Last Updated on June 26, 2018 by OCF Communications
“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:19-21).
I‘ve been re-reading a book called The Treasure Principle by Randy Alcorn. I’ve always known that you can’t take your treasures with you when you die.
But he goes a step further, by telling us that we can send our treasures on ahead.
In his book, Randy Alcorn tells about a trip he took to Cairo, Egypt. He went down a street littered with garbage, turned into a back alley, and came upon an unkempt graveyard for American missionaries.
There he saw a tombstone that read, “William Borden, 1887-1913.” An heir to the Borden Dairy estate, Borden gave away hundreds of thousands of dollars to missions.
While enroute to China to serve as a missionary himself, he stopped in Egypt to study Arabic. There he contracted spinal meningitis and died one month later at the age of twenty-five.
The epitaph on his tombstone ends with the phrase, “Apart from faith in Christ, there is no explanation for such a life.”
Mr. Alcorn then went straight from Borden’s grave to the Egyptian National Museum to see the King Tut exhibit. King Tutankhamen lived a life of unbelievable wealth and luxury.
Dying at the age of seventeen, he was buried in a golden coffin. He was also surrounded with tons of golden items which were intended to assist him in the afterlife. But these items lay untouched for three thousand years until Howard Carter discovered the burial chamber in 1922.
The differences are incredible. One lived a life of luxury and was buried surrounded with tons of gold.
Yet he could not take the tons of gold with him and will suffer an eternity without Christ. The other gave up a life of luxury and was buried down a back alley. He also could not take anything with him.
But instead of leaving his treasures behind, he sent them on ahead. Borden invested in eternity and ended up with untold riches in Heaven in the presence of our Lord. In his Bible, he had written the words “No Reserves, No Retreats, No Regrets.”
Where are you invested? Is it all in the here and now, or are you also investing in eternity? Remember, you can’t take it with you. But you can send it on ahead.
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