Jealousy

For Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Proverbs 27:4

Wrath is cruel, anger is overwhelming,
but who can stand before jealousy?

A person can be jealous about us. He is jealous of our good fortune - the money we earn, our popularity, whatever it is that he perceives we have and he wants. In that jealousy, he become our enemy, or, rather, makes us the enemy. We have what he does not, and he will act, not merely to attain what we have, but to take it from us. Indeed, more important than getting what we have is to see that we lose it. He wants us to feel the loss that he feels.

A person can also be jealous for us. He wants us, and he does not want to share. He is resentful of the attention others show us. Nor does he want us sharing. He cannot abide us being friendly towards others. He certainly cannot abide us loving others. He would rather us feel his pain than be happy with others.

How dangerous then is such a person. An angry man loses his anger when his attention is diverted to other things. Cruel wrath often is not personal. We experience harm while we are in its way, but it will pass. The jealous man, though, is obsessed with the person about whom or for whom it is jealous. His happiness is tied up in the fortune of the person with whom he is obsessed.

We are in danger of becoming that jealous person if our joy is not found in God alone. For as much as we love God, then as much we will rejoice in the fortunes of others, especially in their standing with our Lord. Because the love of God is so satisfying, we cannot be jealous of what others have. Jealousy, then, becomes a good measure of our satisfaction with God.