This is part of an ongoing series on the Ten Commandments. God’s word reveals to us the laws he requires for living in the world as he has ordered it, and only by living according to this law are we able to flourish and enjoy our creational purpose: to glorify God and enjoy him. This series explores how Christians, whose identity is in Christ and whose inheritance is stored in eternity, should live under and live out the Ten Commandments.
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.— Exodus 20:17
I adored our first year of marriage. Our first apartment was six hundred square feet of hand-me-downs, broken knobs, and burnt dinners. We were figuring life out as a union and trusting God to establish our ways.
My innocent joy soon faced an enemy as we accepted invitations to other homes. We’d pull into driveways and my heart would covet the manicured lawns, warm foyers, expansive ceilings, and space for a crowd. I started to believe my possessions and living arrangements played a part in my worth. Would people feel welcome in our home? Could we serve others? Could we be hospitable? All of these questions were portrayed as caring for others when really they were idolatry. Idolatry has been a stumbling block for God’s people across the Bible. In the Old Testament, it primarily took the form of a physical image made with gold or other material that Israel worshiped. Israel would bow down to these pagan deities—lifeless images carved from created things. Their idolatry—like all sin—lay deep within the heart.
Today, we may not have gold icons but we still worship created things, people, or ideas that draw our devotion away from God. In this sense, covetousness acts as idolatry, seeking to create, earn, or control happiness. It’s believing that something “out there” will bring us fulfillment, thus spurning God’s good portion for us and replacing him on the throne of our hearts.
Coveting In Israel
In the book of Exodus, where we first see the Tenth Commandment given, God, the great I AM, called up Moses according to his promises and set his people free from 430 years of slavery in Egypt. It was after this grand exodus that God gave them the law. Everything about God’s law represented his holiness, which perfectly deserves gratitude, humility, and obedience.
Despite this great rescue, Israel struggled with covetousness. They grumbled against the Lord and wished themselves back in Egypt saying, “Would that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the meat pots and ate bread to the full, for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger” (Ex. 16:3). Israel longed for a momentary satiation of hunger, not trusting in God’s daily provision and his promise of a future inheritance of a land “flowing with milk and honey” (Ex. 3:8). They set their hearts on something they didn’t have, and it was a rejection of all that God had done for them. This is the sin of covetousness.
In contrast, humble contentment would say, “God has saved me, he is with me, and I have everything I need in him.”
The Westminster Larger Catechism describes this contentment required by the Tenth Commandment as “a full contentment with our own condition,” and “such a charitable frame of the whole soul toward our neighbor” that all of our thoughts and intentions toward him or her are in pursuit of his or her welfare.
What Coveting Does to the Heart
In that first year of marriage, I learned that coveting my neighbor's home was coveting an ideal that I thought could offer me something God hadn’t. There I was, experiencing the blessing of marriage, walking in glorious salvation, with a roof over our heads and food on our table, and my heart cried, “It’s not good enough!”
My heart was divided, resulting in bitterness, disobedience, and frustration. I was far from God. This is what coveting does—it separates us from experiencing God’s goodness, and it hinders our love for both him and our neighbor.
What God taught the Israelites post-exodus is the same thing Jesus taught in the Gospels. Jesus says, “I am the bread of life; he who comes to me shall never hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst” (John 6:35). In Christ, we have everything we need. All of our longings, desires, and affections are satisfied in his perfect love. This was true in the Old Testament as God continuously provided all things for his people. The message is clear—in God alone do we find our needs met—and met to the fullest degree.
The Source of Our Contentment
You may ask, how can that be true if I struggle to pay rent, if my marriage is on the rocks, or if I’m battling cancer? Does God really meet all our needs in these scenarios?
Later on in the Gospel of John, Jesus says, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly” (John 10:10).
Biblical abundance is not rooted in something physical, but spiritual. God certainly has the power and sovereignty to provide financially, mend broken relationships, and heal the body, but that doesn’t mean those things will always happen. The state of our soul will always be the greater problem on the table—not our rent. We can’t look to something material to mend what is ultimately spiritual. Even in the wilderness, the physical provision of manna was meant to point to a greater spiritual provision in Jesus (John 6:31–51). This is precisely why we can experience divine contentment even in the midst of suffering and lack, because we have been given abundant life in Jesus Christ.
