Matthew 13 and verse 44, and
this is the parable, just two short parables that the Lord
gave to his disciples. One about some hidden treasure
and one about a pearl of great value. Verse 44 of Matthew 13
says, again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a treasure or treasure
hidden in a field. The witch, when a man hath found,
he hideth, and for joy thereof goeth and selleth all that he
hath, and buyeth that few. And then the next verse tells
us another parable again. The kingdom of heaven is like
unto a merchant man seeking goodly pearls, who, when he had found
one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had, and
bought it. May the Lord bless these readings
to us. I think boys and girls, younger
people here and the older people who seem to like listening to
these parables just as much as anyone, that here we have another
example of a couple of parables that the Lord has given us connected
together. And he uses these pictures, these
stories, these earthly stories, commonplace stories, stories
that would engage and interest the attention of the people that
he was speaking to in order to give us a spiritual and a heavenly
meaning to them. And that is not to say that every
little aspect of every parable has to have a direct meaning. It's a thrust, it's a message
that we are finding in these parables. The Lord is telling
us something about the kingdom of heaven. That's what he likens
it to. He says, the kingdom of heaven
is like this. Now the kingdom of heaven is
used in scripture to speak about the church or the experiences
of the church. We're talking here about the
people of God. And when the Lord says the kingdom
of heaven is like this, he's saying that here we can see how
the church is affected by things that happen. And the people of
God and the individual members of the church are affected by
the ways of God. This speaks about the gathered
people of God in this world. And the pictures that we're given
today are pictures about things being found. And I guess we all
have a memory. of finding something, maybe it
was something that was lost and we hunt for it and we hunt for
it like a set of keys and it takes us a long time and we're
getting anxious and we're running out of time and everything and
then we find them and how relieved we are to find those keys to
get on with the job in hand. Or sometimes it might be something
valuable that we find and we think to ourself, how good, how
fortunate, maybe how lucky I am that I have found this thing,
something of value that we've come across, that we've discovered. And that's what we find here
in this narrative. And true it is that in the world,
whether we're younger or whether we're older, we know that there
are many people in the world who are searching for something. And sometimes people know what
it is that they're searching for, they're very ambitious,
they've got hopes of what they hope to achieve or what they
hope to accomplish or what they hope to do. And sometimes people
don't quite know what it is that they're looking for, but they
just have this kind of good hope that something good will happen
to them and that they'll discover and find something which helps
them. And all over the world, people
are really very much the same. They have the same kind of desires,
the same kind of ambitions, the same kind of hope for good for
themselves and for their families and for their loved ones. And
I think that if we spend time with people, we will soon get
to see that there is this common urge for peace and for joy and
for happiness and for contentment. And sometimes you hear it said
that people are looking for success or people are looking for happiness
and people are looking for this contentment and peace in their
life. To some extent, some people find
that. And for others, it's a very elusive
thing, and they don't really ever find what they're looking
for. But the Lord Jesus Christ is
here telling his church, his people, that they have a search
for something that is very valuable. And it's like treasure that is
hidden in a field. And that which they seek, that
which they are looking for, is actually the Lord Himself. The church seeks after Christ. The church is looking for Christ. And whether we realise it or
not, in so many words, that is what the church, in God's purpose,
in God's plan, will discover, will find, and will find to be
the source of our happiness. And we find the Lord Jesus Christ
in the gospel. Now maybe this doesn't seem a
lot like walking out in a field right now, and probably with
the temperatures out there, that's a good thing. But in a sense,
that's the picture that the Lord has given us. That when we come
to church, when we come to hear the gospel, when we come to read
the word of God, when we come to share together in fellowship,
we're looking for something. We get up this morning from our
beds, we have our breakfast and we are thinking to ourselves,
I'm going to church to look for Christ. I'm going to church to
see if I can find Christ, to see if Christ will find me, to
see if I can discover something that will be a help and a blessing
to me. The point that the Lord is making
is that once we discover the Lord Jesus Christ, He puts everything
else into perspective. For once we have Him, we realise
that we have discovered the most important thing in life. And
everything else in life, though it once seemed very important
to us, takes a back seat, becomes less important than the knowledge
of Jesus Christ in our lives. And that's the parable about
the man who found the treasure in the field. And there's another
side to that as well, because there's a parable of a pearl
of great price. And in that sense, I think that
it's as if the Lord is zooming in on a particular aspect of
this theme, this message. I don't know whether any of us
have got these phones or these tablets. You know when you get
a photograph from someone and you're looking at it on your
phone and then you take your two fingers and you flick it
on the screen? And if it's a good resolution
picture, you know what happens? you can zoom right in. We like
to do that because we like to see the expression on the faces
of the children when our daughter sends us photographs and we flick
it on the screen and it zooms right in. And I think that's
what the Lord is doing with this parable here. It's as if he's
flicked it to open it up and allow us to see something in
greater detail. And it's a picture of a merchant,
a merchant who is seeking fine pearls. He's looking for things
that are wholesome, things that are valuable, things that are
desirable, commendable things like peace and prosperity, wisdom
and knowledge, honour and love, the high virtues of life. Things that will do us good. And there are many important
things in our lives. Many things that are useful to
us. Like our friends and friendship.
Like our education and school. Like our health and well-being.
These are all important things. And like a good merchant, we
should be looking for these things. These are like goodly perils
in our life's experience. But then we discover something
which is a peril of greatest price. And that again is showing
us this picture of the excellence of the Lord Jesus, the superiority
of the Lord Jesus Christ. There will be things that will
take our time and attention in this life. But when we discover
that pearl of greatest price, the highest, the best, the most
excellent saviour, Jesus Christ, that one who is the saviour of
our souls, it will change our life forever. It will change
our perspective forever. And the things that we once thought
were the most important things in life, we will see are not
as important as we once thought. The Lord Jesus Christ will become
that one whom our soul lovest, the chief amongst 10,000 to our
soul, and all the other attractions of this life will pale. What's
the lesson for us here? It's simply this. the excellence
of Christ, the superiority of knowing Christ, of having Christ
as a friend, of possessing a knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ in our
heart and in our soul. Christ the first, Christ the
last, Christ the beginning and the end, Christ to be our all
in all. And of all the attractive and
desirable and outwardly profitable things that we will be engaged
in, in this life, in this world, the true child of God discovers
union with Christ to be the highest and the first. They discover
that he is the pearl of great price. I hope that as we think
about these things, as we come together to hear the gospel,
to seek after the things of Christ, that we will discover him to
be that pearl of great price, the lover of our soul and the
one upon whom our affections rest and remain. Amen.