Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Matthew 6:21 NIV
It happened again this week. I was meeting with two beautiful young people for pre-marital counseling. They are going to get engaged soon and wanted to get a head start on it. Good thing. I wish everyone did. We were talking about the various needs men and women have, and we had just started on financial stability. They already live together, and I asked them if they combined finances or kept them separate. They looked stunned for a moment, and then said almost instantly, “Separate! We will never combine!”
We talked about it for a few minutes, as they explained to me that his obsession with fixing classic cars was extremely expensive, and he would never let her know how much he spent on that. Her obsession was collections and coffee. She drank Starbucks at least five times weekly, collected their specialty cups and Stanley cups as well. She felt rather good about it because she figured she made more than he did, and the car parts were much more expensive, so it was no big deal. I asked, “Really? No big deal? Have you never had a fight about it?”
Again they exchanged glances and wry smiles. Then she said slowly, “Actually, we just had another fight about it this week.”
We sat in the silence for a moment. Then I just said, “Yep.”
After a minute he said, “Yep, what?”
I responded with no smile, “Yep, this is what you’ll probably get divorced over in four years.” (Did I mention that unless you want straight talk, don’t come to me for counseling?)
You can imagine that led to the rest of our time together. They were ready to truly talk and do some homework. They invited me to have several sessions on money with them because they think realistically it’s going to take a little while. It gave me an awesome opportunity to talk about the roots of their problems too. They had already told me about details of their living arrangements, and I let this question hang in the air for a moment, “Doesn’t it strike you as a little out of balance that you trust each other with your bodies and future but not your money?” Ouch. He reached out and took her hand as they stared solemnly at each other. I shared Jesus’ words that “where your treasure is, that’s where your heart really is.” Jesus said there’s no better illustration of where our heart TRULY is than where our resources go. It’s never truer than in our relationship with Him.
- Have an honest conversation with Jesus. In your relationship with Him, what does this look like. What is the location of your treasure saying to Him?