COVETOUSNESS by E. L. Hastings

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 4, 1873

COVETOUSNESS

By E. L. Hastings

A lad one time stood by the pilot of a vessel which was making its way through one of our narrow and dangerous channels; and he said to the old weather-beaten sailor, as he watched him guiding his vessel this way and that, around the floating buoys that marked the channel, “What do you turn out for those little bits of wood for?” The old man was too busy to look up. He growled out, “Rocks!” “Well,” said the boy, “I wouldn’t turn out for those pieces of wood.” “Poor, foolish boy,” said the old sailor, “little do you know about rocks.”

Now, passing in the course which the church of Christ is called to tread, and seeking to make the port which she is destined for, God’s word points out certain dangers, presents certain perils, floats certain buoys, and when God warns, we do well to take heed. We may think the warning is of little account, but if the great Captain says, “Rocks!” it is well for us to beware.

The text is a warning. It is in the twelfth chapter of Luke, and the fifteenth verse: “Take heed, and beware of covetousness.”

When Christ says, “Take heed,” take care. When he says, “Beware,” when he says, “Rocks!” there is nothing for a Christian to smile at, or to look lightly upon. Now, it is written in 2 Tim. 3, that in the last days perilous times shall come, for men shall be covetous, lovers of their own selves. So you see this which I speak is present truth. It is dispensational truth. It is truth for the last days, and any other day. It is not like a crate of peaches, that is spoiled if it is not used within a week, or like a message that you must be quick with, or lose it, but the solid old corn of the Lord, that will keep a year, and be sound. Our Saviour tells us in Mark 7:22, that out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, and foolishness.

Covetousness is put there as one of the tenants of the heart. It does not come from circumstances, or from external things. It is one of the native plants in the soil of an unregenerate heart. We read in Rom. 1: 2, 3, concerning the heathen, who, by reason of their dislike to God and his knowledge, were given over to do those things which were not convenient, being filled with unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, envy, murder, debate, and so on. This was and is the condition of the heathen world in all ages, and in the catalogue of human sins that proceed from the heart, this sin of covetousness is not forgotten nor omitted, and then in the last days, in our days, this covetousness was to be intensified, and not only that, but it was to take its seat and throne in men who, having a form of godliness, deny the power thereof. In other words, the sins of the heathen world recorded in Rom. 1, in the time of Christ, become the sins of the Christian world in the last days, as Paul writes to Timothy.

Covetousness is a discontented, unsatisfied, grasping desire after the things of this world. The word itself may be applied in another direction in a good sense—“covet earnestly the best gifts;” “covet to prophesy;” “forbid not to speak with tongues;” but the usual application of it is to that inordinate love of this world which the Scriptures condemn. This, like most other sins, is the perversion of a natural instinct. Gluttony is sin, but eating food temperately is duty; so seeking and gaining a subsistence in this world is right, but the intensifying of that desire becomes covetousness, and is wrong.

Do you want to know just what the Lord thinks about covetous people? Now, some of them may be very respectable people, very pious people, very honorable people, very rich people, who wear good clothes, live in fine houses, and be very excellent in many things. Let us read in Ps. 10: 3: “For the wicked boasteth of his heart’s desire, and blesseth the covetous, whom the Lord abhorreth.” That is what God thinks of the covetous man—he abhors him! Can you think of a stronger word? Well, I should hate to be such a man as God abhors, so I should hate to be a covetous man, even if I could get rich by being such. All other evils come from this. The love of money is a root of all evil, not “the root,” as our version reads. It is not the root of all the evil in the world, but a great part of all that is wrong, that is wicked, that is evil, springs from a love of money. Men will do everything evil to gain money when they are covetous enough to do it.

