Jesus teaches that if we really trust God, we will act as if treasure in heaven is what matters (compare 1 Tim 6:8-10). Although Jesus illustrates his point here with images about treasure in heaven shared by many of his contemporaries (such as Sirach 29:10-11; 4 Ezra 7:77; 2 Baruch 14:12), only the most radical sages of antiquity shared Jesus' view that earthly possessions were essentially worthless. Yet for Jesus the treasure is not merely in heaven (Mt 19:21); it represents the kingdom of heaven (13:44). Idolaters who value Mammon too highly to abandon it for what Jesus values will have no place in his kingdom (19:21-30; compare Lk 14:33).

Some other countercultural sages in antiquity also advocated lack of attachment to material possessions (Epict. Disc. 1.18.15-16). Unlike some philosophers, however, Jesus is not against possessions because he supposes them to be evil (compare Lucr. Nat. 5.1105-42; Sen. Dial. 5.33.1); the issue is not that possessions themselves are bad but that a higher priority demands our resources. If we value what our Lord values rather than what our society values, he demands that we meet the basic needs of people lacking adequate resources before we seek to accumulate possessions beyond our basic needs (19:21; compare Lk 3:11; 12:33-34).

Someone will object that we have to stop sacrificing at some point because we will never finish meeting all this world's needs (Mt 26:11). But could not the abundance of this world's needs represent a call to keep sacrificing? Do we use the behavior of many of our fellow Christians to justify reinterpreting Jesus' explicit call to value what he cares about more highly than possessions? Many professing Christians before Luther were wrong about justification by faith; is it possible that most Western Christians today wrongly miss Jesus' explicit teaching about sacrifice?

One researcher suggests that professed followers of Christ take in 68 percent of the world's income, yet only 3 percent of that goes to the church and a tiny percentage to world missions. Perhaps if more Westerners lived even briefly among the desperately hungry or developed friendships with people from lands where laborers for the gospel are few, our priorities would change. Meanwhile Jesus, who already sees the needs of all people, summons us to value what matters to him-if not yet out of love for them, then out of love for our Lord who loves them.

Can we claim not to love wealth more than our brothers and sisters in Christ when we see them hurting and do not sacrifice what should matter to us less than their need? While many of us pursue status symbols that television suggests are "necessities," evangelical ministries to the poor claim that forty thousand people die of starvation and malnutrition daily. That means roughly twenty-seven a minute, twenty of whom are children under five years old. (This represents a loss of life roughly equivalent to the first atom bomb being dropped again-every three days.) Wherever possible, people should earn their own wages and not become dependent on charity. But children under five cannot "pull themselves up by their bootstraps," nor can our brothers and sisters in drought- and famine-stricken areas. Those who say, "For the sake of everyone it is better to let the weak die off," are social Darwinists, not Christians; Christians are called to serve the weak.

The world's need is overwhelming, but if as individuals we calculate what resources we do not need and contribute them to ministries like World Vision and Food for the Hungry, we can at least do our part to make a difference in the world, trusting that God will raise up others to join us. One wonders, too, what a witness it would be among the world's poor who are not Christians if they saw that wealthier Christians cared more about the poor than about their own affluence.