If so many men struggle with pornography, today, do we just need to resign to the struggle? Is this something all guys will face throughout the rest of their lives?
Through the prophet Isaiah, God calls the people of Jerusalem to repentance and back to the relationship He once had with them.
In chapter 51, God urges the men to wake up and stand because there is no one to guide the people (Is. 51:17-18). Devastation and destruction, famine and sword have come to the city of Jerusalem, and among all the sons she raised, none of them can take her hand and comfort her. Why? Because, as the prophet put it, they lay bound at the head of the streets like wild bulls caught in nets (Is. 51:20).
The men of the city were helpless because they had become entangled with the sins of the nations around them. They could not guide Jerusalem.
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This image of something as powerful as a wild bull held captive by something as insignificant as string eerily correlates with our struggle for moral freedom. We as men have a strength. God made us male for a purpose. He gave us everything that goes into our being. Sexuality, emotions, spirit, mind, body—all of it is designed and crafted by God and it is good.
It’s no accident we have such high sex drive. God designed us that way.
He created us to go out and conquer and create goodness and beauty in the world—He needs us to have powerful initiative. People are looking to us for guidance and protection, but the very strength and power we can offer has become hostage to the itty-bitty, stringy net of immorality.
Because of moral compromise, we find ourselves unable to love deeply and fight for others. We have a boatload of guilt, shame and dysfunction dragging behind us as we grapple with the net that holds us down.
In the middle of it all, it feels there is no way out.
Freedom from the Net of Lust
I know what it’s like to feel as though hope is lost, as if I will never get out of this net. But I also know what it is like to live free.
I know it’s possible to be cut out of the net, as it were, and be the man God meant me to be. I know the feeling of looking people in the eyes without anything to hide and genuinely loving them for who they are and not for what they can give me.
I know the feeling of having passion coursing through my veins, living an adrenaline rush and not feel guilty about the experience. I no longer need to control my sexuality. God has done something in my heart that allows me to live freely in my passions in a way that protects and values those around me.
This kind of freedom is powerful.
I don’t mean to insinuate I no longer face temptations, or even fail. It’s just that I have discovered a new way of living. I have found a new way of thinking that allows me to bounce out of the gooey trap of compromise faster than I did before. I can walk away from temptation. I am free from the net.
And you can be too!
Live Free: Making Sense of Male Sexuality
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Moving Beyond the Struggle
You don’t have to be another statistic, proving all men struggle with moral failure. You don’t have to live with guilt. You don’t have to hurt those you love by your emotional absence because of your obsession with pornography. You don’t have to just control your sexuality, trying to keep desires at bay.
You can live truly free.
You can experience meaningful relationships and make a difference in people’s lives. You can become a man who is not bound by a net of moral compromise. You can be free to enter the chaos of an attack from the enemy and create order without being taken down in the process.
If you’re trying to cover it up, stop! Your secret sin has devastating effects on the ones you love most.
If you’re trying to overcome sexual compromise through more spiritual disciplines, give it up! Your works are as filthy rags. Surrender to the fact that each of us are broken at the very core of our being. We need something much deeper than behavioral changes to happen for us to be able to live truly free.
And if you are trying to do any of this without including others in the journey, quit! You need to tell your story. You need brothers around you who know your journey.
When we begin confessing to each other, the toughest string in the net tears. Isolation is defeated. And we are free to take the next turn in the journey: discovering the real problem behind sexual defeat.
Share your thoughts in the comments below. Coming up, we’ll turn a corner from looking at the prevalence of pornography use to exploring why pornography is so addictive in the first place.
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