There’s a Treasure Map in the Bible… Have You Seen It? Jason Willis

You have a secret life with God; you will be rich in the afterlife. So if you're excited about that, one, two, three... Shit! All right.

It's going to be a special day. I'm going on a treasure hunt, and I need a group of children to go with me. But you cannot come unless you are excited about finding some treasure. So I need you all to prove to me that you're excited. Raise your hand if you're excited about a treasure hunt.

All right. I saw a few hands not go up. We're going to need—I'm going to need some proof here. When I count to three, I need you to scream, "TREASURE!" as loud as you can. If you don't do it, you can't come on the trip.

One, two, three. TREASURE! Oh, no, no, no, no, no. Our way too weak. I need you to really be excited. One more time. One, two, three. TREASURE! All right. Now I got my crew.

One man's trash is another man's treasure. Jimmy's mother throws away an ordinary toilet paper roll. Jimmy sees it, and he's absolutely blown away that he found all the parts he needs to make a rocket ship for his pet lizard. "Leeroy Jenkins," he exclaims. That's his pet lizard's name. Who in their right mind would throw away a perfectly good toilet paper roll when there's such a high demand for rocket ships? Tonight, Leeroy Jenkins, we're sending you to the moon.

One man's trash is another man's treasure. It was trash to Mom. It was a rocket ship to Jimmy. It works the other way, too. For kids your age, your mom making you lay down for a nap can ruin your afternoon.

When I was your age, I was told it's nap time, and I would be like, "But why?" Why should we waste time napping when we've got forts to build and trees to climb and friends who are hiding that I need to go seek and basketball to play and lizards to catch for space expeditions? Why waste time taking a nap?

But suddenly I blink. Can y'all recognize who that is? That was me a little bit younger. This is me now.

I blink. Next thing you know, I'm 42 years old, and it's Monday morning after a long weekend. And Bill says to me, "How was your weekend, Jason?" And I say, "You're not going to believe it. I had the best weekend ever. I took a nap Saturday and Sunday."

One man's trash is another man's treasure. A nap can ruin your day, but it makes my day the best day ever. Now, why on earth would we be talking about treasure? Well, because all through the Bible, we are told that some people go to heaven when they die, and when they get there, there may or may not be some sort of pile of treasure for them.

First Corinthians says, "Do you not know that in a race everybody runs, but one receives the prize?" Run in such a way that you are the one that wins the prize. Everyone who runs the race trains hard so that they can be the winner. Now, the foolish people, they do all that hard work so that they can win some silly little crown that won't last. Look at that thing. It's all rusted.

But you, Trevor, you, Wally, you, Mitchell, you are running the race of life for an imperishable crown. The Bible says that this crown lasts forever. If a thief wants to come in and steal it, he can't do it. If a moth wants to come in and eat it, it'll break its little moth teeth.

And it won't rust either. It lasts forever and ever, and it will never corrupt. And it's like having a crown times infinity times infinity times a billion trillion gazillion infinities. You know what else the Bible says? He says at the end of times, everyone who's ever died is going to come back to life, and Jesus and his angels are going to be in the sky. And Jesus says this. This is what he says. He says, "And behold, I come quickly, and I bring my reward with me." Hear that? He's going to come with your reward.

Question. What is heaven treasure? I mean, what does it look like? Here on earth, treasure is things like gold and silver. But then you read in Revelations, it says that in heaven, the streets are made out of gold. If this were heaven and we wanted to go to Chick-fil-A, we'd have to pull out our gold road map. We'd go left on Lincoln Way Gold, get on 81 Gold South, get off of Gold Walker Road, take a left, and then we'd go on that right. I'm not sure what the name of that road is, but it doesn't matter. It's made out of gold because we're in heaven, right? And then there on the left would be that delicious chicken sandwich with those two little perfect pickles and that hot toasted bun.

If gold is what the streets are going to be made out of there, I can guarantee you the treasure there isn't gold. But the question is still there. What is heaven's treasure? What does it look like? Now, when I was studying this, I came across a verse in First Corinthians that says, "The man who tries to imagine what heaven treasure is, he's just kind of wasting his time." I mean, it doesn't say that exactly, but what it says is, "No eye has seen, no ears have heard, none of your imaginations have ever been able to even dream of what God has in store for those who love him."

