You
are probably a church-going Christian woman if you're reading
this page. Why do I say
that? Well, porn addiction is both condemned and rampant
in religious communities but unlike the world at large,
religious people actually want to be good. Just like you
want to be good. But you're not as good as you wish you
were so here you are, reading my page. So the question is,
why are those who aspire to be the best ending up as the
worst of sinners? That is, why are clergy turning out to
be the worst pornography addicts? To understand this apparent
contradiction, you have to understand the many faceted nature
of sin.
See
him for who he can be.
Sin
is a very ugly word that people simply
don't like to use. It refers to any person's thought or deed which
defies God's life-sustaining laws as laid out in the Jewish scriptures
and clarified in the Christian scriptures (The Bible: "Old"
and "New" testaments). There are ceremonial laws in scripture
and moral laws in scripture but sin only refers to the moral laws.
Most Churchgoers are quick to say "we are all sinners" and
yet are loath to say "I am a sinner." There is an irrational
perfectionism and hypocrisy in us that leads us to shy away from taking
God's words to heart. We don't like to get personal with God and in
fact, we seldom get personal with anyone anymore. This superficiality
is fertile ground for sin to grow in.
Satan
took the form of a serpent and tempted Eve to take a fruit which
God had expressly forbidden. Eve
was gullible - she believed a talking snake - so she ate it and
gave it to Adam. All she did was hand him the fruit. No song &
dance. No build up. She just handed it to him. Adam was not deceived.
He knew what he was doing. At that very moment, they both realized
their guilt. From that moment we were all plunged into sin because
we are their children. It's like a terminal genetic defect and yet
we are each individually responsible for our own sins. Most people
claiming to be Christians don't believe Adam & Eve were real
people but they were. Oh, they were. You and I are their actual
physical descendants.
How
can this be? The prohibition against marrying close kin didn't
come until the Law of Moses, a good 2500 years after creation. Until
then, it was common to take a wife from one's own family - starting
with sisters. We are their actual descendants and we carry their
sin nature. We are born with it and we are willing accomplices to
it.
In
the Evangelical Christian culture,
we know what most of the rules are even if we don't take them very
seriously. We also know that the Messiah came in the form of a man
- eternal God and finite man in one - and he paid the fair penalty
for Adam's sin and our sins too through his crucifixion. The New
Testament clearly states that we can enter the Kingdom of God by
believing Jesus and following him in loving obedience. Just as Adam
& Eve left the Kingdom by their act of faithlessness (believing
a lie), we can reenter it by living a life of faithfulness to God
because of what Jesus did. You know the Gospel, I don't have to
repeat it here for you, do I? Faith is the step and Messiah is the
doorway. It is a conscious act of will that is inspired by God.
If we do not renounce sin and leave the old lifestyle behind, our
"faith" is fraud. There are a lot of phonies out there
so beware and read the Bible for yourself.
Jesus
said, "Come to me, all you
who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke
upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart,
and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my
burden is light."
Encourage
him to fight the good fight.
Our
relationship with God the father, God the Messiah (son) and
God the Holy Spirit starts with our need to learn from him. Think
about it for a moment. If we were born with complete knowledge of
God and the universe then we would have nothing to talk to Him about!
"Come to me... Learn from me." Christ wants to talk with
you and be in personal fellowship with you. Far too many Churchgoers
fail to understand this. They look at God as a tool. They pray prayers
in order to get what they want. Like the teenager who never speaks
to his dad except to ask for money. That's not much of a relationship,
it's just a start. Likewise, Jehovah God desires a sincere loving
friendship with each of us and he likes to be asked for spiritual
stuff.
When
you take a step of real faith, abandoning your former sinful
life and take Messiah's hand (so to speak) then he will hold you
up. He will teach you. He will draw you closer into fellowship with
himself. You will spend the rest of your life learning from him
and walking with him and growing in wisdom as you read the scriptures
and talk with him. Don't expect him to talk to you through the ceiling
but He will make himself known to you in special ways unique to
you. He'll guide you to scriptures that answer your questions and
people and places that show you truths you seek. He'll speak to
your heart in ways I can't describe. It's an amazing thing! The
Holy Spirit is closer and more intimately involved in a true believer's
life than any brother, sister, husband, child or parent could ever
be. He knows how rotten you really are deep down and he loves you
anyway - because your guilt has been transferred to Jesus - paid
in full.
He
is fighting every man's battle.
