff.  You can’t be nimble and flexible enough to welcome God’s newness if your life is weighed down by cares and concerns about things you own.

 Give.  Give to the poor.  Share some of what you have with those who don’t have much.  Make life a little easier for those who have it harder than you do.  Spread the wealth, whether that’s money, time, talent, expertise, or attention.  Let the goodness that has flowed into your life flow through you to bless those who need it.

And then make.  Make purses that don’t wear out.  Decide what’s most valuable and then go get it.  Run your calculations.  Put pen to paper.  Figure out what you want more than anything else.  And then figure out how to protect and conserve it.  Be done with storing up the kinds of things that can fade, wear out, run down, or be lost or stolen. 

For nearly twenty years, I had a leather wallet that I loved.  This soft leather and its hand-stitching had so delicately shaped itself to my rear end that it had become part of my anatomy.  I was in Florence, Italy in 1999.  We stumbled across the shop of an artisan leather worker.  The smell of that shop was so wonderful, the leather was so soft, the designs were so beautiful that I knew I had buy something.  Unfortunately, I bought a leather jacket that I have never worn.  I can’t think of a single situation in life where I would look good in this jacket. 

But that’s all water under the bridge, because I also bought an elegantly simple leather wallet.  This wallet carried my cash and cards for nearly twenty years.  Eventually, the wallet’s stitching began to wear out.  John Renard stitched it back together twice.  When I took it back to him a third time, he said, like a surgeon with bad news, “Jared, there’s nothing I can do.”  Just last year, after twenty years, my wallet closed for the final time.  I am embarrassed to admit that I now carry a faux leather wallet I bought for $9.99.  It won’t be long before I’m carrying my valuables around in a Ziploc bag.

Whether we carry our money in wallets or purses, money-clips or fanny packs, Jesus warns us not to get too attached to what we prize or treasure.  Your valuables can be stolen by someone with sticky fingers.  But even if no one steals your treasures, they’ll still wear out eventually.

We bought a Honda Accord last year.  It was used, but it was the newest car we’ve ever had.  After hitting a deer and totaling our minivan, we declared that we were done with minivans.  We wanted something more youthful and energetic.  As we drove the sleek, low-mileage sedan off the car lot, we promised ourselves that we would wash it more often.  We would vacuum it out more frequently.  We would not allow papers and receipts and wrappers to accumulate on these new floorboards.  The kids were NOT going to eat fast food in this car like they did in the minivan.  There would be no French fries down in the crevasses; no chocolate milkshakes left to sour in this new car. 

But when my wife backed into a parked car and cracked the rear bumper, it was all over.  Now I will admit that a few weeks later I accidentally backed my car into it and left a mark on the driver side door.  There’s plenty of blame to go around, most of it to her, but let’s not dwell on that.  My point is that once the bumper on your new car is busted; once there’s an indentation on the driver side door – it looses some of its shine.  Have you had that experience with your car?  Or with a new pair of shoes?  Or with a washing machine?  Or a new phone?  Or a house?

One of my favorite authors, Alain de Botton, has a book called The Architecture of Happiness.  In that book he explores the ways beautiful walkways and objects and buildings can enhance our lives, providing us a home that balances us and calls us to live our best lives.  But even so, he writes, “our buildings have a grievous tendency to fall apart again with precipitate speed.  It can be hard to walk into a freshly decorated house without feeling pre-emptively sad at the decay impatiently waiting to begin: how soon the walls will crack, the white cupboards will yellow and the carpets stain” (p. 15).

When you have money and things, the problem isn’t so much in the having of them; the problem is that in having them they bend our lives out of shape.  They call for our first and best attention.  They become objects of concern and worry and fret.  Even the best things money can buy will break, fade, depreciate, or get stolen.

For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.  This principle can apply to our lives in a great variety of ways.  If your treasure is money, your heart will be set on money.  But your treasure might not be money and the things money can buy – like nice houses and cars and clothes and vacations.  Your treasure might be comfort, safety, familiarity, conflict-avoidance, revenge, a house, the perfect family, a reputation, status or power.

Do not miss how radical and fresh and strange this teaching is.  Jesus teaches us that the real question is not whether we’re religious people.  We might like that question.  It can at least be answered.  If we’re religious or a frequent and involved church-member, we can pat ourselves on the back for those accomplishments.  But Jesus’ question for religious people is sharper, and penetrates more deeply into the center of who we are.  Not: are you a religious person?  But instead: what do you treasure and value?  To what have you given your heart?  It turns out that sometimes, people like us go to church to distract ourselves from the painful truth that we have given our hearts to something small and selfish.

The question hits just as deeply for those who pretend that they aren’t religious.  Nonreligious people have convinced themselves that they’ve seen through religion.  They’ve outsmarted it and don’t need it.  But Jesus teaches that this is a silly approach to life.  Everyone worships something.  We worship whatever we value.  We worship and treasure whatever gets our time, energy, attention, and effort.  Your religion might be your alma mater (I have a friend who will be buried in a casket with his university logo!); it might be your retirement account; your children – their performance in school, in sports, their popularity or their career or even their staying nearby; your religion might be your career; or your family; or your alleged independence from others.  So the question comes just as forcefully to those who see themselves as free from church or institutional religion: to what have you given your heart?

The problem with treasuring what can’t last is that our best attention will be diverted into something not all that important.  And in that situation we will leave ourselves completely unprepared for the arrival of God’s fresh grace and power in our lives.  That’s why Jesus tells the parable of about those unprepared for a home invasion.  Jesus warns us against getting so deeply and intensely devoted to what we treasure that we’re left unprepared to move in new directions when the opportunity arises.

So let me ask you:  What’s currently getting your best attention?  What do you daydream about?  What is it you’re working to accomplish right now?  Is it a healthy pursuit, leaving room for other projects and other people?  If this project or passion of yours failed or disappeared, could you still live with joy?  Do your current plans leave room for you to be generous and to share – in both a planned and a spontaneous way?  Do your plans leave room – in terms of money, energy, time, and relationships – for new things to happen?


Don’t be afraid, little flock.  When Jesus identifies us as his little flock, he reminds us who we are.  We are the sheep of God’s pasture.  We are the beloved children in a new family with the protection of a parent’s love.  We are the objects of God’s creative delight and deep joy.  We are awash in abundant gifts.  And we are learning to say, “Here’s my heart, Lord.  Here’s my heart.”

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