To-Do, Not-To-Do
The main focus of my To-do list in this particular series of devotions is the command to love one another in John 13:34. From there we went to 1 Corinthians 13:4-5 to focus on what love is. In learning about love, we are adding more specific things to our to-do list. From the next part of the definition of love, 1 Corinthians 13:4 tells us what not to do. Normally, I don’t have a “what-not-to-do” list and just focus on the “to-do” list. If we are focusing on what we are supposed to be doing, then there is a natural tendency to steer away from what we shouldn’t be doing. However, because it is part of the “love one another” command on the to-do list, I am going to include the parts of the definition of love that shows what love is not; or in other words, what-not-to-do.
Love does not Envy
Firstly, we need to know what envy is if we are to avoid doing it. According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, envy is the “painful or resentful awareness of an advantage enjoyed by another joined with a desire to possess the same advantage.” In other words, it is that miserable feeling that we get when we think about an object, talent, life, family, or whatever that another person has that we think should be ours.
I had to think about this for a bit. Love does not envy. In other words, love does not feel miserable or resentful when it sees someone enjoying something it would like to have but does not. Imagine for a moment what it would be like to try to love some one while feeling resentfulness toward that person. We might not want to show kindness to someone for whom we think already has an advantage over us. We may find it hard to be patient with someone that must have it easier than us because of their advantage. We may even feel that we don’t like them because they are not as grateful as we think they should be, sharing as much as we think they ought to, or using their advantage as well as we think we would if we had it. We would miss out on many opportunities to show love. It might also sour our attitude so when we are doing things that should be loving, we are, instead, only going through the motions.
These are the types of things that would make us unloving so we should endeavor to not be envious. Today, I will be checking my life for signs of envy. I will ask for the Lord to highlight any envy in my life so I can deal with it now, and stay away from it in the future. I will ask someone close to me where they see that envy might be a problem for me. There are many accounts of envy in the Bible where it shows how serious it can be, but I am going to take some time today to see what Proverbs has to say about envy. I am pretty sure that it will be there.
Do you have verses that you like to remember that addresses envy? Or maybe you would like to share an account from the Bible that deals with envy?