If I Can’t Have It, No One Can | The Seven Deadly Sins | Envy | Pastor Patrick Houston

So good to be with you celebrating on Palm Sunday. My name is Patrick. I'm the campus pastor down in Salt Lake City. And so we love you all the way from Salt Lake and we're so glad to be up here with you today and uh joining in with everybody online.

And today it truly is going to be a Palm Sunday celebration. Um but I I want to ask you if you would as an act of celebration, let's stand to our feet. We're going to read God's word together. I just want to honor this moment. We're going to jump into Matthew 21 and we're going to read the the Palm Sunday triumphal entrant entrance of Jesus.

And uh I I just I want this word, this scripture to just begin to elevate the the the expectation you have for Jesus moving here today in your life and in this room and what he's going to do to everybody watching online. I believe that he has something powerful and victorious that he wants to do and it's going to start right here. here.

And so we're going to celebrate in this scripture together. Matthew 21:6 says, "The disciples went and did just as Jesus directed them." And I felt led just to pause right here for a moment and encourage you that God wants to work through your obedience. He wants to use your yes to do something that's going to change the course of your life, those who you love, the world around you.

And so if maybe you just been a little bit wrestling with God about something, I I just feel like I was prompted to tell you he's waiting on your yes and he wants to use that to move. Okay, just a little something extra in the beginning. Just a little something extra.

Verse seven, they brought the donkey and the colt. They laid their clothes on them, and he sat on them. And a very large crowd spread their clothes on the road, and others were cutting branches from trees and spreading them on the road. Then the crowds went ahead of him, and those who followed all shouted, "Hosana to the son of David.

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosana in the highest heaven. And I just want to take a moment, church. Can we just celebrate the triumphal entry of our savior, of our king? Can we just shout, "Hosana! Hosana! Hosana! Come this way, Lord Jesus.

Find in me a heart that celebrates your victory, Jesus." That's what we're here to do on Palm Sunday. Or you can grab a seat. Hopefully, you're sitting next to somebody that you like. If you don't like them, it's too late now. You're locked in. As a church, we've been in a season uh in a series called Killing You Softly.

And if you've been here, you know we've been walking through the seven deadly sins. And it has been a ride. It's been a ride. Um I I don't know about you, but uh each week I have left church realizing I am more jacked up than I realized. It's like, man, I'm a pastor and I'm a sinner at the same time.

What is happening here? Uh I I'm realizing I'm in wrath. I'm I'm more angry than I thought I was. Uh in greed, uh more greedy than I thought I was in gluttony. I eat way too much all the time. Thank God we're fasting. And uh and lust and and all of these things.

It's it's like you you show up to church and you're like not beat up, but just like understanding that there's a problem, you know, like that. It's been wild. And Pastor Levi has done such a beautiful job at helping us see how dangerous these sins uh can be when left unchecked in our lives.

And so today on Palm Sunday, yes, this is a Palm Sunday message, but we also are going to be talking about envy. And like I don't know how that really connects. We'll get there. Okay, just hang with me. Don't walk out yet. We just need a little bit of time.

All right. So, we're going to jump into a little bit down the road in the timeline before the the crucifixion, but after Jesus's arrest, after the triumphal entry, he's been arrested now and he's on trial. And so, this is Matthew 27. We're going to jump in here and we're going to see really how envy comes to life.

Matthew 27:15 says, "At the festival, the governor's custom was to release to the crowd a prisoner that they wanted. At the time they had a notorious prisoner called Barabus. So when they gathered together, Pilate said to them, "Who is it you want me to release to you? Barabbus or Jesus who is called Christ?"

And verse 18, this is going to be our key verse for today. For he knew it was because of envy that they had handed him over. For he knew it was because of envy that they handed him over. Let's pray together. Jesus, we thank you for your triumph, for your victory, and we ask, Lord, that in these next few moments that we we share in your word together, that you would open up our our hearts and our minds to hear from you, to allow you to come in and and move things around in the room, that you would move things around in our heart, and that you'd create space for your spirit.

God, we just want to receive all that you have for us today. Would you use this time together in Jesus name? Amen. Amen. Have you ever like just been observing something and when when you saw it, you realized, ah, they almost had it, but they just did a little too much.

It was just a little too over the top, a little too flavorful, a little too much salt, a little too much charisma, you know? Uh there there's like things in life that that it's like just you just went one step too far, you know, like just one step to the edge there.

I I think about something important in my life, Taco Bell. And one of the most perfect things on the planet is the Chalupa. If you can't tell, I'm fasting. But Chalupa, it's it's it's crisp, it's fluffy, it's got like this crunch to it, and then when it's got the right ratio of fillings in it, it's just perfect.

