BY RONALD E. DORSEY, JR.

ATTHEW 6:19-24 is familiar to many Christians.* Its popularity comes mainly from the fact that it addresses one of the most polarizing issues in humanity--the rich versus the poor. Since the genuinely rich make up a pittance of the total population, most of the readers of this text use it as vindication of the virtues of poverty. In fact, many individuals may derive subconscious satisfaction from reading this passage because it seems to devalue the position of the wealthy while simultaneously catapulting the poor to a superior status in a way that can usually only be dreamed.

In a sense this passage may be more about dealing with the resentment some poor people have toward the wealthy than it is about actual wealth. After all, you don't have to possess treasure in order for your heart to dwell on it. As I read and thought, it occurred to me that, despite the differences, rich people and poor people are probably more alike than either would care to admit.

There are, of course, many obvious differences between rich and poor. In fact, people who are born rich have an entirely different mentality than the average person. For most of us, nearly every decision we make--what to eat for lunch, where to live, how to dress, and what to do with our free time--is made against the heavy, sometimes overbearing, backdrop of our financial constraints.

On the other hand, think for a moment about people such as Prince William and Prince Harry. These two lads, born to Prince Charles and Princess Diana, belong to the superrich class in which money truly is not even a consideration. If they want to go skiing in the mountains of Italy, it's done. A spontaneous surfing trip to San Diego, California, is no problem. If they want a new speedboat, sports car, or motorcycle just for kicks, all they need to do is let someone know when to take and deliver the order. Being born into this position can easily lead to feelings of self-reliance, arrogance, self-centeredness, dominance, and, ironically, stinginess.

While most of us are constrained by the sizes of our wallets, constantly bumping against the unseen perimeter that only a select few ever break through, people such as William and Harry have the world at their fingertips, and all doors open to them because they were born with what we call--with all the envy of a little child watching the big kids play basketball--a silver spoon in their mouths. We think that because we weren't born into the ranks of the superrich, that means that we were not born with silver spoons in our mouths. But were we?

The Next Generation
To me, Matthew 6:19-24 implies certain interrelated principles that can be specifically applied to what I call the next generation of believers. This includes those who were either born into the fellowship of Christians or, like me, brought in very early in life. There is the ostensible principle of valuing heavenly things over earthly, but there are others as well. Two of these are being dedicated to the service of God by separating our attitudes from those of the world, and focusing our lives on the cause of God through real commitment.

It's funny how this next generation of believers, to which I belong, is the exact opposite of the early Israelites. During the time of Moses the Israelites were delivered in a most miraculous way from their oppressors. Time after time God revealed His might on behalf of His chosen people. Yet we find in Numbers 14:2, 3 that when they were on the doorstep of the Promised Land, those who had been delivered lost faith because of their fear of the inhabitants. This fear and lack of faith caused the first generation to die in the wilderness, just short of their goal. God had to deliver the next generation into the Promised Land.

For us in modern times, it appears that those who were delivered from lives of darkness and bondage to sin have remained faithful, while we in the next generation lack the faith to be delivered--not so much because we fear the inhabitants, but more so because we want to be like them. I can imagine that if we were the ones in the Desert of Paran with Moses, the older generation would be eager to take the land, while the younger ones would want to assimilate into the Canaanite lifestyle and hope to be delivered that way.

We want to be like the inhabitants of the world because we have lost sight of the fact that it is we, not they, who are rich. We are the ones born with the silver spoons in our mouths. We may not have come from money. We might not have Ivy League educations and country club memberships, but what we have is a treasure most precious, because we were born into the light of truth. The keys to salvation are ours. The truth of the gospel has been entrusted to us. The reality of forgiveness is ours for the asking. But the silver spoon has become tarnished. We hold our treasure in contempt because they don't teach it in law school. The gospel isn't part of any MBA curriculum. The halls of academia ring hollow when it comes to the message of salvation.

We have dedicated all of our might and minds to building bigger barns--all to the neglect of the gospel. The sad part about it is that some of us have dedicated our lives to building bigger barns when we ourselves have just moved out of the outhouse. It is during the stage of life that begins sometime during our mid-20s and ends in our mid- to late 30s that most of us get ourselves firmly established financially. At the beginning of this stage we may still be financially depending on our parents on some level, if not completely. All of our education is usually completed, we've had a few years of experience in our chosen careers, and our first true promotions usually occur here. We are just starting to make ourselves comfortable in life. Many of us ruin these material blessings by always seeking more, by never being happy with the provisions God has made for us, and by constantly trying to build bigger barns. Our bank accounts prosper while our souls are constantly being downgraded.

It is at this point that many of you reading probably expect me to say something to the effect of God's not minding material things and wanting us to be prosperous. I firmly believe that most people, spiritually speaking, would be worse off if they were rich. It is probably even true that most people would be eternally lost if they were granted great riches. When Jesus said, in Matthew 19:24, that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God, He said it for a reason.

Have we gone the way of Balaam and Judas--used oftentimes by God for His kingdom but ultimately undone by our hypnosis at the hands of a world gone mad? Worse yet, have we come under that same hypnosis having never been used by God at all? We can get so caught up in chasing our dreams that, when it's all done, we've never truly caught hold of those dreams and we've somehow managed to lose our souls in the process. "The service of Satan is full of care, perplexity, and wearing labor, and the treasure men toil to accumulate on earth is only for a season" (Ellen G. White, Thoughts From the Mount of Blessing, p. 89).

