The Abundant Life, Part 12: Coveting Never Helps

06/04/25 • 32 min

Jesus at 2AM - A Humorous, Intelligent Look at the Bible, Church History & the Life of Faith

To put it bluntly, if it’s the abundant life we seek, then covetousness has to go. Mainly because yearning for the things of others turns life into a constant competition that we can never win. Whatever we possess or achieve, we can always find someone with "more." And the tragic result is a never-ending experience of deprivation and a fundamental dissatisfaction with our life (not to mention a sense of increasting tension with others).

It's an important lesson brought to us by guest preacher Erika Karimi who started out as a Michigan based podcast listener and is now an ordained elder at Canvas and a regular part of our preaching rotation! (Maybe God has plans to use you at Canvas? Stranger things have happened!!)

The text for this sermon can be found here: Exodus 20:17 (NRSV)

If you value the podcast and are able to support the community from which it comes, you can make a tax-deductible contribution to Canvas Presbyterian Church here! (Thank you!!!)

For more sermon series, resources and means of contacting me, simply head to jesusat2am.com, send me email, or come chat on BlueSky.

The text for this sermon can be found here: Exodus 20:17 (NRSV)

If you value the podcast and are able to support the community from which it comes, you can make a tax-deductible contribution to Canvas Presbyterian Church here! (Thank you!!!)

For more sermon series, resources and means of contacting me, simply head to jesusat2am.com, send me email, or come chat on BlueSky.

Previous Episode

The Abundant Life, Part 11: Bearing Honest Witness

In this episode we turn to – you guessed it – the 9th commandment: You shall not bear false witness. It’s instruction that – like all the commandments – seems, at first glance, very simple and straightforward: When you are called as a witness in a trial, do not give false testimony.

But when we look a little deeper, we see that this commandment is filled with implications that I think are critical to explore if we are to live the abundant life – not the least of which is to recognize that in life, there will be conflict. Wrongs will be done. Harm will happen. There will be disputes that require adjudication. If life in the community of faith were easy, there’d be no need for a commandment about truth-telling.

Indeed, it turns out that truth-telling is key for a healthy community. And in fact, can be very healing when wrongs have been committed. Sometimes the only justice that can be granted is an honest accounting of what has transpired. But owning wrongs goes a long way towards making repair.

And yet there is another reason that the people of God are called to be honest brokers in all that we do – we bear witness to God himself, whom we believe raised Jesus from the dead! ...a claim that strains credulity to its breaking point. If we want to be the least bit credible when it comes to bearing witness to Christ, we had best have a long reputation of integrity – intellectual and otherwise...

The text for this sermon can be found here: Exodus 20:16 (NRSV)

If you value the podcast and are able to support the community from which it comes, you can make a tax-deductible contribution to Canvas Presbyterian Church here! (Thank you!!!)

For more sermon series, resources and means of contacting me, simply head to jesusat2am.com, send me email, or come chat on BlueSky.