Unmasking Envy in Life and Ministry

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Baptisms are the holy grail for church planters. We want people to find hope in Jesus. It’s why we counted the cost, casted vision, and galvanized a community to join us in reaching our cities. There is no greater joy than publicly declaring a person is buried with Christ and resurrected to new life. But many pastors turn this sacrament into a metric for success. We expect it to validate us and the sacrifices we’ve made, the support we’ve raised, and the vision people embraced.

In the early stages of our church, I wondered why God blessed the evangelistic efforts of other churches but not ours. It was difficult not to compare our church to other new churches. I’m ashamed to admit how often I watched a baptism on Instagram, and instead of joy for what heaven gained, I despaired for what we lacked.

They say comparison is the thief of joy, and only gratitude can protect us. In other words, whenever we are tempted to compare our lives to others, the solution is to remember what God has given us and be grateful for what we have. This is wise counsel. And yet, I wonder if it’s too simplistic. It assumes that the comparisons we draw and the despair we feel is mostly driven by a forgetful and ungrateful heart.

In his book, The Soul of Desire, psychiatrist Curt Thompson suggests that something else lurks in the shadows:

As René Girard points out, no small part of why I desire something is envy. Human behavior…is primarily learned through mimicry, by watching the intentional behavior of others…Therefore, I want something because you want it. And if you’re a person of authority in my world, one whose admiration and affection I long for, I will tend to want the things you want.

As a result, a great deal of what and how I desire has less to do with the object of my desire and more to do with being able to compete in my world, with being adequate and acceptable.

And as I have explored in The Soul of Shame, my need to have what you have is itself a way for me to defend against my shame of not being enough, shame that finds its way into my life and my soul early and often.¹

Thompson suggests that in early childhood, we learn how to live in this world by imitating the examples of others. In that sense, looking to others as models worth emulating is a necessary part of our development. However, when shame enters our lives and takes hold of our natural tendency to mimic others, especially those we esteem, we not only see what they are, but are accused of what we are not.

This means that every time you compare your life to others, and desire what they have — be it beauty, career, or baptisms — it isn’t always the object itself that you desire, but what that object promises you: adequacy and acceptance.

I started to see this dynamic at work in many of my desires in ministry. For example, I once listened to a sermon and was struck by the number of authors that the pastor quoted. I imagined how his knowledge gave weight to not just his words, but to him as a person. Unwittingly, and rather instinctively, I resolved to read more. But what fueled that desire?

Was it a love for learning, a longing to be an effective communicator for the glory of God, and a love for the people I preach to? Or, was it that upon discovering how well-read he was, I realized that I was not, and therefore, my decision to read more, while good in itself, was really a desire for adequacy and acceptance, an attempt to silence shame’s accusation of not being enough?

Perhaps it’s a bit of both.

My point is not to overanalyze every desire we have, but only to pull back the curtain long enough to see why gratitude, generally commended, does not always cure our envy and compulsion to compare. It doesn’t address the shame that lies at the center of so many of our desires. For if you tell a person who longingly looks upon the success of others to be grateful for the success she already has, it may provide momentary relief but still nurture the lie that success forges the path to dignity.

Instead, when it is adequacy and acceptance that we desire, we must turn to a truer source of dignity and belonging, that which gives us greater glory and wealth than a thousand books and baptisms, not wrought by our efforts and achievements, but bestowed upon us as a gift — the unsurpassable glory of being loved by Jesus and belonging to him.

This will not prevent our comparisons, but it will render shame’s conclusions powerless. The highlight reels of others may give us the impression that some blessing, something divine, or even miraculous is happening to them. And indeed, it may be. But in that moment, the miracle we really crave is one that we already possess and is happening to us now: someone of infinite beauty, worth, and glory sees us and loves us. It’s why we counted the cost, casted vision, and took our first wobbly steps of faith in obedience to his call. Because nothing compares to this.

What do you seek when you compare yourself to others?

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Jason James oversees The Advance Initiative’s content and cohort. He coaches planters and pastors as a certified coach with City to City and Church Multiplication Ministries. He is also the pastor of New Hope Church in Harlem, NY.

1. Thompson MD, Curt. The Soul of Desire (pp. 12-13). InterVarsity Press. Kindle Edition.