“YOU SHALL NOT STEAL”

a 10 Commandments series - #7 a
Job 1:13-21

The best and most effective television commercials are the ones that create in our minds a perception of
need where need doesn’t really exist. The other night, Brandy was watching the Bachelorette special on ABC when
a Wendy’s commercial aired, one of her pregnancy cravings. Even though we had eaten not two hours before, I was
charged with the task of going to the Wendy’s by Kroger’s over on Monroe St., to get my wife a large diet Coke, a
sandwich and fries, because she saw the commercial and all of a sudden came to a perceived realization that she was
kind of hungry, and the one thing that would satisfy her hunger and cravings would be Wendy’s.
If you get right down to it, the most effective commercials aren’t necessarily the funniest or even the most
memorable. They’re the ones that take you from a place of contentment and move you, through logical
manipulation, into a place of discontent where you are made to think that your life is missing something, and the
only thing to fill that void, the only thing that will make you content once again is that very thing which just
happens to be right in front of your face at that very moment in the commercial.
People get paid boatloads of money to take you from contentment to discontent in commercials, and often
are successful in convincing us that their product will cure our discontent. We’ve seen already on several occasions
how the Ten Commandments go much deeper than face value. What I mean by that is, when we discussed the 5th
commandment on murder, we didn’t talk about just the unlawful taking of another’s life, but really cut to the core
of where murderous rage comes from. When we meditated upon the 6th commandment, we didn’t just talk about
the forbidding of enjoyment of marriage blessings outside of God’s framework of marriage. We cut to the very core
of our vulnerabilities as sinful human beings, seeing how even the littlest thought or inclination could snowball into
something very damaging and destructive, even unto eternity.
We’re going to do the very same thing with the 7th commandment. This commandment doesn’t just
address petty thievery or grand larceny, or the other forms of stealing that are obvious even to the worldly. Finally,
it deals with our propensity towards being discontent with God’s rich blessings even when we have every reason to
be completely content, because he never ceases to give us our daily bread, just as we ask, and always opens up his
hand to bless us with his Word which feeds our souls to eternal life. In short: we have everything we need for this
life and especially in preparation for the next. There is no reason to ever be discontent as a Christian. That sense of
contentment is found in this commandment: “You shall not steal.” Luther’s Small Catechism explanation is: “We
should fear and love God that we do not take our neighbor’s money or property, or get it by dishonest dealing, but help him
to improve and protect his property and means of income.”
The section of Scripture that we are using as a backdrop to the 7th commandment is Job chapter 1 where the
Holy Spirit chronicles the devastating losses that Job suffered in his life. Job is one of the great characters of the
Bible who is immediately associated with intense suffering and pain, and it’s not difficult to see why. In one day,
three messengers come to him, one right after the other with crippling, devastating news that most people would
quickly succumb to despair over. His vast wealth in the form of oxen, donkeys and servants, which the Lord blessed
him with, was struck down by raiding marauders. All his sheep and the servants who tended them were burned up
by fire that fell from heaven. And his own flesh and blood, his sons and daughters were all crushed to death when a
vicious wind caused the house they were in to collapse on top of them. His wealth, his servants, his family, all gone
in one day, in one instant!
That’s why Job is so quickly associated with suffering, with unforeseen tragedy, and why many Christians
identify with Job when such things befall them in their own lives. But I didn’t select this as the text for today
because I wanted to give to you a portrait of enduring suffering. I selected it because Job presents to us a wonderful
example of contentment, whose words serve as the creed for all Christians who are assaulted with unforeseen trouble
and hardship: “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”
What wonderful godly contentment, and yet so difficult to put into practice, because the creed that we hear
from outside the safe haven of God’s house is very different from the Christian creed of contentment. What we
hear in so many and varied ways is not, “The Lord gives and takes away. Blessed be his name!” What we hear
whispered into our consciences every day is: “You deserve everything! You deserve the world, and don’t let anyone
tell you otherwise! You deserve to have the best of the best, and if that means that you have to hurt people along the
way to get it, if that means you need to swindle people out of their belongings to get ahead in the world, if that
means that you cheat the government out of taxes that are rightly theirs to take, then so be it. After all, the
government has enough money. They won’t miss yours. And if people are so ignorant that they can’t tell that
you’re taking them for a ride, then that’s their fault for not being smart enough to be shrewd in their financial
dealings. You deserve the world, and you have the right to do whatever it takes to get what you deserve!”
