Before you search for porn again, remember that there is always, always a way out! God promised that “The temptations in your life are no different than what others experience. And God is faithful. He will not allow the temptation to be more than you can stand. When you are tempted, he will show you a way out so that you can endure.” (1 Corinthians 10:13 NLT)
Click away. RUN away. Don’t “fight” the temptation. Flee it. Duck and cover. God will come to your rescue… when you truly want Him to do so.
Our church’s website features a page dedicated to offering help to those who struggle with sex and porn addiction. Sadly, it’s one of our most popular pages because it’s found so often through Google searches for porn (an intentional result of some SEO work we’ve done). We want people, particularly men, to find the page and find hope. There is a God who wants to help you out of this. There is a church that will join hand in hand with you. There is healing. There is freedom.
There’s always a way out for you.
But for the girls… the story is different.
If you think porn is victimless, get your head out of the sand. First of all, you need to understand the pornography industry and its massive impact. Then, join the cause, spread the word, free the girls and the boys victimized by porn.
There is an awful story in the Bible (there are plenty of those – God inspired a rather honest book) of a man living in the town of Gibeah, which had descended morally to resemble Gomorrah. It was located in the territory of Benjamin. A couple of visitors stop in Gibeah to stay the night in the square, and an unnamed man pulls them into his house because he knows what will befall them. The men of the town pound on the man’s door, demanding to be allowed to rape the visitors, but the man of the house protects them. Honorable, right?
Instead, he offers them his concubine and tells them to do whatever they please with her. He shoves her out the door and locks it. Those men raped that woman all night long. She crawled back home and died on her doorstep, victimized by the depraved cravings of a society gone sexually mad. She was first devalued by her husband, then degraded and abused to the point of death, treated as a mere object of pleasure.
While reading the story, you’ll have no respect left for the people of Gibeah or for the man who so easily surrendered his personal sex slave to the men of the town. But you will, hopefully, identify with what the people of the town say at the end of the chapter.
Everyone who saw it said, “Such a horrible crime has not been committed in all the time since Israel left Egypt. Think about it! What are we going to do? Who’s going to speak up?” Judges 19:30 NLT
That’s a question for our age as well. Remember these glaring facts:
- 85% of young men and half of young women watch porn on a regular basis.
- This generation fights sex trafficking more than anyone ever has.
- More than anyone ever has, this generation consumes porn.
I don’t care where you stand politically on the issue of freedom of speech or censorship. Who cares? And it doesn’t matter that you think you don’t have a problem, that you can watch porn casually and it won’t affect you or those around you. Not only is that stupid and naive, it’s an extremely selfish way to think in light of what you now know about the industry’s victimization of young women, and young boys too.
So what’s next?
- RUN to Jesus for forgiveness. He gave His life on the cross for you long before you ever looked at porn for the first time, and He knew that you would do so, over and over, and died for you anyway. He loves you that much, and His grace will cover your sin if you’ll repent.
- RUN from the temptation to look at porn. Don’t fight it in your own willpower. Flee. Run away. Run to the Bible. Run to your small group of friends who are seeking to remain free alongside you.
- RUN to a church that gets honest and doesn’t sweep sexual sin under the rug. Join a recovery group or another small group that will be a safe place to talk about it.
- FIGHT the industry by refusing to click. You can’t fight the temptation of lust on your own, but you can fight against the industry by refusing to take part in it. And remember watching FREE porn still feeds the industry. Someone always makes money when you click, even if you aren’t paying to watch in that moment.
- GIVE to the cause. Make amends and restitution by fighting for the rescue of trafficking victims.
- Men, TEACH your boys to honor, respect, and protect women. And teach your daughters they are infinitely valuable, beautiful, and deserve to be honored, respected, and protected.
If after reading this, you’re hanging your head in shame and guilt, stop it! It’s one thing to face your sin honestly, confess it to God, and turn away from it and get help. But stop believing you’re the innocent victim. You have a choice. She doesn’t. For you, there is always a way out and you are responsible for seeking it. But for her, and millions like her, there is no way out as long as you keep clicking.
There is no such thing as free porn. There is always a cost.