Do you realize how amazing that is? How amazing? Because our imaginations are incredible. When I was a kid and we were driving down the road and I would see the trees going by, I could see myself in the trees. I was just going flying through the trees like I was a mixture of the Credible Hulk, and Tarzan, and Superman. I actually saw it in my head.

Our imaginations are amazing. You kids can imagine playing soccer on the moon, kicking glowing meteor balls that leave stardust trails. You can imagine having a tea party with dinosaurs that wear bow ties and monocles. You can imagine diving into a library where books come alive and the characters jump off the pages and go on adventures with you. You can imagine flying a hot air balloon powered by a giant toaster, shooting out flaming bread slices. You can imagine riding a giant hamster wheel that powers a floating city in the sky. You can imagine climbing trees in a world where the clouds are made out of trampolines and the sun is a big snow and a big disco ball.

You can imagine climbing trees where the leaves are made of pizza. And finally, you can imagine having a pet octopus that paints pictures by squirting rainbow ink. What? It's almost like there's nothing we can imagine. We can imagine almost anything.

And I want all of you in the room, grownups and children, everyone close your eyes. No peeking. And we're just going to sit here for 10 seconds. And I want everyone to do the best that you can to imagine what heaven treasure might look like. Everybody imagine.

Okay, you can open your eyes. First Corinthians 2:9 tells us that we don't really know what heaven treasure's like. We don't really know exactly. Can't be for sure, but we can and do know that whatever it was that you were just imagining, it's not even close. We can't even imagine how amazing it's going to be.

Now, I'm about to tell you something. It might be a little bit hard to believe. You're not going to believe what I found in the Bible. You know that story where the guy finds a treasure in the Bible, and then he goes and buys a whole land and he buries it just to keep it for himself? I kind of felt like that when I found this in the Bible. How did I not know that this existed?

But then I was thinking, what do I do with it? Do I keep this a secret for myself? Or do I share this with everybody? But if I shared it with everyone, it might just change the world.

But because this group of children right here, because you are so mature and so responsible, y'all are the most awesome group of children I've ever met. And so because of this, I have decided to share this secret with you.

You ready?

There's a treasure map in the Bible. I can already hear some of your parents back there thinking right now. Wait a minute. There ain't no treasure map in the Bible. What kind of heresies? He's about to teach our children. But I'm telling you, by the end of this day, your parents will be back there saying, "Well, I'll be had. There was a treasure map in there the entire time.

Just never saw it." Now, I need you all to pay attention to this because this is like a big deal. Like I'm about to give you all a leg up in life. I'm about to be teaching you stuff that you're going to learn at like five, six, and seven years old. I didn't even learn until I was in my like forties. So pay attention. This is good stuff here.

I found this treasure map hidden in the Bible. I found it in pieces. And we've already talked about the first piece, First Corinthians 2:9. For me, when I learned that what heaven treasure is better than we can even imagine, that was the beginning of the treasure map for me. And so this is where we're going to begin. And then this here is going to be our destination. And as we go on this journey, we're going to be making four stops marked by these red Xs.

Now, this journey, it's going to be long and perilous and full of obstacles and challenges and dangers. And along the way, if we are going to survive, we all need to be as wise as serpents and as gentle as doves.

If you're ready for this treasure hunt, scream, "TREASURE!" One, two, three, "TREASURE!" All right, let's do it. Let's move to our first destination, which is the swamp of the devil's little secrets. If you really want to understand heaven's treasure, you must start with understanding the secret life. But you need to know that there's a good secret life and a bad secret life. So let us pass through the swamp of devil's little secrets and see what we can learn.

John 3:20 says that evil hates the light. Let's read the passage. "For everyone who does bad things hates the light and does not want to come into the light because the bad and evil things they did will be seen. Their evil secrets with the devil will be revealed." And this can be a difficult passage to understand, especially for young minds. And so allow me to walk you through this one a little bit.

Just imagine that it's a very special day. Oh, it's a special day. But it's not a special day for you. No, it's a special day for your brother because it's his birthday. And then Aunt Nana comes over and as a gift gives your brother a package of the 12 most delicious pieces of chocolate you've ever seen in your life.

