Our Restless Catechism
The 9th and 10th By Rev. William M. Cwirla
You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife (or husband), his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey (or Porsche 911), or anything that belongs to your neighbor.
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an you sin without even doing or saying anything? You bet you can! You do it all the time, and you probably don’t even give it a second thought. I can do it while at the dinner table with my family or even while standing in the pulpit, and no one would even have the slightest notion I was breaking not one but two of God’s commandments. In fact, I could look perfectly innocent, pious, and holy while doing it and you’d be completely unaware of it.
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I’m talking about coveting—the desire to have what you don’t and can’t have. It’s a sin that goes on entirely in the heart without so much as an external twitch. It may not seem like much of a sin. Who gets hurt? What’s the harm? Why make so much of a fuss over what appears to be a victimless sin? Coveting is the root cause of all kinds of trouble. “You desire and do not have, so you kill. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and wage war” (James 4:2). The externals always begin internally, with the heart. “Out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, fornication, theft, false witness, slander” (Matthew 15:19). Coveting someone else’s spouse can lead to adultery. Coveting someone else’s donkey or Porsche can lead to theft or fraud.
Every external sin begins with the sinful heart—the heart that does not fear, love, and trust in God above all things. The 9th and 10th commandments loop back to the 1st commandment. Coveting is idolatry (Ephesians 5:5, Colossians 3:5)! Our sinful hearts are restless, wanting more and more, seeking security, identity, meaning in things, especially things we don’t have. If only I were with that person, I’d be happy. If only we had a nicer house in a better neighborhood, we’d be content. But the problem with the heart unbuckled from God is that it’s like a dog chasing its own tail. There’s no end to it. We’re never at rest; we’re never content—always chasing after newer, brighter, faster, better. We have a big problem. We can curb the externals and more or less keep ourselves in line with a little “just say no” self-discipline and a few threats and punishments. You can choose not to “follow your heart,” and therefore not steal or commit adultery. But those desires of that restless heart of yours are not going to go away with teeth-gritting self-discipline any more than a strict diet will make you stop wanting that chocolate shake. How do you deal with sins of the heart? How can
