Effective Spirituality

Here we discuss the ways and means of developing effective and functional relationships with the Divine. Have you ever felt spiritually abandoned? Does obtaining faith in God seem like a lost cause? Do your most heart felt prayers get no response? Let's look at why some people get in touch with the divine and others do not. If you already feel God working in your life; great! Here we will look at ways to increase that relationship with the divine.

Coveting

I was thinking about how my choices hold me back.  I am so good at stagnation! See, I have a small problem with coveting.  I should choose not to, but instead I spend too much time liking a lot of things I don’t have. Just after my mission I felt no desire for anything but God’s presence. But since then I have changed a lot.  A few days ago I noticed there was a Chickery piano for sale.  In their day, the Chickery pianos were better than the Steinways.  I have played them before and they are a sweet breeze to play. The action is superb and the sound range is tremendous.  So I went to check it out knowing I couldn’t buy it.  I played it for a few minutes and it was about what I expected.

Then my visit took an interesting turn. The lady selling the piano and I were of a similar mind.  We began to talk and share ideas and experiences.  It was such a pleasant surprise.  I felt like I had met a long lost sister. Both of us had other things pending, so we parted before we finished talking.  I got something so much better than I was looking for.  It’s nice when God carefully diverts me from what I covet.

I don’t know if I can ever become so Godly minded that I stop coveting.  But at least there are times when I’m helped to remember what I want most: wonderful relationships.

Learning to stop coveting what we don’t have is only the first step.  What about coveting what we do have?  Coveting is not limited to things we don’t yet own. If someone takes something from us, don’t we protest and want it back? Don’t we ‘covet’ what was taken and seek justice over the item taken? Maybe I am taking it too far.  But some of the greatest men including Jesus gave up everything. They did not even covet their lives.

  I know I don’t stand very near to God or Christ.  I just want to discover how far I still have to go to reach Him.  So I explore these ideas of extreme righteousness.  I often heard how we should practice moderation in all things.  But Jesus wasn’t ‘moderately’ righteous.  He was the extreme, the supreme example of righteousness. 

Getting back to coveting, perhaps we need to reverse coveting and take it to extreme selflessness.  It’s something to think about; something to explore in how we run our lives.