This covetousness, you perceive, is classed with great crimes. To-day it is a very respectable thing. I doubt whether any of you ever knew of a person being turned out of the church for covetousness. A man swears, gets drunk, lies, steals, and is turned out. A man may be covetous, and be in good and regular, yes, even in high standing in a great many churches. Christ said it was very hard for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of Heaven—something like getting a camel through the eye of a needle, or some such thing; but it is about as hard sometimes to get a rich man out of a church in these days as it is to get him into the kingdom of Heaven; he stays and holds on, no matter what else may happen. I remember a man who went to preach in a certain place, and they asked him of his success. Well, he said he had not taken anybody into the church, but he thanked God he had got several out.

God classifies covetousness with such sins as murder, theft, and other immoralities. It is not a respectable thing with him. Hear what Paul says in Col. 3: 5: “Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth: fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry; for which things’ sake the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience.” Turn to 1 Cor. 5: 9, where Paul bids the church not to keep company with a covetous man, not “even to eat with such an one.” Read in Eph. 5: 5—“For this ye know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of God.” Is that not rather severe? “Let no man deceive you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience.” So they are not to have the fellowship of Christ in this life, and they have no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Now, that must be a terrible sin that cuts a man off here, and there too. What is it? It is a root of all evil.

1. Men preach through covetousness sometimes. There was a man of old hired to come and preach against Israel. He was very careful to preach nothing but the truth. He had a call from a king, but said he, “Though the king should fill my house with gold and silver, I would not preach anything but what the Lord gave me.” But he was hired, and yielded. He loved the wages of unrighteousness, and he took the job of cursing Israel for so much money, if God would let him do it. The Lord did not let him, but made a dumb beast rebuke him, and when he was ready to curse, God turned him from that, and made him bless instead of curse, and at last he died as the fool dieth, and never received his salary, nor saw his home in peace. Now, the apostle warns men against the error of Balaam, who loved the wages of unrighteousness. He wanted to tell the truth, to bless what God blessed, and curse what God cursed, but he wanted the money, and he perished in seeking to gain it.

2. Covetousness leads men to steal. Once there was a defeat of the armies of Israel. What is the matter? They have gone back before their foes. Well, they inquired of the Lord. That is a good deal better than to inquire of the neighbors when there is trouble, for sometimes you do not find what the trouble is by doing that way; but here they inquired of the Lord. You will find the story in the seventh chapter of Joshua. They learned there was an accursed thing in the camp. How did it get there? They found that Achan was the man. He had brought in from the spoils a goodly Babylonish garment, two hundred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold, and said he, “I coveted them, and took them; and, behold, they are hid in the earth in the midst of my tent, and the silver under it.” This is what covetousness made that man do. He brought in a cursed thing, a Babylonish garment, that perhaps looked as tempting as some of these modern bonnets and fine things, which people nowadays love so well. This garment and gold routed the whole host of Israel; one man’s covetousness defeated the army of the Lord of hosts, and the result was, the man died, his wealth went to the flames, and his name is left for a curse and a hissing to this day.

3. Men will not only preach for money, or through covetousness, and steal through covetousness, but they will lie through it, and even pretend to sell the power of the Lord, working miracles to bless mankind. A man came once to a prophet to be cured of leprosy. He was sent down to Jordan, and went, and after he returned, he wanted to pay the prophet something. Everything, almost, is run by money, and it seemed so to him. He thought that the gift of God could be purchased with money. The prophet did not want his money, but he had a servant that was a covetous man, and he lied, and took the money, and took a curse with it, for he went out a leper as white as snow, bearing the mark of God’s wrath till he sunk into his grave. That is what God thinks of the covetous!

4. For the sake of this world, a covetous love of it, men turn back from Christ. One man said, “What shall I do?” “Keep the commands.” “Oh, I have done all that.” “You lack one thing; go and sell all you have, and give to the poor, and follow me.” “And he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.” He was like a bird with a string tied round his leg; he could fly so far, and no farther. Christ said, “Cut that string.” He could not do that, and went away sorrowful. What became of him, we do not know. He drops out of sight like a stone in the midst of the ocean. His name is not found among the saints of God, and goodly fellowship of the apostles and prophets. You do not hear of him mentioned with Peter, Paul, Thomas, and John. You do not hear of a crown for him, or a throne for him in the kingdom where the apostles shall reign. Why not? “He went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.”

