Bringing Out of His Treasure – 6/8/25

In The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt, T.J. Stiles skillfully chronicles the unlikely achievements of Vanderbilt as he rises from an uneducated boatman to the ruler of a railroad empire and eventually became known as The Commodore. He was born when George Washington was president. He died just a few months before Rutherford B. Hayes took office.

Stiles argues that Vanderbilt did more than anyone else in our country’s history to create the economic world we currently live in, the good and the bad. But in December 1836, when Vanderbilt was only 42, he was told that he was going to die.

He was diagnosed with “pleuro-pneumonia.” One of his lungs had collapsed, most likely because of an injury he had experienced from a train wreck.

The Vanderbilt family was still grieving the loss of their four-year-old son George, who had just died a few weeks earlier. So there was this darkness enveloping their home and they desperately needed hope. The family gathered around their father and grandfather who confirmed their fears that he was dying. And then he spoke what he thought were his final words. He said,

“Don’t be too anxious to make money. There’s enough for you all.”

James Cross, his son-in-law, confirmed,

“That was the whole of his conversation.”

That was it: there’s enough for you all.

Now, of course, it could have been worse. He could have been a drunk and left his family in massive debt, but Vanderbilt didn’t die then. Those weren’t his last words. He went on to recover and become the richest man in our country’s history to date. He left most of his financial empire to his eldest son, William, whose son, George, built a little cottage just north of here. You might’ve noticed the Biltmore Estate in Asheville.

But when I read those words, his supposed final words, I wanted to cry. Really? That’s it? Your family just experienced devastating loss (their four-year-old). They’re about to lose a rather young, but still the patriarch of the family. Essentially, the only thing you say is, “There’s enough for you all.”

It’s kind of pitiful. It’s a picture of real poverty. Poverty of soul, poverty of words, poverty of relationships. And if we don’t believe that, then we might be living in the kingdom of America and have lost sight of a much richer kingdom.

Jesus is opening our eyes to a far richer kingdom. He’s using parables to help us see what we would not otherwise notice. As Steve helped us see last week with his summary of the eight parables that Jesus is describing. This last one, the householder (that’s the one we’re looking at today), could be a parable or could be just a summary story. I think it’s a parable.

But Jesus is opening our eyes to the characteristics of his kingdom. Things like, as we’ve been learning, irony. Things are not what you would expect. Things like patience, as wheat and weeds grow together and things aren’t always resolved right away as we would desire. Things like the slowness of the growth, where you can have the kingdom described as a mustard seed— barely visible, tiny. It’s a treasure though, a pearl — though small and growing extremely slowly, yet of infinite wealth, worth selling everything to possess this kingdom.

At the end of the sermon, Jesus asks his disciples,

“‘Have you understood all these things?’ They said to him, ‘Yes’” (Matthew 13:51).

Wouldn’t you have loved to see their eyes, “Yes.” We know the disciples are being a bit optimistic because when we get to the next chapter, Jesus asks them,

“Are you still without understanding?” (Matthew 15:16)

And in chapter 16, even after Peter’s great confession (remember, Jesus had to rebuke him),

“For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but the things that man” (Matthew 16:23b).

You still don’t get it. So we know the disciples have a long way to go to understand the way of Jesus, the King and his kingdom. But why doesn’t he correct them here when they say, “Yes”?

Perhaps he’s comparing them to the crowd and the religious leaders. They understand far more than the crowd or the leaders. Or maybe better, they are believing what they do understand. Even though their understanding is not complete, it may be really small, they are believing everything they understand and they’re staking everything on that.

Some of you who have been around for a long time may remember a story I told many years ago of a conversation I had with Ben Arnold, one of our pastors from way back who went out to help plant a church out west. He had just returned from Ethiopia training pastors, and I was asking him about that experience. The way he described the difference between leaders/pastors here in the States versus pastors in Ethiopia. It was really interesting. He said we know this much [a great amount]. We have seminaries and countless books. We know this much [a great amount] and we’re believing and living this much [smaller amount]. They know this much [smaller amount], and they’re living and believing this much [same amount]. You see the difference? They have less knowledge (many of them have very little education), but what they know, they believe and they live. We may have more knowledge, but what we know and actually believe and live may be much smaller.

