PornCIiPM

Personal Observations:

v. 27-28, Sin, specifically the sin of adultery, along with any other sin, is a heart issue ().

v. 29-30, Jesus presents a call to action:

Extreme measures must be taken

Modes of sin must be eradicated

In both examples (eye, hand), Jesus makes note of hell

This is a matter that has eternal impact/consequences

Subject: What am I talking about?

What is Jesus’s call-to-action when it comes to sexual sin?

Complement: What exactly am I saying about what I’m talking about?

Jesus’s call-to-action as it pertains to sexual sin is to cut it out of your life.

The Big Idea:

To follow Christ, we must participate in the spiritual discipline of cutting and tossing away of those parts of our lives leading us to hell.

Before we begin, I have one request of you, that you would pray with me and for me as I preach.

Pray

Please rise for the reading of our Lord’s Word:

Matthew 5:27-30

(Cut and Paste observations to points of discussion when beginning outline)

ex. “Why is unity central to the Church?”

Stage 1

Complement: What exactly am I saying about what I’m talking about?

ex. Spiritual unity in the Church is a reflection of the oneness spread into every facet of the relationship between God and His people.

The Big Idea:

Genesis 1-2Intro:Attention and interestCan you imagine it? With His very breath, God established the universes and all they contain. He brought forth the world, its sun and moon, He created the skies, the ocean, the mountains, the plants and trees and all the life that would live in between.Then, after seeing it all as good, God created the pentacle of His creation, the crown jewels that would eternally rest upon His brow: mankind. Taking the dirt from the ground, He formed it into man and breathed into his nostrils life.After tasking man with some responsibilities, God declared a bizarre need in the man: the need for companionship outside of God, Himself. God puts the man into a deep sleep and takes from His body a rib and fashions it into a woman.At the cusp of Genesis 2, the first ever recorded words of mankind are written. And it’s a song:Of loveOf onenessOf shamelessnessThis is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh. She shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.Surface needsAnd humanity for some time enjoyed a world unimaginable to us today. They consumed the fruit of the garden with joy, the sweetness of nectar a simple beacon that pointed to the wonderfulness of God. God made sweetness. They consumed each other in marital love, their bodies embracing and merging in a oneness that echoes beyond the halls of sexual pleasure; they partook in a oneness that God Himself enjoys within the Trinity. And with their hands, they consumed the good works God prepared for them beforehand, joyfully fulfilling their purpose as children God.Everything was GOOD. Was good. So what happened? What led from a perfect creation, a perfect relationship to God and to one another to utter brokenness? To tears? To pain, sickness, and death?If you can, please open your Bible to Genesis 3 and rise for the reading of God’s Word: Read passageIt is typical, when faced with the consequences of a terrible action that we often focus on the action itself once it has been caught. In our narrative this morning, it is of no surprise when you ask another Christian, “Why is there death in the world,” they will more than likely immediately point to Adam and Eve disobeying God, which is obviously true when looking at our text. However, I believe the problem of sin is much deeper than that. I’ll tell it to you straight, sin does not begin at the commission/omission, that is the action or withholding of action, but at the desire for it in our hearts.SubjectYou can find many discussions, books, and sermons that will talk about avoiding temptation, whether you keep away from it, flee from it or slay it. But what about when the desire and your flesh consummate their passion? Where do you go when a confession of what you have done can destroy everyone and everything you hold dear? What do you do when you use apathy as a fig leaf to cover your sin before God? Where can hope be found in the midst of such despair?

ex. Spiritual unity is central to the Church because it is a reflection of God’s relationship with His People.

Prayer Requests & Praise Reports

Read Passage

Stage 2

Intro:

Ministry is dirty work; it’s a lot like farming. There’s planting, there’s sowing, there’s watering, there’s handling of animal manure. In my case, I deal with quite of sailor manure. Just two days ago, I received a call from a sailor who left for the fleet last year, telling me that he’s still struggling with pornography.

