It can be really hard. We turn on the TV, and there it is. We open a newspaper or a magazine and we're hit with it again. Walk down a high street and there's something every few steps. Even looking at a website on our phones isn't safe. It's a massive, all-pervading, dangerous temptation.
Perhaps the assumption is that I'm talking about pornography, which is what most people imagine when they think of visual temptation. In fact it's more subtle than that. It's so subtle it doesn't even seem like a temptation. It's just – well, stuff. Advertisements for gadgets, for holidays, for houses, for clothes. Carefully calculated appeals to our instinct to possess, finely tuned to make us want things we never knew we needed and part with money we could have spent on things we probably needed more.
Our society works the way it does because people consume. The more we consume, the more other people produce. People get richer – and the state gets richer – because we're encouraged to buy more, eat more and be entertained more. Consumption has become a social duty.
Christians are part of society. We read the same magazines, take the same Tube journeys, watch the same TV programmes. We face the same pressure to buy.
At the same time, we follow a Lord who owned nothing, who seems to have left his family and any kind of settled existence for the three years of his active ministry, and who told his followers not to lay up for themselves treasures on earth, and to sell their possessions and give to the needy.
It's a problem, and one that many Christians struggle with. We want something and we can afford it because we worked for it, so why not just have it?
Most of us don't have the sort of income that makes conspicuous consumption, Premier League footballer-like, a problem. There are limits on our consumption because there are limits on our resources. But that creates its own problem: we can be made to live in a state of permanent discontentment at the thought of everything we don't have. If only we earned more, or won the Lottery, or received an inheritance, everything would be alright.
How do we live with integrity as disciples of a man who owned nothing in a world that seems to offer everything – if only we can afford it?
Here are three principles that might help.
1. Learn to put God first. That's something that has huge implications. It means looking at how we treat other people, what we value, what we desire and how we live. Christianity is a worldly religion, in that we find God in everyday life rather than trying to detach ourselves from it. But if we make God our priority, we'll find ourselves less distracted by things, no matter how glossily they're presented.
2. Don't despise material things. The beautiful and desirable objects we're programmed to want have been made by someone. Creative activity mirrors the acts of the Creator. It's not wrong to appreciate good craft or good storytelling or wonderful technology. These things honour God. But we can admire and appreciate without coveting.
3. Find a balance. Self-discipline is good, and in the case of material things this means not having all that we can – or all that we want. If we learn to say no in one area of our lives, we'll train our mental and spiritual muscles to make it easier for us to say no in other areas too.
Some of the wisest advice on how to live in the world comes in the book of Proverbs: "Give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, 'Who is the Lord?' Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonour the name of my God" (30:8).
Too much money makes us forget God, and too little does as well. Learning to be satisfied with our daily bread is one of the tasks of our discipleship. Anything more than that is a gift to be savoured, but it's not a right – and desire for more should never overshadow our relationship with God.
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