Sexual Immorality
So, I just feel like this is such an important thing, and it is something that I personally struggle with on a daily basis. I used to feel bad about the fact that I have to fight it daily, but, while I am still not proud of it, I realize every guy reading this struggles with it. I don’t care who you are you have had to deal with this in your life, and I am sure it is a constant struggle. Now, I have said it before, there was a time when the man I was, is not the man He wanted to me to be. During those times, I don’t know if I was so much struggling against it, as embracing it. Now, a lot of people including the person I used to be don’t think its that big of a deal. After I had turned around, I still struggled, and honestly would watch porn, I thought, well, ya know, I’m not ACTUALLY having sex, so, its okay, right? WRONG!!! It says if you look upon a woman with lust in your heart, you have committed adultery. Now, where does this cause a problem? It causes a problem every where, if you are going about your business, and having to carry that weight around with you, it is going to become such an unbearable burden you will not be able to handle it on your own by any means. It will stop you from being able to do the work that God has called you to do. I don’t think I am the only one of us who realized that every day we’re right in the middle of a spiritual war with the souls of those we were called to go out and save for the kingdom of God. Now here is the thing, what kind of warrior are you going to be, if you are standing out in the middle of the battle field with your pants around your ankles? I don’t know how many of you would want to be out in the middle of a battle field, looking for the guy who is supposed to have your back, and there he is pants down, looking for sexual gratification. Brothers, we are better than that, we are stronger than that, because we have His strength in us. I feel like for far too long, so many of us have been thinking well, I just have to accept that I struggle with this, and I always will. Yeah, we will probably struggle with it forever, but if we put ourselves on the path the God has for us, and recognize the problem and hand it over to him, we can move past it. I know a lot of us think that we have such hard problems because we see pretty girls somewhere, and we have a bit of a thought, or we see a gorgeous girl in a movie scene. We don’t know JACK about temptation, let me tell ya about a guy who did. I am sure we all remember Joseph, ya know, the guy with the coat of many colors. Well, while he was in Egypt, he had really become a great man, he was respected in what he did, and well, his master, Potiphar, even trusted him with his money, business affairs, the guy trusted Joseph with EVERYTHING! Well, old Potiphar’s wife, she had taken a liking to Joseph, and, I am sure that she was not too shabby looking, one might call her Hotiphar, I mean come on dude was rich, rich dudes did not marry the ugly girl in the back of the class. The rich guys married the really hot women, well, here is the thing, Hotiphar, was very forward, she actually looked at Joseph and said to him lie with me, he simply told her no to be basic about it. Now it got bad later, he actually went inside to take care of some work that he needed to do, and all the men were gone from the house, she grabs him by his garment, saying lie with me, and he said no, and actually fled away from her, leaving his garment there. I’ll be honest with ya guys, I don’t know many men who would have that kind of strength, I mean, you gotta think Potiphar is rich and he was probably like, hey bring forth the hotties! Now, do you think you could have said no? Do you think you could have ran away so fervously that you actually leave the clothes there as you are running away? Well, here is the thing, because of the choices Joseph made, because he knew God did not want him to give in to lust and temptation, and because he persevered through the trials and tribulations that he experienced, God blessed him in such a way, he actually ended up being higher ranking than Potiphar, the man who used to call him his slave, was now underneath Joseph on the totem pole. We need to remember that, God, has so many blessings in store for us, and so many great plans that we can not even BEGIN to imagine! Alot of guys think that this is a struggle that there is no way to move past, well, here is the thing, we can escape from it, we don’t have to stand our ground and put up a fight against the temptation, we need to RUN, just like Joseph did. 1 Corinthians 10:13 “No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.” Isn’t that a great thing? I mean, He knows we will be tempted, but he will ALWAYS, ALWAYS provide a way out, we just have to look for that way out so we can run, as fast we we possibly can from those situations that tempt us so badly. I know I personally always wanted to be strong enough to stand up to that temptation, but, now I just look for a way out, I run, and run, and run, I will run more than Forest Gump if I have to from now on, and I hope that we can all realize that is what we need to be doing. Now, I think this is gonna be hard for men, we have to remember, sometimes, it’s ok to run, and sexual temptation is one time where it is definitely okay to run!