And to be honest, you get a little bit sad. I mean, you like chocolate. You like chocolate a lot. And it starts feeling like maybe things aren't fair. Why does he get 12 pieces of chocolate and I get zero? Like, where's the democracy in this?

And then you start to get bothered by this. And he's so excited about his chocolate, and you just want one. And so you reach out to grab one, and he snatches it back. "No, they are mine." And you say, "Mom, he's not sharing with me." And to which your mother replies, "Oh, sweetheart, it's his birthday. It's his present. You just can't take what's not yours. That's called stealing."

Suddenly, out from the kitchen, you hear one of your other brothers scream, "Grandma and Grandpa's here." And everybody gets excited and runs to the kitchen to see Grandma and Grandpa. But you notice something. As your brother, in his excitement, was grabbing his candy and shoving it in the bag, one piece fell out and it rolled up under the couch.

And you saw it happen. But he didn't. And you're watching as everyone runs outside to meet Grandma and Grandpa. Suddenly, the devil begins to whisper in your ear, "Finders, keepers lose their sweepers. It wasn't fair that he had 12 pieces and you get zero.

Now you can take this piece and nobody will know." Sure, your brother, when he finds out that it's missing, I mean, he's going to be upset, but he should have been willing to share in the first place. And it's his fault for dropping it. Just saying.

Here you find yourself in the swamp of the devil's secrets. And so you reach under the couch and you grab that piece of chocolate and you put it in your pocket. And then you go run like you did nothing wrong and go meet Grandma and Grandpa.

Now, I want you to notice something about this. You know that you can't tell anyone. It must remain a secret. If you told any of your other brothers and sisters and they found out, they might go tattle-tale on you. And if they do that, now you're in hot water for lying and disobeying and stealing. So shh, it must remain your own little secret.

Now, because of this choice, you have created this little secret world with you and your evil desires and the devil. But of course, it's not a secret from God. He's watching the whole thing happen. It's only a secret from the humans. And this is what John 3:20 was talking about. For everyone who does evil, everyone who steals the chocolate that their brother drops under the couch, that does not like the light and does not want to come into the light because the light shines on the bad stuff that we've done.

That is what the light does. It makes everyone see the evil secret things that you have done. And so when you have a secret in the swamp with the devil, the Bible says that it makes you hate the light.

Just think about it. If one of your brothers or sisters were to find out and tattle on you, what would happen? You would be angry. "Why didn't you tell on me?" And why would you be angry like that? Because the tattling shined a light on the bad thing that you did, and it makes you hate the light.

Listen, all of us mess up from time to time. Sometimes we do bad things, even the grownups, surprising. But the good news is there's always a way to make it right. The devil cannot trap you forever in the swamp of his lies.

God has provided a way out of the swamp. And this leads us to our second destination. So let us all escape this dangerous swamp together. And now let's move to the second destination on our treasure map. This one is God's secret place.

You're still excited, right? One, two, three. "Treasure!" I didn't join you. I'll join you this time. One, two, three. "Treasure!" All right.

Matthew 6:5 says, "And when you pray, do not be like the bad people. The bad people love to pray standing in front of everybody. They want all of the other people to see them praying. It makes them feel good when others see them praying.

I promise you, people who pray like this just to put on a show for others to see, they get no treasure in heaven for that." God says the good feelings that they get when people see them praying, that is the only reward that they get.

But this first doesn't end there. Next, God gives us the third piece to our treasure map. He stops talking about what the bad people do, and he starts talking to us. And he gives us instructions on how to get heaven treasure. Let's read this together. He says, "But you children, when you are different, when you pray, don't be like the bad people. No, instead, when you pray, go into your room. And after you have shut the door and no one can see you, now you pray to the Father who is in the secret place.

And your Father who sees you do in secret, he will reward you openly." This tells us that when we get treasure in heaven someday, everyone's going to see it. They're going to be saying, "Wow, look at their treasure."

You will be rewarded openly for what you do in secret for God.

And that's not my favorite part. Let's read it. He says, "Now when you pray, your Father who is," here's my favorite part, "in the secret place."

Did you know that?

Has anyone ever told you that God has a secret place just for you and him, and he can't wait for you to come join him there?

I bet some of you didn't even know you had a secret place, but you do.

Some of you may be thinking, "Well, what kind of secrets?"

