We arrange our lives around what we value. And when our arrangement and our values get out of sync, we eventually have to rearrange.
I have a friend who’s been married for fifteen years, and you can tell from a mile away how much he treasures his wife. But there was a long stretch where his calendar was completely out of alignment with what he claimed to value. Life was hectic, he was busy, and he and his wife began to drift, relationally, emotionally, and sexually. So he had to rearrange his calendar to reflect what really mattered.
So let me ask you the same: does the way your life is arranged actually reflect what you value most?
That’s a great question. But it’s a secondary question. The first question is: What do you value most?
People are complicated. It’s hard to peel back all the layers of motivation and isolate the heart’s deepest desire. But I want to suggest that figuring out what you really value is much simpler than you might think. You don’t need a year of therapy or a weekend in the woods. Instead, let’s talk about your relationship with money.
So here’s a controversial thesis. Not controversial because I might be wrong. Controversial because you’re going to wish I was wrong. (How do I know? Because I wish I were wrong too.)
How you arrange your money is the most reliable indicator of what matters most to you.
Pastor Sam Storms told a story about his father, a banker for thirty-five years, who used to say, “Give me five minutes in a man’s chequebook, and I’ll tell you everything you need to know about him. I’ll tell you whether he loves God, his wife, and his children. I’ll tell you whether he really believes the Bible. I’ll tell you what he values and what he hates.”
Of course, money isn’t the only indicator of what’s happening in your heart. Your calendar reveals what matters. Your thoughts say a lot about what’s going on internally. Your search history is doing some pretty honest reporting, too. But there are two reasons I’m hung up on the money thing.
First, because you are. Most of us don’t go to work because it’s fun. You have bills. We don’t live where we live because it’s our dream house in our dream neighbourhood; money decided that. We dress how we dress because that’s what fit on the clearance rack. Money decides what car we drive, what kind of retirement we’ll have, how we spend Saturday nights. Like it or not, money shapes our choices, and our choices shape our lives. If I showed you my bank statement, you’d see how little I care about beauty products. But you’d also see how much I spend on coffee. Oof.
Second, and this is the real reason, because Jesus said so. “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:21). And don’t read treasure as a euphemism for time or talent. Jesus is talking about money. If you want to see how passionate someone really is about something, find a young man with money on the line in the final seconds of a football game. Where your treasure is, your heart is.
Jesus said:
“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also… No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.” (Matthew 6:19–21, 24)
Where are you storing up treasure? In other words, how have you arranged your wealth?
Notice that Jesus isn’t focused on how much you have. That matters because when we talk about money, the dominant emotion that rises up tends to be guilt. If you’re poor, you can feel guilty because you don’t think you have anything meaningful to offer. If you’re rich, you can feel guilty because you know you could give more than you do. And if you’re somewhere in the middle, you can feel guilty because you want to be generous and don’t know how. Everyone, at every income level, feels some version of, I’m not doing enough.
Two passages cut through that. First, Mark 12. Jesus is sitting across from the temple treasury watching people drop in their offerings. The rich are throwing in large amounts. A poor widow drops in two small copper coins, a few cents. Jesus pulls His disciples close and says, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything, all she had to live on” (Mark 12:43–44). Jesus honours not the amount but the heart behind it. Tiny gifts given in faith can move mountains. Your poverty doesn’t disqualify you from generosity, dignity, or Kingdom impact.
Second, 2 Corinthians 9. “Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Corinthians 9:6–7).
A farmer who scatters more seed gets more crop than a farmer who scatters less, regardless of mood. The seed does what the seed does. But when it comes to giving to God, the attitude matters. God can bless a gift given out of duty, but the giver isn’t blessed. Wives, would you rather get flowers from a husband who can’t quite figure out how to express how much he loves you, or flowers with a card that reads, “I didn’t really want to do this, but I know I’m supposed to”? God can bless a “have to” gift. He blesses both the gift and the giver when the gift is “want to.”
God wants to bless you. What a tragedy it would be to be rich on earth and poor in heaven. The way you end up that way is by neglecting to store up your treasures in the right place. The Bible speaks of rewards in heaven: greater responsibility, greater honour, greater joy. Faith in Christ grants entry into the Kingdom; faithfulness to Christ shapes our experience within it.
