Tuesday after the Nineteenth Sunday after Trinity Sunday
Posted on October 25, 2022 by under
Scripture: St. Matthew 6:19-23 (NKJV)
6:19 “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; 20 but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
22 “The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. 23 But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!”
Devotion
“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
You can discern many things about a person by what they hold dear to them. Our Lord Jesus Christ uses the image of the eye as the “lamp of the body” to demonstrate this reality. What you focus on will be the centerpiece of your life, whether that be for a short period or long period. The focus for every Christian is Jesus Christ. By Christ, we are dead to sin and raised again with Him through Baptism. By Christ, we are given the Holy Ghost, who proceeds from the Father and the Son. Even in the midst of the distractions of the world, the flesh, and the devil, Christ is still our centerpiece.
Christ must be our focus. Without Christ, we have no righteousness. As our Lord says, “If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!” If your own righteousness–your own ‘light’–is the focus, then darkness is all you will have.
Praise be to God that we have our treasure in Christ who gives the true light.
Prayer: O Almighty and most Merciful God, of Thy bountiful goodness keep us, we beseech Thee, from all things that may hurt us; that we, being ready, both in body and soul, may cheerfully accomplish those things that Thou wouldest have done; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever One God, world without end. Amen.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
