Coveting and Simplicity(21Nov10)
Series: Loving God through the Ten Commandments
Ten Commandments M9 Sermon Notes (10 11 21)
Speaker: Ken Shigematsu
Title: Coveting and Simplicity
Text: Deuteronomy 5:21; 1 Timothy 6:6
BIG IDEA: We are freed from coveting when we feast on God.
In the movie Amadeus, Salieri was the court musician in Vienna. He worked hard at his music, writing reasonably good melodies and choral pieces.
As a young man he had prayed fervently, "God, Let me make music that will glorify you… Through my music, help me lift the hearts of people to heaven.”
Then came boy-wonder—the young Mozart. His music dazzled people. His melodies were complex and fun all at the same time; they soared and seemed to bring heaven to earth.
But Mozart, at least as the film portrayed him, was immature, vain, and vulgar. He chased girls around the room and he giggled with a silly, irritating laugh. Salieri grew miserable coveting Mozart`s talents. Salieri had lived a holy and obedient life. Why shouldn’t he enjoy some of that kind of success?
Have we all looked at a sibling, or colleague, or friend and thought if only I had their_______. Haven't we all coveted someone else's success or salary, or spouse or situation?
Today as we come to the end of our series in the Ten Commandments, we’re going to look at the commandment against coveting.
If you have your Bibles please turn to Deuteronomy 5:21
21 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife. You shall not set your desire on your neighbor’s house or land, his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”
The translation for the Hebrew word translated in English covet, hamad, means to over-desire something, to want something inordinately. We may dream about the thing we want, we may feel that our life has no meaning or value or significance without that thing or person. Our coveting may even become so strong that we are willing to do almost anything to get it and experience utter despair if we don’t. There is nothing wrong with desiring something. Desire itself is a gift from God. But when we covet, i.e. when over-desire something to point where we feel that our life would have no meaning or significance or value without that thing or person, when we do almost anything to get that thing or person, where we would feel complete despair if we didn't get that thing or person, when our desire for that thing or person becomes greater than our desire for God, then we have broken the Tenth Commandment and have sinned by coveting.
In the first message in this series, No god but God, we alluded to the fact that all the other commandments flow from the first commandment, “You shall have no other gods before me.” Or framed positively, “Thou shall put God first.” If we could consciously choose to keep only one commandment, the most important commandment to keep would be the First Commandment; that is, “To have no other gods, but God.” That is to put God first. If we kept the First Commandment and had no god but God, by definition we would keep the Second Commandment. We would not have any idols, whether those idols are romance, family, career, making money... If we kept the First Commandment and had no god but God we would never, as KP talked about, empty the name of God of its value by not living in a way that reflected the name and character of God. If we kept the First Commandment, we would honour Sabbath, as Jade (Dan and Lee) talked about, and honour our parents… on so on…. And we would keep this Tenth Commandment: if we had put God first, we would not covet our neighbour’s spouse or stuff.
The First Commandment seems really important if we think of it in that light. It is foundational and the key to keeping all the others.
The Tenth Commandment, at least on first glance, doesn’t seem all that important. We might ask, “Why is there a commandment against coveting? What’s the big deal in coveting?” The Tenth Commandment, though it may not appear so on the surface, is a foundational commandment like the First Commandment, which calls us to put God first in our heart. The Tenth Commandment shows us just how important the attitude of our heart is.
As we read Jesus’ great Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew, we see that what is most important to God is not simply the external keeping of the commandments, but the attitude of our heart in honouring the intention of the commandment. When Jesus spoke on the Sixth Commandment against murder, he also condemned the destructive anger that we can harbor in our hearts, the anger that leads to murder and, if not literal murder, to the maiming of others through our words. Jesus affirmed that committing adultery was wrong, but he also condemned staring at another person in order to deepen our sexual desire for that person (assuming we do not have a relationship with that person) so we would take the person sexually, if we could. With Jesus, it wasn’t just the outward action, but the inner attitude of our heart that mattered.
Now, the reason why the Tenth Commandment against coveting is so foundational is because it helps us ensure that the state of our heart is in alignment with God and his intentions for us. If we are people who covet, we will commit other sins. We know this from experience and we see clearly this illustrated in Scripture.
In the book of Joshua we read about a man named Achan who came across silver, a wedge of gold, and the equivalent of an Armani suit, all that were not his. We read in Scripture that he coveted them and stole them (Joshua 7:21). Achan’s coveting these valuables led him to break the Ninth Commandment against stealing.