This really wasn’t much of a surprise; this has been an issue we’ve spoken about for many months. I listened to him, I encouraged him, I shared with him my own burdens, I pointed him to the powerful words of John Owen, who has much insight on sin and temptation. I sought to equip him with both biblical truth and extrabiblical resources.

Then he shared something shocking to me.

He shared with me of one of his battles with temptation, how proceeded to walk it off. He’s on a ship and while there is only so much walking one can do, he made his rounds through the usual passageways, entering his berthing area (living quarters for the sailors), where a large group of his shipmates were gathered, watching pornography on their TV.

It was shocking to me because just last week, a sailor secretly filmed female sailors undressing in their berthing area and posted it on a pornography site. In fact, a year or two ago, a sailor of mine was kicked out of the US Navy SEALS program for reporting to his chain of command that his instructors were utilizing pornography in their powerpoint presentations.

It almost seems impossible to escape pornography in a culture helplessly consumed by it.

Statistically, I know some of you have experienced this in your own ministries.

In fact just by statistics alone, I know that at least 95% of you in here have had direct exposure to pornography.

This

In fact, let us look at some of the statistics on this:

Powerpoint slides 1-6

It would be quite an understatement to say that the Church has a porn problem, both from within and without.

Now I still think it is necessary to ask, because there is often enough push back when it comes to discussing the Biblical Perspective of pornography: What does have to do with pornography?

Well having skated through three semesters of Greek by the skin of my teeth, let’s look at pornography through the lens of Scripture.

S7. Pornography and The Bible:

The word pornography, derived from the Greek porni (“prostitute”) and graphein (“to write”), was originally defined as any work of art or literature depicting the life of prostitutes. -Encyclopedia Britannica

While the digital era of pornography is not something Scripture literally calls out, i.e. Jesus does not say, “Hey, stop googling porn,” this does not mean that Scripture has nothing to say about the concept of pornography.

In the 55 times we see πορνεία and its affiliates in the New Testament , it is always presented in a negative context.

S8. Biblical Perspective:

Don’t Do It. Ok, that concludes my sermon.

...

In all seriousness, it is sin. It’s not for nothing that Paul says in ,

φεύγετε *imperative* τὴν πορνείαν *accusative*. -

“Y’all flee sexual immorality.”

S9. Biblical Perspective:

It’s a wrong way to look at the purpose of sex.

Pornography deeply habituates your soul to look at things in the completely opposite way than God does. -Timothy Keller

It’s a twisted way to look at the purpose of sex.

Pornography presents an image focused solely on the visible and the erotic. The human person is reduced to what can be seen [and] excludes any sense… of the intimacy and sacredness of the human person. -Percy, Anthony, Theology of the Body Made Simple (p. 78).

It’s a tragic way to look at sex.

It takes a son or daughter, a mother or father, a brother or sister, a human being and strips them of their sacred identity as an image-bearer of God and reduces them to a virtual object to orgasm to. Intimacy and sacredness is stripped, covenants are broken and betrayed, whether you are married or not.

Pornography rapes holy sexuality and transforms it into a grotesque shadow of its former purpose.

It’s an evil way to look at sex.

Not only is sex an invention and gift from God, sex is also a reflection of God as observed in the Trinity. Has anyone in here had Dr. Clark or Dr. Johnson before? Try imagining hearing this in their voice; this is a quote from their book The Incarnation of God: The Mystery of the Gospel as the Foundation of Evangelical Theology

“The personal and sexual intimacy that Adam and Eve experienced as they became one flesh was not the first indwelling or penetration to occur among persons. It was, of course, the first of all human sexual unions, but the first indwelling or penetration among persons belongs to the eternal union between Father, Son, and Spirit. God is who he is by virtue of the indwelling intimacy shared by the divine persons; apart from it, God would not be his triune self.” -Clark & Johnson,

S10. Biblical Perspective:

Now as important and somewhat obvious as these truths are, there is one more Biblical perspective that I believe is the most important to note:

Broken sexuality is redeemable.

