BROKEN: Desires (Covetous Idolatry)

[Read Romans 7:13-25 & Colossians 3:5]

I want you to think about the last argument you had (call it a fight if you want). What was it about? Now, take a moment to think deeper, asking the question, “What was it REALLY about?” I can guarantee you I know the answer. You wanted something and didn’t have it. That’s why you fought. You wanted a clean kitchen and didn’t have it, so you fought. You wanted more time and you didn’t have it, so you fought. You wanted some peace and quiet and didn’t have it, so you fought. You wanted...and didn’t have. 

We actually read about this in God’s Word. In James it says, “What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel.” (James 4:1-2, ESV). That’s the reason we fight and quarrel. It’s the reason we have conflict. Our desires are at war within us. They are distorted and misdirected. 

It hasn’t always been that way. When God created everything in the beginning and said it was very good, our desires were properly aligned. Yet, that didn’t last forever. Here’s what we read right after the creation story: “Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’ ” But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.” (Genesis 3:1-6, ESV). This is the beginning of distorted desires. 

Notice one minor detail. Remember what I told you a few weeks ago about the way God created the trees? He said, “And out of the ground the LORD God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food.” (Genesis 2:9, ESV). So, God created the trees pleasant to the sight and good for food. Yet, after talking with the serpent, Eve looked at the tree and “saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise.” (Genesis 3:6, ESV). That last line is important. God didn’t create the trees for that purpose. She desired more from the tree than God has designed it. That is the nature of sinful desires—desiring things beyond their created purpose. 

That connects to another important aspect of this story. Notice the serpent’s tactic. He not only questions God by saying, “Did God really say?”, but he also questions God’s goodness and provision. He tempts Eve to think that God is holding out on her, that there’s something better out there that God is withholding from her. And, to take this a step further, Eve begins to think that if she truly wants to be satisfied—to truly have her desires fulfilled—she needs to take things into her own hands. It’s all up to her—that’s why she eats of the tree. Lorenzo Albacete has said, “There is only one temptation. All particular temptations are expressions of this one original or ‘primordial’ temptation. It is the temptation to believe the fulfillment of the desires of the human heart depends entirely on us.” (Christopher West, Fill These Hearts, 112). 

This was at the root of the first sin and the well has been poisoned ever since. Ever since that first sin, every single human that has ever lived has a sinful nature that desires the wrong things and thinks they are the one who needs to fulfill their desires. They need to take matters into their own hands. 

Look at the struggle the Apostle Paul describes in Romans chapter 7–and keep in mind this is the struggle of a Christian, someone who has been converted. He says, “For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate...For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.” (Romans 7:15, 19, ESV). Have you ever been there? Boy, I sure have—in little and big things. I want to eat well and work out regularly, but then I don’t. I want to have patience and not blow up in anger, but then I do it. Why? My desires are at war within me. 

On the one hand, I want to do what’s good and right, but then I keep doing the things I hate. Why? Because in that moment I WANT to do the things I don’t want to do. Somewhere, deep down, I actually want to do the things I hate. THAT is our sinful nature. THAT is our disordered desires from the fall. Our sinful nature is at work, causing us to desire things that will destroy us. Take a moment to let that sink in. Your sinful nature wants you to be destroyed. So, it’s at work within you, causing you to desire things that will destroy you.

And, let’s not forget something that is even darker than that. In the previous chapter of Romans, we read that before we are in Jesus Christ—before we trust in Jesus—we are slaves to sin—slaves to our sinful nature that is trying to destroy us. There is no Spirit in us before we’re a Christian. There is no Spirit to wage war against our sinful nature. We’re completely enslaved to something that is trying to destroy us and kill us. 

That also means that our desires are completely enslaved and distorted as well. Without Jesus Christ, we are left to a life of perpetually desiring the wrong things and then chasing after those things with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength—things that will eventually, slowly destroy us. 

But notice something else that comes up in Romans 7. Notice what we read about the law of God. We read, “So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good.” (Romans 7:12-13, ESV). This is a powerful truth. Sin produces death in us through what is good. Or, another way to say it, Sin takes good things and distorts them so that they turn into bad things. 

Let me give a couple examples. First, let’s look at the Apostle Paul’s example. Is it a good thing to want to obey God’s law? Of course it is. Yet, sin can easily creep in and turn it into something deadly. Look at the Pharisees and how sin used the law to bring death to them. We all know various people who have also fallen into this trap and become legalistic to the point of death and destruction.

What about food? Is it good to desire to eat food? Of course it is. We just talked about how God created food so that we would desire it and eat it. Yet, we also know that sin can take hold of this desire, and turn it into something that is not good. We can desire food so much that we can destroy our bodies and die because of our distorted desire for food. Sin took a good thing and turned it into a bad thing. 

