Why do we care as Christian men that we live a pure life and not sin- particularly in this area? First, the sin we yield to becomes our master- and we its slave. You may have noticed that when you fall in this area its very easy to get into a habit of falling.
Another reason we avoid sin is it cuts off our fellowship with the Lord. If you have a Christian life but aren't in the process of really knowing the Lord, walking with him, loving him, and hearing his voice this one may not register with you as much. However, let me assure you that there is a life way beyond just "getting saved". Your decision to repent and believe in Jesus starts a marvelous life of adventure, discovery, and even a spiritual romance that will give meaning to your pain, permanence to your forgiveness, and grace that will last. If you aren't living this life-- ask the Lord to show you how and start spending time in prayer and the Bible daily.
To keep this article short I will only list one more reason we want to avoid, particularly, sexual sin as Christian men. The fact is your spiritual confidence and authority to represent Christ in your daily life is annihilated when you sin. Your own thoughts and guilt- along with your spiritual enemy will question your "worthiness" to share your faith, encourage someone spiritually, offer to pray with someone, etc. It is immediate and automatic that (at least you believe and feel) you lose your spiritual authority when you sin sexually.
I want to acknowledge that there are other sins that work against men as well. From my own experience I have found that fear, jealousy, gossip, and back-stabbing are very good at assaulting a Christian man- and taking him down. I am just saying sexual sin is the worst, the most damaging, and the most authority-stealing sin for a man. (my opinion)
I will now discuss why sexual sin works on so many levels against men. Some of this is from my own personal experience and will not be flattering to me. It won't be too bad because I am too full of pride and fearful to share anything beneath medium depth...
Flattery. What? Yes, the "love language" and key of a man's heart is actually not sex it is respect. As men we have to be careful because a mere smile from a woman at work or in an airport can, if we let ourselves think about it, become a snare. What I have written about here is just innocent stuff so far- a woman can smile or pass a compliment because she is a nice person. As men we must steel ourselves while also yielding our thoughts and feelings to the Holy Spirit.
It can get worse than just a smile in innocence. Women who are actually targeting a man can use flattery, revealing clothing, hints that can be taken two ways, and other things-- unfortunately this can be effective in flattering a man. We must be like Joseph and run away from even subtle advances- we must distance ourselves. It is also very helpful to find at least one Christian man whom you trust as a shield-bearer and confidant. I nominated a Christian family man friend of mine into this role and for the past 3 years or so I have called him not just as a friend- but two or three times with urgent prayer situations in this general area of temptation. Once I sent him an email during a very direct attack of the enemy. I can honestly tell you that I felt it when he started praying for me- it was a huge help. We do NOT, in our pride gentlemen, have to do this all on our own. I hope you can see how much I wrote on flattery- and I hope you will take even that as a warning. Proverbs says "guard your heart"-- with the help of the Holy Spirit who is in you... we can do just that. How noble it is to be a pure man for our family. How much honor we walk in when we have a choice to sin- and run away even while our flesh is screaming and our soul is feeding on the respect and attention. How mighty and strong we are when we are pure and walking in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Images. This one is obvious because men are visual. It is no accident women were created in a different, unique way men are attracted to. God intended to create a marriage between one man and one woman and he made them fit physically, visually, and emotionally. Men are naturally attracted to women. I was at a life group a few years ago and we had a session in which we went around the room and shared about temptations, strategies, etc. I shared at that time that I am careful to not look at women. I divert my eyes a lot etc and speak to them as directly in their eyes as I can manage. I shared this and one guy said women were "God's creation" etc and it was ok to look, he kind of mocked me. He fundamentally disagreed with my strategy. Another guy didn't outright oppose me but he described how he would often have "30 second affairs" with women. He would smile at them and the ones that would smile back at him would give him a charge, a validation. I've often wondered how the life of the first guy turned out. I do know a strong Christian friend right out of high school ended up in deep backsliding and sexual sin and almost shipwrecked his faith - he had said women were "God's creation" too. I did find out, sadly, that the guy who had the 30 second affairs lost his wife a couple of years later and he's devastated. In the Bible the famous man of God Job said he made a covenant with his eyes not to look at a young girl. David said he would set before his eyes no vile thing. It would do us well to follow their advice. I found in my own experience when looking at pornography that it was progressive- I would get sort of bored with basic stuff and have to move into deeper areas. In addition, I ended up seeking out some of that in real life. You can start looking at a swimsuit edition, end up in "newsworthy" pornography, and end up deeper and deeper. The interesting thing about sin, in this case sexual sin, is that it blocks guilt- I am actually more sad and ashamed about the pornography in my past now than when I was doing it. The closer I came to sin- the less guilty I became. The further I am away from those sins- the more sin memories hurt me- but I'll take the hurt for the freedom. God heals hurts. So, when we engage in pornography or other sexual sin we deaden ourselves so that we must look at worst kinds of it to get a charge out of it. Later, we end up seeking it out and all the while we burn and scar our conscience so we feel less and less guilty. Engaging in this sin seems attractive and exciting but it eventually deals shame and destruction. Pornography has an effect similar to drinking an addictive poison that makes you feel less like you are dying- the more it kills you.
