Hi

The other day my youngest son and I were searching through his bedroom cupboards when right at the bottom of one of them underneath a sea of Leggo and rubber dinosaurs we found an old metal detector. Looking in glee at each other my son and I grabbed the metal detector, replaced the batteries and headed for the garden. We soon had the metal detector working and to our excitement got our first bleep bleep in the middle of the lawn. Grabbing a trowel I cut a neat hole, and gently lifted a small circle of turf out and dug down to discover a 1988 50 pence piece. Encouraged by our find we cleverly divided the garden lawn into a grid, (I had recently seen this method on a archaeology program) and like a pair of true professionals got another then another contact. After a short time we soon had a booty bag full of treasure including an old pair of pliers that I had previously lent to one of the older kids, a backed bean tin and a ring pull.

It was at this point that the phone rang, so leaving my son with the metal detector I went inside confident that he now knew what he was doing.

The phone call turned out to be quite lengthy, so 20 minutes later I put the phone down only to bump into my wife coming in from work. “What you been up to she asked cheerily”? “Let me show you I said”. Leading the way to the rear garden and proudly thinking that my son must have found some really impressive stuff by now.

It was as I got to the back door closely followed by my wife that I got one of those odd feelings that usually precede a surprise that is just about to jump into ones life, and sure enough when my wife and I surveyed our rear lawn we got a surprise. Because as opposed to a nicely tailored lawn our rear garden now looked like the far side of the moon, and gave the impression that it had suffered some kind of ferocious attack by moles with explosives, and standing right in the middle of this mayhem caked in mud was our son brandishing a full sized shovel and metal detector, saying “Guess what I’ve found”?

For a moment there was a silence then I can remember expressing my feelings toward my son in a less than gentle way. The remainder of the day was dedicated to fitting the turf to the hole, getting the right level and then jumping up and down on it.

It was during the jumping up and down that this line popped into my head.

For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. (Luke 12:34)

I glanced over at my son and began to think on this some more, and began jumping up and down even more vigorously on a particularly large clump of stubborn turf that wouldn’t fit in the hole.

Then this question came with a gentle grace that could only be the Holy Spirit,

“what exactly is your treasure then”? Stopping for a second to get my breath I pondered on this, knowing that I probably wouldn’t like the answer.

Was my treasure and therefore my heart buried with the stuff in the garden? Jesus said do not lay up treasures on earth for yourselves, where moth and rust corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal. (Matthew 6:19)

Was my treasure in the beauty of my ex lawn and garden, I certainly felt more than a bit upset at its demise, so it obviously meant quite a lot to me.

Or was my treasure buried in my pride at appearing blameless in front of my wife for what had just happened?

Looking over at my young son, I saw clean tracks down his cheeks where tears had washed away the dirt and remembered how Jesus had rebuked all those who thought they were wise and religious(even his own disciples) and said “let the little children come to me”.

I walked over to my son and we hugged for a long time, for me because I remembered where my treasure was hidden and for him because he knew that he was loved and precious and was one of the treasures buried in my heart.

Silly old dad!

Love Pastor Rob