Applying the Gospel to Pornography: How Christians Should and Shouldn't Deal with Lust

I know it’s Mother’s Day, but this particular issue has been on my mind and heart the past few weeks, and I wanted to flush out some thoughts here. I truly hope it is helpful.

The first place to start is to recognize that pornography is an epidemic among men (and some women(!). It is readily available for anyone, anytime. Most men watch porn on at least a weekly basis or at the very least, have been in bondage to it at some point during their life. While listening to Loveline, I often hear men describe their porn intake as “a healthy amount,” as if it’s human need. Parents should not be surprised to learn that their sons have a secret porn addition on their home computer, and I have heard many such stories. Likewise, the overwhelming majority of men at Moody Bible Institute during my time there viewed pornography regularly, some of them with hidden icons on their desktops that led them to websites they knew the internet filter didn’t catch. I also know more than a few marriages and ministries that porn has devastated or is in the process of devastating. Additionally, I personally was a slave to pornography for 8 years or so, and at times it absolutely ruined my life.

The church isn’t going to get anywhere by not addressing it and not talking plainly about it in the name of Victorian nicety or appropriateness. I believe sometimes people just think they can teach the Bible and occasionally reference issues like pornography either to shame others or in the hopes that they will sort of deal with their sin by osmosis without the minister having to get involved in the messiness of sanctification or upset the religious people by talking about such issues in a formal setting. This isn’t helping anybody, and in fact, it’s hurting most men. My several years in youth ministry have also heightened my awareness for the need to deal with such matters. For these reasons, I am going to talk bluntly and frankly about pornography and masturbation in the Christian life. If you are struggling with such things, I hope you will find this refreshing, helpful, and freeing because you are living in a life of bondage and desperately need the gospel. What I want to do here is helpfully show how we can apply the gospel that sets us free from the enslavement of this particular sin to our situations. But in order to do that I need to explore how satan has taken and corrupted our understanding of the gospel so that we deal with our sin in unhelpful, religious ways.

The truth is that those of us who live by religious principles are usually self-righteous and judgmental towards others but we also are completely inept in dealing with sin (see my posts on religion). Such a misguided understanding of the spiritual life coupled with an addiction to porn is quite a destructive cycle that I will illustrate below. I understand religiosity well because I was saturated in it for 25 years and know many Christians who wake up with this kind of life perspective daily. In this article, I will refer to this worldview as “Christian Religiosity,” or “Christian Moralism.” Its basic tenant is giving lip-service to Christ’s death and resurrection for salvation but practically believing that we have been left to live the Christian life by our own power. Many of us would never advocate this, but our lives betray us. Preachers that subscribe to Christian Moralism fire their congregations up weekly to go live better rather than turning them over to the power of the Holy Spirit who alone can sanctify Christians. In this kind of a framework, Christians believe that to beat sin, they need to try harder or do better. Let’s look at how this works itself out with pornography. Here are some of kinds of gimmicks that I have seen Christians used to fight pornography and, in several instances, have used myself:

-Meeting weekly with an accountability partner to help monitor sin.

-Installing Covenant Eyes, a program that emails every website you visit to an accountability partner.

-Installing internet filters or getting rid of it altogether.

-Putting Bible verses on the wall, over the bed, or on a sticky note on the computer.

-Using a Bible verse as a screen saver.

-Wearing a ring or bracelet or getting a tattoo on the hand they usually masturbate with.

-Doing small groups.

-Counting the days since porn was last viewed.

-Reading books about how to deal with porn.

-When I was at Moody, I and three of my friends used a calendar to report to each other how we were doing with our porn struggles. We were each assigned to a specific corner of each date on the calendar and would write a smiley face if we had a good day and a sad face if we had a bad day. That way we could check up on each other and pray for each other.

Many of you will relate with this list because you have done several of these things as I have. There are two observations I want to make about this list: (1) If I wanted to look at porn badly enough, I always found a way around whatever was in my way, which shows that all this stuff doesn’t work in the first place, and (2) what’s absent from the list is the very thing God gave Christians to help with their spiritual formation in the New Covenant: the Holy Spirit (Jer. 31:33; Ez. 36:26-27; Acts 2). It’s kind of funny, really, that so many Christians are trying to live their spiritual lives in such an “unChristian” way. In fact, the problem is much, much too deep to be taken so lightly. Pornography, like all sins, is a worship problem. Guys want naked pictures of women and orgasms more than Jesus. Lust is their Jesus-that’s the issue. Porn addicts have a functional savior that they run to when they’re stressed or tired or overworked or anxious that they believe will bring peace into their lives and make it all better. But it never fulfills them, and they then end up becoming enslaved to it and pouring themselves out to it by spending valuable time staring at a computer screen. That’s not a porn problem, that’s a worship problem. Or, a better way of saying it is there are no porn addicts; there are only idolaters-but this idol can never deliver what it promises. I have a suspicion that a few pieces of paper on the wall aren’t going to change anyone’s worship practices. We desperately need Jesus to bring us the true gospel that can alone change our hearts and help us worship rightly.

