Sermon by Rev. Ray Silverman

Sermon: As we proceed through the series of the Ten Commandments, we notice that each commandment, taken literally, seems to strike closer to home. Very few people have actually committed a murder. Adultery is somewhat more common. But stealing is something that every one of us has probably done at one time or another. As children we may have taken a toy from a friend’s house, or taken something from school. Maybe we picked up an item in a store and didn’t pay for it at the checkout counter. As adults the impulse to steal may have lingered on, but taken subtler forms.

Let’s consider some examples. A man is in an automobile accident, and the company sends him a check to cover the damages to the vehicle. He expected to collect $240, but the typist made a mistake and sent him a check for $2,400. He says nothing about the error, since he did not make it, and quietly puts the check in his bank account.

Here’s another example: a person who is well able to work and has been offered a good job chooses instead to receive public assistance. She continues to live off of the money that comes to her monthly through the labor of others.

Or take the case of the wealthy merchant. He pays his employees poorly and expects them to work long hours. He steals from his employees the wages they rightfully deserve. On the other hand, consider the workman who accepts high pay for inferior work. He steals from his employer the wages he does not deserve.

These are some examples of the many kinds of theft that may touch our lives. All forms of theft, whether it is the toy stolen at the nursery, or the major business scandal, comes under the general scope of the commandment, “You shall not steal.” However subtle the theft, it is as real a robbery as ripping a lady’s purse out of her hands, or picking someone’s pocket, or breaking into someone’s home. Those who have been robbed, especially those whose homes have been broken into, share a common reaction: they feel violated, they feel invaded.

As we move into a deeper consideration of this commandment, we shall see that this feeling of invasion and violation is also true of spiritual theft. Evil is often portrayed in sacred scripture as a thief. Jesus says, “I am the door of the sheep. All that ever came before Me are thieves and robbers. The thief cometh not but for to steal and to kill and to destroy.” (John 10:7-10) Jesus portrays Himself as the good shepherd, the keeper of the sheepfold. It is He Who stands at the door and guards against invasion. Each of us are protected, fed and nourished by the Lord, like sheep cared for by a shepherd. Evil comes to steal and kill and destroy, but Jesus guards us. He protects the sheepfold against the violator. He protects against invasion. He lays down His life for the sheep.

As human beings, we are born with a sacred trust. We are given the ability to love God and our neighbor. As children the love that our parents give us, the love that we feel for siblings and friends, the adults who touched our lives with kindness – all these experiences add to our sacred trust. We hear inspiring stories, we witness acts of courage, we thrill to the wisdom and beauty that comes to us through art and music and literature. Our sacred trust continues to grow. Our faith in God deepens. Our love of service becomes stronger. We experience more and more joy in doing good with no thought of reward. We may have amassed no real supply of material possessions, but we have indeed laid up for ourselves a magnificent sacred trust. We indeed have treasures in heaven. As Jesus said, “Lay not up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal, for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:19, 20)

To have such a sacred trust, to have such heavenly treasures, is a great blessing. It is a precious inheritance, and must be protected, lest it be stolen away. Our spiritual treasure house is our mind, with its vast stores of remembered thoughts and feelings. It is for each of us a repository of divine blessings, divine messages and benevolent emotions. It is an abode for the Lord, a place where He can grow with us, a home well-furnished with the highest teachings about universal human brotherhood. The walls are decorated with words of spirit and life, and the library is filled with books written by and about the people of God. It is a clean, well-lighted place, humble, yet abounding in sacred priceless treasures. It is a human mind, built and furnished by the Lord Himself, a human tabernacle, a sacred temple, a house of God.

But outside there are thieves whose continual desire is to invade. They yearn to sneak in when we are unaware, snatch away our hope, steal our confidence, and plunder our home. When they are finished with us, we feel stripped of everything, like the man traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho. He fell among thieves, who stripped him of his clothing, wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead. The unseen spiritual world is full of marauding spirits whose primary delight is to invade our spiritual treasure houses, to strip us of every delight in following the Lord, and leave us half dead.