But Taco Bell, they they did the thing. They they they did the gimmick. They they they bought in and they took one step too far. And maybe you've heard of it a while back. They did this thing. It was a monstrosity, an abomination unto the Lord. They called it the naked chicken chalupa.

And by your response, I can tell you don't know what that is. I'll explain. The naked chicken chalupa is what they call a chicken breast. Now, we all know it was not chicken breast. We don't know if it's actually chicken, but it definitely wasn't a chicken breast. They batter it, they fry it, and they shape it into a taco shell to replace the traditional chalupa shell, and then they put all of the taco seasonings and stuffings inside of that, right?

And it it's just one of those things where you're like, you already made something perfect and then you had to go and ruin it. Now, normally I'm all for fried anything. Fried chicken, fried mushrooms. I don't even like mushrooms. You fry it, I'll eat it, but one step too far, Taco Bell, you messed up.

Another thing that I think about one step too far is all of the liveaction remakes that are happening. You know, it's like, can we just let our childhood live and breathe and be what it was? I don't need a slightly more realistic looking lion to sing and roar.

I don't I don't. The cartoon was enough. Simba was great as he was. I didn't need the CGI Simba. I didn't. And just recently, the live action Moana trailer came out. Again, Disney one step too far. I don't know how it's possible, but somehow the the Maui wig makes the Rock look more bald.

I It's I don't understand it. Too far. Too far. And there's a lot of things in life that just like just a little bit too much. When I begin to think about envy, I think it can operate the same way in our lives. We we step into these areas where maybe we're already struggling.

And what envy wants to do is it wants to drag us over the ledge to where it's just too much. And we find ourselves in unhealthy cycles and places. And so today, I want to kind of walk us through how we can see envy walking and manipulating and using our emotions and and our desires in a way that's pulling us from God and pulling us from what he's already provided and pushing us into what the enemy would want for us, which is to kill, steal, and destroy.

Now, a modern definition, what we would normally see envy as and kind of define it as is sadness or jealousy at another's good fortune, their possessions or happiness. And this is my my title for today. In other words, it would be if I can't have it, no one can.

If I can't have it, no one can. Envy is is one of these things that really historically has has been identified as a much bigger deal than what we kind of see in our world today and our culture today. We we kind of lump it in with like jealousy and greed and it just, oh, I'm just I'm so envious of you.

We'll say that to a friend. We'll say that to someone we love. I'm so not really understanding that envy is much deeper and darker than just a passing, oh, I'm a little jealous here. It's actually uh Socrates says envy is having an ulcer inside your soul, an ulcer in your soul.

And the Greeks, they would have identified an intense negative emotion like envy as something that would would be producing increased bile in your body that it would actually cause you to be physically sick and ill. And they associated envy with the color green. And then again, Shakespeare, he he calls envy the greeneyed monster.

There there's this idea around envy that creates like this this this sickening from the inside. But here in scripture, we actually see it goes even deeper than that. In this this verse in Matthew 27, this is Pilate passing judgment on Jesus. and he he's not a a believer.

He's actually there as a government official to to occupy and to rule and to to oppress the Jewish people. And him on the outside of the situation looking in, he can see and identifies what's actually at the root of of of the Pharisees arrest of Jesus and then pushing for him to be crucified.

It's only out of envy. That's what it says in verse 18. He knew that it was because of envy that they had handed him over. And right there, that that Greek word for envy that they're using in scripture, it actually is more closely related to the desire to pull down, to wither, or to decay.

The counterpart to that in Hebrew and what we would see in the Old Testament as envy is being described is to burn up or to rot. We see it in Proverbs 14:30. A heart at peace gives life to the body, but envy rots the bones. The very framework of who we are, our bodies are being rotted from the inside.

When envy is allowed to go unchecked, it begins to to create this infection in us that eventually will cause our whole framework of life to to fall apart. And I said, you know, we we have some connection and understanding in in our modern culture that that would kind of connect envy to things like greed and coveting and jealousy.

And so I kind of want to walk through these really quickly and just talk about how they're connected, but really what they are is just an on-ramp to envy. And so we we've talked about greed in this series already and how dangerous it can be. And the action in in greed is to to clutch to to grab for more.

I I I want more. I I have this appetite for more. I have to keep on grabbing more and obtaining more for myself. And where greed begins to transition from greed into envy is when you have this heart that that becomes from getting more to it's worth more to me than you are.

The the thing that I want, the thing that I'm envying, I desire it more than I value you. And that's a harsh reality sometimes to think about, but but we can get into this this cycle of just continuing to consume, consume, consume. I want, I want, I want, I want.

