Covetousness

I am having a hard time distinguishing between covetousness and enthusiasm. Let me state it plainly - I have lust in my heart for a guitar. I already have two very nice Martin acoustics: a twelve string and my dream guitar, an OM-21. And yet I am still not satisfied. I find myself looking at "guitar porn," i.e., pictures of high craftsmanship like this beautiful Collings mahogany to the right. It has everything I want and admire in a guitar: a slotted headstock, 12-frets at the body, and a small size. It would sound and play completely different from anything I own.

Since covetousness is a dissatisfaction with what God has given us, a desire for more, I cannot help but think my attraction to this instrument is somehow wrong. I don't need it. I can't really afford it. It serves merely to fill a niche, or better, to scratch an itch. I doubt very much that if I did buy another guitar I would then be satisfied. As someone once said, "You'll only be satisfied with the next guitar." Still that finish is so sweet....

The American economy is fueled by covetousness. We accumulate mountains of stuff, and forget we even own it. Coveting things is our national religion, an attempt to fill the "God-shaped spot" within us with "things" instead of God himself. It is like trying to put a square peg into a round hole - it won't fit, and it won't satisfy. I know this, but I still covet, and I believe the tenth commandment to be the hardest one to obey. When was the last sermon you heard on self-denial? True repentance, according to the Heidelberg Catechism (Q.88), is "the dying of the old self and the birth of the new." As Paul wrote, "If you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God" (Colossians 3:1). And yet I do hope there are guitars in heaven....