Right now, there’s something economists call the Great Wealth Transfer, the largest generational wealth shift in history, from baby boomers to their kids and grandkids. But there’s a bigger transfer going on. Every act of generosity, every unseen sacrifice, every dollar given in worship, every gift no one applauded: all of it is being stored up in heaven. When we stand before Jesus, the distribution will shock us. Many that were last here will be first there. Don’t store up regrets in heaven. Store up treasure.
What does it actually mean to “store up treasures in heaven”? It means spending your money in a way that brings glory to God. And what brings God glory? God is most glorified when we treasure Him above all else. When Jesus is so clearly our greatest treasure that every other treasure looks like pocket change, God gets the most glory.
Augustine called this ordered loves. Sin isn’t only loving bad things. It’s loving good things more than you love Christ. David put it this way: “Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you” (Psalm 73:25). Paul said, “I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” (Philippians 3:8). Jesus said, “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field” (Matthew 13:44).
My prayer is that your greatest treasure would be Jesus, and that you would leverage what is so valuable to you (your money) for what is most precious to you (Him).
What does that look like? Investing in Bible colleges that train the next generation of pastors. Backing boots-on-the-ground ministries: youth ministries, recovery homes, pregnancy care centers, and ministries to newcomers. Supporting global workers and missionaries who plant churches where Jesus’ name has never been heard, who translate the Bible into new languages, and who raise their families in hardship so others can hear the gospel. And it looks like fuelling your local church. The church is the primary way God’s work advances in the world. Every time you give to it, you’re funding one more child hearing that God loves them, one more teenager giving their life to Jesus, one more marriage on life support catching breath, one more grieving family experiencing the comfort of the Spirit, one more person stepping into the baptismal tank to declare they have been raised to life again.
So practically, how do we store up treasures in heaven? You may have to rearrange a few things.
I’m going to say something so simple you’ll be tempted to dismiss it. Don’t. Your spiritual life isn’t a vibe. It isn’t New Age “energy.” It’s built on real, physical decisions that honour Jesus. He never separated the spiritual from the spectacularly ordinary. Feeding five thousand people started with a boy handing over a lunch.
Most of us arrange our money like this: spend, save, give. We spend first. If anything’s left, we save. If anything’s still left, we give.
The Bible flips that order: give first, save second, spend last.
We give first because God always gets our first, not our last. “Honour the LORD with your wealth, with the firstfruits of all your crops; then your barns will be filled to overflowing” (Proverbs 3:9–10). Firstfruits meant giving to God while the harvest was still in the field, before you knew if there would be enough left for you. This isn’t a “give $100, get $1,000 back” promise. It’s a much deeper one: when you put Me first, I’ll take care of you. Right after Jesus told us that where our treasure is, there our heart will be, He went on to say, “But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” (Matthew 6:33).
We save second because saving isn't hoarding; it's ordering your life wisely. “The wise store up choice food and olive oil, but fools gulp theirs down” (Proverbs 21:20). Saving prepares us for seasons we can’t yet see, so we can keep giving freely. It supports generosity; it doesn’t compete with it.
We spend third. Here’s my best pastoral wisdom on spending: have fun. Enjoy life with the people you love. “When God gives someone wealth and possessions, and the ability to enjoy them, to accept their lot and be happy in their toil, this is a gift of God” (Ecclesiastes 5:19). Enjoy good food. Enjoy His beautiful world. Enjoy German-engineered automobiles. The one flashing-red caveat: stay clear of debt. Debt does not glorify the Lord. If you’ve already accumulated some, take care of it with laser focus and guard against it creeping back.
A starting framework for some, a long-term goal for others: 10% giving, 20% saving, 70% to live on. The Bible doesn’t give us exact numbers, so adjust it in a way that you’re convinced in your heart honours God.
But this much is sure: to honour Him with your money, you need a budget. I know, you came to church and got a financial seminar. But a budget isn’t just a spreadsheet. A budget is a theological document. It arranges your life around what you value most.
If you don’t have one, make one this week. If you do have one, does it reflect what you value most?
Because where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.