Listen, you can't even imagine. It's not like there's one or two secrets. It's more than I could count. In fact, there's thousands of them. God wants to have an entire secret life with you. And it's the same way with the devil. The devil wants to have his own secret life with you that you're not allowed to tell anyone about.

But God wants the same. He wants to have an entire life of secrets with you as well. But question, what does the secret place look like? The Bible says that when you go into your room and close the door and nobody can see you, then when you pray to God, that becomes the secret place.

But what happens if you share your room with three or four brothers and you never get the room alone? No worries. Anywhere can become a secret place.

Maybe you go meet God in the closet. Maybe that can be your secret place. Or maybe pretend that you need to go to the bathroom. And then you go and you just sit next to the toilet and pray to God.

God doesn't care that the toilet's there. He just cares that you want to be with him in secret.

You can even, and this is my favorite, you can pull a blanket over your head at night where no one can see you. And that little place in your bed can become the secret place where you talk to God.

Like I said, all of us mess up. All of us fall into temptation and do bad things sometimes. We get stuck in the swamp of the devil's lies. But God is a forgiving God. And when you go to him in the secret place and you tell him what you did, "Oh, dear God, I'm so sorry.

Ah, man, it was my brother's birthday and he was getting all these good things. And I just wanted one. And he was being selfish. And then he one dropped on the couch and I stole it. I did the wrong thing, God. And I ate it.

I'm so sorry. Will you please forgive me?"

When you go to him in the secret place and you tell him what you did, he will forgive you because he is a merciful God. And when you are forgiven, you are free from the swamp. He gets you out of the swamp.

So you will do bad things. You will mess up sometimes, but there's always a way out for you.

Wow. Wow, wow, wow. What an amazing adventure so far. We have learned that heaven treasure is so amazing that we can't even imagine it. And now we have passed through this dangerous swamp of the devil's little secrets. Next, we learned about the most amazing place where God waits for us every single day in the secret place. So let us now continue this adventure to our third stop on this treasure hunt.

And that is the humble abode of King Conrad and the wise and discerning Aunt Caroline. Too bad they missed it today.

Are you still with me? One, two, three. All right. They're still with me.

In this part of our adventure, we are going to discover the key to heaven treasure, which is taking up your cross. The taking up your cross is the key to storing up treasure in heaven. And I can already hear it now. You can't teach children about taking up their cross. That's too hard. That's deep grown-up stuff, but I don't believe it. You are the smartest children I've ever seen in my life. I know that you can understand this.

Taking up your cross is the key to storing up treasure in heaven. But what is taking up your cross? The best place to begin learning about this is with the word selfish or selfishness. Raise your hand if you know what being selfish is.

I knew you were smart. I'll tell them.

Meet selfish Steve. Selfish Steve only cares about himself. He doesn't care about you. All that matters to him is himself. To help us understand selfishness, let us go on this adventure at the house of King Conrad and the wise and discerning Aunt Caroline for a lesson about pizza, one of the most delicious things that exist.

But have you ever wondered why pizza is so fantastic? The reason is because pizza has a magical ingredient. I bet some of you probably didn't know one of those ingredients is magical.

But which ingredient is it? There's so many. You've got the bread. You've got the pizza sauce. You've got the cheese, the pepperoni, the mushrooms, the ham, the bacon, all the thousands of other toppings. But which one is the magical one? We will learn in this story.

One bright afternoon, you are invited to play at Andrick and Willamina's house for an excitement as in the air. For four straight hours, you have been busy running through the hallways and building block towers and giggling uncontrollably every time Pierre jumps from behind the couch and playing hide and go seek and tickle fights and even having a contest to see who can hold their breath the longest.

Suddenly, your tummy lets out a mighty roar like a hungry lion saying, "It's time to eat." You're hungry, and so you find Aunt Caroline. But why? Well, because she's in charge of supper. And you blurt out, "Aunt Caroline, I'm so hungry. What's for supper?"

From somewhere close by, Andrick overhears. He bounces up, practically glowing with excitement. "Yes," he shouts, "my favorite supper. I'm going to tell Willamina," and he runs out of the room. But he didn't mention what the special meal is going to be. And so now your curiosity is way off the charts. You can feel your stomach rumbling again, even louder.