King David, the great shepherd king of Israel, on a balmy spring evening was out on the roof of his palace. He was bored and he was restless. He noticed a beautiful woman named Bathsheba bathing. She was married to one of David’s most loyal soldiers, Uriah the Hittite. David did not simply admire her beauty. He stared at her and deepened his sexual desire for her, such that he wanted to take her. And as the King of Israel he had the power to do so. David’s coveting of Bathsheba, another man’s wife, led him to adultery (2 Samuel 11-12) and later to the murder of her husband.
In 1 Kings 21 we read of King Ahab, an evil king of Israel, who covets the vineyard of a man named Naboth. As a result of his coveting Naboth’s vineyard, he actually ends up breaking three of the commandments. He uses false witnesses to testify against Naboth accusing him of cursing God and the King, breaking the Ninth Commandment so Naboth is executed. Ahab breaks the Sixth Commandment against murder. Then he breaks the Eighth Commandment against stealing by confiscating Naboth’s vineyard. So coveting, in the case of Ahab, leads to lying, murder and theft.
We could continue to add examples of how coveting causes us to break all the Ten Commandments. God didn’t just add the Tenth Commandment against coveting because he wanted ten, which is considered a more complete number than nine, and so was desperate to come up with something.
No, he added the Tenth Commandment because the Tenth Commandment, like the First, is foundational. When we keep the First Commandment, we are able to keep the Tenth Commandment, which is arguably the least concrete, but the one that most deals with the attitude of our hearts--by keeping the First Commandment, putting God first, having no god but God, we are able to keep the Tenth.
If we don’t keep the First Commandment we will find ourselves coveting.
As we talked about in the first message in this series, the Ten Commandments reflect the way we were designed, the way we were made. We were created to put God first. We were made to worship and serve the living God. If we don’t worship and serve the Living God, the desire to seek and serve God will be redirected and we will seek and serve something else.
In Romans 1:5, we read:
25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
We were created to worship and serve the living God, but if we don’t worship and serve the Creator, we will worship and serve created things. If we don’t find our meaning and value and significance in seeking and serving the Living God, we will put our value, significance and meaning in some thing or someone else. It might be a romantic relationship or having a particular kind of family, or the approval of someone important in our life. It might be career or making money. It might be your beauty or your athletic ability or your brains or some great cause. Or perhaps the Christian ministry. If we don’t turn to the Living God for our value, meaning and significance, we will covet value or meaning or significance in some one or something else. Not putting God first leads to idolatry and idolatry leads to coveting.
Part of what is so diabolical about coveting is that even when we attain the thing that we are coveting, if the thing we are coveting does not include God, we will eventually feel empty.
Scottie Pippen, the famous basketball player and a long-time teammate of Michael Jordan, was born into a small house crammed with lots of people and didn't have much as a boy. But his journey into the NBA changed all that. His NBA contract promised him at least $14.7 million a year—which did not include income from his endorsements. He already owned a 74-foot yacht and a $100,000 Mercedes.
But that doesn't shield him comparing himself to others and coveting. A Sports Illustrated feature said: "Before every [home] game in Portland's… Pippen lets his gaze drift over to the courtside seat occupied by Paul Allen, cofounder of Microsoft and owner of both the Trail Blazers and the Seattle Seahawks, a man with a personal net worth of $40 billion. 'What does he have?' Pippen asks. 'Forty billion? How can I make just one billion? I just want one of them! What do I need to do?'"
If Pippen gets his one billion one day, will he be satisfied?
Part of the reason that attaining what we covet will not satisfy us long term is because we are always apt to compare our self to someone who has more…
I read a column by Pico Iyer in the New York Times. He was writing about how he now wanted to simplify his life, after having felt like he had had enough of the rat-race in the corporate world. He wrote: “I remember how in the corporate world I always knew there was some higher position I could attain which meant that like Zeno’s arrow I was guaranteed to never arrive, always to remain dissatisfied.”
Even if we momentarily reach the very pinnacle of whatever it is that is our thing—whether it’s money, to become the richest person in the world—if it’s a career, we become the leading person in the world in that field or end up with our “dream person” and we are momentarily on top of the world--without God—eventually--we feel there is a part of us that is empty, because God made a part of our heart so deep that no amount of money, no career achievement, no romantic relationship can fully satisfy us.
C. S. Lewis said, “Nothing in this world can completely satisfy us because we were made for something beyond this world.” We were made for God.
So how do we become people who honour this Tenth Commandment?
One of the ways we are prepared to practically honour the Tenth Commandment against coveting is by shunning comparisons. I know it is impossible to completely stop comparing ourselves to others, but in so far as possible avoid comparing.