5. For the sake of money, for the love of it, for covetousness, men will forsake the ministry of Jesus Christ. I can imagine how a man might come down from the seat of a senator or a governor, to make money. I can imagine how a man might come down from being president, or king, or emperor, to make money, but to think of coming down from the position of a minister of Jesus Christ to make money! And yet men have done it. “Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world.” John Bunyan tells us that his Pilgrim found a place by the wayside where there was a silver mine, and Demas was there crawling, but there were quicksands there, and men went down and never came up.

6. Through covetousness men will make merchandise not only of the word of God, but of the people of God. So we read in 2 Pet. 2: 3, 14, that certain false prophets, through covetousness, and with feigned words, shall “make merchandise of you: whose judgment now of a long time lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not . . . having eyes full of adultery, and that cannot cease from sin; beguiling unstable souls: an heart they have exercised with covetous practices; cursed children.”

7. Through covetousness men will make gain of godliness; that is, through covetousness men will part with their dearest interests. I heard of one man who, for money, sold his Lord. Thirty pieces of silver was the price in the eyes of a covetous man of Him who was purer than the sons of men, whose life was the ransom of a lost world. Cast it in the potter’s field! That is what the Lord is worth to you, is it, Judas? You have sold out for thirty pieces of silver—go hang yourself! Judas was covetous—Peter denied his Lord. Peter wept bitterly—Judas went out and hung himself. David sinned, and David repented. Achan sinned through covetousness, and perished. It is one of the most dangerous rocks in this channel! The man that runs on this rock has but little hope of salvation.

8. Do you know how God guarded his people against this sin of reaching after the world as opposed to being content with such things as you have—the sin of keeping that which is another’s, instead of being content with that which is your own—the sin of grasping, and gaining more? Do you know how God guarded his people against it? From Mount Sinai he thundered, “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbor’s.” He there nips in the bud the covetous desire which leads to ruin. What did he do when they entered the land of Israel? He knew there were men that would want all the land they could possess, so he said, “The land shall not be sold forever.” Every man had a portion, and he could not

have any more. He might buy the title to a piece of land till the year of jubilee, for ten years, five years, or forty-nine years, as the case might be, but when the time of jubilee came, every man started for home. “We will have the land; it is our land.” The father perhaps became poor, and lost it. The children say, “The jubilee year after next, and then we are going home!” “Jubilee next year, and then we are going home!” “Jubilee in six months, and then we are going home.” “Next week will be jubilee, and then we are going home.” And when the day comes, they pack up, and go, and take possession of the old home. A man could not own all the land about him, could not leave it to his children, but he had a temporary lease, and when done with it, he was just as poor as anybody. “Well, they might have money.” Oh! yes, but when they had it, they could not have any interest on it; and if a man had money to spare, he could lend it; but if he lent it, when he received his pay, no usury was taken with it; no twelve per cent, no twenty per cent a year, was collected. In the Psalms, we read that “he that putteth not out his money to usury” is so far fit to abide in the holy hill of the Lord. It was of no use for a Jew to be rich there—he could not buy land, or if he did, he could not keep it, and if he got money, he could not do anything with it but hoard it. “Well,” says one, “he could take usury of the heathen.” It is a rule in finance that where there is poor security, men get high interest. If any man wanted to lend his money to the heathen, he could do so, whether he ever got his principal or not. Under the Jewish polity there was nothing to encourage worldly gain.

