The pride of your heart has deceived you, you who live in the clefts of the rocks and make your home on the heights, you who say to yourself, "Who can bring me down to the ground?" Obadiah 1:3
Pornography is a deceitful lover, at best, and a destructive one, at worse. Its flirtatious images offer hollow intimacy and shallow sensations. Though lewd to the Lord and to those who love Him, it lures in the naive and the narcissistic. Pornography respects no persons: pastors, politicians, athletes, students, managers, mechanics, sales reps and homemakers are all candidates for its control. What may start out as a thrill sets up its consumers for a painful, destructive spill.
Pride is at the root of pornography. It centers around an infatuation with self that is easily seduced by sensual temptations. When we place ourselves at the center of the universe we are set up for perverted desires. A life with no filter other than what feels good, will soon feel really bad. Job loss, marriage loss, reputation loss, financial loss, health loss and loss of respect for ourselves are all familiar fruits of pornography. So, the first step is to agree we have a severe problem with pride.
Your heart will become proud and you will forget the Lord. Deuteronomy 8:14
So what is the solution to the problem of pride and its puppet pornography? Our humble heart positions us to receive authentic affection from our Heavenly Father. We embrace the true lover of our soul in confession and repentance. He fills us and frees us with the compelling love of Christ. The lust of pornography cannot co-exist with the love of God. We learn to love ourselves for His sake, because He first loved us. Our selfish love is replaced with our Savior’s love.
Moreover, in marriage you can avoid pornography by growing in godly contentment and sexual satisfaction with your spouse. Perhaps you engage a sex therapist who can help you establish a healthy process of spiritual, emotional and physical intimacy. Seek accountability from trusted confidants, by inviting them to view what you view on the internet. Above all, guard your heart with God’s love for out of it flows everything you do. Jesus is the real, lavish lover of your soul!
Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it. Proverbs 4:23
Prayer: Heavenly Father, I embrace your authentic affection and reject pornography with its pride and pain.
Related Readings: 2 Kings 10:31; Proverbs 10:31; Luke 6:45; Philippians 4:7
