August 23, 2009 Pastor Tim Pusey

THE TEN COMMANDMENTS:
GETTING TO THE HEART OF THINGS
Deuteronomy 5:21, NLT

I want you to stand and do something for me just one more time! For while I know that the Ten Commandment Song may be a little cheesy and not quite as cool as most of you, I still think it’s been a good little tool to help us remember the Ten Commandments. So set your pride aside one more time and sing with me—
One—Don’t worship other gods
Two—No graven images
Three—Don’t take God’s name in vain
Four—The Sabbath is for rest
Five—Obey your mom and dad
Six—Don’t ever, ever kill
Seven—Be faithful to your spouse
(Eight)—And don’t steal
(Nine)—Don’t lie
(Ten)—Don’t wish for other people’s things!

(c 1994 Word Publishing Company; words by Gloria Gaither and Shirley Dobson)

Aren’t you glad you won’t have to hear that one again—except that you’ll wake up in the middle of the night with the tune in your mind, trying to remember all the words. Great!

The 10th Commandment, as found in Deuteronomy chapter 5, goes like this—
Do not covet your neighbor’s wife. Do not covet your neighbor’s house or land, male or female servant, ox or donkey, or anything else your neighbor owns (Deuteronomy 5:21, NLT).

Some have considered it the “weak sister” of the list of Ten. It doesn’t seem as dramatic as the others! Some have wondered why the Lord ended with what they thought was the least important of the Ten. But as we get into this Commandment this morning, I have a hunch that you’ll see that while this Commandment isn’t as visible or tangible as the others, it gets to the heart of things! And that’s exactly why it’s so very important!

Coveting is probably the least understood of the Ten Commandments. Many have asked, “What in the world is coveting?” As our little song tells us, coveting is wishing for other people’s things. It is indeed an intense desire to possess something or even someone (!) that belongs to another person. To covet is to crave or yearn for something that does not belong to us. It is to be discontent with what we have, as opposed to what someone else has. We covet whenever we set our hearts on anything that is not rightfully ours.

Basically speaking, this covetousness springs from a greedy self-centeredness and an arrogant disregard of others and of God’s law. Granted, not all desires are selfish. God made us to be creatures of desire. Our desire for food reminds us to eat—though some of us have a disproportionate desire for such activity! Our desire to do something worthwhile motivates us to work. Our desire for friendship draws us into meaningful relationships. We have many healthy desires, but our desires can also be corrupted by sin. We often want the wrong thing, in the wrong way, at the wrong time, and for the wrong reason. And that’s what the 10th Commandment rules out!

Have you ever watched a little group of 2-year-olds playing in the same room? A ball may have been in the room since they gathered and not one of the kids seemed interested in it until one of those children starts to play with it. And suddenly, every child wants to play with it—and they’re not interested in sharing! Nothing arouses a child’s interest in a toy quite like seeing it in the hands of another child! And coveting in that case quickly leads to stealing—and you can have a roomful of unhappy, crying children all too easily! Now, we adults are more subtle about such things, but we’re guilty of the very same thing!

Coveting is what causes that little twinge of disappointment whenever someone else gets what we want. It’s how we might react when a co-worker gets the promotion, when your roommate finds romance and you’re still single, or when friends go where we can only dream of going on a vacation. We are always comparing ourselves to others, and frankly, we resent it when we don’t get what they have! The Apostle James described it like this—
What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? You want something but don’t get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel and fight (James 4:1-2a).

How do we covet? Let me count the ways…
• The most common way we think of coveting is desiring material possessions—things like a bigger house, a new car, more exciting entertainment, new clothes, the newest models of gadgets or appliances.
• But the commandment also rules out coveting “your neighbor’s wife”—so this is a clear reminder that sex can be one of our most unruly desires. Whenever we engage in sexual fantasy, we are guilty of a kind of coveting. We are feeding a sinful desire that soon will demand to be gratified.
• We may covet other people’s attributes—such as their good looks, their brains, or their talents!
• We might covet their situation in life—
o People who are single may want to be married.
o People who are married may wish they were single again!
o Those without children may covet those who do.
o And sometimes those who do covet those who don’t.
o We might covet someone else’s financial security and their freedom to go places and do things that we will likely never be able to do.
• We can even covet someone’s spiritual attainments or their special spiritual gifts. It might be that we covet a prominent position of ministry in the church.
• We might covet the opportunities others seem to get that we never do.
The list isn’t meant to be exhaustive. The truth is that we’re not supposed to covet anything someone else has. God’s Word rules out every wrongful desire!