9. Notice how God has set his mark upon this in the exclusion from his special service of all men who are tainted with this sin. You recollect when Jethro the priest of Midian, Moses’ father-in-law, came to see him, as we read in Exodus 18: 21, and saw that the affairs of the people were bringing too much labor upon him, he gave him advice, telling him to appoint men under him who should decide the minor points of difficulty, but refer the important ones to Moses, and “moreover thou shalt provide, out of all the people, able men”—that is the first thing, not fools—“able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness; and place such over them to be rulers of thousands, and rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens.” “Able men, such as fear God”—and when a man fears God, he does not intend to fear anybody else much. “Men of truth,” men who will not lie. Men “hating covetousness”—God would not have a man sit as a magistrate to judge a quarrel in a company of ten men, unless he was a man that hated covetousness. That is what God thinks of covetousness.

Again, turn over and see what Paul writes about the order of his church, the church of God as recorded in the first epistle of Paul to Timothy. Concerning bishops, or elders, it is written, “A bishop must be blameless . . . not greedy of filthy lucre, . . . not covetous.” So you see that in the Jewish and the Christian churches, covetousness was and is a positive disqualification for any position of responsibility and trust. The man who holds these offices must be a man that is not greedy of filthy lucre; he must be a man that fears God, and hateth covetousness, and who has the interests of God’s people at heart.

10. Look for a moment at the history of God’s people, and see what kind of men they have been in this respect. There was Abraham, of whom you read in Gen. 14. He went out against a king who had conquered the people of Sodom, his neighbors. The king had taken them away, and Abram heard that his relative, Lot, was taken captive with them. He armed three hundred and eighteen of his servants, and pursued the king, and brought back all the goods, and the people that were taken away. The king of Sodom went to meet him, and Melchizedek, king of Salem, brought forth bread and wine, and blessed him, and he gave him tithes of all the spoils, and the king of Sodom said, “Give me the persons, give back the captives, and you keep the goods, take all the spoil.” What a splendid chance for a covetous man it was; but Abram said to the king of Sodom, “I have lift up mine hand unto the Lord, the most high God, the possessor of heaven and earth, that I will not take from a thread even to a shoe-latchet, and that I will not take anything that is thine, lest thou shouldest say, I have made Abram rich.” You could not buy him. He would not take even what was offered him. God owned the heaven and earth, and was Abram’s portion, and the king of Sodom could not make him any richer. He would not take the king’s gift, but, contented with what he had, he waited for the “city that hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.”

Take the case of Peter. To the Saviour, he says, “Lord, we have forsaken all and followed thee.” That is not covetousness. He may not have had much to leave, but whatever it was, he left it, and followed Christ. “What shall we have?” “An hundred-fold,” said Jesus, “in this world, and in the world to come, life everlasting;” and I think that will do very well.

Take the case of Paul. He had been preaching to the Church of God at Ephesus, and he called the elders together as we read in Acts 20, to take farewell of them, knowing that he should never see them again. He had preached, and toiled, and was poor. He knew what it was to be hungry, and cold, and naked, and have no certain dwelling place, and he says, “I have coveted no man’s silver, or gold,” though they had much of it, perhaps, “or apparel,” though they might have worn very good clothes, and he, very poor ones—“I have coveted no man’s silver, or gold, or apparel, yea, ye yourselves know, that these hands have ministered unto my necessities, and to them that were with me.”

Again, we read in 1 Thess. 2: 5, something more. “For neither at any time used we flattering words, as ye know, nor a cloak of covetousness; God is witness.” He felt it was an important matter; he would be clear, not only of their blood, but clear in their sight. He wrote to the church at Corinth, and said, “I sent unto you Titus. Did he make gain of you? walked we not in the same steps?” There was a man who would not make gain of the people of God.