Images. One of the best things I did to get free in the area of sexual sin was to stop allowing my eyes to see things that were provocative -cold turkey. Television was nearly eliminated, during racy commercials I would close my eyes, no late night television, no suggestive non-Christian music, careful on movies, careful on highway billboards, and careful in the check-out line at the grocery store. One of the most direct mental programming changes I made was to stop looking at women who were not my wife. In our image and sex-driven culture we are surrounded by opportunities to feed our fire source as men. We must stop using our eyes for cheap gratification and ask the Lord to control our eyes. God has given us the power to forget- it took a couple of years for the images to stop swirling but they eventually did. (if you are tormented by these images/thoughts - you can email me and I will tell you how to deal with these, I learned the hard way)
Physical need. I am not going to get into this one deeply but guys do have a physical need in this area. Unfortunately we often wake up this hunger before marriage so we burn and don't have our God-given relationship as our natural solution. Paul said it is better to marry than burn with passion- excellent advice. I was in these areas of sin right up until the time I got married. When I decided to get married it was to a Christian woman and I made the commitment that she would be my ONLY source for fulfilling this need. This was hard at first but became easier.(that said I was tempted just this week in this area so we have to maintain vigilance with HIS help). Last thing- when we are in sexual sin, we often "ramp up" our fire source to the point that most women would never meet the need. Have the mindset to ramp yourself down a bit, reduce your appetite, allow your fire to be reduced to more normal levels. This takes time-- ask the Lord for help in prayer.
Here are some sin strategies that do not work against sexual sin and I imagine they wouldn't work well against gossip or envy either.
Using your guilt to keep you from sinning. We often get militant based on the guilt of sin we have just committed but I have found we have a short memory and this does not work long. Its a human tactic and it doesn't work well against a spiritual problem with strong links to our need for respect, masculinity, and a real physical need. Its all well to say "I'll never do that again" when your need isn't there for awhile. It won't last forever.
Using your fear to keep you from sinning. Sometimes we're so afraid of sin that, for awhile, it might stop us from sinning. This is also not a good long-term solution.
Using your success to keep you from sinning. Having a period of time you have success is good but, by itself, it is not enough for traction alone to give you future success. We need deeper solutions dealing with root problems.
Some good strategies. Guys, the cure for me, not to say I have already been perfected, but what seems to have been successful in my freedom these past 12 years when I was so deeply in sin was the following:
* Make a commitment to live for God
* Eliminate image sources that are counter-productive or pornographic.
* Stop looking at women.
* Your wife is your only source- period.
* Do not allow yourself to get into unforgiveness and resentment against your wife, do not allow the sun to go down while you are still angry. Be forgiving- and ask forgiveness. A good relationship with your wife is spiritually powerful and will protect you. The Bible says our prayers are actually hindered by not treating our wives well.
* Spend time with the Lord in prayer, Bible reading, and attending a vibrant and teaching church. Have a firm and passionate desire to seek the Lord throughout life.
* Get rid of idols- is there something that has your heart other than God?
Deep therapy from the Lord is required to set free - and heal:
* The cure-all is the Holy Spirit, changing our hearts working within us etc. Try to have a regular time of personal worship, singing, and praise to God. Ask the Holy Spirit to lead this time. I believe it is the power and grace flowing from a love relationship with the Lord which is the most powerful weapon of personal transformation and freedom in this area.
* Sit in a private time 1-to-1 with the Holy Spirit. Ask him to unveil to you the lies leading you to sin in the first place. Have your Bible open and ask him to show you what led you to sin- what are the lies you are believing? When he reveals these confess these as lies and as sins- ask him what the truth is that you didn't know before. Ask the Lord to heal you and set you free from each one as you encounter them. Really ask him to walk with you through each area of the bondage.
I believe that, ultimately, passionate love pursuit of the Lord- not just being content with "being saved" is the lasting and life-transforming way of overcoming sin.
We seek God because we love him- the more we seek him- the more we love him. Later we realize we are free and we can't really say when it happened or how it happened.
No comments:
Post a Comment