Breaking Free From Jealousy

Scriptures: Proverbs 14:30, John 21:15-23

THE CONSEQUENCES OF JEALOUSY 

“A tranquil heart gives life to the flesh, but envy makes the bones rot.” PROVERBS 14:30 (ESV) 

Envy is spiritual cancer, destroying a person from the inside out. 

The consequences of jealousy are grave. King Solomon does not mince words as he warns us of this diagnosis with graphic imagery and directs us instead towards a life of health and peace. 

Envy harms us. Even if it does nothing to anyone else, it will still destroy the one who envies. It influences our perception of others. It breeds a destructively critical spirit, leading us to view our neighbors with unwarranted suspicion and anger. It leaves us incapable of being happy for others and undermines any chance of contentment, for there is always someone else with more for us to feel resentful of. Envy makes the bones rot. 

Jealousy can invade swiftly and subtly. Take the apostle Peter, for example. Before the crucifixion, he had made a mess of things by denying Christ three times. John records that Jesus made breakfast for Peter and some other disciples on the beach after His resurrection. Jesus spoke with Peter, restoring their relationship, reminding him of His call to Peter to follow Him, and tasking him to shepherd and feed His people. If you had asked Peter what his heart most longed for the day before, it would have been this. But when Jesus added that one day Peter would be called to give his life for his Lord, how did Peter respond? By looking at John and saying, “What about this man?” 

Jesus, though fully aware of the dangers of jealousy, replied, “If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow me!” (John 21:22). 

How easy it is, even in moments of great advance, for jealousy to infect us and cause us to forget all that Jesus has done for us and given us! How, then, do we find any kind of cure for this spiritual rottenness? 

The last thing we want to do is the first thing we need to do: recognize envy for what it is—sin—and bring it into the light of God’s presence through confession. Then, we must prayerfully reject jealousy, moment by moment, asking the Spirit to enable us to reflect on all we have in Christ until we are gripped not by jealousy but by joy. Those who count their blessings can praise God for the blessings He bestows on others. And a tranquil heart gives life. 

Do not let your envy eat away at you unchecked. In what way does it have a hold on you? Confess it, pray about it, and fight it with gospel truth. 

• How is God calling me to think differently?
• How is God reordering my heart’s affections—what I love?
• What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Scriptures: Genesis 37:9-11, 1 Samuel 2:1-10

RESPONDING TO ANOTHER’S SUCCESS 

“He dreamed another dream and told it to his brothers and said, ‘Behold, I have dreamed another dream. Behold, the sun, the moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to me’ … And his brothers were jealous of him.” GENESIS 37:9, 11 (ESV) 

Envy is a feeling common to humanity. It is also a monster—a giant that can eat anyone alive. 

How do you struggle with envy? Who are those in your sphere of influence or your field of vision experiencing favor or success, and with whom in some way you wish to swap places? We must be careful. “The odious passion of envy,” writes George Lawson, “torments and destroys one’s self while it seeks the ruin of its object.”[1] Envy tends to destroy the envier. 

They did not yet know it, but Joseph’s brothers were on the road to the evils of deceit, malice, and slave-trading their own sibling—to the most detestable forms of cruelty. The first step on that road was their jealousy of him. But they did not see it, so they walked towards actions they presumably had not countenanced when Joseph started sharing his grandeur dreams. 

We must learn to see our envy and deal with it. So how can we handle others’ success without succumbing to bitterness and jealousy? 

First, we recognize that God is sovereign over the affairs of man. God determined for Joseph to have what he had and be what he was—and He determined a less significant position for Joseph’s brothers. If they had been prepared to consider this, although it might have been hard, they would have been spared the self-inflicted pain of their envious hatred. 

Second, we turn to God in prayer. F.B. Meyer, a great 19th-century preacher, once told of how another preacher came to minister in the same area where he was already ministering, and suddenly there was a drift from his congregation. Jealousy began to grip his soul, and the only freedom he could find was to pray for this fellow pastor—to pray that God would bless another’s ministry. Prayer loosens the grip of envy on our hearts. 