But the greatest example on the Lord’s side against covetousness is found in him who was rich, yet for our sakes became poor, that we through his poverty might be rich. You know his grace; you know the glory he had with the Father before the world was; you know the stable and the manger, and the little cot at Nazareth, and the daily life of the Jewish carpenter boy; you know the toil that hardened his hands, and clothed his body, perhaps; you know his ministry, poor and destitute. Certain women ministered unto him. He had not a shilling to pay his tax until a fish was made to furnish it. He was not so well off for a home as the foxes or birds, for they have holes and nests, but he had not where to lay his head. When, to fulfill the prophecy of God, he must ride in triumph into Jerusalem, it was on a borrowed colt. When he must keep the passover with his disciples, it was in a borrowed room. When he hung on the cross, there was nothing to quarrel about only the seamless garment, and the vesture that had gathered the dust of the pathways as he traveled on his mission of love; and when at last he was hung upon the cross, there was not a grave prepared, not even a sepulcher for him, until Joseph won immortal honor, not because he was rich, not because he was an honorable counselor, but because he came and begged the body of Jesus, and for three days and three nights gave it room in his own new tomb.

Jesus, who thus lived and died, says, “Take heed, and beware of covetousness.” When a sinful, fallen man says this, you can sometimes turn to him, and say, “Why don’t you practice what you preach?” but you cannot say it to Christ. Let his words stand: “Take heed, and beware of covetousness.”

Well, now, this spirit of covetousness is entirely opposed to the spirit of Christ. It is creeping through the church and world, and is one of the perils of the last days, in which we live. It is all about us; it seems as if the high-water mark of covetousness comes clear up to the very sanctuary of God. Men want their money, they want their money no matter what the needs of others are, no matter what the urgency is. It seems to be money that moves men to action. Read what God said to his own people in the first chapter of the book of Malachi: “Who is there even among you that would shut the door for naught? Neither do ye kindle fire on mine altar for naught.” They had become so covetous that they would not shut the doors of God’s house without they were paid for it, nor build a fire on God’s altar unless they could have the money for doing it. Well, what then? He beheld their sacrifices, and rejected their offerings, and despised the covetousness of their hearts. Do we see anything like it? Do we see it in our own lives? If we do, it is best for us to look steadily into that perfect law of liberty, and continue therein, and be doers of the word, and not hearers only.

God warns people perpetually. Covetousness is idolatry. He says, “Thou shalt love the Lord with all thine heart.” Now, if you love money, you do not love God with all your heart. God says, “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself;” but if you love money, you do not love your neighbor. You perpetually grasp after what is beyond your reach. You will not be contented with a dollar, but, getting that, seek another one; but God wants you to be contented with what he gives you, and not hoard up your wealth and heap up treasures for the last days.

This curse runs all through the State, all through the community. You can hardly buy a shilling’s worth of goods without being cheated, and it is equal to a liberal education in the devil’s college to learn all the tricks of trade. You will be cheated by men in little ten-cent bargains, and by men who would do it a dozen times a day. You get sand in your sugar; you get rotten apples at the bottom of the barrel, and good ones on the top; and in other ways you are deceived by a fair exterior, while the interior is far below the representation made. You get cheated in every way by which men can make money, and the land reeks with swindling, with stealing, with great enterprises for dishonestly obtaining the people’s money. You cannot take up a paper but what you find it running over almost with accounts of this infernal chase after riches.

You will find this same covetousness in the church, where a covetous people get a man to preach God’s gospel to them, and then if he did not bind them hand and foot, he never would get his pay from them. You will find it in a covetous ministry, looking this way and that way to see who will go higher in their offer of salaries. You will find it in that universal greed of gain by which men are bought and for which men are sold, for which men lie and for which men let other people lie and they stand still and say nothing. You will find it all through the community. The world is rotten to the core with this sin of covetousness.

You want to hear on the signs of the times—well, we find that, in the last days, perilous times shall come, for men shall be covetous. There is a sermon on the signs of the times—make the application. People want to get rich, but “he that hasteth to be rich hath an evil eye.” God’s word warns men about being greedy of gain, warns men that if they would dwell in his tabernacle, they must despise the wealth of mammon. He cries, “Woe” unto him that gains an evil gain.

