PORN ADDICTIONS

Various news stories today described how regulators at the Securities and Exchange Commission (the federal agency that regulates various stock market activities) were consumed by porn addictions during work hours while the economy was being set up to crash. The articles describe how SEC attorneys, accountants and other employees spent up to 8 hours per day on porn sites and filled the SEC hard-drives with porn. Several of the articles had titles such as, "Did Porn Cause the Financial Crisis?"

What can we learn from these revelations?

First, porn (any sin) is not neutral in its effects on us and on other people. Sin is inherently destructive. Hundreds of billions, if not trillions, of dollars have been lost/stolen in the last decade alone due to well educated, often brilliant, wealthy people lying, cheating and ripping off others. Names like Enron, Madoff, and a multitude of other companies and people have demonstrated that sin is pervasively destructive. Porn destroys individuals, families, companies, government and the economy - it is not a harmless personal activity. Porn separates us from God and draws us close to the soul of Satan.

Second, there is no effective remedy for the effect of porn on people apart from a daily relationship with Jesus Christ that enables the Holy Spirit to direct and protect us. I can say that I have been free from porn my entire adult life. This is not because I have stronger will power or am emasculated or am aberrant in my thinking or am better than others. I am weak and tempted and know the power of porn. Instead, there are three reasons that porn has not invaded my life:

1. God Himself Bought Me With The Price of the Life of God The Son - Jesus. 1 Cor. 6:20. Therefore, I am to glorify God with my body. I know that Satan is prowling around like a "roaring lion," seeking to devour me. 1 Pet. 5:8. He is shooting flaming arrows at me. Eph. 6:16. I see every temptation to do evil, including porn, as flaming arrows directed at my heart and soul from the arsenal of the enemy. If those arrows hit my heart or take root in my body, they will be destructive. I hate the enemy of my soul and he hates me, so I don't want him to have any window of opportunity into my life. My shield against the flaming arrows is faith in Jesus Christ - the reality of Who He is and what He has done for me. Eph. 6:16. Through faith, I want to glorify my Heavenly Father, who loves me and who has purchased my life for all eternity at great cost to Himself. Without faith, it is impossible to please God. Heb. 11:6.

2. I can resist porn because I have been given the seal of my salvation, the presence of the HOLY Spirit. Eph. 4:30. God did not leave us in this world to try to live for Him on our own strength. In order to deal with the powerful influence of the Devil, and live victoriously, God has given us the Holy Spirit to empower us and guide us into all truth. John 14.15-20, 26, 15:5, 10, 16:13-15, 1 John 3:24. We can courageously overcome the world because we have the presence of Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit in us. John 16:33 Greater is He Who is in us than he who is in the world. 1 John 4:4. In order for us to take advantage of this gift of God, we MUST ABIDE with Him every day - to not abide is to go it dangerously alone. See John 15, 1 John 2-4. In order to abide, we must INVITE Jesus to be Lord/Master over our lives each day. We must put on His character, His values, His heart, His desires. Porn is so antithetical to Jesus Christ that it will be offensive and grotesque and avoided for the person abiding daily in a living, vibrant relationship with Jesus Christ.

3. I do not want to grieve the Holy Spirit. Eph. 4:30. The instruction in Ephesians comes from Isaiah 63:7-10, where God describes His sacrificial, faithful, wholehearted love for the people of Israel, only to have them rebel and grieve the Holy Spirit. When we deliberately give into porn or other intentional sin, we rebel against our God, our Hope, our Creator, our Redeemer, and we grieve Him - we hurt Him. Heb. 10:26-31 tells us that willful, habitual sin is, in essence, trampling the Son of God under our feet, treating contemptuously the blood of the covenant by which we are sanctified, and insulting the Spirit of Grace. Therefore, it says that God is just to punish such misconduct. I don't want to experience what that means. More fundamentally, however, I don't want to hurt the God Who has demonstrated such incredible love for me.