The Value of the Kingdom

On September 4th, 1972, CBS launched their new American TV game show where contestants would compete by guessing an items value. And if you guessed it correctly, you could win boat loads of cash, or even that dream boat you had always dreamed of. And after having aired over 9,000 episodes since its launch, The Price is Right has collected quite a few people who lost miserably simply because they didn’t know an items value.

For example, when the show brought out an iPhone 6 that included a calling and data plan to be be bid on, for some bizarro reason one of them thought that the item was valued at $7,500, when in reality it was only worth a few hundred dollars! And so because he didn’t know the value of the item, the contestant lost out badly.

Another time the show’s host brought out a nice quilted hammock, which was supported from the ground up by a large piece of wood. And sure, it did look pretty nice compared to other hammocks, thousands of dollars nice! Which is exactly what one contestant bid when they thought it was worth $7,000! What is this, a sleep number hammock? In reality though, the price of the Hammock was worth only $880’s. And so because he didn’t know the value of it, he lost out badly.

Not everyone though fails to know the value of items by over guessing their value, many fail by under-guessing item’s values too. For example, one man’s showcase that he bid on was an around the world trip, staying in top-of-the-line hotels, experiencing all-expenses paid fine-dining, and having the vacation excursions of a life-time! And even though many in the crowd uuuuwwwwed and awwwed, the man bid only $4,600 on a vacation most only dream of, which was actually worth $26,000! And so because he didn’t know the value of it, he lost out badly.

Ya know, when it comes to determining the value of things, do you realize that this is actually the most important thing you’ll do in your entire life? It really is. That’s not an exaggeration. Because if you get this wrong, you have absolutely EVERYTHING to lose! However, if you get it right, you have everything to gain and more!

What am I talking about? I’m talking about what Jesus is telling us in Matthew chapter 13, with: The parable of the hidden treasure, The Parable of the pear of Great Price The Parable of the Drag Net And the Parable of the New and Old Treasures.

See, in these parables, Jesus is telling us that there is something that is something that is so valuable we should consider everything else completely WORTHLESS in comparison to it. He’s telling us that it’s so valuable, that we should be willing to give up EVERYTHING to gain it! That’s how valuable it is. And so if we properly recognize its value, Jesus tells us that it can be ours for the having.

So what it is and how do we get it? As Jesus tells us it is the Kingdom of heaven, and we get by recognizing 3 things: By recognizing:

1. Its worth
2. Its Cost
3. Its Calling

1. Its worth

If said to you: “Hey, is this worth $500 to you?” What would you say? Would you say yes, or no? Well, that depends right? If it’s a piece of paper, you’d say: “No! Absolutely not!” But if it’s a piece of paper with winning lotto numbers on it, or a key to a bitcoin wallet with 1000 bitcoin on it, I am guessing you’d say: “Absolutely!” And even if you didn’t have any money at all, you’d come back to me with the $500 within that day after having pawned everything you possibly could to get it.

And this is the kind of thing that Jesus is telling us with these parables. He’s telling us that the Kingdom of Heaven is like a hidden treasure in a field or Pearl of great price, that when a person finds they sell everything they have in order to buy it! His point is that the Kingdom of Heaven is the greatest treasure their is, and anyone who refused to drop what they have and seek after it making a horrible mistake! And He’s making this point to us by way of a parables. What are those? Parables are an earthly story with a heavenly meaning. And these two parables are simply teaching us by way of illustration the same thing that Jesus taught us back in Matthew chapter 6, where He taught:

Matthew 6:33 (ESV) But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness

Now with this first parable, the parable of the hidden treasure, it sounds like Jesus is telling us a story about a pretty shady person. Dude finds a treasure hidden in a field, he re-buries it and goes and sells everything he has in order to buy the land and gain the treasure. Now, that might sound like Jesus is suggesting shady business practices, but He’s not. Because the way this worked, was back in Jesus’s day, they didn’t have a First National Bank that you could go and put your treasure in. Their economy didn’t work that way. And so what people would often do, especially if an invading army was coming in, they would bury their treasure in field so no one would find it, and after the conflict ended they would come back and it would be safe in the ground right where they left it: Unless of course they didn’t survive the invasion, and then the treasure would be left there in the field until someone found it. BUT, the thing was, in Jewish Law, no one would have seen this as stealing or shady at all, because of the way their business practices and ethics worked back then. The point, don’t get all focused on that, because that’s not Jesus’s point.

Jesus’s point is simply that the Kingdom of heaven is of such great value that when a man discovers it and it’s value, they are willing to give up ANYTHING and everything for it.

Now, throughout Jesus’s earthly ministry, what has He been doing? He’s been offering the Jewish people the Kingdom, and so far, they’ve been rejecting it because they didn’t realize its value! See, they thought the kingdom was going to come entirely differently than how it did! They expected a conquering King | Not a suffering Savior They expected justice and wrath | Not Mercy and Grace They expected the White Warhorse | Not the Colt! And so when the most valuable thing - The King of the Kingdom - showed up, they failed to recognize His value because they overvalued things of infinitely lesser value! You might say they were the worst spiritual Price is Right contestants of all time. And so consequently, they lost out badly.