And we don't even look at who we're taking from. Greed pushes us into a heart of envy. And then there's coveting. And what coveting is, the action here is is to compare. And I think this is one of the the the biggest traps the enemy uses in our society currently to to drag us into envy is for us to look at someone else and compare what we have to what they have.

And before you know it, we're on this ice hill and we can't stop. Because comparison always puts us in a posture to be envious. You know that if you grew up playing sports at all, you know, in baseball, you always have the coach say, "Ready in your ready stance.

Get in your ready stance." It's knees bent, head up, glove down, you're ready to go, right? Whether you're in the outfield, you're you're in the infield, you're ready to catch the ball if it's coming your way, you're ready for action. But when we allow comparison to develop in our lives, we start turning our back and envy swoops in.

Comparison always postures us for envy. like, well, you know, I don't really have that bad of comparison. I'm not really coveting things that bad. Here's a little practical way that that comparison can develop in our lives. You know, you're scrolling through Instagram or Facebook or maybe you're on TikTok and then you see that person post, right?

You know that person. You know that one. And they're on another vacation. They're on another awesome trip doing amazing things with amazing people. And what's the first thought that hits your mind is, "Oh, I hope it rains. I hope they get a flat tire. I I hope that their credit card gets frozen."

Just something. Please, Jesus. You like you even just just a little just a little jab in there, right? And that's envy. moving from comparison into further deceit. There's jealousy. The action here is to keep it. It's actually a defensive desire. Now, now jealousy, it doesn't necessarily have to be bad.

Jealousy can be good or bad depending on your heart posture. Like, well, you know, I don't know about that. Well, well, the Bible describes our God as a jealous God. And if it's a characteristic of the creator, then it's a good thing in the right context. God's jealousy actually is for you.

It's for me. It's for the space in our heart for him to be able to take the throne of our heart. And he's willing to do whatever it takes to make space for that should we choose to receive him. That's a good thing that he's willing to defend his kids, his son, his daughter.

I'll fight for you. You know, I I have a jealousy for my wife. I'm willing to protect my marriage. I don't want anything to come in between her and I. I want there to be complete unity in our relationship. And so, I will distance myself. I will set up boundaries and and and defenses in order to protect the thing that I love the most.

It's a good thing. Where jealousy becomes unhealthy and leads us into sin is when we go from protecting mine to assaulting yours. Say, I I I want mine and I want mine so bad that I'm going to attack you to keep it. And if that means I gain what you got, good for me.

And it begins to drive us outside of saying, "God, thank you for what you gave me. I want to be a good steward of it." And to I'm going to continue to try to consume. I'm going to continue to take what I feel entitled to. And we see that greed is clutching.

Coveting is is comparing. Jealousy is to keep. But envy kills. Envy kills. It it actually is dehumanized destruction. We learned when Pastor Levi was teaching us on how to defend and fight against lust in our lives that much like lust, envy will dehumanize and devalue those who are being envied.

That it goes from from I just want that thing to I hate that you have it and I don't. It objectifies people. It objectifies accomplishments and puts it into a place that that I will have this at all cost. It's kind of funny, but it's a perfect example is that that really any of us can become Smeaggle, right?

Like like we can all find ourselves ready to choke and kill the person and the thing that we loved just because Providence put the ring in their hand and not ours. And before you know it, you're left in the wake living a life of regret, of frustration, of hurt, and hopelessness.

Because envy dehumanizes and destroys. It has the potential to turn you and I into a killer. It starts here in our heart and those little thoughts and judgments over Instagram. those little thoughts and judgments as we observe the world around us and then it begins to move into our deeds and in our actions as we actually begin to to go after and take what is ours.

It's another great depiction in in the Christian Bell Batman with the Heath Ledger as Joker and Alfred says like some men just want to watch the world burn. Like when we get to this place of envy and I can't have it, nobody else can. I'm willing to burn the whole house down.

You think, "Well, I I don't know. I I don't know that I'd be willing to go to the place of of murder. I don't know that I'd be willing to go to the place in my heart of even beginning to think about harming somebody or hurting somebody or or taking somebody that that didn't belong to me.

I I I don't know." But when we allow the these thoughts and these patterns to begin to develop that envy has its way in us and we take one step too far, it accelerates much faster than we think it ever could. There's an example in First Kings chapter 3, and this is a a crazy instance where King Solomon has set up the the availability for the people of Israel to come and be counseledled.

He he's the wisest being to ever live. He's got this wisdom that's a gift from God. And so, he allows the people to come before him and say, "Hey, we've got this thing and we can't figure it out. We need you to pass judgment. We need you to share your wisdom so that way we can figure this out."

