it up for
the sake of having it.</i> If you do it is in danger, and you are in danger.
It may be stolen. Every vault, and safe, and safety-deposit company, and
lock, and key backs up that statement. Or it may be lost through rust or
moths, the two things that threaten all inactivity. The stuff that isn't
in use wears away. The wear of use can't compare with the wear of disuse
or neglect.

Then <i>you</i> are in danger of your heart being affected. It will be wherever
your treasure is. It may get locked up, and so dried up for lack of air or
poisoned by bad air. The blood must have fresh air. The heart must have
touch with men to keep its vigor. It may get all dried up with <i>things</i>,
instead of keeping vigorous by touch with needy men. That's the twofold
danger. That's the first thing Jesus says: Don't store it up, down here,
in the ordinary way.

The second thing is this: <i>Store your surplus up.</i> Be careful of it. Keep
strict tally. Let the books be well kept and balanced. Let no
thoughtlessness nor carelessness nor thriftlessness get in. Store it up.
But be careful where you store it. Keep it carefully guarded against the
action of thieves and moths, and against the inaction of decaying,
destroying rust. That is the second thing. Store it up carefully.

<u>Be Your Own Executor.</u>

The third thing is this: <i>Store it up by means of exchange.</i> Keep it safe
by giving it away. The whole value of money is in exchange. It must be
kept moving. But, <i>but</i>--and the whole heart of the teaching is here--be
very wary about your exchanges. Invest your money in <i>men</i>, wherever the
need may be. All that you invest wisely in men is stored up against any
violence or craftiness of thieves and any corroding of rust.

All that is not out in active use directly among men, for men, in Jesus'
name, is in danger of being stolen, or of decaying, or of injuring you, or
of being left behind, utterly worthless to you when you are through down
here. Be your own executor.

Some years ago one of the religious papers of New York City told of the
death of a maiden lady named Elizabeth Pellit. Her home was in the
hall-room of a tenement-house, and at her death all her earthly
possessions could be put into one common trunk. No executor or
administrator was needed. Living in narrow circumstances, her friends
thought she had denied herself all luxuries and even many comforts. But in
the forty years of her Christian l