I wonder if something like that is going on here. The disciples don’t understand everything they will eventually understand. But what they do understand, they’re saying, “Yes, Lord.”

In light of that, let’s look at the next verse, parable number 8: the homeowner’s treasure.

“And [Jesus] said to them, ‘Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like a master of a house, who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old’” (Matthew 13:52).

Here Jesus is comparing a trained scribe. That word trained is “matheteuo,” which is the word we get “to make a disciple,” to teach or train a disciple whose eyes are open to the kingdom. A trained scribe is like a hospitable homeowner who brings out of his treasure what is old and what is new. Now that’s the question: what exactly is the analogy?

What is the homeowner bringing out that the trained scribe is like? Could it be souvenirs? You’re going over to somebody’s house, and they just got back from traveling. I looked around my office and grabbed a few. I don’t like souvenirs generally because they’re just more to dust. But when I was teaching years ago in Russia, I just had to get a Russian stacking doll. How can you go to Russia and not get some of the great communist leaders? Then I was looking, and I have this warrior’s club from when I was in Fiji with the Buttrams and the Meyers years ago. I thought this would be really helpful for church discipline. Everybody needs one of these. Then, of course, when you’re in Africa, you have to get — I think these are called monkey drums or something. I have no idea. Is that what Jesus is talking about? If somebody comes back from Africa and they’re talking about their trip and you bring out of your treasure these souvenirs. You guys probably have much, much better ideas there.

Or maybe it’s family memorabilia. I thought about opening it up and seeing what interesting stuff is represented in this room. Wouldn’t that be fascinating? Some people are like, “We have George Washington’s saddle passed down through our family.” Our family, we don’t have anything like that.

The one thing that I noticed in my office was a picture of my grandfather. I know you can’t see this because it’s extremely faded. The reason I love this, it’s a picture of him with his flight suit on. He was a stunt pilot — open-air cockpit, all that, spins … There are so many stories. If you come to my house and you say, “Do you know anybody who was a pilot?” Boom, you’re going to get a lot of stories about my grandfather. Is that what he’s talking about here? Family memorabilia?

Or perhaps valuable coins or art. This past Christmas, my mother-in-law gave each of us in the family a box with a rare coin in it. It wasn’t about what the coin was valued at, it was because the coins came from my father-in-law’s collection, that meant a lot to him. He’s now with Jesus, and so she was passing those along to her children and grandchildren. Is that what he’s talking about? That the homeowners bring out of their treasure old and new?

Or possibly food and drink. He might be talking about that. The word treasure there is the Greek word that’s transliterated “thesauros.” We think of a thesaurus as a treasure of synonyms, but in this day, the word simply could refer either to a storehouse for precious things (the treasury that things are kept in) or it could refer to the treasures (the valuables themselves). Perhaps Jesus is talking about bringing out valuable food items that are brought out of the storehouse, the pantry, the wine cellar; smoked meat, aged cheese, fine wine. And “what is new and what is old” could refer to what Matthew Henry suggests,

“Things of this year’s growth and last year’s gathering.”

Fresh vegetables and smoked meats, could be. Whatever Jesus is referring to (and I don’t think there’s any way to know for sure because the parable is so short), his point, though, is clear. I want to give you a rather elaborate explanation of the point, and then I’ll try to shorten it a bit. Here’s the elaborate one from D.A. Carson:

“Thus the Old Testament promises [and piety] of Messiah [of the Anointed One] … have found their fulfillment in Jesus’s person, teaching, and kingdom; and the scribe who has become a disciple of the kingdom now brings out of himself deep understanding of these things and their transformed perspective affecting all of life.”

That’s the big definition explaining the point. Let me give you a little shorter one, and then we’ll unpack this.

Disciples of the kingdom value, practice, and share what they understand.

1. value

Remember, the disciples at this point don’t fully understand what they eventually will understand. I actually find encouragement in that, do you? We don’t understand what we will eventually understand. But notice Jesus doesn’t correct or rebuke them here. He encourages them, and he tells this tiny parable to stir their imagination. In other words, don’t wait until you understand everything to bring out what you do understand. Value what you understand rather than lamenting what you don’t.

Can we linger here for a moment? I think this is an important question. Will you give thanks right now for what you do understand? Even though there may be a lot of things that you don’t yet understand?