What Timothy Saw
There are many biblical examples of next-generation believers. Timothy was a New Testament believer who provides an excellent example for us today. According to 2 Timothy 1:5 and 6, Timothy was a third-generation believer. He had his grandmother, mother, and the apostle Paul all praying for him, but Paul explicitly reminded Timothy that it was his own duty to "stir up the gift of God." Likewise, many of us contemporary, next-generation believers have many people praying for us while we steadfastly refuse to pray for ourselves. While the prayers of our parents, friends, pastors, and elders are good, and they are often directly responsible for letting us see Christ at some point, it becomes our own duty to fan into flame the spark that those prayers provide.

Timothy lived in Lystra. This was the city in which God healed the paralytic man through Paul. When the citizens of Lystra saw this miracle, they immediately wanted to bow down and worship Paul and Barnabas. The priest of Zeus brought wreaths and bulls to sacrifice to the two apostles as the people cheered, "The gods have come down to us in human form" (Acts 14:11, NIV). Interestingly, some Jewish leaders came in later and got those same people ready to stone Paul, which they in fact did, leaving him for dead. I can only imagine that those Jews must have been very persuasive in order to convince an entire city of people to kill someone they had very recently been ready to worship. Nevertheless, this was the spiritual confusion in which Timothy lived, yet his faith remained strong. So the question is, why was Timothy's faith so strong amid such confusion? Why was he not persuaded, along with the others, that Paul was a fake?

One compelling answer is found in 2 Timothy 3:10-15. Verse 14 indicates that one powerful motivation for Timothy to remain strong was his personal knowledge of the one who taught him. Timothy saw firsthand the sufferings that Paul endured for the cause of Christ. He understood the love that Paul had for the people and for the gospel that he preached. Paul was a living epistle to Timothy, and his actions demonstrated a sincerity that even the best of sermons could never replicate.

There will always be issues in our modern church that divide the generations. These issues will be argued endlessly by some very persuasive people on both sides of the issue. And like the citizens of Lystra, some people today will be captivated by the powerful arguments of skilled tongues and ultimately be deceived by vain philosophy. For my church, and I suspect for others as well, the issues have been movies, music, jewelry, clothing, etc. These issues have probably been divisive for as long as these items have been in existence, and they aren't likely to be settled until the Lord settles them by redeeming His chosen few. Sometimes people simply decide to leave the church altogether because of differences over these issues. Those of us in the next generation who are somewhat older have made our decisions regarding these matters. Some of us have stayed, and some have gone. Whatever our decision has been, we cannot deny that those who taught us the Scriptures--those in the first generation of believers--are serious about their Christian walk, they are faithful to what they believe, their beliefs are based on their understanding of the Scriptures and the prophets, and most important, their love for us in the next generation is genuine. As with Timothy, this proven and demonstrated love, along with the convicting power of the Holy Spirit, should bind us with a godly loyalty to the kingdom of Christ.

Just as we older members of the next generation have made our decisions, the younger members (those in middle school through high school) are on the brink of making their decisions themselves. They are not quite young enough to be our children and not quite old enough to be our peers. They are in a critical and extremely dangerous time in life, because they are now making decisions that will affect them for eternity. One wrong turn or bad decision now, and it may take them a long time to make it back to God--if they make it back at all.

The verses in 2 Timothy 3:10-15 are a challenge for us older members as we relate to the younger members. When they look at us, do they see the same perseverance, sincerity, and love that Timothy saw in Paul--and that we see in those who taught us? Or have we given them a distorted and unholy portrait of what a true Christian should be, thereby making the wrong decisions seem more appealing to them? If Paul were alive today, I'm sure he would say the same thing to us that he said to Timothy: "Continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it" (2 Tim. 3:14, NIV).

Using Our Silver Spoon
Just as being born with a silver spoon in one's mouth--in the secular sense--usually brings about characteristics such as self-reliance, arrogance, and dominance, being born with a spiritual silver spoon brings about certain characteristics as well. One of those characteristics, genuine concern for the welfare of others, was evident in Timothy. Paul wrote about it in Philippians 2:19-22.

Have you ever noticed how, generally speaking, the first generations of the superrich are very generous, while the second and third generations hardly ever are concerned about helping humanity with their wealth? It seems cliché to hear stories of poor immigrants who come to America with almost nothing, build wildly successful companies, and work their way into multimillionaire status--only to wind up giving much of their money away. Then there are other stories of the next generations of these rags-to-riches families who end up fighting viciously over the estates once the patriarch or matriarch of the family dies. Sometimes the natural love of kinship gets overwhelmed by a wave of lawsuits as entire families become blood enemies.

The next generation of believers may not end up at odds with one another like the next generation of the superrich, but we surely don't seem to show the same commitment to sharing as our predecessors. The first generation of believers are much more eager to share their spiritual treasure, and display much greater energy and perseverance than do succeeding generations when it comes to introducing others to Christ.

Is it possible that we are more concerned about our own interests than those of Jesus Christ? Is it possible that we don't realize the value of the treasure into which we were born? Is it possible that our birthrights are of no more value to us than a bowl of porridge?

The most important point to remember is that no generation has to die in the wilderness without entering the Promised Land. There is always room at the welcome table for one more place setting. Therefore, let us follow the example of Timothy and the exhortations of Paul, stirring up the gift of God by joining "in suffering for the gospel, by the power of God" (2 Tim. 1:8, NIV).

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* For those who cannot recall directly from memory, the verses go like this: "Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven: . . . for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. . . . No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon."

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Ronald E. Dorsey, Jr., an accountant in Washington, D.C., writes from Upper Marlboro, Maryland. He and his wife are members of the Pisgah Adventist Church in Charles County, Maryland.