The reason that Scottie Pippin was not satisfied with a $15 million a year contract was because he was comparing himself to Paul Allen. When we compare ourselves, we usually compare ourselves to people further down the path from us and that leads to coveting.
If we compare our appearance to someone we consider more attractive than us--it will lead to coveting that person’s looks.
If we compare our work and career curve to someone else we consider is doing better than we are--we will also find ourselves coveting.
(Now the answer is not to compare yourself with someone who is doing less well than you are. The answer isn't to look backwards over your shoulder and say, "you're such a loser." That simply leads to pride.)
In general, it's simply best to avoid comparing yourself to other people and their situations. "If only, if only, if only..." can be a deadly phrase. Thinking things like, "if only I had her boyfriend" or “his family” "if only I had their salary" or “if only I had that job..." This kind of thinking only intensifies our coveting, leads to misery, and may in fact set us on a path that we were never intended to travel down, as we seek to live someone else's story.
Near the end of the Gospel of John, Jesus implies to Peter that he would die a martyr's death. Peter then asks Jesus, "What about John, what will his path be?" Jesus replies, "What is that to you?" Some of us are tempted to compare our path to the path of someone else, and Jesus may well be saying, "What is that to you?"
I have been reading Wynton Marsalis’s book, Letters to a Young Jazz Musician, and in that book Marsalis says in speaking to young musicians, “Be yourself.” He says, “Duke Ellington (the great jazz musician) said it best: ‘It’s better to be a number one yourself than a number two somebody else’.” 2x. I love that. You get the next world, God will not ask you, "why are you not Moses?" Or "why were you not Mother Teresa?" He'll ask you, "why were you not you?"
Part of what it means to avoid the sin of coveting is to refuse to compare, and to embrace the unique call that God has on your life.
And, second, you know where I am going now. The way to honour the Tenth Commandment is to put God first.
We have longings, powerful, primal longings, and the best way to deal with those longings is to channel them to the One for whom they were made.
Gerald May, the acclaimed psychiatrist, in his extremely helpful book, Addiction and Grace, writes, “After 20 years of listening to the yearnings of people’s hearts, I am convinced that all human beings have an inborn desire for God. Whether we are consciously religious or not, this desire is our deepest longing and our most precious treasure.”
And so, we honour the Tenth Commandment by directing our cravings, our primal longings toward the one for whom we were made, the Living God.
Jesus said, “I am the bread of life; whosoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst” (John 6:35).
We are hungry people, but all of our hungers, whether it is for love, romance, family, finding meaning in our work or career, all of these hungers are all symptoms of our craving for God.
So we honour the commandment against coveting by seeking to find our heart’s satisfaction in God. As that happens we find ourselves more content. The apostle Paul in 1 Timothy 6:6 says:
6 But godliness with contentment is great gain.
To people who are running after money and other idols, godliness coupled with contentment would be a great gain. As many people have observed, there is a clear link between godliness and contentment. It’s no accident Paul mentions has them side by side in this verse. Godliness leads to contentment.
St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622), the author of the great book, Introduction to the Devout Life wrote: “The immature are unhappy over what they don’t have, and the mature are happy with what they do have.”
It as we find our self increasingly satisfied in God that we will find ourselves content.
So feast on God and drink of the Holy Spirit.
Embrace the forgiveness and the friendship that is offered to you through God’s Son Jesus Christ who died on the cross, absorbing your sin and shame so that you can be forgiven and freed and adopted into God’s family as a treasured son or daughter and friend.
Eat--Jesus who is the bread of life and drink of the Holy Spirit.
Some of you may be saying, "But, don’t you have to say that as a preacher?"
In your heart, some of you have said in effect, "What good is it to have God in my life, if I don't have this or that?"
I have a mentor who serves a pastor in New York City. Before serving in New York, as younger pastor he served a small church in Virginia. I remember him sharing that while he was in Virginia, he was counseling a teenage girl in his office. She was quite depressed because she was thin to the point of being unattractive. She also was having some skin problems. She was so down because she couldn't attract any boys. Tim, leaned forward and said, "You don't have to be depressed... you have no reason to be down... Think about it, you have Jesus Christ. Your sins have been forgiven. You've been adopted into God's family. You are a daughter of the King."
This teenage girl responded by saying, "Yeah, so what? What good does that do me if I can't get any dates?"
Most of us adults are too polite to say that. But, in our hearts some of us have said, "What good is it to have God if I don't have_______?
