Daily Manna, Year Two · Day 176 · June 25
Hid In A Field
“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto treasure hid in a field; the which when a man hath found, he hideth, and for joy thereof goeth and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field.”
The field looks like every other field on that road, and it is priced like every other field on that road. That is the whole point of the story, and it is why the man says nothing to the owner.
Two kinds of people read this story and get stuck in different places. One hears the words "selleth all that he hath" and starts working out what would be left. The other hears "for joy thereof" and cannot remember the last time joy was what drew him toward God.
To the first reader: Jesus does not ask anyone to put a price on the field. He tells what one man did after he had seen what was in it. The selling comes after the finding, so it is what the treasure led to, and not what it cost to see it. Years later Paul did the same sums in a letter, and he does not sound like a man who lost anything: "what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ." A line later he says he does "count them but dung, that I may win Christ."
To the second reader: the man hides the treasure and buys the field, and Jesus adds no comment at all. The joy is simply told as a fact about that man; nobody asks you to show it at the door. The very next story has a merchant who finds one pearl of great price and does the same thing, and no joy is mentioned there at all.
Father, show us what is in the field. Both of these readers live in us. We have been told the price many times and hardly ever shown the treasure, and from the gate the price is all we can see. Open our eyes to what Jesus is worth, and let the joy come to us the way it came to that man, when he saw it. Thank You that the treasure is real, and that You are the One who shows it. Amen.
Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year one reading for day 176 is The Strong Tower (Proverbs 18:10).