OK so Jesus’s second parable is the Pearl of Great Price, and it’s making a similar point. Which is that the Kingdom is like a man searching for fine pearls, who comes across the grand-daddy pearl of them all, and then sells all he has in order to get it. Now in Jesus’s time pearls were a really big deal. During this time, people were about as fascinated with the beauty of Pearls as Golem was with his ring. And if you don’t know that Lord of the Rings reference, then don’t worry about it, cuz I’m sure you still get the idea anyways. How valuable were these? One historian recorded that the Roman general Vitellius financed an entire military campaign by selling just one of his mother’s pearl earrings! So the point here is, the Kingdom of Heaven is of EXTREME WORTH! And so if we are going to receive the kingdom we must recognize it’s worth.

But does everyone recognize it? No they don’t. That’s why Jesus told us the parable of the 4 soils. 3 of those 4 soils - which represents people’s hearts - are not going to recognize the worth of the kingdom, and so consequently they aren’t going to receive it. And why not? Because their heart’s are like pigs in the mud who just love their mud! They think mud is just the best thing ever, and so even if they accidently dig up a Pearl in the mud, they are just gonna look right past it at all the mud because that’s their heart’s true desire! But what has more value? Mud or a pearls? Pearls!

And yet, some of you are valuing mud when you have the pearls of heaven laying before you! And all you have to do to get them is be willing to give up your mud!

And yet apart from the grace of God the human heart refused to give up the mud. The human heart is completely unable to see the buried treasure! And so instead we go along foolishly chasing after the things of this world when the things of eternal glory lay before us!

What kind of things am I talking about? Oh man. Anything! Literally. Jobs, career, hobbies, relationships, homes, cars, vacations, friends, family - all of it easily distracts us from the pearls of heaven like mud does to a pig. How incredibly foolish when we have before us eternal treasure that will never fade or grow old!

This is why Jesus told us in His sermon on the mount to lay up treasure in heaven where moth and rust doesn’t corrupt, and where thieves do not break in and steal! And yet so many, 3 of the 4 Jesus tells us with His first parable, utterly refuse to trade their rags for riches! And they refuse to because they fail to recognize that the things of this world are completely valueless compared to the things of the world to come. For if they did, there would be no questions about it, they would count the cost and realize it was no cost at all, and then make that exchange in a heartbeat! Which bring us to second point.

To receive the kingdom’s reward we must recognize:

2. Its Cost

There’s no question about it, when it comes to receiving the Kingdom of Heaven, it’s going to cost you. Do you remember what Jesus said back in Mathew 8 about the cost of following Him?

Now when Jesus saw a crowd around him, he gave orders to go over to the other side. And a scribe came up and said to him, “Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.” And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” Another of the disciples said to him, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.” And Jesus said to him, “Follow me, and leave the dead to bury their own dead.”

Matthew 8:18-22 ESV

And then Matthew 16 Jesus says:

Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul? For the Son of Man is going to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay each person according to what he has done.

Matthew 16:24-27 ESV

Wait a minute then… what’s Jesus talking about here? I thought Salvation was by grace not of works? Absolutely it is! But this grace that saves us is a grace THAT WORKS! And how does it work? By making us give up on the foolish works we have been living for! By making us realize how worthless the pig slop is that we’ve been living for!

And so yes, salvation if free, but as the german theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer said: “it is free, but discipleship will cost you your life!” And so if you’re a follower of Jesus, then that means you readily accept that following Jesus might you cost all of the pig slop of this world, and your heart’s response is “OK - SO BE IT!”

Bonhoeffer also famously said: “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” And he’s right. For when we come to Christ our old selves die and our new selves are reborn just as a caterpillar turns into a butterfly. And so do you see now why Jesus began His sermon on the mount saying:

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Matthew 5:3 ESV

Don’t you see that when God saves a person, He isn’t OKAY with the status quo! Yes, absolutely come as you are ye sinners poor and needy, weak and wounded, sick and sore! For Jesus does stand to save you, full of pity, love and power! BUT THAT POWER DOESN’T LAY DORMANT, DOES IT? No it doesn’t. It launches into action changing the heart and leading it to love not the things of this world, but the things of the world to come. It begins to change a person to become a creature they never could have imagined!

C. S. Lewis talks about this, and it’s quite helpful. Here’s what he says:

“Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on: you knew those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently he starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of - throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace.” (C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, New York: MacMillan Co., 1960, p. 160).

