Back in the fifth parable of Matthew 13, Jesus likens the Kingdom to a “treasure hidden in a field”. As stated in a previous post, I believe this “treasure” speaks of our Kingdom CALLING which is “hidden” from us until God has done His work of preparation – to give us a burden for the “field”, not just ambition for the “treasure”.
Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant seeking goodly pearls: Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had, and bought it. (Mat 13:45-46)
Here, in the sixth parable, the Lord uses the example of a “merchant seeking” pearls to describe the Kingdom. Unlike the fifth parable, where the “field” is what the “man” (Kingdom citizen) sells everything for, here the “merchant” (Kingdom citizen) “went and sold all he had” to buy the one pearl.
What does the “one pearl” refer to? Love. Love is the “one pearl of great price” we are to sell everything else to obtain. Having a burden for the world (“field”) is one thing, being able to express God’s love in the trenches of ministry, with the daily attacks of the enemy on every side, is quite another.
As in the sixth day of creation, this sixth Kingdom parable signifies that the strains of true ministry will always draw out of us the “beasts and creeping things” resident in our hearts and keeping us from releasing genuine love. But this exposure is necessary to produce in us the finished product, a “man in the image of God”, the “pearl of great price”.
For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ: (Eph 4:12-13)
No comments:
Post a Comment