, My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous;

, In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished on us.

, For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

S11. Our Call-to Action:

But we can’t end there. Redemption does not stand apart from obedience. In , Jesus tells us that if we are going to follow him, we must participate in the spiritual discipline of cutting and tossing away of those parts of our lives leading us to hell.

Are you hearing me? To follow Christ, we must participate in the spiritual discipline of cutting and tossing away of those parts of our lives leading us to hell.

So what parts of this sword has our Lord given us to aid us in our combat against broken sexuality:

Beginning with Galatians, it is interesting note that Paul begins this sentence with the imperative, Walk by the Spirit. Some of you perhaps know that when something is written as an imperative, it is generally to be understood as a command.

Paul is saying WALK by the Spirit...

A second interesting thing to note is that when Paul says you will not carry out the desire of the flesh, that word “not” in the Greek is “οὐ μὴ,” which literally translated means, “not not.” This is what’s known as an emphatic negation, which means that Paul is making a very heavy emphasis here.

Paul is commanding Christians to WALK by the Spirit, so that they will NOT carry out the desire of the flesh.

Our first step in combat, Walk in the Spirit.

What does that look like? We know what that looks like. But I will let Paul explain it better in Romans 6.

Live your life out as you would expect any Christian to.

Read your Bible, meditate, pray, and fast, participate in the life of the Body, love God with your heart, soul, and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself.

is important because what we are ultimately discussing here is identity-based living/action. From v. 5-10, Paul blatantly sets up premise of our identity in Christ. This premise demands a response.

From v. 11, Paul is saying with all of this being said, likewise consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ.

First it is an internal response, a cognitive recognition of who we are in Christ.

Immediately afterwards, in v. 12, the response must follow externally. Paul goes on to say, therefore (because you are dead to sin and alive to God in Christ), do not let sin reign in your mortal body. *note, this is said in the imperative, thus a command and a call to proactivity in our faith.

With everything that we have going on in this passage, I want to draw our attention to v. 21-24. There is a lot of interjecting going on in this passage, but I believe it is safe to assume that Paul’s main point in v. 21-24, in light of what we see in v. 17-19, is this:

if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him… that… you lay aside the old self… and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind and put on the new self...

Now think about it. Paul says in that if anyone is in Christ, they are are a new creature; the old has passed away and the new has come.

Now that is who we are. We are as Paul says, dead to sin and alive in Christ; we are a completely new person, separated from the old self that was crucified with Christ (). How is it then that Paul says that we must put on the new self? I would argue that this is all a discussion on identity-based action.

If you are a Christian, I would contend with you that pornography is not a bondage you have to submit yourself to anymore, as Paul says in , the one who has died is freed from sin. So rather than celebrate your struggle with pornography by quoting to one other, I would implore you to celebrate Christ’s victory over pornography in your life by meditating on to better understand your Christian identity.

This leads me to our application on where to go from here.

It’s simple:

S12. Application:

That’s it. The Holy Spirit used those very words by Dr. Neeley to aid me in my own fight against pornography.

Any questions?

Point 1 (v. -)

Point 2 (v. -)

Point 3 (v. -)

