Love of money is covetousness

 I Timothy 6:12: [12] Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many witnesses.

When Paul talks here about, “Fight the good fight of faith,” the point is not, “Fight to keep the doctrine straight.” That’s other passages. It’s, you fight the struggle to walk by faith in the doctrine; stay in the Word by faith regardless of what feelings come; it’s that constant battle and struggle to walk by faith and not by sight.

There’s the constant struggle that sight gives you. II Corinthians 4: [18] While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.

You look at circumstances and the C&S Gang (circumstances and situations) comes along and beats on you and your attention is drawn to the earthly, fleshly, physical things. The struggle is to walk not by the sight, and the experience, and the feeling, but to walk by faith in the truth of God’s Word and not by the things you see.

We live from moment to moment in a world where the things that seem the most real to us are the things we can touch and feel. There’s an old saw you hear in religion that says, “A man with an experience is more powerful than a man with a message.”

Listen, you can tell people something all along but if you give them an experience, something to experience, they’ll go for that faster. That’s how you explain the seeming popularity of the so-called Pentecostal-Charismatic Movement.

There’s something they’re experiencing going along with it; that’s how you explain the seeming popularity of the formalism, of Romanism and the liturgical, sacramental, sacerdotal kind of system.

I had a Roman Catholic priest tell me once, “You know, pastor, what we’ve got that you don’t have is we have theater.” And they do; they have all this theater.

You know, if you watch movies and you have a religious figure it will either be a Catholic priest, because they’ve got things to do and you want action in movies, or it will be some, what they call a Bible-thumper, because he’s doing something. It won’t just be a message to believe.

So that issue of experience is always powerful. How do you fight to take the truth of God’s Word--that’s just doctrine and truth but life--and then apply it? There’s a struggle there to walk consistently by faith, and it’s the struggle OF faith just to stay in the Word and in regards to what happens, just let the power of the Word of God work on you.

I Timothy 6: [6] But godliness with contentment is great gain. Verse 8 says, [8] And having food and raiment let us be therewith content.

That’s a great verse. Godliness is God-likeness. It’s thinking like God thinks and acting like God acts and working with God, delighting in what He does. With contentment means “that’s enough.” When you don’t need something else. Just be satisfied.

[7] For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out.

I’ve done two funerals in the last couple of weeks and you know how much both those people left? Everything. You come in with nothing and you go out with nothing. There’s people worried about their possessions but you’re going to leave them all behind anyway.

[9] But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition.

There’s the problem—they that WILL. It doesn’t say they that ARE rich; it’s people who have that incessant desire for more who fall into temptation and a snare, and many foolish and hurtful lusts.

[10] For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

Now, people say that’s a bad translation. No, what is the love of money? “Which while some having coveted after.” That’s what the love of money is—it’s covetousness.

Colossians 3 says covetousness is idolatry. Idolatry is substituting something for God—that is the root of all evil. The fighting of the good fight of faith starts with fleeing these things. Don’t let sin rule your life.