I think there is a tendency among people to consider this as a relatively minor sin. Somehow it just doesn’t seem to fit into the “big league” sins like murder and adultery! And it really doesn’t seem like a very climactic ending to the Ten Commandments!

There is something unusual about the 10th Commandment that distinguishes it from the rest. It goes straight to the heart of things. The other nine Commandments explicitly condemn outward actions like making idols, working on the Sabbath and killing innocent victims. And, as we’ve talked about, these commandments also forbid sins of the heart that lead to them—things like hatred and lust. But the first nine Commandments start on the outside and then work their way in as we learn how to apply them. On the other hand, the 10th Commandment starts on the inside of us. It’s not so much concerned with what we do, but with what we want to do! It confronts our internal desires.

The 10th Commandment makes it clear that God requires inward as well as outward obedience. If it weren’t for this Commandment, we might think that as long as our outward actions were acceptable, that everything was okay. But coveting gets to the heart of things—which is indeed where sin gets its foothold in our lives! The truth is that the human struggle with coveting is exactly what has led many to violate the other commandments! The question we’ve got to ask ourselves is this: What does my heart desire and where will that desire lead me in the end? What a question!

I remember the TV game show called Supermarket Sweep—do you remember that? The show would culminate in two teams being set free in a grocery store with their carts for so many minutes—and the one who rung up the highest total at the checkout was the winner. Can’t you just see the shopping carts flying! They’d fly through the stores, just like you and I would do if we were set free for a shopping spree at a Target Store or Walmart today. You’d hurry to the electronics and load your cart with a computer, digital cameras, DVD players—you name it. Then on to the auto shop, where you get another cart and throw 4 new tires into it. Then you see the linens and grab enough linens to last your whole extended family for a lifetime! You’re ripping down a main aisle, grabbing things right and left. Time is running out, but you just saw another person with a third cart, and you know you’ve got to do the same if you’re going to win! So you start filling it too, though it’s a little harder to move through the store now because you’re trying to navigate three carts! You see another person with watches and jewelry, and you’re sure you’ve got to one-up them. You’re on your way toward the checkout, but if you can just grab a few more things on the way, maybe you can win what you’ve got. You know you’re pushing it, but you just have to grab a little more. You hear the timer running out: 5-4-3…you’re hurrying as fast as you can…2-1…your carts turned funny and they don’t want to move…0! Time’s up! You lose! Looser!

Why were you the looser? Because enough was never enough! And that’s just how we get consumed with things and ambitions and desires! But when is enough enough?

Let me tell you something. Happiness is an inside job. It comes from the inner soul—that inmost place where we make our choices. Our problem is that we usually end up coveting that which can never make us happy, failing to realize that what matters most is not what becomes of us but what we become. We determine that.

Someone has suggested that there are at least two ways to be rich. One is to have a lot of possessions; the other is to have few needs. To win the battle over coveting is to put our needs in the proper perspective, and diminish our wants to a manageable level.

Frankly, coveting is not only sinful, it’s stupid! We have no cosmic right to an equal share of what everybody else has! If you’re prone to leaning in that direction, consider how you would feel if you were averaged out with the world’s 6.7 billion people. I’d dare say you’d have a lot less than you do today, for over 1 billion people around the world go hungry every day. About 1/4th of the people around the world face a severe housing problem. As Americans, we live in one of the high-income nations—but 80-90% of the world’s population is not so blessed materially. One of the marvelous ways to confront our covetous desires is to put ourselves in the situations where we see how the poor and needy live every day! That’s the great merit of missions trips and involvement in ministries to the needy right here in our area!

Now and then I get to realizing that I’m far too insulated from the reality of how most people live. And I have a hunch that most of us are. And I’m also convinced that we can’t be faithful followers of Christ and remain so isolated and insulated—and that we as individuals and as a church body need to keep looking for ways we can see the needs of others and address them.