You lean in, eyes shimmering, and ask, "Oh, Miss Caroline, can you please tell me what Andrick's favorite supper is?" Aunt Caroline glances around, and then she whispers, "Bread." Your heart sinks a little bit. "Bread? That's all?" I mean, you're trying your best to smile so that you don't look ungrateful. But, oh, Miss Caroline, she is wise and discerning. She can see your disappointment peeking through. And so, with a twinkle in her eye, she said, "Oh, it gets better.

Andrick loves his bread with smashed tomatoes." You blink in confusion. "Smashed tomatoes with bread? And I thought Andrick was cool. That seems weird. I don't know about this," you think to yourself as Miss Caroline turns and walks towards the kitchen. "Oh, I almost forgot," she says as she looks over her shoulder. "Andrick's absolute favorite part of the meal is the cheese."

Now your brain starts to ticken. Bread, tomatoes, cheese. Bread, tomatoes, cheese. Your face lights up. "Oh, Aunt Caroline, are we having pizza?" Aunt Caroline grins from ear to ear. "We sure are. And it's better. It's even homemade pizza. And you get to help make it. And the next door neighbor, Steve, he is going to come over, and he's going to eat with us."

Now, I want you to notice something. Without the cheese, it's just smashed tomatoes and bread. But boy, when you add cheese to that puppy, you got it yourself a pizza. Cheese is the magical ingredient in pizza. But there's more lessons we need to learn, more important lessons we need to learn here.

So you and Andrick and Willamina spend the next hour helping Aunt Caroline make this homemade pizza. And there's just enough for everyone to get their own gigantic slice. It's just as big as your head. And each of you get to add your own favorite toppings to your own slice. And then, being very thoughtful, Andrick says, "Pepperoni is Steve's favorite topping." And he continues, "So I will make him a slice with pepperoni, and I will sprinkle it with a little extra cheese."

The pizza is popped into the oven, and the timer is set for 30 long starving minutes.

At last, the timer dings. Aunt Caroline cries out, "It's supper time," which is right on cue. Because you hear the car pulling in next door, Steve is getting home with his father. And so Willamina rushes outside and says, "Hey, Steve, come over. We made you a slice of pizza with extra cheese and pepperoni, just like you like it."

So everyone gathers in the kitchen. And Mr. Conrad, the king of the house, he says a quick prayer. He then turns to Steve and announces, "In this house, Steve, our guests eat first." Steve flashes a huge grin. He grabs a plate, and he heads towards the steaming pizza. He spots his pepperoni slice with the extra cheese, and he picks it up triumphantly and plops it on his plate.

But then, out of the corner of his eye, Steve notices the other slices: yours piled with pineapple and ham, Willamina's four cheese blend, and Andrick's. Well, his looked like it came from a candy store explosion. Steve's eyes dart from slice to slice. He mumbles, "I do like pepperoni, but I also like those toppings and those toppings and those toppings." Before you know it, Steve has scooped up all of the cheese on all of the pieces and put it on top of his.

The room goes quiet. Everyone's staring, wondering, "Did Steve just take all of our cheese and toppings?" You've been daydreaming for ages about this perfectly cheesy slice. But there you are, staring at a piece of bread topped with nothing but a smashed tomato.

You eat your supper with sadness and disappointment. Why? Because selfish Steve was selfish.

And what makes him selfish is that he doesn't care about your desires. He doesn't care about you want and desire. He only cares about his own desires. But what does this word desire mean? It's kind of a grown-up word a little bit.

What does it mean? Well, it's very similar to the word want. Sometimes they mean the same things, but sometimes desire has a more intense feeling. When you want something and you don't get it, you feel bad. But when you really desire something and you don't get it, then you just feel horrible. Now, to understand these wants and desires, we need to know that you're still with me. One, two.

Three. All right.

Now, to understand these feelings and to understand this, we really need to focus on the feelings. All right? This is really important. We need to understand what we want and desire, but we need to think about how our feelings are connected to it. Let's look at just a couple of examples.

Imagine that you've been waiting for Grandma and Grandpa to come home, to come visit. And you're sitting out there waiting. And then you see them way at the bottom of the hill. You see their car turn the corner. What happens inside of you when you see their car?

That feeling happens. I'm excited. You run in and you scream to everybody, "Grandma and Grandpa are here."

