The fear of the LORD is pure, enduring forever.  The ordinances of the LORD are sure and altogether righteous.
They are more precious than gold, than much pure gold; they are sweeter than honey, than honey from the comb.

Psalm 19:9-10

Just one thing is valuable, and that is the anointing, the presence of God.  I can lose everything else, but if I ever am without the presence of my Lord in my life, I am the the most poverty stricken on the planet.

What is more substantive, the presence of God or the shoes on your feet?  What has more worth, all the gold of the Earth, or the words contained in the Bible?

To know the Lord, and to have Him daily in my life is more important than friends, than eating, than social standing or a good job, or any view of wordly success this life could ever afford.

But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

Matthew 6:33

This world and all that is in it will pass away.  If God gives you prosperity, and lets you enjoy it, then enjoy it for all your days under the sun, but remember this.  From dust you came, and to dust you will return, and everything that you have will return to rust, corruption, and the fire, before the day is through.

The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.

1 John 2:17

Only one thing matters in Eternity, and that is Christ.  Christ is love, Christ is peace, Christ is joy, and power and goodness and strength.  What we do in this life apart from Him is meaningless, except as in it reaches other people in some way.

An intercessor who simply prays all day could do more in their life time than a preacher who preached every day of his adult life.  A preacher could do more than a thousand others, if they lead a lost soul to the Lord.  A man must know by the Spirit which way he should choose.

Nothing else matters above pleasing the Lord, and living in His way.  No law could accomplish this, but as we are enabled by His Spirit within us, He is able within us to live His perfect and holy life as we continue to grow in His Grace and learn from Him.

At the end of the day, we will leave this world the way we came, naked, with nothing.  We will stand before the Almighty as we are, with nothing hidden, added, nor taken away.  A life lived.  We were given life for a purpose (Genesis 1:28).  We will be responsible for how we carried it out.  In the New Covenant, in the Kingdom of our Lord, this means how much we have submitted to His Lordship, and allowed His Holiness and Righteousness to be lived through our lives.

The Spirit of the Lord is the most precious thing we have.  We do not own Him, but He own us, and is with us.  We must live in Him.  We must walk with Him.

Jesus gave a parable in Luke 16:1-9 about a shrewd manager.  He was being forced to leave his current state of life, and to go into another one.  So, since he still had time, he used what was in his possessions to secure a better future for where he was going to be a short time.  By making the right friends before his termination, he was making sure that he would not have to do menial labor nor beg.  Jesus’ summation of His parable was this, “And I say to you, make friends for yourselves by means of the wealth of unrighteousness, so that when it fails, they will receive you into the eternal dwellings.” (Luke 16:9).

What good does the wealth you are a steward of in this life do you in the next?  To the rich young ruler who wanted to be perfect, Jesus said this, “One thing you lack: go and sell all you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.” (Mark 10:21).  Jesus didn’t argue that he had kept the commandments from his youth.  Jesus didn’t criticize his zeal.  He wasn’t calling the young man’s bluff, because Jesus didn’t lie.  But, the verse says that Jesus looked at him, and loved him.  Jesus said one thing he lacked, and what was the one thing Jesus said he would acquire through the sale and giving?  Treasure.

This life cannot be lived without Him.  A man had come to the only Good Teacher, and asked Him how to be perfect.  Jesus said it was easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for the rich man to enter the Kingdom (Mark 10:25).  This young man lacked the most precious thing, something Jesus referred to as “treasure in heaven”, and it was this that Jesus said that he required to be perfect.  What He lacked was the love to see His fellow man, the faith to see God more brightly than anything else in His love, and the hope that, whatever comes in this life, God’s loving kindnesses were sufficient (1 Corinthians 13:13).  What He lacked was the fullness of the heart of the Father, to look upon his wealth as of less value than his brothers, and to learn to obtain the thing of greater value, His heart.

His heart is pure gold, and is given to those who seek Him with theirs.  What the law could not do to both make us holy and live fully for Him, God did in sending Christ, to both make us holy and turn us to live it through the agency of His Spirit.  So long as it is our own effort, it will always fail, but as He teaches us to seek Him, we find that place of His Spirit, learn to live from there, and are transformed from glory to glory (Matthew 7:24).

So what if we could live just inside the door and make it to heaven?  Why not press all the way into this salvation?  Why wait and enjoy what is only temporal, instead of laboring for that which DOES satisfy, the Bread of Life (John 6:48)?  If we only had a better glimpse of what awaited us, nothing would be too great to hold onto in this life to keep us from it.

Looking at them, Jesus said, “With people it is impossible, but not with God; for all things are possible with God.”

Mark 10:27