Mt. 6:19 “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal.”
Mt. 6:20 “But lay up for yourselves treasures in Heaven, where neither moth not rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.”
How do we lay up for ourselves treasures in Heaven? However we can do it out to be pretty important to us. We lay up treasures for ourselves by acts of tzedakah. These acts are always directed towards our fellow man, not upwards towards God. When one give with the right attitude, not expecting to receive something in return, he will receive something. You give simply because God expects you to and you do it out of love for Him. “Lose your silver for the sake of a friend or brother, and do not let it rust under a stone and be lost. Lay up treasure according to the commandments of the Most High” (Eccl. 29:10, 11).
Source: Eccl. 29:10, 11
Mt. 6:21 “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
Mt. 6:22 “The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light.”
Mt. 6:23 “But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in your body is darkness, how great is that darkness?”
M:Terumoth 4:3 says, “The person with a good eye gave the fortieth part of the first fruit of the heave offering for the maintaining of the priests, while the person with the evil eye gave a sixtieth.” M:Avoth 5:15 says, “He that gives, but wants a monopoly on giving and does not want others to give too is considered to have an evil eye.” These two verses have been misinterpreted probably about as much as any other in the Gospels. Most of the time, when a sermon is preached concerning them, the subject is usually about lust, or sexual immorality. That is incorrect. The good eye meant a person who was a generous giver and the bad eye meant someone who was stingy. With this knowledge of the eye we can now understand what Yeshua meant when He said if you have a giving attitude, your whole body will be affected.
Sources: M:Avoth 5:15; M:Terumoth 4:3
Today there are those who view Yeshua as an ancient guru leading His disciples in techniques similar to other eastern methods of mystic meditation. These groups rely on the New Testament quotation found in these verses as their proof text because of the phrase “if your eye is single” found in some translations. Although this verse has a Hebraic meaning which from the time of Yeshua meant a liberal giver, those who see Yeshua as a guru claim this verse points to an ancient non-Jewish meditation technique known as the third eye or the single eye. This single eye technique designates a place in the center of one’s forehead as the spot, according to eastern theology, that is the center of spiritual being. While focusing on that spot an individual is believed to be able to become spiritually illuminated. This view has even become popular in some churches where they have adopted the Apocryphal Gospel of Thomas as their basic text, claiming that it is both older and more accurate than the canonical Gospels.
Source: Apocryphal Gospel of Thomas
Mt. 6:24 “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.”
Both Yeshua and Paul declared that we are to die to sin and its laws of bondage on this earth, because we believers cannot serve two masters and belong to God. In one of His famous expressions Yeshua took both sides of the sages and the side of the Dead Sea Sect when He said, “no man can serve tow masters.” The sages describe man as a servant of two masters - his own instincts and his Creator. Yeshua grafted on the Qumran element, speaking on the contrast between God and mammon as a duality between poverty and prosperity, just as it is found in the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Mt. 6:25 “Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat and what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is life not more than food and the body more than clothing?”
Mt. 6:26 “Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?”
When Yeshua said, “take no thought for tomorrow,” He was saying that we should seek to be the demonstration of God’s power today, and all these other things will take care of themselves. M:Kiddushin 4:14 says, “Rabbi Simeon ben Eleanor said, ‘hast thou ever seen a beast or bird that followed a trade? They are fed without toil. These were not only created to minister to me, while I was created to minister to my Maker. Was it not right then that I should be supported without toil? I have marked my work and forfeited my support.”
Source: M:Kiddushin 4:14
Mt. 6:27 “Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?”
Mt. 6:28 “So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin.”
Mt. 6:29 “And yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.”
Mt. 6:30 “Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?”
Mt. 6:31 “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat’ or ‘what shall we wear?’”
A parallel teaching about us not being anxious is found in the Talmud. “Rabbi Eleanor said, ‘whoever has a piece of bread in his basket and says “what shall he eat tomorrow?” belongs to them who are of only little faith.’”
Source: BT:Sotah 48b
Mt. 6:32 “For after these things the Gentiles seek. For your Heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.”
Mt. 6:33 “But seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.”
M:Berachoth 2:2 says, “He who takes on the yoke of the Law shall have the yoke of the Kingdom taken from them.” The rabbis say that this kingdom of the law spoken of here is the oppression of the government. He who quotes the Shema has accepted the yoke of God’s Kingdom, and that is the first step in receiving the yoke of the“n commandments” (M:Avoth 3:5).
Sources: M:Avoth 3:5; M:Berachoth 2:2
Mt. 6:34 “Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble”
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