You get excited and you run inside. So let's make another example. Remember. And remember, we are focusing on the feelings we get when we first realize that we get what we want. We got that feeling when Grandma and Grandpa pulled up, right?

Example number two. You love Burger King, chicken nuggets, and fries. And you're driving home from a long hike. You've been hiking all day long in the woods. And once again, your stomach starts to growl from the back seat. You say, "Dad, can we have Burger King for supper?" And he says, "Maybe." But because he knows you ask a thousand questions an hour, he says, "But if you ask again, the answer is no."

So now you've got to control yourself. As you drive, you know Burger King is just around the next corner. And you're thinking, "Oh, man, is Dad going to stop? Is Dad going to stop?" And you're controlling yourself. You're not asking him again.

You turn the corner, and there it is. You can see Burger King, but it seems like Dad isn't slowing down. It seems like he's going to just drive right by. And then you think, "Oh, just when you think all is lost, he slams on his brake and he turns in." What happens in that moment?

Yes. That feeling, there it is again. It hits you in that moment. That feeling when Dad pulls into Burger King, or that feeling that you get when Grandma and Grandpa turn the corner, that feeling. What are good words to describe that?

What are good words? Give me some words. When you're excited about something, how does it make you feel?

Someone, we're not moving on. If you're excited enough, you'll know the answer. Happy. What else?

Excited. Yes. When you get what you want, you feel happy. Excited. Yes. I'm getting what I want.

Now, this is important because we really need to understand these feelings and how they're attached to what we want. I'm going to give one more example, even though I think you probably got it. It's the same feeling you get when you plan to spend the night with each other. You've got the whole evening mapped out. First, you're going to build a miniature world made out of gum wrappers and sticks. And then you're going to make homemade pizza for supper. And then you're going to build a rocket ship for Leroy Jenkins to go to the moon with the spare parts that some crazy person threw away in the trash can. But there's only one thing in the way.

You still have to ask Mom and Dad.

Sorry. Something's wrong.

Ah. So you go in to ask your mom. The slide's not there. I must have deleted them. You go and ask Mom, "Mom, can Miles spend the night?" And she says, "Sure. That's okay." That feeling happens. But it's only okay if your father says it's okay. Oh, all the feeling went away. It went from happy to sad. And so you go and you ask your dad. You say, "Dad, I just asked Mom if Miles could spend the night, and she's perfectly happy with it.

In fact, if you ask me, I think she's pretty excited about the idea. But you know, Ma, she's always thinking about you, Papa. She said it's okay with her if it's okay with you." So finally, the answer comes. He says, "Yes, Miles can spend the night." And what happens?

That feeling again. And then when you go tell Miles, "They said yes." What happens to Miles? That feeling when you get what you want, you get good feelings.

Oh, they were there the whole time.

Listen, if you want to store up treasure in heaven, you need to understand how the feelings are connected to our wants and desires. Imagine my finger here is what you want. And when you get the thing you want, it feels good. When you don't get it, it feels bad. And you need to understand that.

It's just as important to understand the bad feelings. So let's go back to the beginning of the story where you're outside waiting for Grandma and Grandpa. And then you're waiting for them to turn the corner, but instead of seeing them, your mom hollers out, "I just got a call from Grandma. Grandpa's not feeling very well, so they're not coming over."

So what happens? Oh, the bad feeling happens. When they show up, the good feeling. When they're not coming, oh, the bad feeling. It's the same feeling you got when you saw selfish Steve take all of your cheese and toppings. Oh, bad feelings.

The words for it are disappointment and sadness. But what does all this have to do with heaven, treasure, and taking up your cross? Well, it has everything to do with it. You see, in this adventure at King Conrad's, we learned two things. Number one, two things about taking up your cross and storing treasure in heaven. What are these two things? Number one is that when you have things that you want and then you get it, you get the good feelings.

But if there's things that you want and you don't get them, you get the bad feelings.

And these are connected with your desires. And the second thing we learned is selfish. When you only care about yourself, when you only care about what you want, you're just like selfish Steve. So now it's time for us to take these two ideas and turn them into treasure. You still with me? One, two, three, treasure.

