Some of the biggest questions churches are facing have less to do with the morality behind sexual addiction and far more to do with the integration of the topic or, more importantly, the people. How do we keep a tight, grace-filled hold on these beautiful people who are struggling so deeply? We certainly don’t want to see them destroyed by their own flesh. And more so, we desire that they too receive the salvation and sanctification that God desires! Jesus exemplified an unconditional love that both said, “you are forgiven” and “go and sin no more” (John 8:11). It is in the balance of these two paradigms that we find our best answers.
Below is a list of answers to the question: how do we appropriately interact with the subject of sexual addiction as a community in our churches?
Brutal Honesty
It is an unfortunate truth that many church traditions do not leave room for honest sharing of one’s own hurts. It’s too painful, too inconvenient, too much hard work to deal with other people’s problems. I won’t presume to speak to all the reasons why this mindset may exist, but those are a few of them. Unfortunately, this kind of thinking develops isolation and separation between members of the body of Christ. The members naturally start to begin two lives as they buck up against the social norms that demand our conformity to single shade Christianity. The answer to this is an entire culture shift. A church cannot function as the healing hands and feet of God without a willingness to crawl into the mud of people’s lives. Brutal honesty, the dopping of playacting, is a fundamental step in this process. Nick Stumbo of Pure Desire Ministries calls this a merging and overshadowing of our personal self and our public self by our Christ-filled self (Safe, Nick Stumbo). We reflect, through our imperfection and His ability to bring healing, God’s glory. From the top-down, we must be reminded that all people are people – and that the reduction of temptation or struggle is simply a blessing from God that He wishes to extend into more and more lives in our churches. If this grinds against you, be reminded that Jesus did this. He talked about His problems! From lamenting over the state of faith in Israel (Luke 9:41) to weeping publically over the shared sorrow of death (John 11:35) to begging his friends to pray with Him in His darkest hour (Matthew 26:36-46), our Savior modeled a shared experience that put and authentic foot forward.
Remember that we are not so different
Paul reminds us in the letter to Titus (3:3) that we are not so different from those who are led astray. The biggest difference is that we now have God indwelling us! Make no mistake, this is a huge difference. But it is not a declaration that no sin can possibly creep in or linger past our date of salvation. The bottom line is this. The struggle that we go through, the temptation to sin, the pain and suffering is to the glory of God and part of our purpose as Christians. We are to persevere. But that perseverance is not always carried out well. For me, and for so many people like me, there was a divided heart that desperately wanted to serve Jesus, but really did not know how to submit my whole self to His direction. The hooks of sexual sin grabbed me young.
This is all of us.
We all like sheep have gone astray (Isaiah 53:6).
In both the parable of the lost sheep (Matthew 18:12-14) and the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32), the implication is that the lost one is a part of the body of Christ. They already belonged to the flock, or to the family, and they left. We, who are in the fold, can leave, and God celebrates in our return! You and I, we are not so different. How would you want to be treated if you were in the same position? To turn the question around, how are you going to love this neighbor as yourself?
Here’s the question everyone needs to answer: do I see myself as superior to those who are in sexual sin? Am I really any different?
Care about stories
As a sort of answer to the above point, think about this. Everyone has a story that gives testimony to their present. Everyone came from somewhere. In our current culture, the average age for viewing pornography is 9, and the average age of sexual intercourse is 12. 7 in 10 girls and 4 in 10 boys are sexually abused before they leave high school. Children are inundated with confusion about their sexuality from preschool on, and everything anyone is talking about is sexual issues. And to top it all off, the internet has made this all accessible at anytime, anywhere. How do we expect anyone to get out of this culture without scars? On one hand, the church has the ability to reach in and bring healing through love and forgiveness. On the other, they have the ability to reinforce the atmosphere of shame and hate that so often descends on those who were practically born into addiction.
Consider a bit of my story. I was raped 4 times between the ages of 7 and 10. Pornography entered my world at roughly the same time. Between Jr. High and High School, I was sexually abused by 4 people and had developed an amazing ability to live a double life. When I did bring up my struggles, I was always the “odd duck” and people ran screaming from talking about it with me. So I ask you, how was I supposed to know what healthy sexuality looked like? Make no mistake, I take responsibility for the things I have done. For the acting out that has occurred and the pain it brought my family and more. But how was I to know? Praise God who has won the victory and pulled me out of the fire! Because now, He has drawn me out of the grave and into the light. The Sleeper is rising and Christ is shining (Ephesians 5:14)!
What’s your story? Surely you are struggling with something that you can track back in your story. In this way, you can relate to the struggle that is happening in the hearts and minds of the sexual addict. It is a good and healthy thing to search for this struggle so that you can relate to the seemingly impenetrable nature of a habit that is deeply seared into the mind.
Two final thoughts about this. If you are struggling sexually, isn’t it time to get help? Reach out to us here at Warfare of Grace, we can help! Second, if you can’t seem to think of anything you are struggling with, then watch out. You apparently are not a threat enough to Satan to warrant bothering.
