Greed

The third topic we are covering is greed. Proverbs 28:20 says, “A faithful person will be richly blessed, but one eager to get rich will not go unpunished.” Greed is one of the hardest issues to deal with. Like most sins greed starts in the heart. You can try all you want to say that you need to save all your money now so that you can provide for yourself later. The thing is you are not the one responsible for providing for yourself. God promises that he will provide for you. By saying I’m going to do all I can to provide for myself in the future you’re telling God that you trust your own plans over Gods.

In Matthew 6 Jesus is speaking in the sermon on the mount where he says, “Therefore I tell you: Don’t worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Isn’t life more than food and the body more than clothing? 26Consider the birds of the sky: They don’t sow or reap or gather into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Aren’t you worth more than they? 27Can any of you add one moment to his life span by worrying? 28And why do you worry about clothes? Observe how the wildflowers of the field grow: They don’t labor or spin thread. 29Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was adorned like one of these. 30If that’s how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and thrown into the furnace tomorrow, won’t he do much more for you — you of little faith? 31So don’t worry, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ 32For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be provided for you. 34Therefore don’t worry about tomorrow, because tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” (CSB).

The issue with greed is that it never stops. You will never have enough money, and you will never be satisfied. When you are greedy all the focus is on yourself and not God. One way to see if you are greedy is try and give money away. If you really trust in God to provide what you need, then give some money away. If you can’t I hate to break it to you but you struggle with being greedy and not trusting in God. If this is something you struggle with, don’t beat yourself up. Greed is something that almost everybody deals with, including me. The good news is Christ came and died for our sins so that we don’t have to pay the price for our sins. With this in mind instead of being greedy this should make us generous. In my personal life I have never regretted giving money to further God’s kingdom.

The best example of greed in the bible occurs right after the Lord’s supper. Judas was a follower of Christ; he got to be right there next to him. He had all the glory of following Christ right there. He turned Jesus in for 30 pieces of silver. He was so focused on his earthly wealth that he sacrificed his heavenly wealth for it. It is easy to look at judas and say he made a terrible decision. In all honesty many of us make similar decisions every day. We get so focused on how much money we can make that we often pass up opportunities to spread Gods love.