Genesis 3Body:Creative narritveSelect readingIt’s interesting that right after this happy picture that the author paints in Genesis 2, he doesn’t waste anytime mentioning The Serpent. Now it’s easy to miss, but this was no ordinary serpent. This was a beautiful and clever creature of the LORD God. What’s more is that this creature seemed to have some information from the down-low.“Did God really say, ‘Y’all shall not eat from any tree in the garden?” Now this question seems innocent enough, as far as we can observe, there was no uneasiness in the woman's response.“Of course we can eat from the trees in the garden, there is just the tree in middle of the garden that God said we can’t eat or even touch, or we die.”That’s a fair response; it’s to the point. It’s true God said nothing about the touching, but I would argue that she is taking the weightiness of God’s command with seriousness.If you know that to commit a certain action would to be sinning against God, why even play with the fire?Well, after her response, suddenly the conversation turns scandalous*gasp* You two surely will not die! For God knows that in the day that y’all do eat from it, your eyes will be opened and you both will be like God, knowing good and evil.LIAR! BLASPHEMER! Right after v. 5, do you see it? Adam yells at this deceiver and… wait a minute. What’s this? No one confronted this creature who would dare call God a liar.v. 6, The woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate.What in the world are they thinking?Is God holding out on us? Is He just holding us back so He can have all the glory to Himself?Do you notice, the road to self-destruction always begins with the temptation to mistrust and disregard what God tells us? It is not for nothing that David, one of the kings of God’s chosen people, declared in Psalm 1 that the one who delights in God’s Word is happy (blessed). He compares those who meditate in the Word of God to a tree FIRMLY planted by streams of water, nourished and maintained all its life.But not so the sinner. He concludes in Psalm 1 that those who disregard God’s Word, the wicked, will perish.So if we have to choose between being happy or perishing, how and why, Christians, do we still screw this up? Why do we continue to yield to temptation and forsake God’s call over our lives?Let’s look back at v.6.Now she saw that the tree was good for food. It was a delight to the eyes; that’s the interesting thing about temptation. The longer you stare at it, the more delightful and indulging it appears. This is often why we fail in our participation of the victory Christ won us into. When we cultivate desire, whether we dwell on the wants of our flesh, allow our imaginations to linger too far in pastures forbidden to us, or not straight up flee from the area that temptation is rampant in, we have already paved our way towards destruction.Don’t anyone tell you otherwise, sin does destroy. Some of you have come from homes or currently living in homes where you have seen the destruction with your own eyes.So she eats one of the forbidden tree’s fruit and her husband watching her, watching his wife betray the God who he witnessed create, and partook in this macabre picnic. At that moment, their eyes saw each other. They saw each other for what they had become. They realized, in the midst of their own scandal, they were naked. In a pitiful makeshift attempt, they put together fig leaves to cover their shame.This is interesting. What do you use to cover the sin in your life? Self-righteousness (I’m a good person)? Apathy (It’s not a big deal)? Deception (I didn’t sin against God)? What are the fig leaves in your lives?What follows next is this, in the midst of their panic, they hear the worst sound in their lives, the voice of God calling out to them. Their first response is to hide. Yet nothing can hide from God. He calls out to the man, “Where are you?” Finally the man cannot take it anymore. “I heard your voice in the garden and I hid myself because I was naked.Who told you, you were naked? Did you eat from the tree from which I told you not to eat?What happens next? He confesses, well maybe blame shift is more accurate. This man straight threw his wife under the bus. What’s more, is that he attempted to throw the LORD under there as well.v.12, No, no God, that woman that YOU gave to be with me, that woman she did this. She gave me the fruit, and then I ate...”He doesn’t even blame the serpent!What betrayal. The man failed his wife. He failed to protect her, to guard her, to defend her, to love her. That man who sung to her, bone of my bones, flesh of my flesh. The man spoke like someone in a panic for their life.As we continue, God then turns His attention to the woman. “What have you done?”Her response is shorter; she is clearly at a loss for words. But like her husband, she blame shifts. “It was the serpent that deceived me, and I ate.”After this, it becomes interesting; it’s easy to miss. God doesn’t give a chance for the deceiver to speak

Point 1 (v. -)

What’s the Main Point?

Stage 3

Let these words stir in you a response to the call-to-action Christ has employed unto all of His followers. May your council be rich in grace and love and your fight be empowered with strength and zeal of our Lord’s holy claim over our lives.

Point 2 (v. -)

What’s the Main Point?

Point 3 (v. -)

Be at peace.

