The Park Road Pulpit
Sermons from Park Road Baptist Church
Russ and Amy Jacks Dean, Pastors
It Is All About the Attitude: A Lesson On Coveting
Exodus 20:17; Matthew 6:19-21
Edward Stallworth, Associate Pastor for Youth and Children, August 11, 2002
MEDITATION
Watch your thoughts; they become words. Watch your words; they become actions. Watch your actions; they become habits. Watch your habits; they become character. Watch your character; it becomes your destiny. —–Frank Outlaw
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. —– Jesus (Luke 12:34)
Coveting is not a word you often hear except in the Bible. It is one of those words that you sort-of know what it means, but you never really define it. Many of the other commandments are much more easily defined. We have laws on murdering, lying and stealing, but there is no law on coveting. The others commandments are familiar to the media, lawbooks, and our day-to-day lives, but coveting is different. Literally, coveting means strong desire and our judicial systems cannot legislate our desires. Besides, I do not think coveting is the right word for what the tenth commandment requires. In context of these commandments, to covet is something different than having a strong desire. It is an attitude.
One autumn evening when I was young, I sat in my room and I smelled heaven. My mother had baked a pumpkin pie. I followed the smell to the kitchen just thinking about that sweet taste. I walked into the kitchen, there it was resting on the counter, and I walked towards it with only a fork. Just when I was getting ready to get into the pie, I heard my mother from the kitchen door say, "Don't even think about it." She then told me that the pie was not for me, but for a family dinner party the next evening. Nevertheless, I had to have that pie and I thought of ways of getting it. So that evening I went to bed setting the alarm for 3 o'clock in the morning. Later, I woke up and I ate the entire pie. The next morning, not only was I not feeling well, my mother was upset and my father was disappointed. I wanted something so bad that I did not think of the consequences. This is what coveting is.
Unlike the last five commandments that talk about dealing with our neighbors, coveting is not measured or qualified. It is an obvious command of why we need to honor mother and father. It is easy to tell people not to commit murder or adultery. It is clearly wrong and easy to preach about stealing or lying. But coveting is a whole different thing. Coveting is not about overt acts, but inner attitudes. John Shelby Spong says, "Obviously it is far more difficult to prohibit attitudes than it is to prohibit action." It is hard to preach on coveting.
How does one preach on not having desires, when in one sense having desires is not wrong? We all have desires. We can look at this scripture passage and we can say that we should strive for an egalitarian society. We can say that if we covet more than we need, we are truly not living the Christian life. However, I do not think that is what the passage means. Many of us work hard for what we have so that we can afford what we want. Why wouldn't we be part of a country club if we could afford it? Why wouldn't we want the best schools for our children? Why work so hard and not have the house that our tax bracket allows us to have? There is nothing wrong with desire. I would even say desire is good. We all have our desires. I have mine and you have yours. Ingenuity, drive, passion, hard work- all come from desire. Whether it is from professional desires, material desires, or personal desires, it is our desires that drive our accomplishments. We should all strive for what is best, and that takes desire. Mediocrity is not a calling for anyone. However, the question remain, how does one preach on coveting.
Russ and Amy assigned me this topic last June before the youth mission trip. I was telling a youth that this was a rather difficult topic for me to preach. I did not even know where to start. She then said, "Why don't you preach on people being happy with what they have?" At the time, that sounded great. I thought about telling you in a sense, to not covet your neighbor's mansion when you own a yacht. I could even say, "Do not covet your neighbor's Mercedes Benz when you own a car." I could go further and say, "Do not covet your friend's filet-mignon-lifestyle when you have food on your table." However, neither life, nor this passage on coveting is that simple.
This past June, many of you know that we took our youth on a mission trip to Washington, D.C. We worked with inner-city children in one of the city's worst neighborhoods. It is amazing that the most powerful city in the world has so many that are impoverished. I want to tell you how our youth did, and I will, but first let me tell you what we saw. We saw children who had to be moms and dads because their parents worked and could not afford childcare. We saw burned-out buildings, stripped down cars, broken glass, and barred windows everywhere. It was hard enough to drive through it, let alone live in it. Could I tell those kids to be happy with what they have? Could I tell them that it is against God's will for them to desire what the rest of us enjoy?
When I researched for this sermon, I found a series on the Ten Commandments dated 1840 from a church in Virginia. The pastor, preaching to both white members and a slave audience, said to the slaves, "Do not covet what the white man has, be happy with what you have for this is your gift from God."
We should desire and want more. It is the desire for freedom that brought about the civil rights movement. It is the desire for equal rights that brought about women's liberation. Desire brings ingenuity, it develops dreams, and it gives hope.
