A peaceful heart leads to a healthy body; jealousy is like cancer in the bones
Proverbs 14:30
Jealousy may start with a subtle feeling of resentment towards someone or could spiral into something as big as planning or even killing that someone. Cain was jealous because his brother’s sacrifice was accepted and his wasn’t; it all started as a feeling in his mind and God told him to watch out for it,lest it consumed him. Genesis 4:1-25
It started off as little jealousy, then anger and then he went ahead to kill his only brother.
The same thing goes for Joseph’s brothers, they were jealous because of a dream that Joseph had shared with them. Genesis 37:10-11. They were not able or did not think to curb the seemingly minute feeling of jealousy.
Then it spiralled into a situation where they were scheming to murder their own little brother but “thankfully” they resolved to sell their little brother to slavery.
I really cannot start to imagine selling off any of my brothers into slavery, no matter how annoying they could be sometimes.
Joseph’s brothers lived with the guilt for a very longtime perhaps until they knew that Joseph forgave them.
Now that we have established how cancerous this thing jealousy can be, how can we deal with it?
Say Yes To Jesus:
We really cannot achieve anything great and pure without the help of Jesus Christ. The default nature of man is dead in sin, dead in jealousy, dead in greed, dead in envy, dead in sin to sum it up. It takes the power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead to raise us from that dead nature; and the only access to that power is through the acceptance of Jesus Christ into our lives.
Once you accept Him into your life, do not stop there, go ahead to spend time with Him by studying the bible, receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit, talk to Him about it and with time you would start to notice changes in your behaviour.
Most probably, you would start to act Christ-like who was never jealous of anybody but showed genuine humility, kindness and love for everybody.
Find Yourself in Christ:
Many times, jealousy may stem from a place of low self-esteem or feeling less competent than the next person. I strongly believe that the more knowledge of ourselves we have, the more knowledge of our uniqueness we have and acknowledge, the less likely for us to feel any less than any human that God has created.
And the best way to find ourselves, get more knowledge of our uniqueness and identity is to delve into Jesus’ love letter to us – The Holy Bible.
In I Peter 2:9 He tells us through Apostle Peter that once we accept Him into our lives, we become His special chosen people, group of royal priests, a holy nation. Brought out of darkness {whatever thing is making us feel inferior} into His marvelous light.{ shining forth His glory and beauty}
This and many more of our identity in Christ can we find in the Holy Bible. We should keep reading them to ourselves till it becomes life and our reality by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Moreso, the more time we spend with Jesus, the more He reveals to us personally.
Avoid Comparison:
Flee from every form of comparson; either subtle or otherwise. The bible tells us in II Corinthians 10:12 that those that compare themselves are not wise.
As we gain understanding and knowledge of ourselves in Christ, we should endeveour to run with that instead of comparing ourselves.
Jesus said similar words to Peter in John 21:22 when he was trying concern himself with Apostle John’s business.
Jesus responded to Him wisely that the details of Apostle John’s life was none of His business. Read the full story in John 21:18-22
King David also was someone who was not threatened by King Saul who was seemingly his rival neither did he for once compare himself to him. David instead busied himself with seeking after God’s heart, worshipping and praising him.
Surround Yourself with Christ-like Friends:
The conversations we have with our friends and family stay a long time with us, sometimes goes a long way to shape our decisions, notions about ourselves and so on.
Therefore, I strongly believe that we should surround ourselves with Godly friends who have identified themselves in Christ, who do not abhor any form of jealousy, who recognise that we are uniquely different and are appreciative of that.
If you struggle to find friends like that, pray to God for them. Trust me, He would bring them to you in Jesus name.
Guard your ear & eye gates:
Things like social media, and all other forms of media channels may give our eyes and ears to things that may cause us to start to second guess ourselves.
Research have shown that the things we give our ears and eyes to consume most of the times go to shape our thinking which may translate into our behaviour and actions.
Therefore, let us periodically take time to identify those channels that plant seeds of jealousy and the likes in our hearts. Then do the needful to screen them, take them out of reach or remove them completely.
Fast and Pray
If you have taken the above steps or even more and the jealousy just would not leave. You may have to fast and pray about it.
Fast to subdue the flesh which may be responsible for the prevalence of the jealousy. Also fasting, to express to God that you have tried everything you could but you surrender all to Him, as you also express your weakness.
Then prayer to communicate with Him how exactly you feel about jealoousy in your life and how you want it to leave.
I trust God to help us to live lives void of jealousy in Jesus name.
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