If we really treasure Christ in our hearts--we will find ourselves coveting less, more grateful, and more content.
I know this all sounds somewhat abstract. So let me illustrate from my own experience.
As I said a couple weeks ago, when I was a young teenager, I love the rush of shoplifting. I also enjoyed the thrill of temporarily borrowing other people's cars and joyriding. (I had a friend who worked at the gas station – I had connections.) My dad became concerned about me. He took me on an open house to prison. He later said, “I just wanted you to see your future home – free room and board, courtesy of the Canadian government.” It didn't phase me. My dad had just become a Christian. So he took me to a Christian youth conference. At that conference I receive Christ in my life and my life begins to change.
To my great surprise, I find myself with a hunger to read the Bible. I also discover that I have a new love for learning. Up to this point, I had been a "C" or "D" student. With my new love for learning, my grades start to rise from the ashes. As a fairly new follower of Christ, my youth pastor Jack Campbell received the call to become a missionary in Africa. It was a big loss. But it also became an opportunity for me and my friend Dave to become the de facto leaders of our youth group. And while I was not the best athlete on the sports teams, it seemed that my teammates were counting on me more. They wanted to get the ball into my hands at the end of the game.
From time to time people would describe me metaphorically as a "favored son."
As a young person doors opened for me. Doors opened to the school I really wanted to study at. A door opens to the company that I really want to work for in Tokyo. Not long after finishing seminary, this door--the door to Tenth opens--even when people say it probably won't because I am young, single, and an ethnic minority. As I shared last Sunday, the door opens for me to marry the girl I really want to marry.
I feel blessed. I feel like I'm living the role of his favored, blessed son.
Then– to our surprise, we get pregnant, and a couple of years ago Joey is born.
Now, Joey has been such a great gift to us--a miraculous gift--from God.
But my life, as it should, really changes once Joey is born.
After a trip to Mexico when Joey is just six weeks old--where I was hoping that he would rise to the occasion--his behavior at six weeks tanks – then I make a decision to cut my traveling and speaking way back. It's the right decision.
But if I'm honest, there are times when I have observed how some of the people I went to school with who married and started families earlier than I did are now at the point where their kids are older and so they are traveling and speaking more than I am. And I can covet their situation. I can even covet earlier versions of my work life when I was out and about more.
But I sense God calling me to resist the temptation to compare them to embrace the gifts of my current calling.
Here's the irony: to be honest, there are still moments when I wish I had the freedom to represent Canada as a Christian leader at a recent conference in Cape Town, South Africa or to accept an invitation to speak in Scotland, the country that I love, but the irony is I have shared spontaneously many times with Sakiko at our small dining table at home over dinner, "This is one of the most happy seasons of my life." My life is not very glamorous these days; in many ways it's very ordinary. But my ordinary life with God, my ordinary life with my family... The stuff that's not at all dazzling to the outside world... feel like such precious gifts. I find myself deeply grateful.
Sometimes we feel that our life will begin, really begin when this happens or that happens...
Our life would finally begin if only, if only, if only...
But perhaps for some of us, our greatest gifts have already been given to us... in the ordinary circumstances of our lives. God is calling us to discover what we already have.
St. Augustine once prayed, "Ancient beauty, ever new, you were within me, but I was living outside of myself.” Whether we know it or not, if we have Christ we already have a treasure that is worth more than all the world. The people around us who love us and whom we love, we are treasures that are worth more all gold or rubies in the world or all stocks of Apple or Google combined. Perhaps for some of us the path to from coveting to contentment is discovering what we already have.
Our hope for the Practicing the Presence movement, where over 1000 people have committed to spending time with God, is not just that we get more information, but that we pause long enough to recognize the infinite gift that we have in God the perfect father and his Son Jesus Christ, who died to redeem us, and in the Holy Spirit. And as a result of that, we would be the grateful for the gifts that God has given us in the people and circumstances of our everyday, ordinary lives
It is as our heart is increasingly satisfied in God and his gifts for us that we will be less tempted to covet after things that ultimately not satisfy us anyway and more content.
John Piper is a pastor from Minnesota, who wrote a book called The Pleasures of God.
He dedicates that book to his sons. He writes these words:
“Finally, a word to my sons…. If there is a legacy I want to leave you, it is not money or house or land; it is a vision of God—as great and glorious a God as one could ever see. But more than that, I want to leave the legacy of passion for this God. A passion far beyond what any human being can produce. A passion for God flowing from the very heart of God. Never forget that God is most glorified in you when you are most satisfied in him….”
