If you have broken the tenth commandment by envying what your neighbor has, chances are pretty good that you may have also broken the first commandment and made that thing a god.

Envy’s Favorite Sport: The Comparison Game

Whenever you catch yourself comparing your lot in life to someone else’s, watch out! When you compare and fret about something lacking in your life, you may be tempted to say, “I didn’t get what she got — that’s not fair!” Or, you could begin to feel boastful that you did, indeed, come out ahead. Pride is the evil sister of Envy.

How do you stop the comparison game? Try Romans 12:15 (NASB): “Rejoice with those who rejoice.” Why is it so much easier to do the rest of this verse — “and weep with those who weep”? Oh sure, if my girlfriend gains ten pounds, I can weep with the best of them. But if she loses ten pound, it’s a little harder to “rejoice with those who rejoice.”

Envy’s Ego-Driven Bumper Sticker: “It’s All About Me”

Here’s how envy would sum up her life philosophy on a bumper sticker: “It’s all about me.” But what happens when your ego gets all that attention it wants? Instead of feeling confident, you start feeling insecure — literally afraid that you can’t keep up the facade. The “it’s all about me” person tries to prove herself to other people, and in doing so, she only reinforces a feeling of inferiority.

What’s the cure for the “it’s all about me” disease? Love others. First Corinthians 13:4 says that love “does not envy.” You see, love cancels out envy. Envy is inward-focused; love is outward-focused. Love gets your eyes off yourself and onto someone else.

Envy’s Theme Song: “I Want It All”

Veruca Salt’s rendition of “I Want It All” reminds me of Aesop’s fable entitled “The Dog and the Shadow.” In that story, a dog is carrying a piece of meat in his mouth while he crosses over a brook. He looks down and sees his own reflection in the water. Thinking it is another dog with another piece of meat, he decides that he also wants what that dog has. So he snaps at the shadow in the water, but as he opens his mouth, his piece of meat drops into the water and is lost. The moral of the story: If you covet all, you may lose all.

The cure for the “I want it all” syndrome is to get you from the state of wanting to the practice of trusting. Try this:

1. God is able to give me anything I ask. “I am the LORD, the God of the whole human race. Is anything too hard for me?” Jeremiah 32:27  

2. So, I ask. You do not have because you do not ask God. James 4:2