I’m really preaching that to myself, because I find myself, when I begin imagining being with Jesus, sometimes my greatest desire is to ask him questions. Jesus, why? What about…? I think sometimes I want answers to my questions more than I actually want to be with him. What Jesus is doing here is saying, “Slow down. You don’t know everything you’re going to know. You will understand. You don’t yet. Will you give thanks for what you do know?”

God, thank you for opening my eyes to your mercy. Thank you for showing me my sin. Thank you for sending Jesus to die for my sin and rising from the grave for my newness of life. I don’t understand everything, but I do understand something. Thank you.

I do think that is one of the keys to being ready to bring out your treasure. Some of us feel like we don’t know anything, so why would we bring out anything? Yet you know a lot more than you used to know, and you will know more than know now. But if you’re waiting until you know everything before you bring it out, you’re not going to bring it out, at least in this life.

Parables are not merely puzzles to be solved in order to get questions answered. They’re windows of the kingdom when our eyes are opened. They are accessible to all who will believe. They’re not limited to an educated few who can get enough seminary training to finally know all the answers.

I want to illustrate this from church history. There’s a man named Irenaeus who was born around A.D. 130. As a boy in Smyrna — Smyrna was in Asia Minor, which is today Turkey — Irenaeas was taught by Polycarp, who was taught the Apostle John. As historian Nick Needham points out, Irenaeus grew up as a follower of Jesus with his friend, Florinus. His friend later deconstructed his faith and began following Gnosticism, specifically a Gnostic leader named Valentius.

Let’s talk about Gnosticism for a second. The Greek word “gnosis” simply means knowledge. Gnosticism was a heresy condemned by the church for believing three things. They held three things very strongly (there are more things, but these are the three big ones):

1. That matter is bad, so everything you see is bad.

2. That the Old Testament is bad.

The God of the Old Testament was different from the God of the New Testament. Therefore, what Jesus is calling us to do—to bring out what is old (Old Testament promises) and what is new (New Testament fulfillment)—they would not believe that. They would reject that. Everything old is out. Everything new is in.

3. Knowledge is secret.

They taught that knowledge is secretly passed through Jesus, through the apostles, through leaders like Valentius, and no one else can understand but them.

What is fascinating about reading Irenaeus is the way he dismantles these false beliefs by showing them that no apostle taught what they taught, and no one taught by the apostles taught what they taught, that this is novel, unbiblical, heretical teaching.

Irenaeus was so burdened for his childhood friend that he wrote to him pleading with him to return to the purity of the gospel, and his friend refused. Irenaeus’s heart was deeply burdened for people who were led astray by lies, so he wrote a large book to confront Gnostic teaching titled Against Heresies: A Refutation and an Overthrow of Knowledge Falsely So-Called.

I want to read a section out of this. Kids, this is a mouthful because this book is almost 2,000 years old. But I think you can follow if you just keep two things in mind.

1. He’s trying to communicate that both the Old Testament and the New Testament Scriptures are the ground for what we believe.

2. Every person can understand. You don’t have to be in the club if you believe the Spirit can enable you to understand. Listen to what he says:

“These things are such as fall [plainly] under our observation, and are clearly and unambiguously in express terms set forth in the Sacred Scriptures. And therefore the parables ought not to be adapted to ambiguous expressions …”

What he’s saying there is that the Gnostics would turn the parables into a kind of interpretation that no one else could understand. It was so confusing.

“But to apply expressions which are not clear or evident to interpretations of the parables, such as everyone discovers for himself as inclination leads him, [is absurd].

“According to this course of procedure, therefore, man would always be inquiring but never finding [no one can understand] because he has rejected the very method of discovery … Since, therefore, the entire Scriptures, the prophets, and the Gospels —[old and new] can be clearly, unambiguously, and harmoniously understood by all, although all do not believe them …. [and here he goes after the Gnostics] they put fetters upon themselves, and every one of them imagines, by means of their obscure interpretation of the parables, that he has found out a god of his own.”

In contrast,

“A sound mind, and one which does not expose its possessor to danger, and is devoted to piety and the love of the truth, will eagerly meditate upon those things which God has placed within the power of mankind … and will make advancement in them, rendering the knowledge of them easy to him by means of daily study.”

