Receiving a Stone (part one)

Jesus moves on to talk about storing up treasures in heaven. There is a way to make “life investments” in such a way that they have an eternal ring to them. So much of what we do doesn’t live on beyond this world of moth and rust, but Jesus is here to tell us how we can make these heavenly investments.

Unfortunately, Jesus starts speaking cryptically about good eyes, bad eyes, light, and darkness.

This isn’t a teaching about seeing the optometrist. In fact, there is great documentation about this Hebrew teaching idiom and the “good eye.” One of the most understandable ways to approach this teaching (along with many others) is in Walking in the Dust of Rabbi Jesus by Lois Tverberg. When a Jewish teacher references the “good eye,” it is a figure of speech about generosity. Having a good eye means that you are generous; having a bad eye means that one is stingy.

In a teaching that would have made a good Herodian wince, Jesus affirms you cannot serve God and money; such an effort is impossible and results in idolatry. In fact, the only way to make heavenly investments is to see through a good eye — through God’s eyes — and to be generous. Generosity is how a person lays up for themselves treasures in heaven.

Which raises a question: What keeps us from being generous? Isn’t it worry? We’re worried that if we’re generous with our resources — our time, our money — there won’t be enough for us. It’s interesting that Jesus’s very next teaching point will be a point about worry. Worry will cripple our ability to be generous. Worry will stifle our desire to lay up treasures in heaven.

Worry gives us bad eyes.

Instead, Jesus invites us to trust. He invites us to trust that God has our best interests in mind — to trust that God knows what we need and will give us everything just at the right time. He invites us to live by every word. There’s no sense in worrying about clothes; God does a great job clothing the earth. There’s no sense in worrying about the things we need to consume; God feeds the birds of the air without any effort. Jesus invites us to trust the story. You see, it’s just what we said over a year ago: trusting the story sets us free to be generous.

Trust gives us good eyes.

Jesus then moves on to talk about judgment:

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.

“Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces.”

More talk about eyes. More cryptic teachings. This time, Jesus seems to be losing his mind over pearls, pigs, and dogs. What is he talking about?

It’s important to know that in Jesus’s day, the Pagan nations were often referred to as dogs. This wasn’t as derogatory as it sounds; it was more like a figure of speech. Jesus even uses this language in a later story when he tells a Gentile woman, “It’s not good to take the bread from the children and throw it to the dogs.” It is a direct reference to Jesus’s ministry to the Jewish people and this request from a Gentile woman (more on that later). I would suggest that a reference to pigs would communicate the same assumptions. One of the largest exports of the Decapolis region (the land of the Pagans), outside of grain, was pigs. Dogs and pigs are two images that would have made Jesus’s Jewish hearers think of the Pagans.

Knowing this brings context to the teaching. A pearl is often used to discuss rabbinic teachings (Tverberg, in her other book, will also talk about how Jews would speak of “stringing pearls”). Jesus is saying that people who claim to speak for God cannot take and throw their morality before people who have not agreed to follow it. This may seem like a no-brainer, but I’m telling you, we religious people do this all the time. We love to speak about our views of righteousness and morality, good and bad, light and darkness, right and wrong — and we expect the world to listen to us. Why would they? Have they agreed to God’s Word as His measuring stick for their own lives? Again, this statement is not meant to carry a derogatory tone, but you cannot throw your teachings before swine and expect them to enjoy it. Quite the opposite — the swine might actually respond with hostility.

This Jesus guy is pretty smart.

Nevertheless, I probably should have made this teaching a separate post. I mean, none of this business about judging has to do with treasures in heaven, generosity, and worry, right?

Of course, there’s that business about the “eyes”… good, bad… planks, specks…

But these are different teachings.
        …right?