I still remember the setting, my general age, and the basics of what I saw despite it being almost 50 years ago. I lived in Las Vegas and it was probably a Sunday because of where we were. At the time, we went to a small house church. It was at this “church” that I saw it for the first time. The pastor’s son had it hidden outside under a little fort that he had created. I don’t think the pastor’s son wanted me to see it because he was afraid I would turn him in (I didn’t turn him in). However, I somehow saw it and while there was not a tremendous amount of flesh shown in this particular picture, I had seen my first instance of porn and I can still remember the general aspects of the picture. As porn goes, it was not the worst. But it was what it was and the picture remains, generally, in my head for seeing it that one split second those many years ago in third or fourth grade.
Thankfully, I have never been addicted to porn. However, I have had to continually make the choice to keep it at a distance and have even stopped using certain services and apps because of what is allowed to be on those services/apps in the form of advertisement and entertainment. As an avid movie watcher, I have some personal records of movies watched in a two-week period that astound people. Movies, of course, have the easy slide into “soft porn” and I am careful what I watch there. There have been a couple of movies and shows over the years that I have simply stopped watching because it was just getting too far down the road. There have also been MANY other movies and shows that I have simply not turned on because I knew what they were about.
That’s the real issue: the choice not to do something…and it goes back to the garden of Eden. Adam and Eve had the choice not to eat the apple. That original sin that affected all of the rest of us is put on a lesser scale before each of us regularly. I have the choice to walk in sin or reject it moment by moment, hour by hour, day by day, week by week, month by month, etc.
That’s the decision with everything: do you choose to do it. It could something more “acceptable” than porn that you choose to do. Perhaps you tend to “exaggerate” a bit too much, stretching the story line for dramatics or to paint yourself or someone in a better (or worse) light. Perhaps you have a tendency to share information that should not have been shared. Perhaps you blur the rules a bit to make it a better situation for yourself. Maybe you flirt with people and let the imaginations of what could happen run rampant. So, you’re a lying, gossiping, cheating, philanderer. That may seem harsh, but that is the cut-and-dry perspective on sin with no grace added.
As the old saying goes, in for a penny, in for a pound. If you sin (even a little), you’re a sinner. Not to put too fine of a point on it, but sin is sin. You can continue to walk in your sin if you choose to do so but doing so continues to separate you from the One who died for the consequences of your sin. My dad used to describe it this way: every time you sin, it’s like you’re taking an ax to a log and creating a bigger and bigger wedge in the log. For some dealing with addictive sins like a pornography addiction, it may seem almost hopeless as you continually choose to sin more to satisfy the addiction to the sin. However, it is still a choice that you make to continue. You still click the button, turn on the movie, open the cover of the magazine, whatever. And it can feel almost hopeless afterwards when you’re dealing with the guilt of the situation. Here is how one writer put it:
It happens so regularly that it’s predictable. The moment I decide to do good, sin is there to trip me up. I truly delight in God’s commands, but it’s pretty obvious that not all of me joins in that delight. Parts of me covertly rebel, and just when I least expect it, they take charge.
I’ve tried everything and nothing helps. I’m at the end of my rope. Is there no one who can do anything for me? Isn’t that the real question?
Jesus’ death on the cross was to pay for the consequences of your sin. He didn’t pay for the consequences simply so you could keep on doing them and have no repercussions. Rather, he wanted to repair the breach (mend the log that had been chopped at by the ax of sin, to use my dad’s analogy).
The writer above goes on to say,
The answer, thank God, is that Jesus Christ can and does. He acted to set things right in this life of contradictions where I want to serve God with all my heart and mind, but am pulled by the influence of sin to do something totally different.
That writer is Paul from the Bible in Romans 7:21-25 (Message version). I also like the emotion you find in the King James version as well in verses 24 and 25:
O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.
So, when you’re struggling in the choice, recognize that the struggle is not a new one. Making a choice is like working a muscle. When you make a choice not to watch porn, (or lie, cheat, whatever,) you’re getting in your reps in lifting the weight. As you continue to make the choice not to do whatever it is, you are pumping iron, building the muscle, making it easier and easier to lift the weight. In the strength of Jesus, our rescuer, we have the opportunity to choose not to sin through His grace and sufficiency. The opposite, of course, is also true. When you choose to watch porn, etc., you are “building the muscles” to do those things and it makes it all the harder to stop. However, Jesus is there for you in those times to help you defeat those habits of sin as well.
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