You Shall Not Covet

28 Sept

Exodus 20:17, Philippians 4:10-13

You shall not covet your neighbour's house, your neighbour's wife, his male or female servant, his ox or his donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbour.

Most of us feel pretty comfortable here. When was the last time you looked at a donkey and thought, I really wish that were mine? The tenth commandment can feel like the easiest tick of the ten.

Until you look at what coveting actually is.

The Invisible Sin

Coveting is wanting what someone else has. Not stealing it, just wanting it. And that distinction matters, because you can have plenty and still want more. In fact, the more you get, the more the wanting tends to grow. That's not a character flaw in a handful of people. That's the human condition.

Fashion houses used to release two collections a year. Now there's something new every week. Apple releases a new iPhone and people who already own a perfectly good phone start wondering if they should upgrade. By most global measures, Sydney residents are in the top ten percent of wealth.

And still, the wanting doesn't stop.

That's not primarily an economic problem. It's a spiritual one. Paul makes it explicit in Colossians 3: covetousness is idolatry. It's greed dressed up as need. And it's invisible in a way that makes it particularly dangerous — you can't see it the way you can see theft or violence. It lives quietly in the comparison, the scroll, the sense that someone else's life is slightly more than yours.

The First and the Last

The ten commandments aren't ten separate laws sitting side by side. They form a whole. The first commandment — you shall have no other gods before me — is the foundation everything else rests on. The last commandment exposes what happens when the foundation cracks: when we don't love God above everything, we start grasping after everything else.

Jesus summarises the commandments as two: love God with everything you have, and love your neighbour as yourself. When those two things are in place, the coveting loses its grip. You stop needing someone else's donkey because you're not building your identity on what you own or what you've accumulated. You stop scrolling with envy because you're not trying to measure your worth against someone’s life highlight reel.

The tenth commandment is the last mirror in a hall of mirrors and the commandments as a whole show us who we are, where our hearts really are, and how far we fall short. That's not a comfortable experience. But the mirrors are there to help, not condemn. Because when we see ourselves clearly, we see our need for Jesus more clearly too.

Learned, Not Given

Philippians 4:10–13 is one of the most well-known passages in the New Testament, and one of the most misquoted.

Paul writes from prison and says: 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.

Notice that word: learned. Paul doesn't say he was born content, or that he was wired for it, or that it came naturally. He learned it. Which means contentment isn't a personality type. It's not reserved for naturally calm, low-maintenance people. It's available to everyone, including those of us who are prone to comparison, who feel the pull of the new thing, who scroll too long and come away feeling vaguely inadequate.

Paul learned contentment through extremes; beatings, shipwrecks, hunger, cold, and also comfort, hospitality, and abundance. He found the same contentment in both directions. The lesson wasn't that his circumstances improved. It was that he found something that didn't depend on his circumstances.

Then comes verse 13: I can do all things through him who gives me strength. This verse has been put on so many posters of athletes and motivational speakers that it's easy to miss what Paul is actually saying. He's not saying Christ will help you succeed at your goals or win the grand final. He's saying: I can be content in all things, in need or plenty, in prison or freedom, because Christ strengthens me to be. That's actually better than the poster version. Because it covers every circumstance, not just the ones where you want to perform well.

What to Do With It

First, name coveting as a sin. Because we can't see it, we often don't call it what it is. The first step toward contentment is recognising when the wanting has become something unhealthy, when the comparison has become a way of measuring your worth, when the scroll has become a way of generating dissatisfaction.

Second, give thanks. Paul opens this passage rejoicing, not because his circumstances are great, but because of what the Philippians have shown him. Gratitude is one of the most practical antidotes to coveting. It re-orients the gaze from what you don't have to what you do.

Third, give away. The Philippians modelled this, they had open hands rather than clenched fists. There's something about generosity that loosens the grip of coveting. When you give money, time, hospitality, you're practising the opposite of grasping. You're trusting that there's enough, and that more will come. It changes the posture of the heart.

Fourth, look to Christ, in both plenty and want. When life is hard and you're tired and things aren't going the way you hoped, Christ is enough. When life is full and comfortable and the danger is forgetting God altogether, Christ is still enough. Keep saying it to yourself: Christ is enough for me here.

The Mountain Stream

John Piper has an image that describes this. Imagine a small country town with a muddy street and a horse trough full of water. And up in the hills behind the town, there's a clear mountain stream. Seeking contentment from the things of this world is like drinking from the horse trough when the mountain stream is right there.

It doesn't satisfy. Not because the things are evil, new clothes are fine, a new phone is fine, following interesting people online is fine. But they can't give you what you're actually thirsty for. Jesus told a woman at a well: anyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again. But whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst.

That's the secret Paul discovered. Not that his circumstances got better. Not that he stopped wanting things. But that he found something that quenched the thirst his circumstances never could. God is not holding out on you. He is not withholding good things. He's inviting you to stop drinking from the trough and come to the stream.

The tenth commandment, at its best, isn't a restriction. It's a pointer. It exposes what we keep reaching for and asks: is that actually going to satisfy? And it points us toward the one who will.