And so the these two women come before Solomon and they say the first one steps up. She says, "We live in this home together. It's just the two of us. And we both became pregnant at the same time. We both gave birth to our babies just days apart from each other."

And again, just just the two of us in the home. And one night in the middle of the night, she she rolled over on her baby boy and smothered him and he died. And sometime she she woke up and she realized what she had done. And so she she took her baby and placed him in my arms and took my child.

And when I woke up, I I panicked. I thought, "Oh my goodness, what what happened?" And then I realized by by looking at her baby like only a mother can. And she she sees this isn't this isn't my son. And she realized what what had been done that she had switched the children.

And so she she comes to home and says she she won't give my son back. I I need you to help us so that way I can have my child. And the other woman of course objects. She says no no no. Her her son died. She's distraught. This this is my baby.

My son's the living son. Solomon does something kind of crazy. He says, "Okay, hey, somebody bring me a sword." So they they bring the king a sword. He says, "Okay, place the the child here. We we'll divide them in two. Then that way you can have half and she can have half.

Problem solved." And of course the mother of the child that was alive, the she she immediately begins to panic. Said, "No, no, no. Please, please don't. She she can have him. She can raise him. she can keep him as her own. Just please don't kill my baby." The other woman speaks up and she says, "Fine by me.

Divide him in two because if I can't have him, nobody can." And this seems like an intense and exaggerated moment. And of course, grief does crazy things to our hearts and to our lives. But I'll share with you my wife and I been married for some time. And for nearly half of our marriage, uh we have been on this journey for fertility, believing God would bless us with a child, doing all that we can to to be healthy and to to to make the right choices and live the right lifestyle and to do everything that we can to position ourselves to receive the blessing of a child from God.

And we're not there yet. We're still believing, still fighting for it. But when you are walking through a season that's as long as the one that we've been in, it's been over seven years now that we've been believing for God to do this for us. That that you begin to see your mind go to crazy places.

And the hard part of this isn't just the fact that we don't have the thing that we desire most in this world. The hard part is to watch the people in our lives continue to move forward. and it feels like we're left behind. That they're walking ahead with the thing in their arms that we've desired for so long and we don't get to see it yet.

And you begin to think crazy things about the people you love most in this world. Like they don't deserve it. Like why not me? Like they should wait their turn. I would be a better parent than them. You begin to allow things to enter into your mind, into your heart that you would never ever in other cases allow to happen.

And if you've ever walked through a prolonged season of waiting or a prolonged season of of health issues or you've been fighting for something or believing for God to to bring a a loved one to to restoration or to salvation, like we all understand that in the waiting, in the struggle, in the chaos, it's painful and it's hard.

And that pain can lead you to envy. And if we leave it unchecked, we'll walk around being envious, murdering people, even if it is just in our soul. And our bones begin to rot. So I want to share with you what I believe we can observe from the Palm Sunday story that actually is a direct attack on envy.

This is how we're going to kill the killer sin. These are these are attributes that we see in the scripture that we read of Jesus's triumphal infy in into Jerusalem. We get to see him triumph over death and the grave and envy here. And the first thing that we see as Jesus is coming in is that people begin to lay down their cloaks.

We get to see the cloak spread out before them. And in in the culture uh at the time that the cloak, the robe, your your garments, they signified who you were. This is how people identified you. This is the image that you upheld and they just begin to cast these at the feet of Jesus.

We have to allow our hearts to be at a posture where I'm going to lay down my own image, my own status, the the way that I'm represented in the world, the way that people perceive me, the the things that I have, the possessions that I have, the the the the feeling of being good enough or or sufficient enough, that all that is laid at his feet.

When we lay the cloak of our lives, the identity that we're holding so tightly onto, the the status that we fight for and the comparisons that we make, all of that gets laid down at his feet. The thing about when you wear your identity, when when you're wrapped in the cloak of who you are, it doesn't matter if you've got the the nicest or the newest.

Because I if you've got something that's tattered, if you feel like your life is worn in and it's it's broken down and you're missing so many things and you feel like life could be so much better just if I had this thing, then that's how your life will always be lived in envy of the other robe.

That's what happens with Joseph, right? Is that his brothers see the blessing on his life and it's because of envy they throw him into the pit and then sell him into slavery. But even if you've got a nice robe, even if you've got everything together, even if you look nice, that thing's going to fade eventually.

Somebody else is always going to have newer and nicer. And so if status is what rules us, then envy is what will lead us. Being received by the culture cannot supersede our reception of the king. Welcoming Jesus into the capital of my heart. We have to lay down our status.

