My wife bought me a metal detector a couple of years ago for my birthday. I told her I wanted one, and she being the great wife that she is, went to a local store and got me a really cool looking model. I could hardly wait to put the batteries in it, and give it a try. I wanned and waved it over our yard, and even some parts of our back pasture. And, I discovered that it worked. It actually detected metal.

I found three or four old, rusty nails. I found a four-foot piece of barbed wire. And I uncovered at least five tabs off of soda cans. The excitement of looking for stuff with my metal detector wore off faster than I imagined, though. It’s sitting in the corner of my shop, gathering dust.

Well, yesterday my wife and I were having dinner with a group of our friends, and one of them showed me a beautiful wooden case he’d brought with him, with several small vials of gold nuggets he’d found with his metal detector when he took it up into the mountains, here in Northern California. When I looked at those beautiful, glittering gold nuggets, I thought about my metal detector in the corner of my shop, and how I’d never found any treasures with my detector.

One of the reasons I’ve never found any gold with my detector is because I’ve never looked in a place that might have some gold. I took my metal detector out to our back yard. That’s an ok place to metal detect if you’re looking old nails and bobbed wire, I guess, but if you’re looking for gold? You might want to try the mountains.

Or even the beach. I’ve heard all kinds of stories about people who lose valuable things like rings and necklaces in the sand at the beach. My metal detector has been sitting in my shop so long now I’d have to probably change the batteries, but then, if I took it out to the beach? There’s no telling what kinds of cool stuff I might find. But it’s still sitting in my shop.

Funny how really good intentions can amount to nothing more than novel experiments or possibilities, if all I do is lean them up against some spare wall in my life. Truth is: I’m surrounded by treasures, every day. And I certainly don’t need some kind of ‘gadget’ to locate them for me. They’re everywhere I look. God allows people — all kinds of good-as-gold people to cross my path every day. If I take the time to notice them, they enrich my life with love and meaning and joy. I don’t need some kind of imaginative ‘people-detector’ to see what’s all around me. All I need to do is pay attention.

If I open my eyes to the richness of life in God’s Kingdom, I will discover amazing treasure, as I walk along the path of my life.

Isa. 45:3 says, “I will give you hidden treasures, riches stored in secret places ….” I’m determined that my deep desire in life will be to search out the hidden treasures in those secret places God has promised … every day.