[1]Editor’s note: This piece is made up of several excerpts from “33 Days to Freedom From Lust: A Hope-Filled Devotional [2]” by Tennessee pastor Jared Moore. The curriculum can be found here [3].
For practicing Christians in 2024, according to Barna, 75 percent of males and 40 percent of females occasionally look at pornography; and 18 percent of current pastors do.[1] [4] This means that Christians in your congregations are probably looking at pornography, and some pastors do as well.
There are several reasons why: influence from the world, the flesh, and the devil; but there is another reason that is more subtle: wrong belief. When I was growing up in my local Bible-believing church that loved Jesus, me and others, some taught that Christian men would always battle lust. It was just our burden in this life, but as I grew and applied their love for God’s Word, I never found that teaching in the Bible.
The prophets, apostles and Christ didn’t speak of struggling with sexual lust. Rather, Jesus called lust adultery, telling us to cut off our body parts that tempt us (Matthew 5:27-30; 18:7-9); Paul said lust shouldn’t even be named among Christians (Ephesians 5:3); Peter said unbelievers live in sensuality and passions (1 Peter 4:3) and false prophets have eyes full of adultery (2 Peter 2:14); and John said that the lust of the flesh, the desires of the eyes and pride of love come from the world not God (1 John 2:15-17).
Even with this cursory glance at Scripture, we can see that lust is not to be tolerated or excused in Christian hearts. Rather, we’re called, by the Holy Spirit’s power within us, through Christ, to the Father, to put to death what is earthly in us: “sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry” (Colossians 3:5).
But how do we put the lust within to death?
The answer is only found in Scripture. We put lust to death in the same way we put all habitual sins in our hearts to death: by loving God and His design more than we love our sin (Colossians 3:1-17). A lust problem is a love for God problem.
The reason Christian men and women lust is because a part of them loves sin more than God and His design; and the reason why they battle lust and not some other sin is because lust is tempting to them, and their flesh and the devil knows it.
[5]When a sinner gets saved through faith in Christ, the Holy Spirit indwells him, uniting him to Jesus, and God forgives him of his sin and declares him righteous in Christ. The Christian’s will is freed from having to walk in the flesh. He can now turn from the flesh and walk with the Holy Spirit (Galatians 5:16-26).
The flesh is sin and will move often on this side of glory (Romans 7), but it does not have to produce the same particular sin your entire Christian life (Romans 8:15; Colossians 3:1-17). By the Spirit, you can starve the flesh when it burns, and like a hot coal, if it burns to no effect, it will burn itself out. In other words, as you, by the Spirit, cultivate love for God and hatred for lust in your heart, lust will die, because you will no longer find it tempting. After all, isn’t that why other sins are not tempting to you? Because they’re dead in your heart?
Since your flesh or the old man is still part of you in this life, it knows what you find tempting, and your flesh moves this direction, contrary to the Holy Spirit (Galatians 5:16-17). But if it moves to no effect, it will burn out on lust and move in a different direction; and then you’ll put that sin to death too, and so on.
The battle against the flesh, the world and the devil in this life does not end until we go to be with Jesus (Romans 7:25); but by the Spirit you can put particular sins of the flesh to death.
You must begin by calling lust sin. Take responsibility for it because your heart is lusting (Romans 7:25; Mark 7:14-23). You lust because you’re a sinner not because you’re a man or woman. Adam didn’t lust before the fall; Jesus has never lusted. No one in Heaven today lusts, and no one in the new heavens and new earth will lust either. Each time you’re desiring evil in your heart, turn from it, turn to Christ, and live His truth instead.
The more you love God, the less lust will have a foothold in your life. To cultivate love for God, you must seek to think His thoughts after Him. There are many things you can do, by the Spirit, to think God’s thoughts rather than the devil’s:
1) Read God’s Word, believe it, receive it, live it and think on it.
2) Worship God in a local church weekly. The Bible, 10 Commandments, and the great commandment begin with God (Genesis 1:1; Exodus 20:1-17; Matthew 22:37-39). He’s first.
3) In all you do, think and desire, live for God’s glory, not your flesh.
4) Cultivate your love for God’s design that is for your good and His glory, by thinking on good, true and beautiful things (Philippians 4:8-9).
5) Laugh at how silly it is for you as a Christian to still lust, since you love and know God and believe all the glorious truths of Scripture.
6) Ask other Christians to hold you accountable by checking on your progress and praying for you.
7) Pray and sing continually in thankfulness for all that God has given you, since the lustful Christian is unthankful for the spouse or singleness God has given him (Ephesians 5:3-4).
Don’t grow weary in the fight against indwelling lust, because Christ is of infinite worth, and we are in Him and love Him; and most importantly, He is in us and loves us eternally.
By the Spirit, we fight to kill all of our indwelling sin for Jesus. He’s worth it.
[1] Barna, “The Silent Problem of Pornography Use Among Pastors,” November 22, 2024, https://www.barna.com/research/pastors-pornography-use/ [6].
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