Ten Commandments M9 Sermon Notes (10 11 21)
Speaker: Ken Shigematsu
Title: Coveting and Simplicity
Text: Deuteronomy 5:21; 1 Timothy 6:6
BIG IDEA: We are freed from coveting when we feast on God.
In the movie Amadeus, Salieri was the court musician in Vienna. He worked hard at his music, writing reasonably good melodies and choral pieces.
As a young man he had prayed fervently, "God, Let me make music that will glorify you… Through my music, help me lift the hearts of people to heaven.”
Then came boy-wonder—the young Mozart. His music dazzled people. His melodies were complex and fun all at the same time; they soared and seemed to bring heaven to earth.
But Mozart, at least as the film portrayed him, was immature, vain, and vulgar. He chased girls around the room and he giggled with a silly, irritating laugh. Salieri grew miserable coveting Mozart`s talents. Salieri had lived a holy and obedient life. Why shouldn’t he enjoy some of that kind of success?
Have we all looked at a sibling, or colleague, or friend and thought if only I had their_______. Haven't we all coveted someone else's success or salary, or spouse or situation?
Today as we come to the end of our series in the Ten Commandments, we’re going to look at the commandment against coveting.
If you have your Bibles please turn to Deuteronomy 5:21
21 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife. You shall not set your desire on your neighbor’s house or land, his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”
The translation for the Hebrew word translated in English covet, hamad, means to over-desire something, to want something inordinately. We may dream about the thing we want, we may feel that our life has no meaning or value or significance without that thing or person. Our coveting may even become so strong that we are willing to do almost anything to get it and experience utter despair if we don’t. There is nothing wrong with desiring something. Desire itself is a gift from God. But when we covet, i.e. when over-desire something to point where we feel that our life would have no meaning or significance or value without that thing or person, when we do almost anything to get that thing or person, where we would feel complete despair if we didn't get that thing or person, when our desire for that thing or person becomes greater than our desire for God, then we have broken the Tenth Commandment and have sinned by coveting.
In the first message in this series, No god but God, we alluded to the fact that all the other commandments flow from the first commandment, “You shall have no other gods before me.” Or framed positively, “Thou shall put God first.” If we could consciously choose to keep only one commandment, the most important commandment to keep would be the First Commandment; that is, “To have no other gods, but God.” That is to put God first. If we kept the First Commandment and had no god but God, by definition we would keep the Second Commandment. We would not have any idols, whether those idols are romance, family, career, making money... If we kept the First Commandment and had no god but God we would never, as KP talked about, empty the name of God of its value by not living in a way that reflected the name and character of God. If we kept the First Commandment, we would honour Sabbath, as Jade (Dan and Lee) talked about, and honour our parents… on so on…. And we would keep this Tenth Commandment: if we had put God first, we would not covet our neighbour’s spouse or stuff.
The First Commandment seems really important if we think of it in that light. It is foundational and the key to keeping all the others.
The Tenth Commandment, at least on first glance, doesn’t seem all that important. We might ask, “Why is there a commandment against coveting? What’s the big deal in coveting?” The Tenth Commandment, though it may not appear so on the surface, is a foundational commandment like the First Commandment, which calls us to put God first in our heart. The Tenth Commandment shows us just how important the attitude of our heart is.
As we read Jesus’ great Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew, we see that what is most important to God is not simply the external keeping of the commandments, but the attitude of our heart in honouring the intention of the commandment. When Jesus spoke on the Sixth Commandment against murder, he also condemned the destructive anger that we can harbor in our hearts, the anger that leads to murder and, if not literal murder, to the maiming of others through our words. Jesus affirmed that committing adultery was wrong, but he also condemned staring at another person in order to deepen our sexual desire for that person (assuming we do not have a relationship with that person) so we would take the person sexually, if we could. With Jesus, it wasn’t just the outward action, but the inner attitude of our heart that mattered.
Now, the reason why the Tenth Commandment against coveting is so foundational is because it helps us ensure that the state of our heart is in alignment with God and his intentions for us. If we are people who covet, we will commit other sins. We know this from experience and we see clearly this illustrated in Scripture.
In the book of Joshua we read about a man named Achan who came across silver, a wedge of gold, and the equivalent of an Armani suit, all that were not his. We read in Scripture that he coveted them and stole them (Joshua 7:21). Achan’s coveting these valuables led him to break the Ninth Commandment against stealing.