The salvation that Jesus offers isn’t just a fire insurance policy! The Salvation that Jesus offers is a wrecking ball that will come into your life and powerfully destroy all of the silly little things you’ve been living for! And when it’s done, as Lewis points out, there we will be a creature that is so wonderful and so beautiful, that if we saw our future heavenly selves today, right now, we’d be so very tempted to worship it! That’s what coming! And it’s coming for all those who’s heart’s treasure the Kingdom’s worth and gladly count the cost of discipleship and deem it worth paying, because by comparison it no cost at all! Not really. Yes, at first before we know any better it seems like a pricey cost! Of course it does! Ask a pig if it will give up it’s mud for pearls and that’s a tall order But once that pig has been changed into a prince or princess who’s Father is the King of the Universe, then everything changes, doesn’t it? Absolutely it does! And when everything changes, we find our heart’s called to live for this Kingdom in radical, live-changing ways, that we never could have imagined or done on our own in a million, million years! Which leads us to our final point.

To receive the kingdom’s reward we must recognize:

3. Its Calling

In the last two parables Jesus gives us a parable of a dragnet that collects the fish of the sea, and one of the householder’s treasure.

With the dragnet, Jesus tells us that the Kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and gathered fish of every kind - some good and some bad. Which sounds an awful lot like Jesus’s parable of the wheat and the tares, doesn’t it? Very similar.

And the point is quite simply. At the end of the age, the angels of the Lord will separate the evil from the righteous. The good fish are kept and the bad fish are discarded into the fiery furnace where their is weeping and gnashing of teeth. And we know what He’s talking about - He’s talking about heaven and hell.

So who are the good fish and who are the bad fish? Well, in Matthew 12:30 Jesus makes it quite clear, as He does all throughout Matthew’s Gospel, but what He says there is:

Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.

Matthew 12:30 ESV

See, when it comes to Jesus, you can’t have one foot in the boat and one foot out of the boat. If you want the salvation He offers, you have to get it the lifeboat, or you’re lost! And as we’ve seen so far throughout our study through the book of Matthew, this is a point that Jesus keeps making over, and over, and over again! Who are His mother, brothers, and sisters? Matthew 12:49-50 (ESV)

And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.”

Matthew 12:49-50 ESV

Some of you might be here struggling with this, and you’re struggling with this because when you came to Christ you didn’t come to Him as a servant before a King, you came to Him someone who was willing to make a trade. Instead of bowing the knee in repentance, you tried to bargain with God and say: “I’ll follow you IF you let me still have this....” “I’ll be a Christian IF that means God bless me how I want.” But is that how you approach THE KING OF THE KINGS and LORD OF LORDS? Of course not. Unless of course you still think you’re the king...

But here’s the thing. You’re not the king. There’s one one King, and His name is King Jesus! And He demands TOTAL allegiance - not partial! He demands TOTAL LOYALTY - not divided loyalty! He demands ALL OF YOU - NOT merely PART OF YOU! And as our Creator King, it is His sovereign right to demand so!

And yet, remarkably, when we bow the knee, and say: “All to Jesus I surrender, all to Him I freely give!” Do you realize what He does for us? He bends down and pulls us up by the hand, and says: “Now let me show you what I have in store for you!” And then after placing a Golden crown upon our heads, And wrapping a pearl of great price around our necks, He looks at us with loving, tender eyes and says: “This is why I asked you to leave your mud pie” “Not because I wanted to harm you.” “Not because I wanted to abuse you.” “But because I wanted to move you from your spiritually diseased rags into the heavenly riches which never fade!” “because I wanted to make you kings and queens of My Father’s kingdom!”

In verse 51, we come to our last parable in Matthew chapter 13, and it’s the parable of the New and Old Treasures. And in this parable Jesus compares His disciples to a master of a house who brings out of his treasure - both new and old. And what is their treasure? The glorious truths of the Kingdom of heaven! (Both Old and New)

And what glorious truths they are! Truths that our world desperately needs to hear! Truths that if they don’t hear and respond to by the grace of God through faith, WILL result in God’s divine dragnet one day capturing them resulting their being discarded into the fires of an eternal hell!

And so I ask you this morning the same question Jesus asked His disciples in verse 51. “Do you understand these things?” Do you see the incredibly worth of the Kingdom? Do you see its incredible cost and do you see the immense importance of our kingdom calling?

If not, then I urge to gaze upon the the most valuable pearl of them all - Christ Jesus our Lord! The King of Kings and Lord of Lords who is the ultimate pearl of great price! Who is the one whom our Hearts were made for! And in Whom Alone do we find satisfaction and true joy!

And why can He be our joy? Because out of His great love for us He valued us, though we were invaluable. He paid the greatest of costs, when it was a cost we could never pay! And He did so because He obeyed His Father’s call, which now makes us able to value Him, consider the cost of discipleship to be nothing at all, and live out our calling in faithful obedience as an act of worship and thanks

The destruction of the word is coming. The great Divine dragnet lies close at hand. Are you ready for it? Do you understand these things? I trust by God’s grace you do

By the grace and power of God may we value the worth of Christ May we count the cost and gladly see that it it no cost at all And then out of our overwhelming joy may we faithfully fulfill our great Kingdom calling by going into the world as fishers of men pointing the salvation which is only found in Jesus Christ.

This is the manuscript the sermon was preached from, so the recording may differ in places.