God
is Real. He told us in scripture
that the Messiah will judge everyone at the last day. It's frightening
reality. He is just and perfect but he is also eager to forgive
repentant sinners with a sincerely regretful heart. You have an
invitation from God to reenter the kingdom by faith in Jesus Christ
the Messiah and it doesn't matter how bad your former sins are as
long as you intend to leave them behind.
How
does all this relate to my man's porn addiction? Ladies, God
cannot used you in his life until you're an empty vessel, totally
yielded to his purpose. If you're still full of your own ideals
and expectations of what a good man should be then God can't use
you here.
The
Christian porn User: When God saves us, he doesn't reform us
- he transforms us. How can we know those porn-addicted pastors
and husbands are really in God's kingdom to start with?
Firstly,
only God knows the heart. We can only look at the fruit of
that heart. When God shines a light on someone's sin - whatever
the sin is - then that means he wants it dealt with. A genuine Christian
is someone who is willing to deal with their sin when God puts them
on the proverbial hot seat. And what's more, a true Christian is
someone on whose sin God often shines a light. So if a person claims
to be a Christian and yet remains comfortable or indifferent about
his obvious sin (lying, gossiping, fornicating etc.) then you have
good reason to doubt he's heaven-bound. It's really hard to tell
if a public figure is a Christian because the fear of public scrutiny
is so great. It's impossible to know without research whether they
"repented" because they fear God or because they fear
earthly losses. Pray for discernment!
Secondly,
sex sin is more complicated than it appears. When porn grows
deep roots in a mans life over the years, it can take lots of time
to get it out. Why? Porn isn't a singular problem. Porn is a teacher
of lies. When you believe lies for a long time, it really messes
you up! It's like being in a cult. Picking up a magazine or visiting
the wrong website are symptoms of a paradigm problem, a wrong world-view.
It's like believing the earth is flat. Asking God to miraculously
"take away the urge" is like asking for a brain transplant.
It doesn't work like that...he needs to learn & believe the
truth. That is a matter of education and conviction,
not of healing. (Although, for some men, a little miracle or two
is all they need to help them focus on rerouting their lives toward
purity.)
Remember
what Jesus
said, "...Take my yoke upon you and learn from me,
for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest
for your souls." "LEARN FROM ME". He needs
to be God's full-time student, not the dragon's. He has to
stop listening to lies and instead fill his mind with the
truth.
But
the truth is often painful. Hebrews 4:12 says, "For
the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged
sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints
and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart."
That is a very frightening thing to anyone but particularly
to a man in porn's deceptive grasp. Porn appears to offer
endless pleasure and God truth appears to offer only pain.
That's a hard sell.
Your
job is to quietly live the truth before him and let the Lord provide
your strength. Nehemiah 8:10b "Do not be grieved, for the joy of
the LORD is your strength." Galatians 5:1 "Walk in the Spirit and you will not gratify
the desires of the flesh." 1 Peter 3:1-2 "In the same way, you wives, [honor] your
own husbands so that even if any of them are disobedient to the
word, they may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives,
as they observe your chaste and respectful behavior." Proverbs 25:21-22 "If your enemy is hungry, give him
food to eat; And if he is thirsty, give him water to drink; For
you will heap burning coals on his head, And the LORD will reward
you." Isaiah
40:31 "but those who hope in the LORD will renew their
strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and
not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint. Psalm 56:8 "You have kept count of my tossings; put
my tears in your bottle. Are they not in your book?"
What
lies does Pornography teach? Lie #1: sex will fulfill all your
needs for intimacy. Lie #2: sex will fulfill all your needs for
power. Lie #3: sex will fulfill all your needs for respect. Lie
#4: imaginary sex doesn't hurt anybody.
God
help us to believe the truth instead of lies!
This
path I suggest can be a bumpy ride.
This is spiritual warfare of a very real nature. Fits of anxiety,
times of sudden depression & doubt, sleeplessness, loss of appetite,
prayer times that envelope you.... expect these. Stay on track,
keep praying, keep learning, keep loving in a 1st Corinthians 13
way. Yield to God and make sure it really is God you're yielding
to. Don't participate in his sin. Confess your sins. Go all the
way.
If
you're not totally convinced that Adam & Eve were real living
breathing people who lived about 6000 years ago at the beginning
of the world then do some research here: answersingenesis.org
If you won't go all the way with this then you can't expect him
to.