King David, the great shepherd king of Israel, on a balmy spring evening was out on the roof of his palace. He was bored and he was restless. He noticed a beautiful woman named Bathsheba bathing. She was married to one of David’s most loyal soldiers, Uriah the Hittite. David did not simply admire her beauty. He stared at her and deepened his sexual desire for her, such that he wanted to take her. And as the King of Israel he had the power to do so. David’s coveting of Bathsheba, another man’s wife, led him to adultery (2 Samuel 11-12) and later to the murder of her husband.
In 1 Kings 21 we read of King Ahab, an evil king of Israel, who covets the vineyard of a man named Naboth. As a result of his coveting Naboth’s vineyard, he actually ends up breaking three of the commandments. He uses false witnesses to testify against Naboth accusing him of cursing God and the King, breaking the Ninth Commandment so Naboth is executed. Ahab breaks the Sixth Commandment against murder. Then he breaks the Eighth Commandment against stealing by confiscating Naboth’s vineyard. So coveting, in the case of Ahab, leads to lying, murder and theft.
We could continue to add examples of how coveting causes us to break all the Ten Commandments. God didn’t just add the Tenth Commandment against coveting because he wanted ten, which is considered a more complete number than nine, and so was desperate to come up with something.
No, he added the Tenth Commandment because the Tenth Commandment, like the First, is foundational. When we keep the First Commandment, we are able to keep the Tenth Commandment, which is arguably the least concrete, but the one that most deals with the attitude of our hearts--by keeping the First Commandment, putting God first, having no god but God, we are able to keep the Tenth.
If we don’t keep the First Commandment we will find ourselves coveting.
As we talked about in the first message in this series, the Ten Commandments reflect the way we were designed, the way we were made. We were created to put God first. We were made to worship and serve the living God. If we don’t worship and serve the Living God, the desire to seek and serve God will be redirected and we will seek and serve something else.
In Romans 1:5, we read:
25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
We were created to worship and serve the living God, but if we don’t worship and serve the Creator, we will worship and serve created things. If we don’t find our meaning and value and significance in seeking and serving the Living God, we will put our value, significance and meaning in some thing or someone else. It might be a romantic relationship or having a particular kind of family, or the approval of someone important in our life. It might be career or making money. It might be your beauty or your athletic ability or your brains or some great cause. Or perhaps the Christian ministry. If we don’t turn to the Living God for our value, meaning and significance, we will covet value or meaning or significance in some one or something else. Not putting God first leads to idolatry and idolatry leads to coveting.
Part of what is so diabolical about coveting is that even when we attain the thing that we are coveting, if the thing we are coveting does not include God, we will eventually feel empty.
Scottie Pippen, the famous basketball player and a long-time teammate of Michael Jordan, was born into a small house crammed with lots of people and didn't have much as a boy. But his journey into the NBA changed all that. His NBA contract promised him at least $14.7 million a year—which did not include income from his endorsements. He already owned a 74-foot yacht and a $100,000 Mercedes.
But that doesn't shield him comparing himself to others and coveting. A Sports Illustrated feature said: "Before every [home] game in Portland's… Pippen lets his gaze drift over to the courtside seat occupied by Paul Allen, cofounder of Microsoft and owner of both the Trail Blazers and the Seattle Seahawks, a man with a personal net worth of $40 billion. 'What does he have?' Pippen asks. 'Forty billion? How can I make just one billion? I just want one of them! What do I need to do?'"
If Pippen gets his one billion one day, will he be satisfied?
Part of the reason that attaining what we covet will not satisfy us long term is because we are always apt to compare our self to someone who has more…
I read a column by Pico Iyer in the New York Times. He was writing about how he now wanted to simplify his life, after having felt like he had had enough of the rat-race in the corporate world. He wrote: “I remember how in the corporate world I always knew there was some higher position I could attain which meant that like Zeno’s arrow I was guaranteed to never arrive, always to remain dissatisfied.”
Even if we momentarily reach the very pinnacle of whatever it is that is our thing—whether it’s money, to become the richest person in the world—if it’s a career, we become the leading person in the world in that field or end up with our “dream person” and we are momentarily on top of the world--without God—eventually--we feel there is a part of us that is empty, because God made a part of our heart so deep that no amount of money, no career achievement, no romantic relationship can fully satisfy us.
C. S. Lewis said, “Nothing in this world can completely satisfy us because we were made for something beyond this world.” We were made for God.
So how do we become people who honour this Tenth Commandment?
One of the ways we are prepared to practically honour the Tenth Commandment against coveting is by shunning comparisons. I know it is impossible to completely stop comparing ourselves to others, but in so far as possible avoid comparing.