Somewhere, John Calvin said that our wicked desires are insatiable—unsatisfiable, unfillable, like leaky buckets. They are never satisfied, always looking for more. That’s why these good things turn into bad things. Because our broken desires are unsatisfiable, we look to things to fill our desires that were not created to fill our desires. We use them beyond their created design and in the process destroy them and ourselves. 

This is at the heart of covetousness. In a simple way, coveting is desiring something we don’t have, but it’s more than that. At its core, covetousness is about distorted desires. It’s not just about desiring things we don’t have, but desiring the wrong things. And here’s what the Bible says about covetousness—these wrong desires—“Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.” (Colossians 3:5, ESV). I want you to focus on the last four words—covetousness, which is idolatry. These two things are one. To covet—to have distorted and wrong desires—is to commit idolatry. 

Think about it for a minute. If coveting is about distorted desires that are unsatisfiable, then you will continue to desire these things more and more and more and more until they become something you desire more than God—which is idolatry. All of a sudden, these good things can easily turn into bad things that eventually turn into god things. They become that place we go for comfort and fulfillment of our desires, rather than God. And, sadly, we keep turning to things that will never fulfill those desires and never bring comfort, so we keep going back to them over and over and over and over again, hoping it will be different this time. Maybe this time it will provide comfort or peace that lasts. But it doesn’t, yet we go back to it again. This is the futility of idolatry. 

Not only is idolatry futile, but it’s destructive. Listen to what the Psalmist has to say about idolatry: “Their idols are silver and gold, the work of human hands. They have mouths but do not speak; eyes but do not see. They have ears, but do not hear; noses but do not smell. They have hands, but do not feel; feet, but do not walk; and they do not make a sound in their throat. Those who make them become like them; so do all who trust in them.” (Psalm 115:4-8, ESV). Those who make them become like them and so do all those who trust in them. That means those who trust in blind idols become blind themselves. Those who trust in speechless idols, become speechless themselves. 

But there’s even more to what the Psalmist is trying to say. He’s pointing out that these idols are dead, lifeless objects. And he’s telling us that when we trust in idols we become like them—dead and lifeless. Or, another way to put it, we become less human. This is the destructiveness of our distorted desires and sin. When we chase after these things that go against God’s will and God’s design, we are actually becoming less human—more like a dead, lifeless object. 

Here’s an example of that truth that I read this past week. Archibald Hart said this, “Today we have taken the pursuit of pleasure too far, and in so doing we have lost the ability to experience the very pleasure we are pursuing...Consistent overuse of the brain’s pleasure circuits causes us to lose our capacity to experience pleasure.” (Dennis Hollinger, The Meaning of Sex, 81). By pursuing pleasure in distorted ways we lose our ability to experience pleasure. Our bodies actually begin to lose their ability to truly experience pleasure. We slowly become like a dead, lifeless idol on the shelf who cannot speak, cannot hear, cannot feel, cannot walk, and cannot experience love, fellowship, or pleasure. And all of this is baked into the sinful nature of every single one of us. 

It’s no wonder that the Apostle Paul cries out, “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?” (Romans 7:24, ESV). How in the world can we ever be delivered from this sinful nature inside us that is always trying to destroy us, always causing us to desire things that will destroy us, causing us to desire things that will make us less human? 

Here’s how he answers the question, “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:25, ESV). That’s the only way you can overcome your sinful nature—through Jesus Christ. You cannot do it in your own strength. You cannot overcome your desires on your own. You cannot suppress your desires enough. You cannot fulfill your desires enough. None of that will work because your desires are all messed up. The only way you can ever be delivered from this mess is for Jesus to cleanse you of your sin and give you a new heart—and new desires to go along with that new heart. He also promises to give you the Holy Spirit who begins to wage war against your sinful nature. In Christ, you have desires that come from the Holy Spirit that begin to wage war with the desires that come from your sinful nature. This is your only hope. You can’t overcome this on your own. You need Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. 

Yet, notice one final thing. When you become a Christian, the battle isn’t over. It’s actually just begun. Before you’re a Christian there is no battle. Your sinful nature is having it’s way with you. But once you become a Christian, the battle begins. The Spirit begins to wage war with your sinful nature. The Spirit begins to reorder the desires within you. You will begin to notice that you no longer desire the things you used to desire—that’s a good thing. You’ll also begin to notice that you are desiring things you never used to desire—you like going to church and reading your Bible.

Here’s the point: the reordering of our desires is a long, slow process. It doesn’t happen overnight. And, the Bible calls it a battle—there is a war raging inside you. That means you need to fight the battle the way God has told us to fight the battle—through prayer, reading God’s Word, attending worship, and fellowship with other believers. Through these things, Jesus and the Spirit begin to reorder our desires so that we desire the right things in the right way. And when we desire the right things in the right way, our desires are filled by our God.