The second thing we see him lay down is is the palm the branches that they cut. And this branch, it wasn't just like a a cool thing to do. I think if you grow up in church and around church, you've probably been at some point where where everybody on Palm Sunday is waving the palm branch and it's cool and it's awesome.

It's it's not just a thing that we do. It's because in the culture it represented actually rebellion. It actually represented freedom from oppression. About 160 years before Jesus rides into Jerusalem, the Mcabes actually start a revolt and they they win Jerusalem back from uh from the Greeks. And this revolt was signified by the palm branch. people then begin to cut it down and ever since they would press it into coins and it became this symbol in their culture that one day we're going to be free from the Romans too.

And so this symbol is them cutting down these palms and saying Jesus has come to free us. And in their minds they're thinking about their nation. They're thinking about the oppression of the Romans. They're thinking about the the the ability and the paradigm and the structure that they're living in right now.

So many of us we we construct our own little kingdom. Our hearts are so so focused on where our nation is at and what it's doing and how to can I get ahead in the rat race and I have to have this home by this time in my life and I have to have this much in the bank account and I have to have this planned out and the 401k.

We we begin to develop all of these plans and build the own kingdom in our own hearts. They didn't realize that Jesus wasn't just coming to free from the oppression politically, but he was coming to free their hearts from the pressure of the law and their own sin and their own wickedness.

We're laying down the palms in front of Jesus saying, "I'm going to give you my plans. I'm going to give you my plans. I'm laying it at your feet, Jesus." And thirdly, we see praise. They lay down their cloak, the palms, but then they lift up praise. What we're doing when we praise, when we come into this house and we lift up songs of praise and of worship, what we're doing is we're celebrating.

We're celebrating his goodness. We're celebrating his kindness. We're celebrating his holiness. We're saying, "Jesus, you are worth this song. You're worth my life." And celebration is always the opposite of comparison. When we can allow the posture of our hearts to be, I'm so glad that you got blessed and not I'm so bitter, that becomes a praise unto God because he's the bestower of all blessing.

Whether you think they realize it or not, whether you think you you deserve more than they do, that doesn't matter. He's the one that decided. And so, I'm going to celebrate. When we lift up praise, when we give Jesus his rightful place, it puts envy in its place, under his feet.

There's this beautiful tradition in Jewish culture. It's a song that they sing during the the Passover seder. It's called Denu. And it's this 15 stanza poem that they sing during the seder. And it's this repetitive song where they sing of a blessing of God of God working miraculously.

They're they're remembering what he did and bringing the Israelites out of Egypt into the promised land. and they'll they'll hit one of these hallmark moments, you know, the the plagues, the the Red Sea, the mana, and after after each one of these, they'll they'll say Denu, meaning it would have been enough.

So God, if if you had just sent the plagues to free us from Pharaoh, that would have been enough. If you had just split the Red Sea, that would have been enough. If you had just given us mana from heaven, that would have been enough. If you had just given us the Torah, that would have been enough.

That's what praise does in our life. It says, "Jesus, you coming for me, you being nailed to a tree, you laying your own life down, you giving it up for mine, and then raising from the dead in victory and triumph, gifting me the gift of salvation, that's enough.

That's enough. If if I never receive another blessing, if I never have another material possession, if I never succeed in any other way, if I can just be called your son, if you can just be called your daughter, that is enough. Jesus is enough this morning. And if you've been battling in your heart with envy, with allowing these different areas in our life just to just to cause us to drift off into the ditch.

I I want to pray for you. I want to believe that what Jesus did and what we're celebrating in this season, that his death, burial, and resurrection, that it is enough for you. is enough for me. So Jesus, we ask. We ask that by the power of your Holy Spirit through your grace that we would release the envy of our hearts, the places where we have not allowed you to be enough.

And would we take up the victory of Jesus? Would you come riding in to our hearts today, God? Would would the the spirit of of laying down our cloak and our status and our identity, God, would us laying down the palm of of our our plans and and our paradigms be be left at your feet.

And may the posture of our hearts be raised to see you glorified on your throne, victorious in every way over death and sin in the grave. And if you're in the room today and you feel an emptiness in your soul and you haven't had the opportunity to step into a relationship with Jesus to to receive that more than enough for your life, I want to give you the opportunity to do that now.

We're just going to pray a really simple prayer. I just want you to repeat these words after me. And everybody in the room is going to going to pray with you and support you in this. If you want to step into this relationship with Jesus, I encourage you to just pray these this these words right now.

Jesus, I need you. My heart and my life are empty. I ask you to fill it now. I give you all that I am in exchange for all that you are. Would you be my Lord? Would you be my Savior? Would you be enough for me in Jesus name?