SummarizePerhaps you are in a place in your life where you have done things. Horrible and terrible things. In Christ, you are not beyond redemption, healing, and reconciliation.Perhaps you are in a place in your life where terrible and horrible things happened to you. In Christ, you are not beyond redemption, healing, and reconciliation.Give a final appealAs we proceed to leave here today, I ask that you would not leave without confessing your sins and your pains to God. Some would say you should go so far to confide in another believer your sins and sorrows and I leave that between you and God to discern.Regardless, I say to you Christians and unbelievers, throw down your fig leaves of deception, distraction, apathy, and fear and stand before God naked and vulnerable and let him cover you in the blood and righteousness of Christ.For it is just as that song says: Eric plays In Christ Alone immediatelyIn Christ alone my hope is found, He is my light, my strength, my song This Cornerstone, this solid Ground Firm through the fiercest drought and storm. What heights of love, what depths of peace When fears are stilled, when strivings cease My Comforter, my All in All Here in the love of Christ I stand. In Christ alone! - who took on flesh, Fullness of God in helpless babe. This gift of love and righteousness, Scorned by the ones He came to save Till on that cross as Jesus died, The wrath of God was satisfied For every sin on Him was laid Here in the death of Christ I live.There in the ground His body lay, Light of the world by darkness slain: Then bursting forth in glorious day Up from the grave He rose again And as He stands in victory Sin's curse has lost its grip on me, For I am His and He is mine Bought with the precious blood of ChristNo guilt in life, no fear in death, This is the power of Christ in me From life's first cry to final breath, Jesus commands my destiny No power of hell, no scheme of man, Can ever pluck me from His hand Till He returns or calls me home Here in the power of Christ I'll stand. Benediction

What’s the Main Point?

The Big Idea:

A. Each student will be assigned a week in which they will present their personal position on one of the weekly topics. The presentation will be in the form of a persuasive sermon, described in the first week of class. A class discussion will follow the 20-minute student presentation. Each presentation should include:

1. An introduction that states why the topic is relevant to the local church;

2. A presentation of the key biblical texts that will inform students about the topic.

3. A presentation of the leading ideas in support or in opposition to a given topic.

4. A concluding statement as to how the student’s future church will handle the issue in question.

S1. Pornography and The Bible:

The word pornography, derived from the Greek porni (“prostitute”) and graphein (“to write”), was originally defined as any work of art or literature depicting the life of prostitutes. -Encyclopedia Britannica

While the digital era of pornography is not something Scripture literally calls out, i.e. Jesus does not say, “Hey, stop googling porn,” this does not mean that Scripture has nothing to say about the concept of pornography.

In the 55 times we see πορνεία and its affiliates in the New Testament , it is always presented in a negative context.

Don’t Do It. Ok, that concludes my sermon.

S3. Biblical Perspective:

In all seriousness, it is sin. It’s not for nothing that Paul says,

, Jesus had strong words to say on the discussion of sexual immorality, going so far to say that it would be better to have parts of your body cut off from you than for it to remain and you go to hell.

What’s important to address also is that ultimately when we are dealing with habitual pornography use, we’re not dealing with pornography. We’re dealing with an unrepentant and forgetful heart or a dead heart.

But I suppose if one wanted to understand what is so sinful about pornography, it’s helpful to point out:

It’s a wrong way to look at the purpose of sex.

Pornography deeply habituates your soul to look at things in the completely opposite way than God does. -Timothy Keller

It’s a twisted way to look at the purpose of sex.

Pornography presents an image focused solely on the visible and the erotic. The human person is reduced to what can be seen [and] excludes any sense… of the intimacy and sacredness of the human person. -Percy, Anthony, Theology of the Body Made Simple (p. 78).

It’s a tragic way to look at sex.

It takes a son or daughter, a mother or father, a brother or sister, a human being and strips them of their sacred identity as an image-bearer of God and reduces them to a virtual object to orgasm to. Intimacy and sacredness is stripped, covenants are broken and betrayed, whether you are married or not.

