Obey your thirst. Just do it. Indulge yourself. We hear the masses roar. For the most part, we all know a lot of the Biblical answers for understanding and dealing with human desire, including those of a sexual nature. After all, many of us have been reading our Bibles most of our lives. Many of us already know that:
- We were created with desires and at the very core they are not wrong or sinful
- Many desires have become sinful as a result of people trying to pursue things God made instead of pursuing intimacy with Him, acting out on their desires in ways that are not glorifying to God (Romans 1:25)
- There is a power struggle between our right desires to pursue and glorify God, and our sinful desires to gratify ourselves (Romans 7:21-25, Galatians 5:16-25, 1 Peter 2:11)
- We are prone to choose to obey/act out on our sinful desires (Numbers 15:39-41)
- Like a fire, the more we give into our desires in a sinful way, the more they grow and consume us (think addiction)
- If marriage solved the problem of sexual desire, there would not be the huge lure to pornography and affairs among married Christians, even among spiritual leaders—the statistics are startling, even for Christian women!
- Death and destruction result in living to gratify our misplaced, fleshly, unbridled desires (Psalm 106:14, Jeremiah 7:24, James 1:14-15)
- The desire for God is ultimately the desire of our hearts and nothing else will satisfy (Psalm 73:25-26)
- God gave us the power to control our desires so that our bodies might be a tool for His glory (Romans 6:12-13, Colossians 3:5-7)
- We are to flee the temptations resulting from desire and allow Jesus to take control of our lives (Genesis 39:7-12, Romans 13:14, 2 Timothy 2:22)
- We can pray and ask God to change our wrong desires (1 Kings 8:58)
- If we delight in the Lord, He will satisfy our deepest desires (Psalm 37:4)
So then what?
We know the answers, but in day-to-day life, is there real 911 help for raging sexual (or any other) potentially consuming or destructive desires? Here are a few tools that have helped me, but they are not pat answers. This is a real battle, our flesh, and it is a process no matter what our area of fleshly struggle.
1. This world is not my home. This is the single most helpful tool I have encountered in any of my struggles of living in this world, whether it be fleshly temptations, discouraging days, injustice, or loss of any kind. We forget and live like this is all we have, or that this is how it’s always going to be, and we forget the big picture living that this world with all its struggles over sin is only very temporary. The world that is our future home will be the place where our desires are not removed (in whatever capacity they materialize), but they are fully and continuously satisfied in Him. Then it only becomes a matter of delayed gratification, not complete abandoning of the longing for fulfillment.
2. Starve the fire. A fire does not go out as long as you keep putting wood on it. It is a paradox, but the more we starve our fleshly desires by not gratifying them in sinful ways, the weaker they become. This is why you see on-the-wagon alcoholics not taking even one drink. This is why sugar addicts avoid all desserts. They know that as long as they don’t put fuel on the fire, it may never fully die out, but it remains manageable.
3. Follow Jesus. Every day of His life, Jesus battled fleshly desires, but He lived by #1: This world is not my home. It should be a great encouragement to us to know that our (single) Savior also had the same unresolved desires, yet He demonstrated that there was something better than giving into them. 1 Peter 4:1-2 says, “So then, since Christ suffered physical pain, you must arm yourselves with the same attitude he had, and be ready to suffer, too. For if you are willing to suffer for Christ, you have decided to stop sinning. And you won't spend the rest of your life chasing after evil desires, but you will be anxious to do the will of God.”
Denying our desires is painful. It is suffering. But we must follow in the steps of our Savior, believing that something better lies ahead. On that day, God tells us in Ezekiel, “I will give you a new heart with new and right desires, and I will put a new spirit in you. I will take out your stony heart of sin and give you a new, obedient heart (36:26).”
That day will surely be worth the wait!
Christian resource for pornography and sex addiction: www.XXXChurch.com