God is the one who sets up and brings down. If Joseph’s brothers had grasped this truth, they would have had no occasion to be envious. God is also the one who gives us every breath as a gift from Him. If they had grasped this, they would have had more desire to give thanks than to grow bitter. Today, search your own heart, recognize and repent of any jealousy that has taken root, and bow in humility and thankfulness before your sovereign God. 

• How is God calling me to think differently?
• How is God reordering my heart’s affections—what I love?
• What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Scriptures: 1 Corinthians 4:7, 1 Timothy 6:6-12

AS HE PLANNED 

“What do you have that you did not receive? If then you received it, why do you boast as if you did not receive it?” 1 CORINTHIANS 4:7 (ESV) 

We call it by different names, disguising it in many ways—but jealousy is often one of the “tolerated” evangelical sins. You are unlikely to find it on a “Top Ten” list of sins that a pastor warns his church against or mentions very often when believers share their struggles with each other. It is on God’s list, though, and it is often mentioned in the Scriptures. In fact, jealousy is found amid some of the most sordid sinful behaviors that the New Testament epistles address because it is meant to be taken seriously (see, for instance, Romans 13:13). 

Not much has changed since Paul wrote to the Corinthians. The average local church still contends with far too much chaos and division caused by jealousy—and one of the dangers of jealousy can be the way it causes us to doubt that God knows what He is doing in apportioning gifts. 

Everything you have, Paul tells these proud, disunited, envious church members, you received—and the Giver of the gifts, the Creator of the universe, does not make mistakes. So how could they—and we—walk around arrogantly as if they would do a better job of being in control of creation? Did we determine our height, girth, speed, or abilities? Who made us unique? God! Our DNA is divinely planned. Our circumstances are exactly as God intends, and He does not make mistakes. Envy is a sin because it is the attitude that suggests that God is not good or does not know what would be for our good. Envy is how idolatry feels. 

When playing piccolo in the orchestra of life, we may find ourselves looking across at a big tuba a few chairs away, being played with deep, loud notes, and being tempted to say to ourselves, “Nobody can hear me. My sound is not good enough.” From there flows a sense of bitterness about our place and a sense of envy of the tuba players. But ours is the piccolo sound for a reason. It is the instrument we were meant to play—so let’s play it with joy and excellence! 

In our endeavors to use God’s gifts, why are we jealous of one another? Why do we let discontentment rob us of the joy He has freely offered? Why do we allow what He has done for someone else to blind us to what He has done for us—not least in giving us eternal riches in His presence? Here is the truth that we each need to rehearse: “God gave to me exactly what I require, I am composed exactly as He planned, and all that He has, and has not, given me is for my good and His glory.” 

Do not allow jealousy to consume you. Instead, live out joyfully the role for which you were created. For you are His workmanship, recreated in Christ Jesus for good works, which He has prepared for and gifted you to do (Ephesians 2:10). Let that be enough for you today. 

• How is God calling me to think differently?
• How is God reordering my heart’s affections—what I love?
• What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Scriptures: Romans 12:15, 2 Corinthians 1:2-7

REJOICING WITH OTHERS 

“Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.” ROMANS 12:15 (ESV) 

Shared joy is a great expression of sympathy. We typically use the word sympathy to describe shared grief, but it also applies to joy. 

We understand sympathy when we use it in a sentence, but the word itself can be difficult to define. So consider its opposite: apathy. If apathy is akin to saying, “I couldn’t care less,” sympathy is akin to saying, “I couldn’t care more.” Sympathy is an identification with the experience of another person. 

Many of us find it natural to “weep with those who weep.” It is instinctive for us to enter into the disappointment and pain of those we love and to cry at the sight or thought of their sadness. This is a good thing, for to “bear one another’s burdens” is to “fulfill the law of Christ” (Galatians 6:2). To enter into the joy and success of others, however, is often the greater challenge because it requires us to work against the grain of the fallenness of our human nature, which is prone to resentment and bitterness. Instead of someone’s success serving as an occasion for us to bless God and thank Him, it so easily becomes an occasion for envy. 

