Sermon Text:

Today we come to the last of the 10 commandments and the end of our series. I pray that this time has made two things more clear in our minds. First, that it is impossible for any to be justified, that means to stand righteous and innocent before God, based on our performance or works as judged by these laws. 

As scripture says, “we all fall short” and not only in our outward deeds, but the spirit of each of these laws, because they are perfect and holy, condemn every sinner. They are therefore a mirror into the depravity of our fallen nature. I pray that this realization has caused each of us to run to Jesus Christ for safety and comfort. These commands show us our great need for a savior. Jesus is a great savior.

Second, as those born again by the Holy Spirit and having been adopted by God, I pray we see the beauty and wisdom of these laws as renewed affections written on our hearts by the Holy Spirit that we may grow to be more like our beloved savior Jesus. They are a guide helping us avoid sin and to live according to the new nature that we have obtained through faith in Jesus. Having been set free from condemnation through faith in Jesus, we are now able to live as saints, which means holy ones, in his strength.

In Exodus 20:17 we have the last of the famous 10 commandments,

17 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor’s.”  

Through the years as an elder/pastor I have been called on to help with many problems. So far, envy over a neighbor's donkey has not been among them. Our world is very different in many ways from the time of Moses. Oxen, donkeys, male and female servants are not a regular part of our experience. One thing that hasn’t changed, however, is the human heart. At that time, livestock and servants were luxuries possessed by the wealthy and the same impulses that lead to coveting an ox are those that covet boats and cars or whatever else.

The specific items listed are just examples. The command prohibits coveting anything, which is clear from the last line, we are not to covet anything of our neighbors. Jesus reminds us that righteousness requires the law be kept not only in letter, but in spirit, and neighbor doesn’t just mean the guy who lives in the house next to ours. God’s people are not to covet anything at all.

The main point of the message today is Our Desires are Perfected in Christ. 

God does not call us to avoid desires or become indifferent to them. The world and the things in it were created for our enjoyment, but always in the proper relationship to our enjoyment of God. The sin of coveting does not come from desire itself, but from desiring wrongly. Coveting is a distortion of desire that expresses discontentment with God and a disregard for others.

It is to confuse what we need with what we want in such a way that are in danger of losing our joy in Christ. 

It is to say “I need that…[expand]. 

It is to be motivated more by a love for something the world could give you than by what God has given you. It is to believe the old lie the serpent told Eve, that we will be more satisfied with what God has not given us than we will be with walking with him in enjoyment of what he has.

In that sense, covetousness is an element of all other sins.

1. We are commanded to have no other gods but the covetous heart makes a god of the things of this world. 
2. We are to worship no images but the covetous person bows down to the images on his coins and the idols of sex, power, and success.
3. We are not to take the name of the Lord in vain, but the covetous person profanes the name by seeking the things of the flesh.
4. We are to rest in Christ, but the covetous man fills all his time and exertion with work to gain that which perishes.
5. We are to honor our parents, but a covetous woman manipulates their love for her and takes advantage of them to satisfy her own desires.
6. We are not to murder, but covetousness breeds greed, jealousy, and anger which are the seeds of murder and often the motivation for it.
7. We are not to commit adultery, but the covetous heart believes its own pleasure takes precedence over others, even if it means destroying friendships, families, and even possibly the souls of others.
8. We are not to steal, but a covetous person thinks they deserve what others have more than them.
9. We are to tell the truth, but the covetous mind loves its own satisfaction more than the truth. Most people tell lies to get what they want.

Of all these commands, this one most clearly shows the true requirement of righteousness. We have seen that nobody has kept the spirit of these commands but it is possible in the flesh to appear outwardly to keep the first 9. But this one is an invisible law. It is the one that most directly points us to the heart, revealing the weakness that brings even the most self-disciplined hypocrite under the condemnation of the whole.

The apostle Paul, the pharisee of pharisees, who was outwardly blameless says this in Romans 7 about how the law, and this one in particular was a mirror, showing our sin and our need for a savior. 

7 … if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” 8 But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. …

 10 The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. 11 For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. 12 So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.  

Even the most hardened pharisee cannot escape the judgment of the law over the motives of the heart. A righteous person is one who is satisfied with God, but this command reveals our secret thoughts that God is not good and doesn’t want us to be happy.

The irony is that God does not call us to a joyless, desireless existence. The weakness of faith leading to coveting actually robs us of much greater joy than worldly things could ever provide. If we trust God and wait upon him faithfully, we will enjoy blessings the Bible says we cannot even imagine. The greatest pleasures of this world pale in comparison to what God has in store for his children.

For years I was convinced that I did not like beets. The only ones I ever had growing up were from a can. They were basically a cold tasteless mush. Then one day I was at a meeting at a nice restaurant and they brought out beets. Not wanting to be rude, I resolved to just choke them down and took some as they were passed around. But when I tasted those fresh beets, prepared by a good chef, it blew my mind. It was like I discovered a whole new world.

