There is a verse from the Bible which most people know. Or at least they think they know it. Complete this well known phrase or saying. “Something … is the root of all evil.” “Something … is the root of all evil.” Many people think the Bible says, “Money is the root of all evil.” In fact it doesn’t. 1 Timothy chapter 6 verse 10 actually says something much more profound. It is “the love of money” which is the root of all kinds of evil. This is an important message for our materialistic world. We should be on our guard, because the love of money can lead to all kinds of evil. Let’s put that verse into its context and see how Paul gets to that familiar saying.
He is talking about the dangers of false teaching and false teachers. He describes them as
1 Timothy 6 5 …. people of corrupt mind, who have been robbed of the truth and who think that godliness is a means to financial gain.
While he is thinking about the contrast between true godliness and financial gain Paul goes on to say this.
6 But godliness with contentment is great gain.
What is important is not getting rich or being rich. What really matters in life is to be godly and to be content. Godliness with contentment is great gain.
Godliness, piety and true religion, means having the appropriate reverence for God. Godliness means living a God-like life. The Good News Translation says, Religion does make us very rich, if we are satisfied with what we have.
J.B.Phillips put it, There is a real profit, of course, but it comes only to those who live contentedly as God would have them live.
Being content with what we have is one aspect of a godly life.
7 For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. 8 But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that.
We should be content with what we have. But it isn’t always easy to be content with what we have. I recognize that for some people the problem is they really don’t have enough. They don’t have enough food on the table or enough money to pay the bills. It cannot be easy to be content in that situation. But that isn’t the problem which the majority of people in this country face. Instead, the challenge for very many people is that enough is never enough. We live in a society which is driven by materialism and consumerism. The world around us tells us we are “born to shop.” “Tesco, ergo sum.” “I shop, therefore I am.” From the moment we are born we are told that we don’t only need money and possessions to survive, but we also need lots of money and lots of possessions to have any possibility of being happy. Success is measured by how much stuff a person has. And popularity rests on having lots and lots of stuff. This materialism is driven by the false god of consumerism with its twin mantras of freedom of choice and satisfaction guaranteed. Films and television fill our heads with images of wealth and prosperity which are out of the reach of most ordinary people. The lavish lifestyles of the rich and famous keep people worshipping the false god of celebrity. Above all we are surrounded everywhere on screens and billboards and shop windows with the hidden persuaders of the advertising industry. This was all summed up very nicely in a promotional slogan for Braintree Shopping Village back when it was called Freeport. “Ours is a shallow meaningless consumer society where we are defined by our possessions. Enjoy!”
Against all the pressures of the world around, the Bible says “Godliness with contentment is great gain.”
In the face of the world around telling us that enough is never enough, Paul says 8 … if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that.
This was not just some optimistic ideal. Paul is simply encouraging others to discover for themselves the secret of contentment which he himself had learned. He wrote to the Philippians,
Philippians 4 11 … I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. 12 I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. 13 I can do all this through him who gives me strength.
Content whatever the circumstances – in need or in plenty, well fed or hungry, Paul was content because he had learned to depend on God’s strength and not on his own resources.
6 … godliness with contentment is great gain.
The alternative to being content with what we have is to keep on chasing after more, and Paul warns us that never ends well.
9 Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction.
It is not just the desire for riches which is the trap, but all the stupid and destructive passions which follow on.
10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.
It is not money itself which is evil, but the love of money which is dangerous. People who set their hearts on being wealthy open themselves up to all sorts of temptations.
Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.
I am sure we all know people who have got carried away with chasing after wealth and possessions. Some of them have even abandoned their faith. Like in Jesus’s parable of the sower and the seed which fell into different kinds of soils,
Matthew 13 22 The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful.
Another word for the love of money of course is greed. We live in a world which thinks “greed is good.” In the film Wall Street, Michael Douglas as Gordon Gekko put it like this.
“Greed — for lack of a better word — is good. Greed is right. Greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms – greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge – has marked the upward surge of mankind.”
More than 30 years on from that film, our Western world is built more and more on that gigantic lie that Greed is Good. The truth is entirely the opposite. The Bible tells us what we know deep in our hearts. Greed is not good. Greed breeds injustice and self-centredness and self-satisfaction. Greed is very bad. And greed is just another word for coveting other people’s stuff. The Tenth Commandment says, “Do not covet.”
Exodus 20:17 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”
“Do not covet.” Craving, hankering after, longing for other people’s stuff, simply means an illegitimate desire for something which belongs to somebody else. Greed is a root of all kinds of evil. Longing after wealth and possessions distracts people from longing after God. Jesus warned about the dangers of greed.
Luke 12 15 Then (Jesus) said to them, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.”
The Message: “Take care! Protect yourself against the least bit of greed. Life is not defined by what you have, even when you have a lot.”