About as heavy a load as any man can carry is ill-gotten wealth. One man met a missionary from a foreign land, and old, gray-headed men they both were. At last he said to the missionary, “When I was a boy playing with you fifty years ago, you lost a quarter of a dollar. We hunted for it, and I found it, and kept it. It has haunted me ever since, and I would not carry it fifty years more for the world. I want to pay it back.” When God takes men in hand, he straightens out those things.

On one occasion, Jesus went to the house of Zaccheus. Zaccheus was looking for him, and when a man is looking for Christ, Christ is apt to be looking for him. Said he, “I am going to your house,” and he received him joyfully. He was a rich man, but Jesus did not despise him because he was so unfortunate as to be rich; so he went down to see the rich tax-gatherer. He belonged to a hard class of people. Well, Jesus went down there, and the Pharisees turned up their noses, and said he had gone to be a guest of a sinner, but he had come to seek that which was lost, and he had found one such man. Zaccheus said, “Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor.” He has got it—something took hold of his rich purse, and his closed fist—“the half of my goods I will give to the poor, and if I have taken anything from any man by false accusation, I will restore him four-fold.” It would not do to give away more than half until he had settled up. And Jesus said, “This day has salvation come to this house, for he is a son of Abraham.” It looked a little like Abraham, who would not receive a thread lest it made him rich. You have prayed for salvation—some of you want a full salvation, and I do not know that the Lord has any other than a full salvation. Well, you would like to have it at your house. How would you like to have it come? As it did to Zaccheus? I am afraid some of you would dodge if it were to come right through the middle of your farms. That is the kind of salvation Christ brought when he came to the house of Zaccheus, and said he was a son of Abraham. It looked as if he was looking for Abraham’s inheritance.

I hear some that talk about Jesus’ coming being very near, but I would like to inquire whether it affects the price of their real estate any? Now, when a man gets to be really a son of Abraham, like Zaccheus, when it affects the price of his real estate, cutting it perhaps right in two, he will be richer with half than he ever was with the whole, because he is rich enough to square up where he has cheated before.

Now, what is the cure of all this? Why, the cure is, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart.” That will cure you. Go bathe in the fountain, and be clean, and love God aright, and oh! how mean this world will appear to you! A certain brother once felt called to give up his all to the Lord—his cattle, his fields, his everything. It was a hard struggle. He went and got up on his shed and looked out on his meadows, and they seemed the finest and fairest he had ever seen. And the cattle—it seemed as if he had never seen such splendid cattle as they were. It was like the devil’s showing Christ all the kingdoms and the glory of them. After looking, he would go back to his house, and then return and take another look, but by-and-by the Lord God touched him, and he gave up all, and when it was a settled thing, he got up on his shed, and looked out on those cattle, and they appeared to be the meanest things he had ever seen, and all that had been his seemed nothing, and less than nothing. He was crucified to the world, and the world to him. From that day, when God said, “Give,” he never withheld. He did not wait to be wrought up into excitement until he was half crazy, but poured it out as God poured it in.

When you love the Lord with all your hearts, it will not take much money to make you rich. You will feel like that little boy in Maine who got up in the schoolhouse, and cried, “Glory to God! I feel fore-handed.”

A little boy came over from Ireland to this country, and he found Jesus. “Bless God,” said he, “I have found a fortune.” He got just what he wanted, and no man gets that until he gets Christ within him. You never can be satisfied with the world. The more of it you get, the more of it you want.

Godliness with contentment is great gain; and this lesson of contentment with such things as we have is a lesson that all professing godliness should learn. Paul learned it, and so must we. To doubt God is to dishonor him, but trusting him is honoring him. Remember the sin of the age is covetousness, and remember the injunction of your Master, “Take heed and beware of covetousness.”—Sermon by E. L. Hastings, in Bible Banner.