However, coveting is something different than desiring. It is more than just wanting something. It is to want something so much that one loses vision of what is right. It is to focus on an object or a goal without a care of how one gets it. When I wanted that pumpkin pie, I was going to get it regardless. Coveting is getting money by any means necessary. It is getting your way without a care for whom it affects. It is making the object or goal of desire a god. One worships it, dwells on it, and lives for it. It is to love something that is not God. It does not allow you to love your neighbor or even your self. It is desire gone amuck and it leads to idolatry. In a sense, the tenth commandment brings us full circle to the first one, "You shall have no other gods before me."
Coveting is to put something before God and we lose sight of who God is and who we are. By losing sight of God, we lose sight of grace and love and the fullness of life. We lose sight of what true worship is. When we covet, the focus is then not on life but destruction. We destroy our faith and hurt our relationships with loved ones. We no longer look at ourselves as people with God, but we see ourselves as someone without. Not without God necessarily, but without the object of our desire we turned into a god. We become less than our potential.
"Thou shall not covet" is not a commandment of action, but a commandment of the heart. Coveting is what gives the breaking of commandments energy. Murder, adultery, deceit, theft- these things start in your heart before they become action. No one desires to be a murderer, but when we covet vengeance, it can lead to murder. No one desires to be an adulterer, but when we covet the lives of other people, it can lead to adultery. No one desires to embezzle money, but when we covet a certain lifestyle, it can lead to stealing. No one desires to hurt others, step over people, or lie, but when we covet image, it can lead to that. What do we covet as individuals? What do we covet as a community? What are those desires that blind us from seeing God and ourselves?
My greatest joy this summer was taking our youth and watching them work on two trips - the one to Washington, D.C. and the other to Daytona Beach, Florida. We need to be proud of our youth because in the face of so many things to complain about, they focused on why they were there- especially in Washington, D.C.
We stayed at a place called Calvary Baptist Church with two other youth groups. As we pulled into their driveway, we saw a dilapidated building that smelled. The organizers had overbooked the building and so the fellows had to sleep on the floor but at least the room was air-conditioned. The girls had beds, but in the hottest week of June, they had no air-conditioning. The other youth groups were not very nice. The food was even worse. Did I mention it was the hottest week of the summer? We did not have to work until 1 o'clock in the afternoon, but we had to be out of the building by 8 a.m. and we spent that time sightseeing. Coveting certain things would have been very easy. We could have coveted beds, good food, and cooler weather, but our youth did not. Instead, they focused on why we were there in the first place. They loved the children to whom we were ministering and lives were forever changed despite the conditions. They had the right attitude and for trips to be successful, attitudes matter most.
Be proud of the youth, because they wanted to do that more than sight-seeing, more than complaining, and even more than just having fun. Many would have seen it as a hard trip, but your youth made it look easy. Despite the conditions, some of the youth wanted to stay longer. I have a personal story for each youth there as well as for each youth that went to Florida. A story of how each went beyond expectation and did wonderful things. I have multiple stories of how your youth did not covet because of the conditions, but stayed focused and did what was right. I wanted to tell a specific story, but there were so many and I could not decide what to share. I encourage you to ask the youth, because they have a lot to tell. We can learn a lot about life through the eyes of our youth.
What do we as a church covet? What attitudes do we have? Do we covet a certain way of thinking and neglect our relationships with others who may think differently? Do we covet our past and forfeit new visions? Do we covet growth and disregard identity? Do we covet our style of worship and ignore the content? I do not know the answers to these questions, but these are questions that we must ask ourselves. If we do not ask hard questions and we do not see what we covet, then we will never grow in our faith in God. We must examine ourselves.
Matthew 5, 6 and 7, Jesus talks a lot about coveting and even more about attitude. He says, "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." In other words, do not desire things, image, power, or fame. Desire what is right and you will see a change in attitude. Friends, is our heart on the things of God, individually and corporately, or are we coveting something else?
We are called to desire grace that welcomes all into our building. We are called to desire love that gives hope. It is when we have the right desires we have the right attitude. It is when we covet that our attitudes go astray.
PASTORAL PRAYER
Lord, we thank you for the ability to set goals, have dreams, and live for hopes. We are grateful for the ability to desire. It is what gives us drive and ingenuity. Lord, may we use this gift wisely. May we desire those things of love and grace and not covet those things that isolate and lead us into darkness. Lord, give us eyes to see within our hearts and give us friends to hold us accountable. May you be our vision and may we always desire to be your hands in the world. We pray Christ's name, amen.