Creeping Covetousness

Michael Jastremski for openphoto.net

So far, today has been one of those days where anything good happening to anyone else just makes me want to bawl.  That sounds terrible, I know.  But it’s the truth.  Examples of “good things” friends have shared with me thus far today have been the news that one is on the hunt for a house, a picture of a newly-emerging baby bump, and a professionally-taken family photo of a very cute young couple with their adorable baby. 

 I feel happy for each of my friends and for the good things going on in their lives.  I do.  But spoiling that happiness is a creeping covetousness that causes me to dwell on the fact that I’ve been married just a few weeks short of eight years and still don’t have a house, that I didn’t have as cute of a baby bump that early on in my pregnancy—and that that’s probably because I wasn’t as flat-stomached to begin with as the lovely gal sporting the bump—and that I can’t afford professional family photos at the moment.

 My shameful reaction to my friends’ fortune reminds me of an interaction I had with a particularly critical peer back in high school.  I remember her standing squarely in front of me as she proceeded to give me an obvious, unasked-for once-over.  I shifted my weight uneasily as I followed her descending gaze all the way down to my feet, observing her as she observed me, and fully-expecting, from the ugly scowl upon her pretty face, that she was about to say something disapproving at best.  To my complete shock, however, rather than offering a scathing critique on my hair, make-up, or clothes, she actually said I looked nice.  She maintained her sour expression as she turned and walked away, pouting.  She was envious.  I was speechless.

 Coming back to my own situation today, I realize that if I really want to sit and tally-up my blessings, I don’t have to count long before I find I have plenty of good things going on in my life.  Somehow, however, the covetousness still manages to spoil my contentment. 

 It’s why, so many times after I’ve spent just a few minutes flitting around Facebook, I find myself wishing I’d chosen to spend my time differently.  Recent studies have even found that the more time a person spends dinking around on other people’s profiles, the more likely they are to feel dissatisfied with their own lives.

 Contrary to what I may have suspected at times, Facebook is not evil, and obviously neither are the positive life updates our friends tend to ambush us with when we least expect them.  But they are popular breeding grounds for covetousness—for making other people’s blessings the bane of our existence.  Thankfully, however, these things also provide us with an excellent opportunity to practice fighting against the covetousness, if we are privy to its lures. 

 In Philippians 4:11b-13, Paul writes, “I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.  I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.  I can do all this through him who gives me strength.”

 With the help of Christ—our all in all—we can fight this battle to find contentment.

 Back in 2 Corinthians 10:3-5, Paul also says, “For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does.  The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds.  We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” 

 We take captive useless thoughts like the ones I had this morning—ones that get us down and feeling sorry for ourselves—and we make them obedient to Christ, who, along with the Father, commands against covetousness.  (In Exodus 20:17, God says, “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”) 

 It’s no wonder God doesn’t want us to covet.  Clearly, covetousness makes us unhappy, and God doesn’t want us to be unhappy.  He doesn’t want us to be blinded from our own blessings because we’re too distracted by the shiny things in our neighbors’ possessions.  We can so easily become like the baby who drops her favorite rattle to go for the ball in the hands of the tiny tot next to her—not necessarily because the ball is any better, but because it’s something she doesn’t have. 


God doesn’t want His children to be depressed or distracted over the things we suddenly realize we're lacking.  He doesn’t want us to forget what’s right in front of us—which, even more than the people and possessions and experiences He’s blessed us with, is simply (though He’s anything but simple) Him.