That’s the world’s creed when it comes to our possessions, which God is protecting in this 7th
commandment, and not just ours, but that of our neighbors, Christian and non-Christian alike. Understand that
the 7th commandment, while it certainly deals with open and blatant thievery that is punished by our system of
justice, it chiefly deals with that spirit of being malcontent, which leads to so much more harm, because the
wantonness that can become such a part of our existence, especially in our lucrative society, that wantonness is like a
bottomless pit that will never be fed to satisfaction no matter how hard we might try. And soon, what God’s desire
for our lives is, worship and reception of his blessings for both body and soul, godly contentment founded upon his
gracious promises, quickly turns into a fruitless pursuit of transitory things which never have any value beyond this
life!
St. Paul warns Timothy of such things in his first epistle to the young pastor protégé: “9 People who want to
get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and
destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the
faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.”
Simply put, when the heart longs for earthly riches, when the heart is attached to the temporary and
transitory, then the whole self will do whatever is necessary to acquire such temporal wealth, which includes any
kind of dishonest gain at the expense of another. But when the Christian heart longs for heavenly riches, when as
Jesus commands, we set our hearts on things above, and not on earthly things, then our whole effort is spent on
ensuring that we are fed with eternal blessings found only in Christ Jesus, his Word and his true body and true
blood in the Sacrament. Then, knowing that our eternal riches are secure, all those temporary blessings that the
Lord gives us to enjoy on this side of eternity, whatever they are, we are content with them, for we have much more
to look forward to in eternity than what we can tangibly grasp for a limited time during our lives on earth.
And finally, that’s what this commandment encourages us to understand. This isn’t just a simple moral law
that forbids the taking of another person’s property, because if that were the case, our sinful nature would always
find justification for doing so – because they’re better off than we are, or we could use more blessings right now with
our own circumstances of life, or because I think God should pour out more physical blessings, but since he isn’t
doing it, I’m going to manufacture it through dishonest means. This commandment is much more than just a
mandate against petty thievery or grand larceny. This is an encouragement to be content in all situations, just as Job
was in the incredible hardships that the devil brought into his life. Be content, because no matter how the Lord
chooses to bless you now with temporal riches, do not set your heart on them, because they are temporary – look to
eternity. Set your hearts on heaven which is the greatest gift your God gives to you.
And interestingly enough, it’s given to you as a gift because of something that Jesus took from you without
your permission – your sins. But unlike the sin of stealing which takes something valuable from someone else
without their permission and to their detriment, Jesus, without our permission, stole from us what was keeping us
out of heavenly glory. Without our permission and without our consent he took our sin debt upon himself. He
impoverished himself before his heavenly Father and endured the punishment that our debts deserved so that we
could be debt-free before the Father and ready to enter the eternal riches of everlasting glory. 2 Corinthians 8:9 hits
home with that very thought: “9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he
became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich.” Such love, such generosity and benevolence has no equal,
and you, dear Christian friends, by the work of God the Holy Spirit, are personal recipients of that perfect
generosity.
Be content with that generosity, for it goes far beyond what we could ever comprehend. Be content because
your great and perfect benefactor, the Lord Jesus, became poor, even suffering death on the cross, so that you may
be eternally rich in his name and by his grace. Find a glorious contentment, as Job did, in God’s great promises,
and you will learn to give thanks to God in everything and for everything, and you will learn to echo the credo of
the sufferer: “The Lord gives and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord!” Now that’s godliness with
contentment. Amen.