Greed is not good – greed is bad. Greed is a root of all kinds of evil.
Colossians 3 5 Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry.

Greed is idol worship. Money is one of the false gods of this generation. Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount,
24 ‘No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.
Money is a false god and greed is actually worshipping an idol. When people chase after money and put their trust in money then they are worshipping wealth and possessions instead of worshipping the one true Living God. The problem is that when someone is serving the false God of Money and greed becomes their driving force, then other things like honesty and integrity go out of the window as well and all kinds of evil usually follow.
Martin Luther commented on this passage – “Take a look at your own heart, and you will soon find out what has stuck to it and where your treasure is. It is easy to determine whether hearing the Word of God, living according to it, and achieving such a life gives you as much enjoyment and calls forth as much diligence from you as does accumulating and saving money and property.”
These are challenging questions. What gives us the most satisfaction and enjoyment? Which gets the most effort and concentration? Living our Christian lives? Or gaining money and possessions? Do we have hold of our money or does our money have a hold on us?
This is why Paul warns Timothy,
10 … the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. 11 But you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness. …..
We have already seen that the love of money was a great temptation in the church at Ephesus where Timothy was the leader and in his qualifications for leaders Paul says that an overseer should be (1 Timothy 33) not a lover of money and deacons should be (1 Timothy 3 8) not pursuing dishonest gain.
In his warning against false teachers, Paul wrote to Titus
Titus 1 11 They must be silenced, because they are disrupting whole households by teaching things they ought not to teach—and that for the sake of dishonest gain.
The love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. After some personal advice for Timothy which we will look at another day, Paul returns to this theme with some instructions, not so much for people who want to be rich but for Christians who already were rich. And before we say to ourselves, this doesn’t apply to us, remember that in comparison with billions of people around the world, everybody in England is very rich.
1 Timothy 6 17 Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.
One of the problems with being rich is that people can be tempted to put their trust in their wealth and in their possessions instead of putting their trust in God. They can end up relying on their money instead of relying on God.
The Bible does not say that Christians are not allowed to be wealthy. There was a rich young man who came to Jesus and asked him “what good thing must I do to get eternal life?”
Matthew 19 21 Jesus answered, ‘If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.’
Indeed, Jesus also said,
Luke 14 33 … those of you who do not give up everything you have cannot be my disciples.
Different groups of Christians have obeyed this command over the centuries. Think of St Francis of Assisi, who was rich but gave all his wealth away. Many other groups of monks and nuns like Mother Teresa of Calcutta have given up all earthly possessions to take vows of poverty. But there were rich people in the New Testament who followed Jesus but who definitely did not renounce their wealth, as far as we know. Joseph of Arimathea, who donated his own tomb for Jesus’s burial. Barnabas, son of encouragement, sold one of his fields, but not all of his fields, and gave the money to the apostles. Lydia hosted the very first church in Europe in her home. She clearly did not give her house away, and nor did other believers we read about in Paul’s letters, because house churches met there. And then there are those Christians who supported Paul financially in his work or gave to the poor fund for the needy saints in Jerusalem.
I don’t believe that the Bible teaches that all Christians are commanded to give away all their money and possessions. Across Matthew, Mark and Luke, one in six verses is concerned with how we deal with money and possessions. 16 of Christ’s parables are concerned with how we use our money. All of that teaching would be irrelevant if we all just gave everything away. The Bible teaches us how to be good stewards of what God has entrusted to us.
The Bible does not say that Christians are not allowed to be wealthy, but it does say that whether we are rich or whether we are poor we must all use what we have been given for God’s purposes and for his glory. We must be responsible stewards of all that God has entrusted to us.
18 Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share. 19 In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life.
Paul is echoing the words of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount.
Matthew 6 19 ‘Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20 But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
We should be not be aiming to be rich in material things, but instead aiming to be spiritually rich. It was again Martin Luther who said that a person must go through three conversions: the conversion of the head, in our thinking; the conversion of the heart in our emotions, and the conversion of the pocketbook, the purse, the wallet. People who are rich, and that includes all of us, need to hear Paul’s instructions.
18 Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share.
Do we give as generously as we could? As former US president and Christian Jimmy Carter memorably said “When it comes to giving, some people will stop at nothing.”
Jesus himself said, Luke 12:33 Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. 34 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
The great preacher Graham Scroggie said: there are two ways in which a Christian may view money. We can ask, “How much of my money shall I use for God?” Or we can ask, “How much of God’s money shall I use for myself?”
Godliness with contentment is great gain. We should resist all the temptations of greed. Christians should be putting aside treasures in heaven, not treasures on earth, rich in good deeds, generous and willing to share. We must always be on our guard. Because the love of money really is a root of all kinds of evil.