{"id":83679,"date":"2025-01-26T20:00:30","date_gmt":"2025-01-27T02:00:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/?p=83679"},"modified":"2025-01-26T20:00:30","modified_gmt":"2025-01-27T02:00:30","slug":"in-defense-of-a-jealous-god","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/in-defense-of-a-jealous-god\/","title":{"rendered":"In Defense of a Jealous God"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\t

by Richard Blackford<\/p>\n

Several times, the Bible states that God is a jealous God. One of those is in the Ten Commandments: “Thou shall not make unto thee any graven image……Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God…<\/em>” (Exodus 20:4-5). That conjures a kneejerk reaction as something bad, for jealousy is a vice rather than a virtue (Galatians 5:20). We’re even told God’s name is “Jealous” (Exodus 34:14). We’re also told that “Love is not jealous” (I Corinthians 13:4). How can all this be?<\/p>\n

Oprah states, “I was in my 20s, and I remember sitting in a church…the minister was preaching about…how the Lord thy God was a jealous God and the Lord thy God would condemn us for whatever, and I remember I had a spiritual! And I was in my late 20s, and I suddenly thought, ‘How can this God who is all loving and all-powerful, why would God be jealous of me?'” [Finding Your Spiritual Path Webcast Transcript, January 14, 2009 www.oprah.com\/spirit]. This moment caused her to turn from her childhood faith in the God of the Bible to a New Age faith in which there are many paths, not one, as the Bible teaches (Matthew 7:13-14).<\/p>\n

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  1. Why would God be jealous of idols? “…For we know that an idol is nothing…<\/em>” (I Corinthians 8:4). An idol is powerless and is absolutely no threat to the person of God.<\/li>\n
  2. The misunderstanding is that God is not jealous\u00a0of<\/strong> us. He is jealous for <\/b>us. Since an idol cannot save us, when we turn to an idol, we turn away from the only one who can<\/strong> save us. The idol is not a threat to God but to us. God loves us and doesn’t want us to be lost, so He is jealous on our behalf<\/strong>. So, while envy is always used in a bad sense, jealousy can be either good or bad, depending on context. We should be thankful and rejoice at the jealousy of God. He is looking out for us.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Not all idols are made of wood, stone, or gold (think “golden calf”). They can get more sophisticated and more deceptive. Samuel said that stubbornness is like idolatry (I Samuel 15:23). Do you know anybody who is stubborn? When stubbornness stands in our way of serving God, we put ourselves first. It can become “self worship.” Paul said “covetousness is idolatry<\/em>” (Colossians 3:5).<\/p>\n

    Covetousness is an insatiable desire for worldly gain – to find fulfillment, meaning, and purpose in things instead of in God. We are not to covet the things of others. Again, covetousness is self-centered and amounts to self-worship.<\/p>\n

    We cannot afford to misunderstand why God is a jealous God. We should be very grateful that God is jealous for <\/b>us, not of <\/b>us.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    by Richard Blackford Several times, the Bible states that God is a jealous God. One of those is in the Ten Commandments: “Thou shall not make unto thee any graven image……Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God…” (Exodus 20:4-5). That conjures…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_seo_schema_type":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[27],"tags":[37,875],"class_list":["post-83679","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article","tag-apologetics","tag-jealousy"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":29490,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/is-jealousy-always-wrong\/","url_meta":{"origin":83679,"position":0},"title":"Is jealousy always wrong?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"October 11, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Doesn't the Bible say not to be jealous? But then in more than one place, it says God is a jealous God. Answer: Jealousy means \"Vigilant guarding of a possession.\" It is the desire to hold on to what is yours for your own personal use. Sometimes we wrongfully\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":96888,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/when-does-jealousy-go-too-far\/","url_meta":{"origin":83679,"position":1},"title":"When does jealousy go too far?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"July 23, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: In your sermon on jealousy, point C, you said that jealousy between a husband and wife can go too far. I was wondering if you could give me an example of righteous jealousy between a husband and wife and an example of jealousy that has gone too far. Answer:\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":63138,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/should-i-not-do-things-that-might-make-others-jealous\/","url_meta":{"origin":83679,"position":2},"title":"Should I not do things that might make others jealous?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"October 7, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Hello, I have read through your site on a number of occasions.\u00a0I have some questions regarding jealousy. When my husband proposed to me, a girl at church seemed very upset because her boyfriend had not proposed to her yet. I was concerned that she may have been jealous of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":63035,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/the-lord-is-a-jealous-god\/","url_meta":{"origin":83679,"position":3},"title":"The Lord Is a Jealous God","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"October 1, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"by Jeffrey W. Hamilton Text: Nahum 1:2-8 \u00a0 I.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0In describing love - Song of Solomon 8:6-7 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0A.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The Hebrew word is qin\u2019ah means to be jealous, to be envious, or to be filled with zeal. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a01.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The root is from a word that means \u201cto become red,\u201d as in a person\u2019s face\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Sermon"","block_context":{"text":"Sermon","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/sermon\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":51971,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/jealousy\/","url_meta":{"origin":83679,"position":4},"title":"Jealousy","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 3, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"by Jeffrey W. Hamilton I.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0We started this morning trying to understand the concepts of envy and jealousy II.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0What is jealousy? \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0A.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u201cVigilant guarding of a possession.\u201d \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0B.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Zelos - It literally means \u201cheat\u201d (Deut 4:24), sometimes translated as zeal. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0C.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The desire to hold on to what is yours for your own personal\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Audio"","block_context":{"text":"Audio","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/audio\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":55357,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/where-did-you-find-that-jealousy-in-hebrew-carries-the-idea-of-becoming-red\/","url_meta":{"origin":83679,"position":5},"title":"Where did you find that “jealousy” in Hebrew carries the idea of becoming red?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 1, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I was reading the article titled The Lord is a Jealous God. In the second paragraph, the author explained the Greek and Hebrew words. I enjoy studying etymology and such things, so especially I loved this section. The explanation of the Hebrew word reads: The Hebrew word is based\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83679","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83679"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83679\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83679"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83679"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83679"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}