Treasure in a Field

“The kingdom of heaven is like unto a treasure hidden in the field; which a man found, and hid; and in his joy he goeth and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field.” — Matthew 13:44 (ASV)

Under his father’s will, Charlie was to receive his share of the family fortune at twenty-five. He turned twenty-five on 2 December 1885, in China. Legacies take time, and it was around the turn of 1887 before he could do anything with it.

He already knew what he would do. He kept reading what Jesus told a rich young man: “go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, follow me.” He knew most Christians didn’t take that as addressed to them. He thought it was addressed to him. He was in a mission that asked its workers to trust God for their daily bread. How could he honestly do that with a fortune held in reserve?

The day usually given is 13 January 1887. According to the accounts, he wrote a series of cheques before he even knew the exact size of his inheritance. When he learned the full amount, he gave away most of what was left. The total is reported at between £25,000 and about £29,000. By most reckonings that’s several million pounds today. It was the whole of his own share.

The best-known gifts were about £5,000 each, to four men. One went to D. L. Moody, the evangelist who had reached his father and restored his own faith; it seems to have gone towards Moody’s training work for ordinary Christian workers in Chicago, which grew into the Moody Bible Institute. One went to George Müller of Bristol, who cared for thousands of orphans without ever asking anyone but God for money; Studd asked that most of it go to missions. One went to George Holland, who ran a mission in the slums of Whitechapel in London. And one went to Frederick Booth-Tucker, who had given up a career in the Indian civil service to lead the Salvation Army in India, where its officers lived barefoot among the poor in Indian clothes.

Notice the pattern. Every one of those men lived by faith and among the poor. Two of the gifts went to India, where the family fortune had been made. Whether Studd thought of it as paying something back isn’t recorded. It looks like it.

He kept back about £3,400, which he meant for a future wife. And there’s something he couldn’t give away even if he tried: he was still an English gentleman from a well-connected family that would help him when he was ill and open doors all his life. That doesn’t shrink his gift. But it helps explain why, later, he sometimes failed to understand that people without his background couldn’t live the way he did.

Was it wise? People argued at the time and still do. A fortune invested could have funded mission work for generations. Paul told Timothy to charge the rich to be “ready to distribute, willing to communicate,” which is a command to generosity, not to poverty. But Jesus did sometimes ask particular people for everything. Studd believed he was one of them. It’s hard to prove him wrong.

The saying most often linked with Studd fits this moment, though nobody has traced it to anything he published and its wording varies. It is the saying traditionally attributed to him: “If Jesus Christ be God and died for me, then no sacrifice can be too great for me to make for Him.”

The key words in Jesus’ parable are “in his joy.” The man isn’t making a sacrifice. He’s making the best deal of his life. Every account says that’s how Studd felt. He never spoke of the money with regret. Hold on to that, because later in his story the joy sometimes went missing. Giving away your own fortune gladly is one thing. Demanding that others give, and being angry at their slowness, is another.

One thing to do this week: give something away that actually costs you, money, time or a thing you like, quietly and gladly. Don’t post about it. Afterwards notice whether it felt like loss or like freedom.