That’s a mouthful, but he’s essentially saying disciples of the kingdom value God’s Word (Old Testament and New Testament) over their own thoughts, their own feelings, their own experiences.

Then he ends with that statement, “by means of daily study,” which leads to the second big point:

2. practice.

When we give thanks for what we know, we don’t stop there. We thirst for more. That’s what Jesus is getting at when he says,

“Therefore, every scribe [I think he’s referring to all of us] who has been trained for the kingdom…” (Matthew 13:52).

Kingdom training is both miraculous and rigorous. It’s miraculous because it’s given by God, like verse 11 said earlier in the chapter:

“to you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 13:11).

To you. But it’s rigorous because those who know are trained. This is the same word that’s used in the Great Commission:

“And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and [There it is, “train”] make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:18-20).

Mike Cosper explains what this looks like.

“The kingdom exists as a world-within-a-world. It’s just out of view of ordinary life, accessible not by will or power but by God’s grace. The Spirit reveals it to us, and once we see it, we’re invited to be one of the crazy ones who give all they have in hopes of living in that hidden world” (Recapturing the Wonder, 143).

One of the crazy ones who will sell everything to buy the treasure in the field.

What does he mean by “hidden?” Look at Colossians 3:3,

“For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”

In other words, you’re not going to know who you really are unless you know who you are in Him. That’s how we know who we really are. Of course, we might ask, “How do we live in a kingdom which remains hidden?” Cosper goes on:

“Seeing the kingdom isn’t enough; we must come to know it in the same way that an athlete comes to know her sport or an artist learns to paint or dance or sculpt. We don’t merely need information. We need to cultivate a way of life that orients us toward that other world” (Recapturing the Wonder, 144).

Training means we’re finding a new way to be in an old world. Again, it’s both miraculous and rigorous. It’s miraculous because God is transforming us through daily/weekly rhythms of life, even when we may not be aware. That’s what Paul is getting at in Romans 8:28,

“We know that for those who love God, all things work together for good.”

What is he talking about there? Just so we’ll live a comfortable life? No, so that all things will work to transform us into his image. That’s miraculous, but it’s also rigorous in that followers of Jesus intentionally place themselves under the Spirit’s training. It’s what we’re doing right now. There are a million things you could be doing right now. Why are we in God’s Word? Why are we listening to his Spirit? Why are we lifting our voices to his name? He is training us to live as citizens in an old world in a new way.

It’s what we’re doing through ministries like Re:Gen or Re|Engage or life groups. The elders are really burdened to help us more, so we’ve been working on a series of workshops regarding Christian disciplines to help us find healthy rhythms of life so that we have these life-giving practices as we follow Jesus together.

Lord willing, we will begin these as soon as we get some ministry space. Building B is now being renovated to provide a lot of ministry space, so, Lord willing, by the beginning of the new year, those workshops will begin. All of these are done in light of Jesus’s call to train disciples of the kingdom.

So disciples of the kingdom value what they understand, they practice what they understand, and then third—and I think this is the main thing he’s getting at in this parable—

3. share.

“And he said to them, ‘Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like a master of a house, who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old” (Matthew 13:52).

So he’s bringing it out. He’s not hiding and hoarding, he’s showing and sharing. I have so many illustrations I want to share, and I’m going to limit it to one (you should be proud of me), but it’s a big one.

A couple of weeks ago, I read an article by Trevin Wax entitled, “Is There a Future for Church Grandpas and Grandmas?” In the article, he’s lamenting what he calls a double literacy loss. The latest data shows young people scrolling more, reading less (that kind of literacy loss). But then also an inability to give sustained attention to God’s Word.

The reason he’s calling it a double literacy loss is not just for the way it affects young people today, but the fact that what he calls “church grandmas and grandpas in the future” are going to disappear. You say, well, what do you mean by that? He has something very specific in mind. To illustrate that, he talks about his own family.

I want to warn you, most of us don’t have families like this. I know for our family, I was the first one (along with my sister) to come to know Jesus. My parents got saved later. We can’t look at generations ahead of us who knew Jesus in this way. But I love learning of stories like this. In the first service, I got to meet a family in our church who’s related to this family, and they affirmed everything Trevin said. So I’ll let him explain.

“This is my heritage. I was blessed to know four of my great-grandparents personally, and my grandparents have also been committed to the Scriptures.

