The Tenth
Commandment

You shall not covet.

The tenth commandment is in some ways the most revealing of all. It turns the decalogue from an outward legal code into an inward moral standard.

The civil law cannot touch us for covetousness but only for theft. For covetousness belongs to the inner life. It lurks in the heart and the mind.

What lust is to adultery and temper is to murder, that covetousness is to theft.

The particular things which we are not to covet and which are mentioned in the tenth commandment are surprisingly modern.

In the housing shortage there is much coveting of our neighbour’s house, and the divorce courts would not be so full if men did not covet their neighbour’s wife.

‘Covetousness…is idolatry’ wrote Paul, and by contrast, ‘There is great gain in godliness with contentment’.

Listing these commandments has brought to light an ugly catalogue of sins.

So much takes place beneath the surface of our lives, in the secret places of our minds, which other people do not see and which we manage even to conceal from ourselves.

But God sees these things. His eye penetrates into the deep recesses of our hearts: ‘Before him no creature is hidden, but all are open and laid bare to the eyes of him with whom we have to do.’

He sees us as we really are, and his law shows up our sins for what they really are.

Indeed, it was the purpose of the law to expose sin, for ‘through the law comes knowledge of sin’.


To read samples of the content of John Stott's book (from which this material originates), please click this... tenth commandment link ... then click on the title "Basic Christianity".

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