Allow Natural Consequences
What is the difference between being a believer and non-believer when we sin? The difference is that a believer is denying the things he or she claims to believe in order to act upon a sinful lust. What follows is a cascade of natural consequences. 2nd Corinthians tells us about the “punishment by the majority” (2:6), a horrible pressure of others knowing of your sin. The feeling that all eyes are on you… because they are. In this passage, the question is, are your eyes loving or judgemental? Paul reminds us that such a person can be overwhelmed by sorrow! That, not the judgment of the people of God, is the punishment for the believer.
A second, and far worse natural cause is the separation that sinful living brings between us and God. The wages of sin is death (Romans 3:23), spiritual and physical – but spiritual death can be experienced right now. People living in sexual addiction experience this separation from God all the time. They live with it. Desperation and frenzy seem to be partners with then day to day. They will often describe living as half a person, or in numbness, or with a constant ache in their soul – this is spiritual death being experienced here and now. If you take a minute and think about those two examples of natural consequences, you’ll quickly see how much punishment the sinful believer is under already.
So, what is the church called to do? The church is called to be a supernatural consequence, not a natural one. We are representatives of God’s grace and forgiveness. Scripture reminds us again and again that a man will reap what he sows! And that the reaping comes from the flesh. We are the body of Christ, called to play the role of forgiveness and building up (truth and love). From personal experience, I can say that the road of grace is a far more effective, encouraging and life-giving way. It is the balm that gently restores a man to faith as well as the medicine that connects his heart back to Christ. In this way, the church can act as a connecting point between the Holy Spirit and the wrecked spirit of a man. I must add, this is a wonderful, edifying experience!
Remember the benefits!
Jesus says this better than I ever could in Luke 7:36-50.
One of the Pharisees asked him to eat with him, and he went into the Pharisee’s house and reclined at table. And behold, a woman of the city, who was a sinner, when she learned that he was reclining at table in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster flask of ointment, and standing behind him at his feet, weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head and kissed his feet and anointed them with the ointment. Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, for she is a sinner.” And Jesus answering said to him, “Simon, I have something to say to you.” And he answered, “Say it, Teacher.”
“A certain moneylender had two debtors. One owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. When they could not pay, he cancelled the debt of both. Now which of them will love him more?” Simon answered, “The one, I suppose, for whom he cancelled the larger debt.” And he said to him, “You have judged rightly.” Then turning toward the woman he said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not ceased to kiss my feet. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven—for she loved much. But he who is forgiven little, loves little.” And he said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.” Then those who were at table with him began to say among themselves, “Who is this, who even forgives sins?” And he said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”
This passage is both a beautiful reality and a warning. The beauty is that those of us who realize that we have been forgiven much will love much! The warning is that if you are feeling unloving, you need to do some heart-searching. Pride is knocking at the door, saying that you are better than the man to whom you are having trouble showing love.
Those who have walked through the suffering of addiction know the depth of God’s forgiving hand (that is, if their minds can wrap around it! It’s BIG!). This can cause a dramatic shift in their heart! Worship becomes a reality. Communion with God becomes a regular behavior. And all the while we find ourselves driven to raise our hands and shout “Holy!” to our Father God, Friend Savior and Holy Spirit guide.
Read Matthew 7:1-5 over and over!
You may already sense this theme among a biblical response to sexual sin, but I will say it here to be clear. The focus is on you. This passage, about a plank in your own eye, is about the nature of judgment. It’s not just that you have a plank in your eye, as if it is some other sin like lying, jealousy, pride, sloth, gluttony or any other. Rather the powerful reality of this passage is that the plank itself IS judgment. When we spend our time pointing out this or that in others, we miss that our focus should be on ourselves. Jesus reminds us that prioritizing “fixing” other people is a sin far more dangerous than whatever we are seeing in them. Our personal righteousness is our priority. We are to work out our own faith (Philippians 2:12).
But how does that look when someone confesses sexual sin? Or in other words, how do we still exercise discernment? Think about it this way, why would Isaiah say “And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (Isaiah 6:5) ? I don’t have time to unpack all of this, but it seems to me that part of the passage is screaming “God has a standard I cannot possibly live up to!” If that is the case, a similar principle can be applied to the plank in our eye. When someone confesses to us a speck in their eye, we are immediately reminded that the standard is too high for any of us! We are all saved by grace through faith (Ephesians 2:8). In this way, we take a seat at the person’s side instead of making them kneel at our feet. From here we walk alongside in love and comfort.
Check out these scriptures that challenge our viewpoint on restoration.
2nd Corinthians 2:5-11 | Matthew 7:1-5 | John 8:1-11 | Galatians 6:1-10 | James 1:12-18 | Titus 3:1-11
And above all things: Love (1 Corinthians 13:13). If we are known for being loving, that’s not bad. In fact, it’s the best indicator of a healthy Christian body (John 13:35)! A church moving rightly speaks the truth in love (Ephesians 4:15).