“My great-Grandma Ollie’s education didn’t go beyond the eighth grade, but she knew her Bible and could recite portions by heart.

“My great-grandpa Champ lived for most of his life in rural Tennessee. Whenever I’d stop by to see him when he was in his 90s he’d quote scripture or reflect on a sermon he had recently listened to on a cassette tape.”

Do you know what those are?

“My grandparents, too, have been rooted deeply in the Word. My Grandpa Wax devoted years of his life to printing Bibles for distribution all over the world.

“My Grandpa Bill taught a Sunday school class for middle school boys, and nearly every time I visited his home, he’d ask about something he had read that morning, (‘Trevin, what do you think Paul means when he says ‘All the promises of God are “Yes” in Christ Jesus?’). Inevitably, he’d choke up and hold back tears as he reflected on God’s grace.”

Now pause here for a second. Do you see a picture of what Jesus is talking about, bringing out these treasures, old and new? Keep going.

“My grandmothers, both still living, begin each day in Scriptures.

“Likewise, my parents study and savor the Scripture …. My dad is constantly memorizing Psalms. My mom has stepped fully into her role as a church grandma by setting the remarkable goal of reading through the entire Bible each year for the next fourteen years and writing down comments, prayers, and counsel in the margins of note-taking Bibles she’ll pass down to each of her grandchildren. (Two of our kids have already received their ‘Grandma Bibles’ and they are treasures to behold.)”

Bringing out treasures.

“The beautiful truth about church grandparents is that anyone can become a super-reader of the Bible. You don’t need a degree.”

\Now Trevin Wax has a PhD. He’s brilliant. But he’s emphasizing this isn’t a secret club.

“My grandparents weren’t part of the ‘knowledge’ class. Some went to college; others didn’t. Some read widely; others were content with Reader’s Digest or the latest from John Grisham. I probably won’t be discussing Dostoevsky’s The Idiot or Kierkegaard’s Existentialism with my grandmothers anytime soon. But we sure can talk about the Gospels. They know the stories of Jesus backward and forward. They’ve immersed themselves in the Psalms. They explore the Epistles as regularly and perhaps more reverently than most New Testament scholars. The Bible is life to them.

“Church grandpas and grandmas don’t emerge overnight. They don’t start their daily Bible reading habit after retirement. Their spiritual heritage is built over decades — slowly, patiently, meditatively, listening attentively as the Lord speaks through his Word.”

Let me apply this to a couple of groups. First, everyone. Do you see the difference between these grandparents and Cornelius Vanderbilt? “There’s enough for you all.” My job is to make money and pass it down. Is there anything bad about making money and passing it down? No, it’s important to provide for our family. But is that your life? Is that what you want to talk about in your final moments? Jesus is saying, “Bring out the treasure.” What’s the treasure?

Let me say a word to grandparents. If you’re in a season of life where you have a lot of free time, there’s a real danger with 24/7 news. A study was done a couple of years ago that said the angriest people in America are young progressives and old conservatives. Isn’t that interesting? Take in more good news than cable news, or you won’t really have anything to pass on. I’m not saying don’t keep up with what’s going on, I’m not saying to put your head in the sand, but know what is your treasure and bring it out.

Young people, let me say a word. You don’t choose to be what Trevin Wax is defining as a church grandma or grandpa when you get to be 80. The time to choose — You can change if you’re 80 and you’re just coming to know Jesus, praise God. My grandfather got saved in his 80s. Praise God.

But can you imagine the impact if we have little kids in elementary school and teenagers in high school who said, “If Jesus doesn’t return and I live long enough, that’s going to be me. I’m going to spend my life — Yeah, I need a job. Yeah, I’m going to need to work, going to have to mow the lawn. But my passion, my treasure is to feast on God’s promises and be ready to share them with anybody who will listen.” We are blessed with a lot of young people like that. And that produces generations to come of church grandmas and grandpas who keep passing on the promises, old and new. Let’s pray.

Jesus, thank you for telling this very simple story. Spirit of God, please bring this home to our hearts so that we would be like that homeowner who loves to share what you enable us to understand— even if we can’t understand everything — to start right where we are and share what we do understand, give thanks for what we do understand. Thank you for speaking to us this morning. We pray in Jesus’s name, amen.