Love does not envy
1 Corinthians 13:4
Envy. An ancient character trait, forever repackaged and rebranded into new and more palatable forms. How easily can what we have come to call “aspiration” turn from the positive pursuit of wanting to better ourselves into a thinly veiled form of envy. The difference most commonly is that envy turns our thoughts from people to things, from subjects to objects. Wherever the underlying thought is “I want what you have” rather than “I want to be the type of person you are”, we are mired in envy. We wish to take things rather than to do the work required on our own character to be the kind of person that attains those things.
I choose the word “thing” advisedly because all objects are things but not all things are objects. By which I mean, a “thing” in this context can be an object (a car, a house, pair of shoes), it can just easily be a job, or a relationship, or an attribute.
When presented with the truth that there are things not in our lives that we wish were, we really only have two Godly alternatives. We can learn to be grateful and contented in our current circumstance or we can work on ourselves toward changing our circumstance. And often we can and should do both.
What we cannot do. What we mustn’t do, is allow ourselves to become so enamored with the thing and so disheartened by its absence that we fall into envy and end up at cross purposes with God over His complete inability to see how richly we deserve it. No “thing” should come between you and God. Nor should it come between you and people. If we are true, we must acknowledge that a heart that sits in want of what others have, changes us, and it affects any potential relationship we may have those people. How can it not?
We are called to people not to things. And likewise we are called to love people, not things. In fact I would contend that love of things is not love (as intended by God) at all. You can appreciate things, you can enjoy things, you be enamored by the things, you can be a slave to things but you cannot truly love them because they have neither the capacity to receive nor the ability to return that love.
Love does not envy, church. It allows us to be content in all circumstances, it rejoices with others in theirs. It wants the best for people and never allows things to come between us and people, and us and God. No thing is worth that price. May the Most High God keep you as you make strong courageous choices to love and not to envy.
Much Love
Stephen Hickson