Everybody has things they want and desire. Your brother, your sisters, your parents, your friends, your teachers, everyone. And those good, fun feelings that you get when you get what you want, everybody gets those. This is the key. You have to learn that everybody gets those feelings.

And when there's something that they want and they don't get it, oh, everyone feels that same way. We're all the same. Did you know that babies are just like selfish Steve? Yeah, sounds weird, right? But babies are selfish.

They know what they want. And if they don't get what they want, they just cry. Can you imagine if us grown-ups never grew out of that?

Babies don't even know how to imagine that you have feelings. And God is okay with babies being selfish because they don't know any better. You know the same thing. You see your little brothers and sisters getting away with all sorts of stuff that you can't get away with, and you say, "Well, it's just because they're babies."

But every baby grows up, and there is a day in their life when they realize for the first time, "Oh my goodness, other people have feelings too, not just me."

This may have already happened to some of you children before you got here today. Maybe some of you are realizing this for the first time in your life. "Oh my goodness, other people have feelings too, just like me."

And when you learn this, you stop being a baby. Once you know that other people have feelings too, and then you choose to be selfish, now you're no longer being a baby who doesn't know any better. Now you've become selfish Steve.

And guess what?

Selfish people don't get treasure heaven, heaven treasure.

And this leads us to our fourth and final stop on our treasure hunt, where we are going to learn how to not be selfish. You still with me? One, two, three. All right. I'm so proud of you children. It's been a wonderful journey so far. We've learned that heaven treasure is so amazing that we can't even imagine what it is. And then we passed through the dangerous swamp of the devil's little secrets. Next, we learned about the most amazing place where God likes to meet us in our secret place where we can get forgiveness and freed from the swamp. Then we went on an emotional roller coaster at King Conrad and Wise and Discerning, Miss Caroline's house, where we learned all about selfishness.

And we learned about how we have wants and desires and how we have these, yes, good feelings attached to them and, oh, horrible feelings that are attached to our wants and desires.

So now let us continue this treasure hunt to our fourth and final stop of the day.

The true test of life. This story takes place at Daniel's house with Keeley, Kyleena, Wally, Chloe, Kenley, Ignatius, and Casey. It's been a long, hard day for Casey. She didn't sleep good last night. She's a little bit tired. She had guests over the past few days. And it's Wednesday night, and Daniel's away at the brothers' meeting, and so she's got the kids by herself.

On top of that, she's got a little bit of a headache. So she takes some ibuprofen, and she lays on the couch, and she prays to God saying, "Dear Father, I'm so exhausted. Thank you for my children. Please help me through this evening and help them to behave so I can get some rest and let my headache go away. Please, Father."

In this story, everyone has desires. Everyone has feelings. Keeley wants to be sewing a dress. Kyleena wants to be reading a book. Wally wants to be flying his drone. Chloe wants to be coloring a book. Kenley wants to be playing with the chemicals underneath the sink. Ignatius wants to, you know, he's a baby. He just wants to poop his diaper at the moment. And then Casey, she just wants her headache to go away so she can get some rest. Everyone has desires. And then something happens.

Kenley, she's walking in the kitchen with a bottle of dish soap that she found under the sink. And she slips on a puddle of water made from a melted ice cube that fell on the floor when Ignatius was playing with the ice maker.

Kenley lands on her bottom, and the dish soap goes flying through the air, knocks over a gift bag, and out comes five. Count them. Five Hershey kisses roll out of the bag. Now, at that same moment, both Keeley and Wally notice something.

There are six children, but only five pieces of chocolate. Both Wally and Keeley realize that someone is going to have to go without. And they both just had that feeling inside. Yes, we're about to get chocolate. They both have that desire now. And neither one of them wants to be the one that goes without. And so both of them, they make a mad dash to the chocolate, trying to push the other one out. "I'm going to get my piece."

So Wally gets his, Keeley gets hers. And then Kyleena, Chloe, and Kenley, they all see what's going on, and they each get their own kiss. Next thing you know, Ignatius realizes, "Ooh, ooh, they got chocolate." And then he realizes, "Oh, I don't get a piece." And he's a baby.

No rest for poor KK.

You see, in this story, the children realized that there wasn't enough. And then when they decided to fight and get what they wanted, they were being selfish.