Emanuel Swedenborg writes, “There are certain spirits in the other world who are engaged in secret thefts. They attempt in a thousand ways to insinuate themselves into the minds of men. They do this by working upon man’s love of ease, pleasure, and praise. They thereby captivate minds and seek to snatch away everything, including the good and honorable things of a person. Like the man wounded by robbers, they not only take away what is good and true, but they spiritually wound by insinuating that which is evil and false.” (Spiritual Experiences 2811) When Swedenborg’s eyes were opened so that he might see into the spiritual world, he was amazed to find that hell was full of robbers. They were there in immense abundance, and they sought nothing else but to plunder and rob. It was their deepest delight. “Spirits of this kind,” says Swedenborg, “are called spiritual thieves because they injure and kill a man’s spiritual life.” (TCR 318)

It is not difficult to perceive the diabolical nature of this level of thievery. Here we are no longer speaking about a pilfered toy or a stolen car. We are speaking more deeply about the systematic destruction of a person’s spiritual life. There is a very real but unseen spiritual world. On the one hand, it consists of good spirits and angels who strive to encourage and uplift us with faith and love. And, on the other hand, it consists of evil spirits and demons, who strive to steal and kill and destroy our faith in God and our love to the neighbor. Such evil spirits secretively work their way into our unconscious mind, if we let them, where they set about gradually destroying us. In the case of theft, they fill us with their own delight in robbery, so that eventually we cannot even leave a store without desiring to steal something. It does not matter whether we are rich or poor. The only thing that matters is the insatiable love of stealing which, like all addictions, becomes more intense every day. Finally we have surrendered our freedom and find ourselves driven by these unseen diabolical influences. They have invaded our minds, stripped us of our beliefs, taken away our confidence in God’s promises, and left us violated and half dead.

But God defends His children. He comes to restore order and peace in our minds, just as He restored order and peace in the temple at Jerusalem 2,000 years ago. It was at the time of his triumphal entry. The people cried out on all sides, “Hosanna,” which means, “Save us, we pray.” The people were excited. They believed that Jesus was about to establish Himself as king and save the people from their natural enemies.

Jesus indeed came to save His people, but not as they expected. He came to save them in deeper ways. He came to save them and defend them from their spiritual enemies. As He entered Jerusalem He headed straight for the temple of God. But people had defiled the house of God, using it as a place to make money for themselves, rather than as a place of prayer and worship. He entered the temple and drove out all those who bought and sold. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves, and then He recited the words of the prophet Jeremiah, “My house shall be called a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves.” (Jeremiah 7:11) This is a divine picture of what the Lord does in each of our minds. He clears out the money changers and the merchants. He drives away those spirits that infest us with the desire to steal that which belongs to others.

In the highest sense, spiritual theft involves our tendency to claim personal merit for the gifts that continue to flow in from God- what we have called our "sacred trust." Although these gifts of love, mercy, wisdom and forgiveness are freely granted, they are never our own. Nevertheless, we are encouraged to use them as if they were our own.

But the great joy comes in the realization that these gifts are exactly that: gifts that bear the name of the Giver, gifts flowing in at every moment in abundance, gifts that are to be used, not stored up. The name "Jesus" is stamped on every noble thought that comes to us. The name "Jesus" is stamped on every benevolent affection that arises within us. All the love that we feel, all the wisdom we attain, comes to us from God. And because it is His love and His wisdom, it comes with an eternal guarantee that it can never be taken from us. As Jesus said, “You now have sorrow, but I will see you again, and your heart will rejoice, and your joy no one will take from you.” (John 16:22)

The commandment against stealing begins at a physical level. We hear it as a warning not to take the goods of another, not to take what does not belong to us. At a deeper level it speaks to us of unseen spiritual forces that invade our mind, compelling us to do their bidding, and conspiring to take away our faith. But at the innermost level, this commandment brings to us the promise that we shall abide in eternal protection when we discover the actual robber, our own tendency to steal from the Lord the credit that belongs to Him alone.

The angels knew what they were talking about so many years ago when they proclaimed the birth of a Savior. He would rise up in every heart, teaching the lesson that must be learned again and again: "Do not steal. Do not attribute to yourself what is rightfully the Lord’s. Give glory to God in the highest. Give glory to God and your joy no person shall take from you. Give glory to God and your faith will remain steadfast forever. Give glory to God in the highest, and you will experience peace on earth, as a man of good will. You will no longer have any desire to steal or any fear of being stolen from. Daily you will hear the Lord whispering, "Do not steal. Instead, follow Me, and you will have treasure in heaven.”