Leave Your Neighbors House To Your Neighbor

The Ninth Commandment.

Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's house.

What does this mean?--Answer.
We should fear and love God that we may not craftily seek to get our neighbor's inheritance or house, and obtain it by a show of [justice and] right, etc., but help and be of service to him in keeping it.

(http://bookofconcord.org/smallcatechism.php)

 

The ninth commandment goes hand in hand with the seventh: "You shall not steal." Leave your neighbor's property alone. Don't even think about it; unless you are thinking about ways to help him keep his property. Desiring what belongs to someone else can lead to all kinds of evil against him as our desires becomes obsessive thoughts and our obsessive thoughts turn to evils action to get what does not belong to us.

 

We should all have our own hopes and dreams. Pursue your own dreams, not your neighbors. What belongs to your neighbor is your neighbors. What is yours is yours.

 

The second table of the law is summed up like this: "Love your neighbor as yourself." (Matt 22:39; Mark 12:31) :May God grant that our neighbors would love us enough not to craftily seek to obtain our inheritance or home even as we would not pursue obtaining theirs. 

 

God's Peace - Pr. J

Proverbs 23 - Common Sense; Avoid Coveting

Proverbs 23 includes wise sayings saying 7 through 19. 

Discussing proverbs the other day at a Bible study, someone noted that the proverbs are basically common sense. Sadly, they are not common sense to everyone. Not everyone has common sense. Not everyone has the wisdom to avoid coveting as the majority of these verses warn us to avoid. Coveting; whether, it is food, drink, riches of any kind, women, etc..., will lead to a person's downfall. Coveting these riches will bring poverty upon a person. These things are deceitful. These false gods will steal even the little that you had. They will destroy you. 

"Apply your heart to instruction and your ears to words of knowledge." (Prov 23:12 NIV) And... live life abundantly in the presence of God, through Jesus Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit.

God's Peace - Pr. J

1 Samuel 18-19 - Jealousy

Well, here goes for the second time this morning. Lost everything the first time! Don't know what's going on with the internet. It's something I can do nothing about.

There are certain things that none of us can do anything about. There were certain things Saul could do nothing about, either. God had chosen David to replace him and David succeeded in everything he attempted while Saul failed. Although his children, Jonathan and Michael loved David, Saul's jealousy of David turned to anger and fear. And... when fear struck he attempted to make sure that David would die.

When I teach the 10 commandments, those ones about coveting seem to be the hardest for young people to comprehend the whys of it. Why is it so bad to be want the things that others have. Because... wanting - jealousy leads you down a path of destruction. It can be be destructive to you as well as the person whose things you want. Jealously, as it grows within a person, can lead even to death, if not of the body (which in fact does happen) but of the spirit.

Saul's whole life ends up one of pursuing the death of David. What a way to live: pursuing death instead of life!

May God help us to support our neighbor to keep all that he has accumulated, all that God has given us and to live lives in thanksgiving for what we have received, for the very life we have been given in Jesus Christ, our Lord.