I am talking about beets. Imagine how amazing pleasures will be in God’s kingdom, where everything is prepared properly and there is no sin to ruin it! It's like God is in the kitchen preparing something awesome for us and telling us to trust him that it will be worth the wait.

God is not stingy.  Proverbs 3:9–10 says,

9  Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the firstfruits of all your produce; 10  then your barns will be filled with plenty, and your vats will be bursting with wine.  

Jesus tells us that God knows what we need and want and if we seek his kingdom first, everything else will follow. Psalm 37:4 says,

4  Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart. 

God doesn’t call us to live as monks, he calls us to enjoy everything we have as having come from him. When we don’t have something we would like to have, he tells us to trust him.

In Proverbs 30:8-9, we have this astoundingly wise and faithful request to God from a man named Agur,

 8  … give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that is needful for me, 9  lest I be full and deny you and say, “Who is the Lord?” or lest I be poor and steal and profane the name of my God.  

How often in our foolishness do we only pray the second part of this prayer? There are many times we do not have the things we want not because God doesn’t love us, but because he does. His sovereign grace is at work from beginning to end to bring about the salvation of his children and he protects us from those things that would ultimately destroy us. He knows you. He knows your every strength and every weakness. He knows that if you were to have been given the wealth you desired, it would keep you from heaven. He knows if you were to get the man or woman you wanted, it would lead to you falling away. When he tells you “no”, it is always because he loves you. 

A wise and loving father doesn’t give the keys to a Ferrari to a son who is still learning how to drive. God will bless you when you are ready and with even better things. For now, he provides exactly what we need. What we really need is to depend upon him more because he knows and we don't know what we can handle and what the future holds. 

Covetousness is when we don’t get what we want and become so focused on it that it becomes more important to us than our walk with God. Jesus warns that a covetous heart chokes out the word of God. In Matthew 13:22 Jesus says,

22 As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and it proves unfruitful.

A heart that loves riches and the cares of the world more than God is an unbelieving heart. You may hear the word every week, but if your love is for the world, you will bear no fruit and receive no reward. The issue is not how much we have or don’t have, but what we love and where we seek our joy.

Living as a Christian in this world is a lot like going out on a boat. The things of the world can be useful to us, just as the water is useful to those who go sailing. The problem isn’t that the boat is in the water, the problems arise when the water starts to get into the boat. Eventually, the water can overwhelm the boat, making it too heavy and it sinks.

Brothers and sisters, if we keep trying to find satisfaction by filling our hearts with the things of the world, it is like pouring buckets of water into our own boat. If our desire is to get to the other side, in God’s power, we need to use our bucket to bail water out, not in. We do that by seeking our joy, peace, and satisfaction in Jesus.

Covetousness is not easy to see. It is like a chameleon that often camouflages itself as virtue. It is skilled at rationalizing itself and deceiving us as to its true motives. We sometimes need to look carefully to see its activity in our own heart. 

Here are seven diagnostic questions we each should ask to identify covetousness at work in us. For each of these we should carefully and biblically assess our motivations.

1. Do we spend more time thinking about the things in the world we want or do not have than we spend thinking about what God has given us in Christ?
2. Do we spend more time thinking about our work than we do about Christ? Is our work a means of blessing others or getting what we want?
3. Are we so busy we barely pray or fellowship with other believers?
4. What is it we love to talk about? Are our conversations consumed more by the world than they are by Jesus?
5. Does the way we spend and invest our money reveal that the things of the world are a higher priority than the kingdom of God and the needs of others?
6. How much stuff do we own that we do not need or use?
7. What are the things in your life you love the most? Now ask, which of these, like the rich young ruler, would cause you sorrow and hesitation to let go of if the Lord required them of you?

For each of these we must ask, “why”? Every one of us was born with a covetous heart. That is our natural disposition. Covetousness is seeking to satisfy our desires with something other than Christ. Before we came to faith, that is all we did. That is all those in the world can do. They are stuck in a vicious cycle of chasing things that cannot satisfy them. They think if they can just get that next thing, whatever or whoever it is, they will finally be happy. But the truth is changing careers, cars, homes, jobs, spouses, genders, or anything else will fail to do it.

We were created to find happiness in God and there is no way to fill that need outside of him. The world rejects that answer and so they pursue it in every other way conceivable and where does it lead? It leads to more pain, more anxiety, and more problems. Someone once said in the world there are “the haves” and “the have nots”. These days, we have “the haves”, “the have nots”, and the “have not paid for what they haves.” But the point is that if all you have is what the world offers, you have nothing that ultimately matters.

Every one of us is a sinner. We have all fallen for the lie that we can do it our way and ignore God but we cannot ignore him forever. There is a day coming when all this will be burned up in judgment and we will stand before the Lord to give an account. If our defense on that day is that we have been a good person, we are condemned. The truth is we are 0 for 10. Even if we somehow managed to keep all but one, we are still guilty of all. James 2:10–11 says,

10 For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it. 11 For he who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do not murder.” If you do not commit adultery but do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law.  

To break any of the laws is to reject the rightful authority of the one God who gave them all. It means that we have placed ourselves above him. Every moral law is rooted in the character of God so to violate the holy law is to reject God himself.

