THOU SHALT NOT COVET

This final commandment was the one that exposed both the rich young ruler, and the apostle Paul, Mark 10.21-22; Rom. 7. 7. It is a sin of the mind but it is expressed both in attitude and in action. Coveting your neighbour’s house leads to ‘keeping up with the Joneses’. Coveting his wife results in adultery. Coveting his ser­vants was old-fashioned headhunting. Coveting his ox and his ass was to envy his labour saving devices and his superior means of transport!

The alternative to covetousness is contentment and there are encouragements in scripture to cultivate that happy frame of mind. Allied with godliness, it is said to be ‘great gain’, 1 Tim. 6. 6. By contrast, the covetous spirit invites temptation, and occasions defection and depression, vv. 9-10. Judas is a sombre example. The greatest stimulus to contentment is the promise, ‘I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee’, Heb. 13.5. This encour­aged a ‘lonely woman’, who was ‘dying on a garret floor’. Her consolation was in this, ‘I have Christ, what want I more?’ The soul that is satisfied with Christ will never become obsessed with material things. These will be seen for what they are, transient commodities to be left behind in the transition from this life to the next. For, ‘we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out’, 1 Tim. 6. 7.

A covetous materialistic spirit is perhaps more serious than at first imagined, for scripture brands it as idolatry, Col. 3. 5. The inference is that if we set our hearts on accumulating posses­sions, we are guilty of the sin that brought such displeasure to God in Old Testament times. It is to displace Him as our first pri­ority in life. The sin is so serious that it is included in a list of excommunicable offences, 1 Cor. 5. 9-11. Obviously, for such drastic action to be taken, the sin would have to be expressed in some noticeable way; for example, to incur debt deliberately, with no genuine inclination to repay. That lowers the assembly’s reputation in the district; hence, the culprit must come under church discipline. Let us rather learn the secret into which Paul had been initiated, ‘I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content’, Phil. 4.11.