Coveting makes us think we can find happiness from the outside in, but, in reality, happiness comes from the inside out. So much of our frustration in life comes from wanting things that God has not given us. We are so prone to concentrate on what we don’t have rather than on what we do have! “If only we made a little more money.” “If only I had a bigger place to live.” Once we get going on this, there’s no end to our discontent. The story is often told of the reporter who asked billionaire Nelson Rockefeller how much money it takes to be happy. Rockefeller answered, “Just a little bit more.” I was struck recently in hearing all about Michael Jackson’s death that all that he had in terms of material things and in fame didn’t bring him enough peace of mind that he was even able to sleep at night without anesthesia!

But please understand that coveting is not limited to any particular tax bracket. Ecclesiastes 5:10 proclaims, “He who loves money will not be satisfied with money, nor he who loves wealth with his income” (Ecclesiastes 5:10). This is true of both the rich and the poor.

As long as we are basing our sense of contentment on any thing in this world, we will always find some reason to make ourselves miserable! And, you see, the problem is not on the outside! It’s on the inside!—and therefore nothing on the outside can ever satisfy it! It will not be resolved by getting more of what we think we want! Until we learn to be satisfied right now in our present situation—whatever it is—we’ll never be satisfied at all!

All too often—
• In the heat of the summer, we long for the cool of autumn.
• In the winter, we’re wishing for the warmth of summer.
• When we’re 6 years old, we want to 12.
• When we’re 12, we long to be 16.
• And when we’re 16, we wish we were 21!
• But most 30 year olds wish they were 25!
• 50 year olds wish for 35 again!
• 70 year olds long for the vitality of 50!
If we’re not careful, we can live our whole lives always wanting to be something that we’re not—and never being content!

The truth is that if God wanted you to have more right now, you’d have it—right? And if you needed different abilities and opportunities, He’d provide them for you. If you were ready for the job you want, He’d put you into it. If you are supposed to be in a different situation in life, you’d be there. Instead of always saying, “If only this or that…”, God invites us to worship Him from where we are and journey with Him to wherever it is He wants to take us.

And the word for such a journey of trust in His will and His provisions is contentment. Contentment is the positive side of the 10th Commandment. It is a remedy for coveting. The Apostle Paul wrote to Timothy—
Godliness with contentment is great gain (1 Timothy 6:6).
The writer of Hebrews wrote—
Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you” (Hebrews 13:5).

Contentment means wanting what God wants for us rather than what we want for ourselves. And the secret to enjoying this kind of contentment is to be so satisfied with God that we are able to accept whatever he has or has not provided for us.

The Apostle Paul had learned this lesson. He wrote—
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 everything through him who gives me strength. (Philippians 4:11b-13)

The bottom line is this: God is all we need—and therefore He is to be the center of our desires. Sounds like we’re coming full circle back to the beginning of the 10 Commandments, doesn’t it? God has provided for the forgiveness of sins through His Son Jesus Christ. Through Christ we have the promise of abundant life here and now—and eternity in His Presence when this life is over. We have the promise that He will never leave us or forsake us and that he will help us through all the challenges of life. What else do we need, friends?

The 10th Commandment brings us to a logical conclusion to this series. And it calls us to decision. We have learned that it is the heart-cry of our Heavenly Father for each of us to find and experience life at its best within certain boundaries,
• that we worship God alone and
• that we worship Him for Who He is, rather than who we might make Him out to be
• that we honor His name and His character
• that we keep the Sabbath day as a holy day
• that we honor our fathers and our mothers
• that we value and respect life
• that we keep the covenant of marriage as a sacred trust
• that we respect what belongs to others
• that we be people of honesty and integrity
• and that we find contentment in God alone and what He provides for us.

And so…the choice is yours. This is a decision you must make. Will you live life God’s way? Will you trust His process for experiencing life at its best? Will you be a man or woman of God—who, as a child of God, acknowledges that God is the God of wisdom and love, and His ways are best for you?

The decision is before you! Are you ready? You can keep trying to find satisfaction in all the things around you, or you can embrace the truth that you’ll never experience life at its best unless you submit to the unseen God’s life-giving guidelines for living. God’s Commandments call us to decision. Are you ready to experience the life He designed for you? How life-giving it would be if our acceptance of God’s ways prompted us to simply reply, “I will do them! I will find out how I am to live my life and I will determine to live that way! This is the best life strategy I’ve ever heard of!”

May I remind you that your Heavenly Father, your Creator God loves you. He has chosen you. And He has waited…for this moment when you reach out to Him and take His Hand and start to trust Him as never before. Would you take that Hand?