Pornography rapes holy sexuality and transforms it into a grotesque shadow of its former purpose.

It’s an evil way to look at sex.

Not only is sex an invention and gift from God, sex is also a reflection of God as observed in the Trinity. Has anyone in here had Dr. Clark or Dr. Johnson before? Try imagining hearing this in their voice; this is a quote from their book The Incarnation of God: The Mystery of the Gospel as the Foundation of Evangelical Theology

“The personal and sexual intimacy that Adam and Eve experienced as they became one flesh was not the first indwelling or penetration to occur among persons. It was, of course, the first of all human sexual unions, but the first indwelling or penetration among persons belongs to the eternal union between Father, Son, and Spirit. God is who he is by virtue of the indwelling intimacy shared by the divine persons; apart from it, God would not be his triune self.” -Clark & Johnson,

This most sublime of all realities is reflected in our human existence, for we are who we are by virtue of the indwelling intimacy shared by human persons, apart from which we would not be ourselves. The existence of every descendant of Adam and Eve depends upon a prior union of persons—necessarily male and female—who share indwelling intimacy. The fact that a human has being is predicated upon the existence of two others joined as one. Thus, any given human being requires two others in such a way that human existence is necessarily and fundamentally tripersonal. (pp. 212–213)

Now as important and somewhat obvious as these truths are, there is one more Biblical perspective that I believe is the most important to note:

Broken sexuality is redeemable.

, My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous;

, In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished on us.

, For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

S5. Devotional:

So for our devotional, if I can have three volunteers to read out the three passages I want us to briefly look at, as I believe they are critical in our combat against broken sexuality:

Beginning with Galatians, it is interesting note that Paul begins this sentence with the imperative, Walk by the Spirit. Some of you perhaps know that when something is written as an imperative, it is generally to be understood as a command.

Paul is saying WALK by the Spirit...

A second interesting thing to note is that when Paul says you will not carry out the desire of the flesh, that word “not” in the Greek is “οὐ μὴ,” which literally translated means, “not not.” This is what’s known as an emphatic negation, which means that Paul is making a very heavy emphasis here.

Paul is commanding Christians to WALK by the Spirit, so that they will NOT carry out the desire of the flesh.

is important because what we are ultimately discussing here is identity-based living/action. From v. 5-10, Paul blatantly sets up premise of our identity in Christ. This premise demands a response.

From v. 11, Paul is saying with all of this being said, likewise consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ.

First it is an internal response, a cognitive recognition of who we are in Christ.

Immediately afterwards, in v. 12, the response must follow externally. Paul goes on to say, therefore (because you are dead to sin and alive to God in Christ), do not let sin reign in your mortal body. *note, this is said in the imperative, thus a command and a call to proactivity in our faith.

With everything that we have going on in this passage, I want to draw our attention to v. 21-24. There is a lot of interjecting going on in this passage, but I believe it is safe to assume that Paul’s main point in v. 21-24, in light of what we see in v. 17-19, is this:

if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him… that… you lay aside the old self… and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind and put on the new self...

Now think about it. Paul says in that if anyone is in Christ, they are are a new creature; the old has passed away and the new has come.

Now that is who we are. We are as Paul says, dead to sin and alive in Christ; we are a completely new person, separated from the old self that was crucified with Christ ( ). How is it then that Paul says that we must put on the new self? I would argue that this is all a discussion on identity-based action.

If you are a Christian, I would contend with you that pornography is not a bondage you have to submit yourself to anymore, as Paul says in , the one who has died is freed from sin. So rather than celebrate your struggle with pornography by quoting to one other, I would implore you to celebrate Christ’s victory over pornography in your life by meditating on to better understand your Christian identity.

This leads me to our application on where to go from here.

It’s simple:

S6. Application:

That’s it. The Holy Spirit used those very words by Dr. Neeley to break me away from pornography a month ago today. So now I have no where else to go but forward in freedom and I hope it will be the same with you, brothers and sisters.

Any questions?