Introduction:
1. Which of these statements would you agree or disagree with?
• Facebook (and other Internet ads) are helpful in making the right choice of what to buy.
• We often buy something we do not need because we see an ad for it.
• Our lives would be better if we did not pay attention to advertising.
• Celebrities should not endorse specific products.
• Most advertisements are truthful.
• Companies should NOT use sexual ads to sell stuff.
2. As we think about our favorite commercials, what product did they advertise and what made us remember the commercial so much?
3. When we purchase an item, how often do we buy a popular brand name instead of a less popular brand and why do we do that?
4. What does God think about all this?
Exodus 20:17 - Do not covet your neighbor's house. Do not covet your neighbor's wife, his male or female slave, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.
• What does it mean to covet something?
• Covet means to want something that someone else has.
• What does God tell us about coveting?
• God tells us not to want other people’s stuff.
• Why would God not want us to covet stuff?
James 4:1 - What is the source of the wars and the fights among you? Don't they come from the cravings that are at war within you?
• Entire wars have been fought because one group wanted what another group had.
• Many of the “wars” we fight in our own personal lives come our inner cravings?
• What is a craving?
• A craving is an unusual desire for something.
• A craving is not necessarily bad, but it can become bad if we let it become an obsession in our lives.
James 4:2 - You desire and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. You do not have because you do not ask.
• When our desires and cravings become obsessive, they turn into coveting.
• We are often willing to “fight” to get our cravings met.
• This always leads to pain in our lives.
• Instead, we should ASK for what we want.
James 4:2 - You desire and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. You do not have because you do not ask.
• Who should we ask?
• Though we can ask our parents, our boss, or our best friend, in the context of this verse we are to ask God.
• Does God always give us what we ask for?
• Why or why not?
James 4:3 - You ask and don't receive because you ask wrongly, so that you may spend it on your desires for pleasure.
• God does not always give us what we ask for because sometimes we only want those things for selfish reasons.
• What are some selfish things we ask for?
• How might be ask for similar things for non-selfish reasons?
Conclusion:
• Advertisers often convince us to buy things we do not need.
• When we cannot afford to buy everything we want, we often covet the things others have.
• Our coveting can lead us to do wrong things in an effort to get what we want.
• God tells us to ask Him for that stuff instead.
• God will give us the stuff we need if our motives for desiring it are pure and right.
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