As if all that wasn’t bad enough, some of the most deep-seeded shame and guilt in people’s lives is often tied to their sexual sin which damages us most intimately because being a gendered being is so integral to who we are as image bearers of God (Gen. 1:27). Sin always brings shame, guilt, and fear and has done so since we walked away from God in the Garden. Shame is what led Adam and Eve to cover their nakedness (Gen. 3:7) even though there was not shame tied to nakedness originally (2:25). Their guilt and fear is what led them to hide from God when He came looking for them in the garden and lie to Him about what they did and blame each other (3:8-13). All this is their scrambling: trying to hide, cover, or ignore the sin they have done rather than owning up to it. Porn addicts scramble in different ways: by staying up late when everyone’s asleep, deleting their internet history, pretending like their addiction doesn’t affect any of their relationships, and smiling at other Christians on Sunday mornings who have no idea what’s going on behind the scenes of their lives. I was often so paralyzed by fear of others finding out I wasn’t perfect that it was difficult to be vulnerable about my sin to people. So I tried all my gimmicks behind the scenes to deal with my sin but instead of finding freedom, I suffered the repeating cycle of guilt and shame that I bore on my own back. I know many Christian young men who dealt with their dark struggles the same way.

At the foundation of all this is that reality that the Christian life for me amounted to trying really hard to be better. When I didn’t look at pornography for a while, I felt great about myself (especially if some of my friends confessed to me that they had recently!) and when I succumbed to temptation, I was utterly depressed, knowing that my best, yet again, was not good enough. We’ve talked about some of the ways not to deal with a pornography addiction; let’s tease out the ways that God has given us to deal with sin. This is what I needed to do, and this is what I believe is the key to dealing with lust issues: I needed to repent of my idolatry and the sinful ways I was trying to manage my sin and turn my life over to the transforming power of the Holy Spirit.

First, I need to remind us of the gospel: God created us in his image to rule and subdue creation, create culture, and enjoy Him (Gen. 1:27-28), but we walked away from Him and chose to be our own gods (Gen. 3:1-7). Because of that, we live outside of Eden, on a planet full of sinners who regularly experience the many ways sin destroys their relationships through shame, guilt, and fear. We also see how sin has physically corrupted our planet that now groans to be redeemed. Most devastating, every human being is now cursed to die (Gen. 3:22-24). God had every right to let us sit in this mess we created and endure it, but He instead took responsibility for it. He humbly incarnated Himself into His very creation on a rescue mission for His image bearers and His creation. He was known as Jesus the Messiah, and He lived a perfect life, although He was tempted in every way that we are and can fully sympathize with our struggles. He was so hated for His teachings and beliefs that conservative and liberal religious people came together and falsely accused of being a traitor of Rome and a heretic. For these false claims, they (along with the Romans) had him crucified. But the reality is that every one of us took part in the murder of God since it was for our sin that He shed His blood as a sacrifice.

One of my favorite Bible verses that illustrates this is Romans 5:8 “But God demonstrates His love for us in this: that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” God didn’t just say “I love you;” He demonstrated it by humbly entering into the very universe He created and sovereignly apart from to die for every one of His image bearers. He did this while we were still sinners, passionately pursuing our own idols rather than God. He died for us and rose again, defeating death, the very thing that was at the core of our being banished from Eden. Because of this, we have hope that (1) we can begin living a new life through a relationship with Christ now, and (2) when we die we will receive a resurrected body and live in the new heaven and earth with Him forever. What is needed for this salvation? Only faith! Faith that Jesus’ sacrifice was enough to cover your sin, and that you can’t deal with it on your own-you need Him to atone for it.

Many of us know this story, but how many Christian lives are characterized by fear and guilt rather than gospel grace? It’s interesting to me how much Christians functionally live like Muslims, as if God wanted their submission and obedience to the exclusion of a loving, personal relationship. We believe in relying upon Christ for salvation, but when it comes to sanctification (growing in our Christlikeness), many Christians think they can do that on their own by trying hard, or at least I did. Some of us need to stop being so dogmatic about truth like the Pharisees were and look at our hearts to see if they are being cultivated towards love, compassion, and grace that God gives us in His gospel.

