I heard a sermon this week, on chapter 11 of Romans, and through the pastor’s teaching I was actually challenged to make others jealous. I never thought I’d say this about a sermon. We do, after all, tend to think of jealousy as a bad thing, as one of the so-called seven especially deadly sins. By the end of the sermon though, the pastor had me convinced that jealousy, within the context of the gospel, is not a bad thing at all—it is instead a most desired outcome.
In several of my favorite stories from Scripture that have spoken to me most intimately over the years, I can see now that the concept of jealousy really is in them; I had just never seen it before. That Samaritan woman, for example, seemed to envy the water Jesus talked to her about; she didn’t want to thirst again, to have to come to that deep well in the heat of the day to heave water up and off to where she came from. Yes, she coveted the lightened burden that this man Jesus told her about.
Then, there was that Syrophoenician woman so desperate for what Jesus had to offer that she was willing to beg for it. She basically told Jesus that, though she knew she wasn’t one of his people, even the dogs at Jesus’ feet could eat the crumbs from his bread; and this woman appeared to envy such dogs, as she somehow sensed that even a proverbial crumb from such a man would be enough to completely alter life as she knew it.
And, of course, there’s that story that truly did rock my world when I found myself near death from a blood disease—the story of that woman who seemed to envy the very clothes that were allowed to touch Jesus’ body. Yes, this woman coveted nearness to Jesus so much that she, after twelve long years of bleeding, dragged herself back to the very crowd she was obligated to stay away from due to her uncleanness and did not leave until her fingers managed to brush against the fringe of the outer garment/cloak of Christ. She had jealousy with purpose.
I wonder how many of us, who do indeed have that very same Christ alive and well within us, make those around us feel the way these women did—like they simply must have what we do. Do those who encounter us feel as if we truly do have something that they just cannot live without? Does our life here make them yearn for something more, something deeper, than anything in this world has ever been able to offer them? Are they jealous of Jesus in us? No, Jesus jealousy is not a bad thing at all.
Leave a Reply