The reason that Scottie Pippin was not satisfied with a $15 million a year contract was because he was comparing himself to Paul Allen. When we compare ourselves, we usually compare ourselves to people further down the path from us and that leads to coveting.
If we compare our appearance to someone we consider more attractive than us--it will lead to coveting that person’s looks.
If we compare our work and career curve to someone else we consider is doing better than we are--we will also find ourselves coveting.
(Now the answer is not to compare yourself with someone who is doing less well than you are. The answer isn't to look backwards over your shoulder and say, "you're such a loser." That simply leads to pride.)
In general, it's simply best to avoid comparing yourself to other people and their situations. "If only, if only, if only..." can be a deadly phrase. Thinking things like, "if only I had her boyfriend" or “his family” "if only I had their salary" or “if only I had that job..." This kind of thinking only intensifies our coveting, leads to misery, and may in fact set us on a path that we were never intended to travel down, as we seek to live someone else's story.
Near the end of the Gospel of John, Jesus implies to Peter that he would die a martyr's death. Peter then asks Jesus, "What about John, what will his path be?" Jesus replies, "What is that to you?" Some of us are tempted to compare our path to the path of someone else, and Jesus may well be saying, "What is that to you?"
I have been reading Wynton Marsalis’s book, Letters to a Young Jazz Musician, and in that book Marsalis says in speaking to young musicians, “Be yourself.” He says, “Duke Ellington (the great jazz musician) said it best: ‘It’s better to be a number one yourself than a number two somebody else’.” 2x. I love that. You get the next world, God will not ask you, "why are you not Moses?" Or "why were you not Mother Teresa?" He'll ask you, "why were you not you?"
Part of what it means to avoid the sin of coveting is to refuse to compare, and to embrace the unique call that God has on your life.
And, second, you know where I am going now. The way to honour the Tenth Commandment is to put God first.
We have longings, powerful, primal longings, and the best way to deal with those longings is to channel them to the One for whom they were made.
Gerald May, the acclaimed psychiatrist, in his extremely helpful book, Addiction and Grace, writes, “After 20 years of listening to the yearnings of people’s hearts, I am convinced that all human beings have an inborn desire for God. Whether we are consciously religious or not, this desire is our deepest longing and our most precious treasure.”
And so, we honour the Tenth Commandment by directing our cravings, our primal longings toward the one for whom we were made, the Living God.
Jesus said, “I am the bread of life; whosoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst” (John 6:35).
We are hungry people, but all of our hungers, whether it is for love, romance, family, finding meaning in our work or career, all of these hungers are all symptoms of our craving for God.
So we honour the commandment against coveting by seeking to find our heart’s satisfaction in God. As that happens we find ourselves more content. The apostle Paul in 1 Timothy 6:6 says:
6 But godliness with contentment is great gain.
To people who are running after money and other idols, godliness coupled with contentment would be a great gain. As many people have observed, there is a clear link between godliness and contentment. It’s no accident Paul mentions has them side by side in this verse. Godliness leads to contentment.
St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622), the author of the great book, Introduction to the Devout Life wrote: “The immature are unhappy over what they don’t have, and the mature are happy with what they do have.”
It as we find our self increasingly satisfied in God that we will find ourselves content.
So feast on God and drink of the Holy Spirit.
Embrace the forgiveness and the friendship that is offered to you through God’s Son Jesus Christ who died on the cross, absorbing your sin and shame so that you can be forgiven and freed and adopted into God’s family as a treasured son or daughter and friend.
Eat--Jesus who is the bread of life and drink of the Holy Spirit.
Some of you may be saying, "But, don’t you have to say that as a preacher?"
In your heart, some of you have said in effect, "What good is it to have God in my life, if I don't have this or that?"
I have a mentor who serves a pastor in New York City. Before serving in New York, as younger pastor he served a small church in Virginia. I remember him sharing that while he was in Virginia, he was counseling a teenage girl in his office. She was quite depressed because she was thin to the point of being unattractive. She also was having some skin problems. She was so down because she couldn't attract any boys. Tim, leaned forward and said, "You don't have to be depressed... you have no reason to be down... Think about it, you have Jesus Christ. Your sins have been forgiven. You've been adopted into God's family. You are a daughter of the King."
This teenage girl responded by saying, "Yeah, so what? What good does that do me if I can't get any dates?"
Most of us adults are too polite to say that. But, in our hearts some of us have said, "What good is it to have God if I don't have_______?
If we really treasure Christ in our hearts--we will find ourselves coveting less, more grateful, and more content.
I know this all sounds somewhat abstract. So let me illustrate from my own experience.