The Apostle Paul lays out how we are to grow in our Christian lives through the gospel in Galatians 3-we need the gospel to be saved, and we need the gospel to grow in our salvation. The Galatian believers were being influenced by the Judaizers, a first-century group of Jews who were calling Christians to keep the OT Laws and be circumcised in addition to believing in Jesus. Paul rightly chides these Christians for listening to them; they were now trying to be sanctified by their good works and leaving the Holy Spirit out of the equation (Gal 3:3) much like Christian moralists do. The answer, he says, is faith, just like the faith Abraham had (3:6-9). We are to have faith in God, not just for salvation, but continually as we grow in Him! As he has said in 2:20: “I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.” The gospel isn’t just to get us saved; the gospel is to form our identity as Christians and be the foundation from which we live the Christian life. God doesn’t expect His children to earn His love by white-knuckling their way into heaven or trying harder or doing better or being moral. He gave us His love in the gospel; He didn’t tell us He would love us if we made ourselves better-He loves us regardless of the fact that we can’t make ourselves better! In affect God says, “I’m going to love you until you obey Me.” So as we grow in Him, we do so on the basis of His grace-something we don’t deserve!

In addition to this, He did not leave us without help; he gave us His Holy Spirit to lead us, guide us, and make us more like Jesus. When we don’t tap into His power and influence by faith, we lose. After all, it’s easy to define what a Christian should be if you have a list of boxes you can check, but what does a Spirit-driven, faith-focused life in Christ look like? It may not be as easily definable, but it is what God requires.

So let’s return to the idea of pornography again. What I once thought was just a sinful addiction I now understand to be something much, much greater. It is at least three things: (1) a worship problem; I’m an idolater. (2)It’s a gospel problem; I had a false gospel of having to earn my righteousness instead of believing Jesus’ righteousness was enough. (3) Lastly, it’s a spiritual life problem; I was trying to sanctify myself instead of surrendering my life to the Holy Spirit who alone can make me more like Jesus. Everything about my understanding of the gospel and the Christian life was wrong; no wonder I went through 8 years of shame and guilt!

I would wager to guess many of you reading this are going through or have gone through some of the same struggles. You need to know that you’re not alone, and you should not be afraid to be honest about your struggles to believers you trust. If they love Jesus and understand the gospel, they’ll show you the same grace that God does. Those of you who are in deep, you may need preventative measures to help limit your internet intake, but you cannot trust in behavior modification as a solution to your worship problem to the exclusion of repentance or work of the Holy Spirit.

In conclusion, I’m going to suggest three things for Christians who are struggling with lust. They are not a “just add water” approach to dealing with your sin, but they are a good place to begin struggling down the lifelong path of Christian maturity and freedom from the bondage of sin.

(1) Every one of us going through these dark, sinful seasons needs to repent not only of our lust but also of our idolatry. Honestly evaluate your heart and ask yourself the question, “Do I love Jesus more than lust?” Ask yourself what lust gives you that you believe Jesus cannot and why your God isn’t big enough to provide you with all your needs. Lust is a different god than Jesus that we really believe can satisfy us in ways He cannot. This is a lie. Worship starts in the heart, and we must search out the worship tendencies of our souls.

(2) In addition to repenting of our idolatry, we need to believe the gospel. Do you honestly believe that God’s love doesn’t change for you regardless of your actions, or do you believe that He only loves you when you don’t sin? You can know if your idea of God’s love is performance-based if you are depressed when you fall into sin. We should be broken and convicted about our sin, but conviction motivates us to do something about our sin, to repent and change. If you’re not able to repent but are instead devastated and depressed when you look at porn, you have a functional savior that is continually failing you. It’s a catastrophic thing, indeed, when our god abandons us. Believe Jesus. Pray that God helps you to believe Him not just for your salvation, but that you trust in His love regardless of what you do. This does not enable you to sin further; it motivates you to want to change.

(3) We need to make the Holy Spirit an integral, daily part of our spiritual lives. Cessationism is as bad as western materialism or naturalism when it stops people from looking to Him daily. If I hear the Holy Spirit called ‘it’ one more time, I’m going to punch myself in the throat. He is the chief way God is working through His people in the New Covenant. When we live in sin, one of the effects this has is that it cuts us off from His influence and opens us up to the influence of the world and our flesh, along with satan and his demons. But as we walk with Christ, we will open ourselves up to the continual sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit. Do yourself a favor-make the Holy Spirit your accountability partner instead of an imperfect person. If you think it won’t work it’s because you haven’t tapped into His transforming power. Jesus sent Him to us for a reason. He can revolutionize people’s perspectives and actions like no behavior modification could.

Dealing with deep-seeded lust issues is not easy, and change won’t happen overnight, but if you can give yourself over to the gospel and the Holy Spirit, you can begin to find forgiveness, love, and wholeness in a way that internet blockers and accountability partners can never bring you. You will find Jesus-and that’s enough to reach beneath all the crud in your life, grab you by the heart, and change you from the inside out.