IDEA: We have to treat covetousness as though it were a disease.
TEXT: "You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s" (Exodus 20:17).
PURPOSE: To help listeners deal with covetousness in their lives.
According to the scientific community, the worst single affliction of the American people is obesity. Do you think people in our country know that? Have they read the articles or heard the programs? Why is it that Americans don’t change their lifestyle?
I. Covetousness is a disease of the soul that resembles obesity.
Christians can read about it in the Bible, but deep down they don’t particularly want to change or they would like to find an easy cure.
It’s also like obesity in that all around us there are fat-food restaurants and there are commercials that urge us to buy more and more of what we don’t really need to stay ahead of people we don’t really know.
It is easier to go with the flow than to try to go against it. In order to overcome obesity, you have to change your lifestyle.
II. If we are serious about not being enslaved with covetousness, then we really need God’s enablement to change.
We have to see that covetousness is destructive. We believe that, not simply because the Bible says it, but because of what we see it doing in our lives.
Covetousness puts you under the burden of credit card debt.
It destroys relationships because we think that giving things to people in place of ourselves is enough.
We have to change the orientation of our lives. Just as you cannot live for food, you cannot live to acquire things. You have to understand where it shows up in your life.
If you find that in order to relax, you go to the mall and shop, that habit is saying something about covetousness in your life.
If you define success in terms of what you have rather than what you are, covetousness is at work.
If you fantasize that all of your problems would be gone if you could only get more money and what money buys, covetousness has done its work.
You have to change the way you live and find your meaning in putting God and what God loves first in your life.
One of the best ways to deal with covetousness is to give your money away.
You don’t really mean give it ALL away? But Jesus in the gospel told the young man to take what he had and give it to the poor [Mt 19:16-22, esp v 21-22].
Does Jesus say this to everyone? Why does this apply to this young man?
Jesus doesn’t mention covetousness, but he does bring in the command not in the decalogue, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." What indication do we have that this young man failed precisely at that point?
III. When it comes to matters of the heart, we need God’s Holy Spirit to enable us to live in spiritual health.