As I said a couple weeks ago, when I was a young teenager, I love the rush of shoplifting. I also enjoyed the thrill of temporarily borrowing other people's cars and joyriding. (I had a friend who worked at the gas station – I had connections.) My dad became concerned about me. He took me on an open house to prison. He later said, “I just wanted you to see your future home – free room and board, courtesy of the Canadian government.” It didn't phase me. My dad had just become a Christian. So he took me to a Christian youth conference. At that conference I receive Christ in my life and my life begins to change.
To my great surprise, I find myself with a hunger to read the Bible. I also discover that I have a new love for learning. Up to this point, I had been a "C" or "D" student. With my new love for learning, my grades start to rise from the ashes. As a fairly new follower of Christ, my youth pastor Jack Campbell received the call to become a missionary in Africa. It was a big loss. But it also became an opportunity for me and my friend Dave to become the de facto leaders of our youth group. And while I was not the best athlete on the sports teams, it seemed that my teammates were counting on me more. They wanted to get the ball into my hands at the end of the game.
From time to time people would describe me metaphorically as a "favored son."
As a young person doors opened for me. Doors opened to the school I really wanted to study at. A door opens to the company that I really want to work for in Tokyo. Not long after finishing seminary, this door--the door to Tenth opens--even when people say it probably won't because I am young, single, and an ethnic minority. As I shared last Sunday, the door opens for me to marry the girl I really want to marry.
I feel blessed. I feel like I'm living the role of his favored, blessed son.
Then– to our surprise, we get pregnant, and a couple of years ago Joey is born.
Now, Joey has been such a great gift to us--a miraculous gift--from God.
But my life, as it should, really changes once Joey is born.
After a trip to Mexico when Joey is just six weeks old--where I was hoping that he would rise to the occasion--his behavior at six weeks tanks – then I make a decision to cut my traveling and speaking way back. It's the right decision.
But if I'm honest, there are times when I have observed how some of the people I went to school with who married and started families earlier than I did are now at the point where their kids are older and so they are traveling and speaking more than I am. And I can covet their situation. I can even covet earlier versions of my work life when I was out and about more.
But I sense God calling me to resist the temptation to compare them to embrace the gifts of my current calling.
Here's the irony: to be honest, there are still moments when I wish I had the freedom to represent Canada as a Christian leader at a recent conference in Cape Town, South Africa or to accept an invitation to speak in Scotland, the country that I love, but the irony is I have shared spontaneously many times with Sakiko at our small dining table at home over dinner, "This is one of the most happy seasons of my life." My life is not very glamorous these days; in many ways it's very ordinary. But my ordinary life with God, my ordinary life with my family... The stuff that's not at all dazzling to the outside world... feel like such precious gifts. I find myself deeply grateful.
Sometimes we feel that our life will begin, really begin when this happens or that happens...
Our life would finally begin if only, if only, if only...
But perhaps for some of us, our greatest gifts have already been given to us... in the ordinary circumstances of our lives. God is calling us to discover what we already have.
St. Augustine once prayed, "Ancient beauty, ever new, you were within me, but I was living outside of myself.” Whether we know it or not, if we have Christ we already have a treasure that is worth more than all the world. The people around us who love us and whom we love, we are treasures that are worth more all gold or rubies in the world or all stocks of Apple or Google combined. Perhaps for some of us the path to from coveting to contentment is discovering what we already have.
Our hope for the Practicing the Presence movement, where over 1000 people have committed to spending time with God, is not just that we get more information, but that we pause long enough to recognize the infinite gift that we have in God the perfect father and his Son Jesus Christ, who died to redeem us, and in the Holy Spirit. And as a result of that, we would be the grateful for the gifts that God has given us in the people and circumstances of our everyday, ordinary lives
It is as our heart is increasingly satisfied in God and his gifts for us that we will be less tempted to covet after things that ultimately not satisfy us anyway and more content.
John Piper is a pastor from Minnesota, who wrote a book called The Pleasures of God.
He dedicates that book to his sons. He writes these words:
“Finally, a word to my sons…. If there is a legacy I want to leave you, it is not money or house or land; it is a vision of God—as great and glorious a God as one could ever see. But more than that, I want to leave the legacy of passion for this God. A passion far beyond what any human being can produce. A passion for God flowing from the very heart of God. Never forget that God is most glorified in you when you are most satisfied in him….”
posted by Shigematsu at 6:24 PM
1 Comments:
I love your worship today. I can really relate to what you have talked about. Thank you fir the inspiring Sunday.
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