Heaven is for the righteous. None of us deserve to be there. What we deserve is to be forever separated from the righteous and from the God we have all rejected. Let to ourselves, we have no hope because just as a leopard cannot change its spots, we cannot change our own hearts. But God created both the leopard and our hearts and what is impossible for us is not too difficult for him.

God did what we couldn’t by sending Jesus to fulfill the law we failed to keep. Jesus earned the rewards of heaven by his perfection. He then offered himself up as a sacrifice to pay for the sin of anyone who puts their faith in him. He satisfies the wrath of God against their sin on the cross, even to the point of satisfying the penalty of the law, which is death. He died, but three days later, he rose from the dead.

He conquered sin and death for all who are his. He now stands as the righteousness of everyone who puts their trust in him alone as their substitute. Just like the old sacrifices pictured, his death has removed the sins of his people. Now, he offers salvation to anyone who repents and believes. All those who believe are united to him by faith and their sinful natures have been killed with him and receive a new heart, born again by the spirit of God.

If this message is new to you and you want to learn more, please see one of the pastors or members here. We would love to share more with you. If you are already a believer then where by God’s grace do you need to grow and change? Where is the battle of covetousness being fought in your life?  

Greed and dissatisfaction do not come from the spirit of Christ, these are the remnants of the old nature, which was buried. We are called to put on the new nature. As believers, we know we by faith we are heirs of heaven. We know the blessings we enjoy in this world have been given to us to be used to bless others to the glory of God. For a Christian to covet makes about as much sense as someone trying to play baseball with a catching glove on both hands. 

What then do we do when we are believers and have a heart that desires to be holy, but we find covetousness at work in us? How do we put that sin to death? How do we gain not only freedom from the penalty of this sin, but from its power over us?

The first thing to do is to recognize that you cannot do it in your strength. Trying harder in the flesh isn’t going to work. We cannot use the same law that shows us our weakness to defeat sin in our life. It isn’t designed for that. Only the gospel can do that. Therefore, the first step is to pray. Admit we cannot do it on our own and need the grace of God.

Prayerful confession is the first step in repentance. Remember the prayer of Agur? We ask God to keep us from pride and covetousness. Then we pursue the means God has established for us to use for him to do this work in us. 

The primary way that works is for us to apply the truth of God’s word to our situation. This is why knowing your Bible is so important to holiness. We need to find and apply God’s word specifically to what it is we are struggling with. A believer who does not know God’s promises is battling demons unarmed. God has provided the armor and the sword, we need to use it. 

Let’s just briefly work through a couple examples so you can get a taste of how this works. First, find passages that address what you are struggling with and look carefully at how the Bible replaces those desires with godly ones. What promise is better than what the sin offers? For example, Hebrews 13:5–6 says,

5 Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” 6 So we can confidently say, “The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?”  

Coveting wealth comes from a warped desire and a lack of contentment. Money isn’t the problem, a love of money is. The answer to greedy coveting is contentment. The author tells us how to be content. Look at the promise and how faith in the promise kills the sinful desire.

We are reminded that Jesus said he would never leave us. That is the promise. Meditate on that promise and how or why it allows us to be content. The two are clearly connected which is why he says “for he has said.” 

We do not need to love money if Jesus is with us. When I go somewhere with my children they don’t have to worry about how much money they have because they know I’ve got it. They will not go without. Verse 6, because of this promise, “we can confidently say”… that is, we can live knowing no matter what happens, I have all I need, and I will be ok because Jesus will never leave me. Even if I lose everything I have on earth, I have not lost my treasure. 

Do you see that? Ok, one more. Romans 8:12–17 says,

12 So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. 13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. 14 For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. 15 For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” 16 The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, 17 and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.  

First we see the sin, to live according to the flesh means death. We are not called to live according to the flesh, but to put to death the deeds of the body by the power of the spirit. We also see the promise. We are sons (and daughters) of God and have received the spirit of adoption.

We owe the flesh nothing because we are children of the most high God. We don’t need to give in to the temptation of the flesh because we are God’s children. We don’t owe anything to the flesh, God has adopted us and we are his heirs. Not only this, but we have his spirit within us, we do not do this on our own. Whatever suffering of lack we have now will quickly fade when we are raised with him in glory.  

Brothers and sisters, the blood of Jesus frees us. We are adopted and loved and now the spirit is at work in us to prepare us for glory. We all stumble, but God is forgiving. The law points us to the gospel as the way forward. Jesus said in John 6:63,

63 It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.

Remember our main point? Our covetousness has been forgiven in Christ and it is being defeated in Christ because Our Desires are Perfected in Christ. Let’s go to his word, take hold of his promises, and run to him. The more we find our satisfaction in him, the more joy and peace we obtain and less we look to find satisfaction in anything else. 

Not only are the pleasures to be found in him greater, they alone will last forever. The greatest promise is that if we find our joy in him, we will be with him forever. The one thing we truly need is Christ. The apostle John says it this way in 1 John 2:15–17

15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. 17 And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.