Watch This if You Have a Low Self-Esteem

• Now I want to go to the next parable and this is my closing thought. And this is where it comes down to you. So we go on in Matthew 13: 45–46. This is the parable I love. I know there are lots of different ways of interpreting parables. And I can say, like a friend of mine, how can I help it if I’m right? I always attribute that to a fellow preacher, Because, it wouldn’t be humble for me to say that.
• Verses 45 and 46, Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant seeking beautiful pearls, and when he had found one pearl of great price, he went and sold all that he had, and bought it. Now there are different ways of applying this, but I want to give you one application which can make a change in your life.
• First of all I want to point out that he was a merchant. He was not a tourist. He was a man who spent all his life dealing in pearls, and he knew the real value of a pearl. And then he found this one pearl, so wonderful and so precious, that he sold all that he had to buy it. This is a little modern version of it.
• But I can imagine him going home to his wife and saying, Honey, I’ve sold our car. You sold our car? Why did you do that? Well, I found a pearl. A pearl? One pearl? Well thank God at any rate we still have a roof over our heads. No, I sold our house too. But you see, he was a man who knew what things were worth.
• He found one pearl that was worth more than everything he had in life and he sold it all and bought the pearl. Now I want you to think for a moment. There are many different ways to interpret this, but I want you to think of yourself tonight as that one pearl, uniquely beautiful and valuable pearl. You know that pearls are the result of suffering.