And as we learned, selfish people don't get heaven treasure, at least not for those selfish acts. But the greatest thing about this story is it's an imaginary story. In imaginary stories, we can rewind time. So let's rewind time. Casey, she's sitting on the couch trying to rest. Kenley slips on the puddle. The dish soap goes flying through the air. It knocks over the bag. And out roll five. Count them. Five Hershey kisses.

This time in the story, only Keeley sees the chocolate. Only Keeley sees it. And that feeling happens inside of her. "Yes, chocolate." But instead of only caring about her own desires, she starts thinking about everyone else. She looks at Ignatius, and she thinks, "Oh, Ignatius loves chocolate too. He will desire it." And then Chloe knows about chocolate, and she will want it too.

And then Kenley and Kyleena and Wally, all of them, they will all have this desire that I have. But Keeley, she begins to count. One, two, three, four, five kisses. But we have one, two, three, four, five, six children.

And she thinks to herself, "Someone is going to be the sad one."

Then she looks over at her mother, resting her eyes, hoping that her headache will go away. And she thinks to herself, "Oh, mother has been working so hard today. She has been serving all of these guests so faithfully, and she's just been so patient with the children. And now her head is hurting, and mommy just wants rest. She has her own desires. She doesn't care about the chocolate. She just wants rest."

And while all of this is happening, inside of Keeley's head, God is looking down from heaven at Keeley, and he starts getting excited. God's heart becomes overwhelmed with joy because he sees Keeley thinking about other people's desires. And when he sees her thinking about others' desires, he becomes so proud of his daughter. And God cries out to the angels, "Bring me Keeley's treasure chest. It's about to happen."

He continues to watch as the story unfolds. Now, before we go, let me ask you a question. When Keeley realized that there wasn't enough to go around, did her own desire go away? No. That's right. She had that feeling already. That desire is there.

After all, the whole thing started with that feeling. She saw the candy, and she desired itself. But this time, instead of just grabbing and fighting, she stops and thinks for a minute about all the desires of the other people. Next, what Keeley does is absolutely amazing. She sacrifices her own desires. She says to herself, "Ignatius' desire is more important than my desire. Kyleena, what Kyleena wants is more important than what I want. What Chloe desires is more important than my desires. What Wally wants is more important than what I want. And what mom's desires after all she has done is more important than what I want." She thinks about everybody else.

And she says to herself, "I choose to be the sad one. I choose to feel the bad feelings. I will be the one that doesn't get the chocolate." She chooses to sacrifice her own desires. She chooses to be the one to experience the sadness herself. She gives up her own desires, and she says to her brothers, "Hey, everybody, come here. I got a surprise for you. Shh, quiet. Mom's sleeping. Grandpa left us these chocolates." And she hands each one of them down the line a chocolate. And she's left with none.

And then she sits back and watches them as they all enjoy their chocolate, and mom's headache is starting to go away, and everyone is getting what they desired. And she sacrificed her own desires. She gave up what she wanted. She sacrificed her desires for others. And when God sees this in heaven, he cries out, "Treasure! Treasure! Give her all the treasure!"

This is how you get treasure in heaven.

This is what it means to take up your cross. Every time you feel that feeling, you're excited about something. Think, "This is your moment. This is your chance. This is your opportunity to stop and think." Ask yourself the questions. "What do my brothers want? What do my mom want? What do the teachers want?

What does God want?"

Listen, every time you choose to let the bad feeling fall on you because you want the good feeling to happen to everybody else, every time you choose to do that, I believe you get treasure in heaven. And this can happen in all sorts of different ways. Maybe you're playing a game, and you notice that your brother doesn't hang up his jacket on the coat rack. And you know it just frustrates your mother when he doesn't do that. And so you decide to stop your game, to stop having fun, and you get up and you go and you hang up your brother's jacket.

In this moment, when you say, "What mom wants is more important than my fun," you are taking up your cross, not being selfish, and earning treasure in heaven. Or maybe it could be that you and your sister both love the window seat in the back of the van. And you have this tradition. Each one of you raced to the van, and whoever gets there first gets the window seat. But this time, you decide to run a little bit slower and let him win.

Not only does he get to feel good because he thinks he beat you, but he also gets the window seat. When you decide that what he wants is more important than what you want, you're not being selfish, you're taking up your cross, and you're getting treasure in heaven. Final example here.