Quotable

“Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have...” (Heb:13:5Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.
See All...). Is it not deeply humiliating, beloved friends, that the best of Christians should need to be cautioned against the worst of sins? May the consecrated become covetous? Is it possible that the regenerate may drivel into misers? Alas, what perils surround us, what tendencies are within us!...

Covetousness is a vice of a very degrading kind, and it is therefore the more surprising that those who have a renewed nature, and in whom the Spirit of God dwells, should require to be warned against bowing down their souls before it, and yet...once and again the saints are warned against “covetousness, which is idolatry.” As long as Israel is in the wilderness she is not out of danger from the golden calf. There is no superfluous text in the Bible....alas, the best of saints may be betrayed into the basest of sins....

It appears from our text that the children of God need also to be exhorted to cherish that most simple and natural of virtues— contentment....O Lord, thou knowest us better than we know ourselves, for thou understandest what poor, faulty things even thine own children are. The best of men are men at best. Unless the grace of God keep us every moment, and defend us from the temptations of our many foes, we would utterly perish from the way. Great need have we to say, “The Lord is my helper,” for if He be not so, we will fall a prey to covetousness and discontent.

—C. H. Spurgeon, From the sermon, “A Vile Weed and a Fair Flower,” quoted in Free Grace Broadcaster, Winter 1999