For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.
Summary: Money is often misunderstood, and even more often misused.
This is, perhaps, one of the most misremembered lines in all of history. Most people, if they use this phrase, end up saying, “Money is the root of all evil.”
That is not quite the same thing.
Money is not evil. It is not even a “root.” It is, rather, something poorly understood, because it is not even really a “thing.”
The dictionary definition of money is usually something like “a medium of exchange.” The problem with that definition is what they don’t tell you about money. It is true that money is a medium of exchange, but the value of money is not in the money itself. The value is what we personally attach to the money.
For example, let’s imagine that we each want to go to the store and buy new shoes. We go to the shoe store and look around. Each pair of shoes has a price tag on it that tells us how much money the store will accept in exchange for the shoes.
If you are like me, you check the price before trying on the shoes. (No point in wasting time if I don’t have enough money to buy them.) But what if I like an expensive pair of shoes that I can’t afford. What if I really like them a LOT. What if I feel like I can’t live without them?
Do you see where this is going?
Wanting something that doesn’t belong to me is called coveting. The Bible has a lot to say about coveting but it all boils down to one word: Don’t! (Exodus 20:17)
Don’t take what is not yours. Don’t even look at it.
If “good” is doing God’s will, then “evil” must be doing the opposite, and that is why Paul says it is the love of money that is evil. When people equate money with possessions, our “coveting” is transferred from one thing, like the shoes we wanted, to the money itself. If we allow ourselves to “love” money, the love of money becomes concentrated coveting.
It’s a bit like breaking the Tenth Commandment with a sledgehammer.
Application: Use money, don’t love it.
Food for Thought: How do we avoid the trap of loving money?
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Continue reading “1 Timothy 6:10a – The Root of Evil”
