What does it mean to be greedy? Does it mean you’re a person who thirsts for money like an extreme surfer thirsts after Mountain Dew? Or does greed go deeper than that?
We get an example of greed in Norman Osborn, as he undergoes his sad, sad transformation into the Green Goblin. Here we have a man who clearly loves his son, though he has difficulty showing it. He also clearly loves the company he built, partly because it represents his life’s work, and partly because it allows him to live in the opulence and luxury that come with being quite possibly the richest man in the world (gigantic mansions in the middle of New York City don’t come cheap).
At the beginning of the film, Norman is a wealthy businessman who has accumulated considerable wealth through highly lucrative government weapons contracts. His company, Oscorp, has been working on a prototype for the military: a super-suit of body armor, that super-cool flying glider and the super-green strength-enhancing serum (or whatever scientific mumbo-jumbo they concocted to explain the green smoke).
Ah, but there is a snag, if you recall. The strength enhancers aren’t working properly, and the researchers are going to have to “take it back to formula,” in which case they will lose the contract.
What’s a multi-billionaire research scientist to do?
Test it on himself … duh.
Norman is pushed forward by greed. He wants more and more and more. This greed is motivated by fear—a fear that somehow he won’t have enough. He doesn’t want to lose the contract to Quest Aerospace, because he fears that his business won’t recover. And he can’t stand to have his business falter. So rather than reevaluate his business model or refocus his corporation on other contracts or at least work on selling the glider and armor to the government and calling the serum a wash, he gets greedy.
Norman wants the whole kit and kaboodle, so he locks himself in that plexiglass room, breathes in the wicked green smoke and, after smashing up the place and killing his assistant, starts down the road to Green Goblinhood.
All because of greed.
He could have avoided it. And once he becomes the Goblin, he doesn’t have to keep it up. He could come to his senses, could start doing the right thing, could turn himself in to the authorities for the murder of his assistant. But instead, he takes out the key players at Quest Aerospace, creating havoc in their company and with their program, removing their capability to receive the contract from the government and sending it Oscorp’s way.
Even after that, he could still salvage himself and save a lot of bloodshed by coming clean when he has his next board meeting. But no. The board votes to sell the company … to Quest. Oh, and they make Norman resign, too. (He’s not a real fan of life by this point.)
But he finds a way to get back at the board members, oh yes. He dresses up as the Goblin and bombs ’em at that big festival with all the balloons and Macy Gray. And that’s where he is introduced to the man who will become his nemesis: Spider-Man.
From one thing to the next, Norman lets his greed make his decisions for him, and it ultimately leads to his downfall. Little by little, he lives out what we see in James 1:13-15:
When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.
Norman is tempted to give in to his basest desire: in his case, greed. And once he gives in to that temptation, that desire to succeed by cutting corners and taking risks, it gives birth to sin. Norman then nurses his sin, personified in the Green Goblin, and that persona leads him to his eventual death.
It isn’t one wrong turn that leads Norman down the wrong path—it is the continual pursuit of greed, the non-stop focus on making wrong turn after wrong turn.
One can’t help but think of the story of David and Bathsheba, when King David made one bad choice after another until he was confronted with his sin. We find this story in 2 Samuel 11, where it all begins with David doing a little slacking off from the job of being king. Instead of being out at the wars with all his loyal soldiers, he was hanging out at the palace, presumably sipping blueberry-almond smoothies and taking late-night strolls on the palace rooftop … where he spied the beautiful Bathsheba in a moment of repose (see v. 2).
Now, David had plenty of wives and other women at his disposal. But greed—the fear he might miss out on something—took hold. His sinful nature got the better of him, and he used his kingly authority to invite Bathsheba for a sleepover. She got pregnant, which was bad for David because … she was married. And her husband was off at the wars. Where David was supposed to be.
So what did David do? Come clean, beg for God’s mercy? Nope. He told the captain of his army to send Bathsheba’s husband, Uriah, home to his wife, pronto, so that he could spend some quality time with her and let nature take its course. And then they would all pretend the baby was Uriah’s.
Except Uriah was too darn noble. He came back to Jerusalem, but refused even to go into his house, instead sleeping at the entrance with all his servants. David asked him what the deal was, and Uriah twisted the knife: “The ark and Israel and Judah are staying in tents, and [the commander of the army] and my lord’s men are camped in the open fields. How could I go to my house to eat and drink and lie with my wife?” (v. 11).
Ouch.
His little ploy didn’t work, so David got desperate—and that’s when things got tragic. He told his army commander to send Uriah to the bloodiest part of the battle, then leave him high and dry so that he would be killed in the fighting.
After Uriah’s death, David claimed Bathsheba as his own wife. She had the kid, a boy, and everything looked like it was going to turn out all right. Sure, Uriah died needlessly, but David’s sin was covered up, right?
Not so fast. God saw the whole thing, and He was very, very displeased. God sent Nathan the prophet to David with a message, and his words (recorded in 2 Samuel 7–10) were harsh indeed:
I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you from the hand of Saul. I gave your master’s house to you, and your master’s wives into your arms. I gave the house of Israel and Judah. And if all this had been too little, I would have given you even more. Why did you despise the word of the LORD by doing what is evil in his eyes? You struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and took his wife to be your own. You killed him with the sword of the Ammonites. Now, therefore, the sword will never depart from your house, because you despised me and took the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your own.
And then David’s son, the illegitimate one conceived in sin with Bathsheba, died.
This is serious stuff, sin. For Norman Osborn, it was greed. For King David, it was lust. What is it for you? Is there anything you need to take a cold, hard look at? Something you need to stop now, before it gets tragic?
Greed isn’t just about money. We can be greedy in other areas of our lives—in relationships, in the ways we look at others, in our bad habits … the list goes on. It takes in anything that we are afraid to be without. But if we feed our greediness, we put ourselves on a dangerous road and often wind up like poor Norman Osborn.
The question remains: What are you going to do with your own greed, your own sin? The answer is completely up to you. Here’s hoping you choose wisely.