Most of us know how to avoid expressing envy. But there is a massive difference between not expressing envy and not feeling envy. We can modify our behavior enough to keep from showing it, but it requires spiritual transformation to get us to the point of not feeling it. This transformation begins with a right understanding of our identity as members of Christ’s body. Paul says that “we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another” (Romans 12:5). To be in Christ means we are members of Him and one another. 

To put this another way: if we are in Christ, we are all on the same team. When we grasp this, it will be as natural for us to enter into another’s joy as it is for a soccer player to rejoice at their teammate’s game-winning goal just as if they had scored it themselves. We win and lose—enjoy and grieve—as God’s people. 

God’s word calls you to “let love be genuine” (Romans 12:9)—and genuine, Christlike love conforms your feelings so that jealousy gives way to joy and apathy to true sympathy. Is there anyone you are standing aloof from in some way, either in their joy or sadness? Have you considered whom you could encourage today? There is almost certainly someone who needs you to reach out and let them know that you are with them, praying for them and there for them as they walk a deep valley. Likewise, there will be someone whose joy you can share, and you can simply let them know that you praise God for His favor in their life. Be someone of whom it can increasingly be said, “They couldn’t care more.” Ask the God of all compassion and comfort to work in you by His Spirit to mold you into that person today. 

• How is God calling me to think differently?
• How is God reordering my heart’s affections—what I love?
• What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Scriptures: Mark 9:33-35, Romans 12:3-13

FREEDOM FROM OURSELVES 

“He asked them, ‘What were you discussing on the way?’ But they kept silent, for on the way they had argued with one another about who was the greatest. And he sat down and called the twelve. And he said to them, ‘If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.’” MARK 9:33-35 (ESV) 

Rivalry is part and parcel of life. On a team, friendly rivalry can be a means of spurring each other on, helping the team members to become faster or stronger. But when rivalry becomes the occasion of selfishness and jealousy, it undermines unity. 

On the way to Capernaum, Jesus had been teaching the disciples, saying, “The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him. And when he is killed, after three days he will rise” (Mark 9:31). Perhaps as Jesus walked ahead of them, He heard snippets of conversation from the disciples jostling their way along behind Him. Their discussion was filled with jealous rivalry over their own greatness. 

That’s a bad topic of conversation on any occasion, but especially in this context. How incongruous that when Jesus was giving them instruction concerning His own suffering and death, they were preoccupied with their own status and greatness! 

Jesus asked them about their conversation to use it as an opportunity for instruction. In the span of a sentence, He turned human ideas of greatness completely upside down. True greatness in His kingdom lies in putting yourself last and acting as a servant to everyone else. This is, after all, how the King of that kingdom lived, and lives, for He “came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). 

If we’re honest, when we consider this scene, we see our faces in those of the disciples. We hear our voices echoing theirs. We find ourselves scrambling for position as they did. Selfish rivalry rises to the surface often and in the most unlikely places. Yet the antidote is always the same: humility. We all need the kind of humility, writes David Wells, that is a “freedom from our self which enables us to be in positions in which we have neither recognition nor importance, neither power nor visibility, and even experience deprivation, and yet have joy and delight … It is the freedom of knowing that we are not in the center of the universe, not even in the center of our own private universe.”[1] 

This is a difficult lesson to learn. Yet despite our rivalry, despite the absence of our humility, Jesus does not abandon us. To see our faces in this scene is to be reminded that we’re constantly in need of God’s grace as we walk along the pathway of discipleship. Only the grace of God can get your focus off of yourself and set you free from yourself. Only gazing at the one who left the glories of heaven to die for you on a cross can change your heart so that you seek to serve, not to be served, and care less about your prestige than you do about the good of others. Jesus is calling you today to serve, even as He serves you. 

• How is God calling me to think differently?
• How is God reordering my heart’s affections—what I love?
• What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?