TREASURES IN HEAVEN

(Guest post by: Abby Fisher) Blogmas Day Fourteen 2024

Gliding, just a bit, on a glittering surface of ice.

Smiling wildly over a text from a friend.

Deep, stark shadows thrown around the room by the light of a candle.

The little shop across the street with Christmas lights flickering in the window on a dreary day.

Flames rising and falling against the glass of the fireplace doors as my body warms.

Middle-aged women sitting around a table, talking with smiles in their voices of how their parents’ lives shaped out.

Sitting with two young girls and watching our circle grow, pulling others off their screens until we fill the space. 

These are the gifts I have been given this week, and it certainly is only a fraction.

But you see, I haven’t always counted these moments as gifts. I haven’t always seen them as gifts. So often, I find myself on autopilot, just trying to make it through the day. I wonder if this stuffy nose of mine will ever clear up or how long the arguing will last this time. I walk into work only worried about getting things done, or I stare at a screen for hours on end. All it does is drain me.

Then, at some point, I can no longer ignore the little hope inside me for something more. I can’t ignore my heartbeat telling me to live and live fully. I turn to the Word. 

“Don’t be afraid, little flock, because your Father delights to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Make money bags for yourselves that won’t grow old, an inexhaustible treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Luke 12:32-34).

Of course, I can take these verses at face value, and see it the way I always have: be generous regardless of circumstances. Afterall, it is Christmas, the time for giving. But do you want to know what He showed me this time? I don’t just see a command (though an important one). I see a Father who delights to give good gifts to His children. Can’t you just feel the smile on His face He’s trying to hide as He bestows on us so much more than we deserve? And if God delights this much in giving, it isn’t any wonder joy abounds when we truly receive all He has given us as good gifts, even the hard things.

These gifts aren’t like the ones wrapped in paper and tied with ribbon that don’t last, either. We’re storing up treasures, gifts, in Heaven for all eternity. The enemy cannot take what treasures we have placed in Heaven with our praise. Those treasures of mine often look like people and moments; that’s what we can take with us to Heaven.

Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Heaven is where I want my heart, tethered to the Father’s. I want to slow down and take in every small gift. When I do so, I find that I am fully living the life Jesus came down to give us because his very presence is found there. 

Forget not this Christmas, Christ has given us the greatest gift: Himself. Jesus’ very presence is the joy coursing through each gift I’ve named above. All I had to spend was time with Him, and isn’t that what Advent boils down to? Spending time with Jesus, knowing His heart so we know His coming in the millions of little ways, even the way of a baby in a manger.