How Can We Prevent or Overcome the Grip of Greed?

Once greed has gripped a person, it is hard to break loose. Therefore prevention is better than cure. Parents need to curb greedy trends in themselves first and then in their children. Most children tend to be selfish. A story is told that one day Abraham Lincoln was taking his two small sons for a walk, but they were crying. A neighbor inquired: “What’s the matter with the boys?” Replied Lincoln: “Just what’s the matter with the whole world. I’ve got three walnuts, and each wants two.”

Parents should “train up” boys and girls in the way of unselfishness and consideration for others, consistently and lovingly. (Proverbs 22:6) This will help them very much during the teenage stage when sexual appetites and other selfish desires may become strong. Young people are constantly besieged these days by sexual provocation. However, the Bible says: “Let fornication and uncleanness of every sort or greediness not even be mentioned among you, just as it befits holy people; neither shameful conduct nor foolish talking nor obscene jesting, things which are not becoming . . . No fornicator or unclean person or greedy person​—which means being an idolater—​has any inheritance in the kingdom of the Christ and of God.”​—Ephesians 5:3-5.

Note that a “greedy person” is also “an idolater.” How so? Those who become obsessed with desire for sex, love for money (such as expressed by thieving, embezzling, and gambling), voraciousness for food and drink, or ambition for power and fame, become slaves to such desires and make them their idols, as it were. Their chief aim in life is to satisfy their greedy desire. Christians who practice such things in an idolatrous way are unquestionably “greedy persons,” in Biblical terminology, and could be excluded from the congregation. They have put worship of their “gods” above worship of Jehovah, who is “a God exacting exclusive devotion.”​—Exodus 20:3-6, 17.

Giving attention to radio and TV programs or books and magazines that stir up greed for harmful things is very dangerous for Christians​—young and old. Remember that David failed to avert his gaze from Bath-sheba bathing and, in a weak moment, got caught in sensual greed. Do you turn off the TV or walk out of the cinema when immorality is featured?

If you want to avoid or overcome the grip of greed, “draw close to God, and he will draw close to you.” (James 4:8) When a Christian’s heart is filled with love for Jehovah, for the Christian brothers, and for the many who need help in these distressing times, then the ugly “seed” of greed finds it more difficult to germinate. Moreover, the holy spirit is an excellent greed killer! So let that powerful force pour into your heart, cleansing it of unclean desires, and filling it with a deep longing to serve Jehovah. Then the loathsome force of greed will not grip you.