I provided the link at the bottom, but before I give you the link, I want to share a few excerpts that I found exceptionally compelling. I hope they will inspire you to listen and read the entire sermon.
- The great tragedy is not mainly masturbation or fornication or acting like a peeping Tom (or curious Cathy) on the internet. The tragedy is that Satan uses the guilt of these failures to strip you of every radical dream you ever had, or might have, and in its place give you a happy, safe, secure, American life of superficial pleasures until you die in your lakeside rocking chair, wrinkled and useless, leaving a big fat inheritance to your middle-aged children to confirm them in their worldliness. That’s the main tragedy.
- Have you ever wondered what the next verse in Colossians 2:15 means? Right after saying that God nailed the record of our debt to the cross, Paul says, “[God] disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him.” This is a reference to the devil and all his demonic hosts. How are they disarmed? How are they defeated? Don’t they prowl around like a roaring lion today (1 Peter 5:8)?
The answer is: They have many weapons. They can do much damage. But they are disarmed of the one weapon that can damn us. The weapon of unforgiven sin. Be sure you see the connection between Colossians 2:14 and 15. In 2:14, it says God nailed the record of our debt to the cross. It’s punished. It’s finished. And in the next breath he says that God disarmed the rulers and authorities. He triumphed over them. Sure, they can beat us up. They can make us see weird things on the walls of our rooms. They can shake your house and cause lying signs and wonders. They accuse you and call you a loser, but they cannot damn you. That weapon is out of their hands. Only unforgiven sin damns. And that was nailed to the cross for everyone of you who despairs of saving yourself and trusts in Jesus. - Justification is the act by which God declares us not only forgiven because of the work of Christ, but also righteous because of the work of Christ. God requires two things for our right standing before him: 1) our sins must be punished and 2) our lives must be righteous. But we cannot bear our own punishment (Psalm 49:7-8), and we cannot provide our own righteousness. None is righteous; no, not one (Romans 3:10).
Therefore, God, out of his immeasurable love for us, provided his own Son to do both. Christ bears our punishment and performs our righteousness. And when we receive Christ as the Savior and Lord and Treasure of our lives, all of his punishment and all of his righteousness is counted as ours (Romans 4:4-6; 5:19; 5:1; 8:1; 10:4; Philippians 3:8-9; 2 Corinthians 5:21).
I hope those short excerpts inspired you to go read the rest of the sermon (or listen to it). Plus, the article has hot-links to all the scripture. It's powerful stuff, and it applies to much more than just sexual failure. It applies to any and all sin in our lives.
May God be glorified in and through His people.
4 comments:
Luke, thanks for this. I was inspired to write a post as well.
It's great how this applies really to all sin in our lives. But if you don't "get it" mediocrity is the sure result in your Christian walk.
Luke, Thanks for your post. I'm a brother in the AC church and live in the west and enjoy reading your blog. I think it's great to have this avenue of communication available and to be able to carry on a dialogue that would otherwise be impossible. I think this issue in particular is one of great importance today and because of the ubiquity of the internet one that ALL men must come to terms with.
I think Piper really highlights something important here (the great tragedy is...) that is often times completely overlooked. That being: sexual failure has a demoralizing effect that brings the Kingdom furthering work we've been called to do to a halt. while I would not come to the same conclusions that Piper does about sexual sin being no real threat to our standing with God I do think it is hugely important to look beyond ourselves and see the greater story that God has called us to be participants in. You can certainly find plenty of examples in Israel's history to see that the wealthy and secure who take advantage sexually of the economically oppressed (without which the pornography industry would cease to exist) will receive a just recompense (Amos 2:6-7).
However When I read the title of the original article: How to deal with the guilt of sexual failure... I couldn't help but wonder if Piper hadn't prescribed the wrong remedy. A doctor does no great service to his cancer patient when he prescribes them anti-depressants and omits chemotherapy or radiation. As I can personally testify, we will never get to the life shaping, purpose fulfilling Kingdom work that has been given to us if we don't first stop and deal honestly with our sin.
The remedy that we find for this in the scriptures is simple, effective but no less painful at times than cancer treatment.
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us [our] sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
-1 John 1:9
This doesn't mean we say a quiet prayer and "give it over to God". He already knows we sinned, what is lacking is not our acknowledgement before God but our humiliation before man. The greatest example of this we have is that of David. If we put his plea from Psalm 51:4 (Against thee, thee only, have I sinned...) into it's proper context we then can see how his responds to sexual failure should be a model for our own recovery. He certainly sinned against Uriah and Bathsheba but the greatest offense was that he should do this as the anointed of the Lord. The full story can be found in 2 Samuel 12 and in it we see that David's confession was anything but private. This is summed up beautifully in the Psalms.
When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long.
For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me: my moisture is turned into the drought of summer. Selah.
I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the LORD; and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. Selah.
-Psalm 32:3-5
What I can personally attest to is that when we bring our sin out into the light and confess it to those whom it affects God changes us. In the case of pornography or any other sexual sin we simply have to get it out in the open. If we are married our spouse needs to hear about it, no matter how damaging we may think it could be to the relationship. If we are single and live alone this may be more ambiguous but we should certainly have someone to be accountable to and this alone may be reason enough to seek a roommate. It's this kind of intimate and often painful fellowship that God has promised to work through and not only does it deal with the guilt of sexual failure but with the root of failure itself. In the end not only freeing us from the bondage of sin but empowering the Kingdom furthering work prepared for us from before the beginning.
But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.
-1 John 1:7
You are mostly right I believe (except for the standing before God being threatened by the degree of our sanctification), but I don’t think it was Piper’s intent to offer the “chemo” aspect of dealing with this sin. I think he’d agree with you that dealing with the guilt of the sin is not the way to prevent the sin itself. But his purpose was in addressing the guilt because he was at the passion conference and his point is that guilt from this sin prevents many from going into missions or full-time ministry. So I think you raise a good point for us to think about but it was not the intent of the sermon to be a comprehensive guide to sexual temptation.
But if you are willing, I’d like to hear more on why you believe our standing before God is changed based on how sinful or holy we are (granted I believe a Christian should not and indeed will not continue in sin after they are saved). The reason I ask obviously is because that seems to be heading in a very salvation by faith-plus-works trajectory. Our justification (standing before God) is based on Christ’s righteousness and not our own. If our standing was based on how sinful we are then we’d all got o hell.
Traever,
I'd love to continue the discussion further. Since it may be lengthy and somewhat off topic from the original blog post I've sent you an email. Look forward to the dialogue.
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