it mostly comes in your interests...

our focus here on the porch right now is that love does not envy. now the fact is envy comes most often in the area that you’re most interested in and you’re most likely to be talented in. for instance, athletes envy other athletes, and doctors envy other doctors. musicians envy other musicians.

i have to say i have never been envious of a good seamstress. they can maybe sew up all kinds of incredible clothes. i just never wanted to be a seamstress. so there are areas in your life that you just don’t envy because you have no interest in those areas.

but if it gets a little bit close to home, and it’s an area that you’re interested in or have some talent in or wish you did, there comes the envy. it always happens. realtors envy other realtors; they don’t envy accountants. so we tend to find those who are closest to us in our profession or in our area of interests. brothers envy brothers, sisters envy sisters – things like that.

because envy is such a hidden sin, we don’t think it’s that bad. we don’t think it’s as harmful as the more overt ones like murder or lust or things like that. but the bible says this is an incredibly damaging sin. it’s hidden. but it’s mean. in fact, it’s the meanest sin of all because it is wishing bad on other people and it’s destructive. it devalues other people, it ruins your happiness, robs you of happiness, makes you miserable. it destroys relationships. it makes you critical.

i’ve discovered that when people are critical, if it’s not a constructive criticism, it’s almost always out of envy. criticism is almost always based in envy unless it’s a constructive criticism.

the main thing envy does is it keeps you from entering into the joy of other people. you miss out on a whole lot of joy in life you could be enjoying. for instance, let’s say you want to get married, but you’re not married right now. so every time you hear about a wedding, instead of being happy, you get resentful. you get envious. you can’t enjoy it. or, let’s say you want to have a baby, but you’re not having a baby. so every time you hear about a baby being born you don’t enjoy that. you don’t rejoice. you don’t rejoice with those who rejoice. you get envious. or you want a promotion, and somebody else in your company gets promoted. you don’t rejoice over that promotion. (“good for you! congratulations!”) no, you’re thinking, “how come not me?” or somebody gets a windfall, and they get a big inheritance, and you think, “how come i wasn’t born in a rich family? i have a poor family. i’m not getting any inheritance.”

as a result, you don’t enjoy much that goes on in the world. you can be a pretty miserable person. if the only time you’re happy is when good things happen to you, you’re not going to be happy that much, because happy things don’t happen to you all the time. a lot of life is just average, and a lot of life is bad things happening to you. on the other hand, if you learn to enjoy the good things that happen to others, you can be happy all the time. because something good is always happening to somebody.

just a thought from the front porch…