Paul wrote the following for a reason: "The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak." (Mat 26:41). Even Eve was willing but weak; and Satan used that weakness to overcome her. God gave our ancestors three commands: (1) Dress and keep the Garden, (2) do not eat of the Tree of Knowledge, and (3) multiply. In response, they had their minds on their own desires, ate of the forbidden tree, and pleasured instead of multiplied. I am inferring that they may have engaged in intercourse for pleasure since immediately after eating of the fruit they covered their genitalia. With fig leaves failing to cover their sin, God shed blood, killed for the first time, and covered their shame. Their pride was that they created their own law in opposition to God's. They became their own authority, and God was diminished.
Of course, there are a few who are asexual, probably because of some hormonal or genetic imbalance, but most people are born with sexual instincts. That urge is God-given for mankind to multiply. Everything that God created was "good" (Gen 1:31). Thus, as even the Tree of Knowledge, sexual gratification was misused - for man's own pleasure rather than God's will.
As you read that, you cringe: How stupid and wrong can Herrin be? The evidence is in the world. Almost everything is about pleasure, and primarily sex. Advertisers know that; why can't Christians understand the same thing?
For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. (Rom 8:3-4)First off, the reader must understand that "the flesh" is much more than just the muscular and epidermal systems. It is the worldly desires of the heart. The flesh is the "antenna" for the sensory system and provides the input for cognition and emotion. The flesh is what picks up the "signals" emanating from the world: "Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation." God's will that people receive true and pure signals from spiritual sources; temptation is interference to that pure signal. The skin and lasciviousness that people see on television is Satan de-pixilating our "screen," making us think it's a true pixilation.
From the time most people open their eyes in the morning to the time they close them at night, they are bombarded with the lust of the eyes. Sex sells. Most commercials do not have Amish-looking women pitching their products! If the commercial even has a pretty woman or man, the human mind has the capacity to make them provocative. Psychologists, Dad, and God agree on one thing: Garbage in; garbage out, not to mention the garbage stored within! That stays in the soul until repentance cleanses it.
When I was a child, I watched the seniors in church as well as the preacher. I thought, they must not have the same thoughts that I do! They did, and if they are alive, they still do! In frustration with temptation, I asked my eighty-years old Dad, "When do they (the lusts) go away?" He responded with remorse, "They never do," As we learned from the apostle Paul, Satan's interference with purity lessens, but we never have a perfectly clear and clean picture. Temptation always distorts the pure things in life.
I don't want my wife to know that I too am human; I have lustful thoughts. Those of us who are Christians are to exhibit self-control (1 Cor 10:13). Ironically, "self-control" is submitting ourselves to God so that we are under His control! I work hard to control places to enter into temptation, but temptation is all around us. (Satan broadcasts a strong signal.) As I sit here, I admit it, I am under the influence of the world. You may not make the same admission, but you are too! Like Adam, I am ashamed and attempt to cover my lusts with symbolic fig leaves. I try to cover my libido with posing that I am without sin. Christians all want to be that way; that's why most of us are hypocrites! The world sees that, but we fail to see it in ourselves! That denial is the Serpent's deception, and we still buy into the lie. There is little about Christians which is pure, and even Paul spoke of that.
Now for those who admit their sexual inclinations, you too have other lusts: stereotypically women lust after material things of the eyes. That's why gold and diamonds sell! Because most people are self-elevating, they contribute to that by decorating their flesh. Their skin becomes their idols. They appease their beautiful brown-toned blemish-free bodies by hanging jewelry from it and adding makeup to make them prettier gods and goddesses. Merchandisers know that, why do not Christians? Jeremiah warned mostly women about such things:
And when thou art spoiled, what wilt thou do? Though thou clothest thyself with crimson, though thou deckest thee with ornaments of gold, though thou rentest thy face with painting, in vain shalt thou make thyself fair. (Jer 4:30).Vain, or self-absorbed people, decorate their "tree" to make it noticeable and to satisfy their self-image. Yes, their bodies become Christmas trees. Tattooing is the most outlandish way of decorating one's own "tree". "Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the Lord" (Lev 19:28). Piercings and tattoos seem to be making you the lord, when God says that He is Lord. That too, is extreme lust of the flesh, and tattoo artists know that it is extreme art. Why do not Christians know that?
Most people combine their lusts: The lust of the eyes incites lust in their flesh, and many take pride in the satisfaction of their lusts. For instance, people want attention. They want compliments; they want to feel beautiful. Many are not, so what does Hollywood do? Puts them in the script; even unattractive people are vicariously beautiful - in their own minds - because they romance with the romancers on screen and lust with those lusting. With poetic justice, lusting after those on videos is merely adoring their image; it's being aroused by the organization of 1's and 0's - pixels.
Pornography amounts to adoring pixels. Pornography is "sexually explicit material that is intended to sexually arouse." (Wikipedia; "pornography"). The courts have never decided what pornography is; to them pornography is in the eye of the beholder. That, again, is Satan's deception. Pornography lies behind the "coat of skin" with which God covered our forebears (Gen 3:21). I take that to mean whatever sexually arouses. As such, modesty is a responsibility! "Women adorn themselves in modest apparel" (1 Tim 2:9). The display of skin is as wrong as the arousal from its affects. Psychologically speaking, the skin is the cause, and arousal is the affect. Immodest people deny any responsibility for that, and feminists consider that an affront to them.
We all are aroused by the explicit show of skin and lascivious behavior. Of course, out of pride, Christians say, "Your sin is worse than mine!" Adam and Eve played that game and so did the Pharisees when Jesus challenged them: "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone" (John 8:7). Most normal people would never look at actual coitus which pornographers sell, but still watch arousing portrayals. What is on most television programs and movies? Sexually oriented themes. Now even aberrant sexual behavior is all over the screens. When will enough be enough? When will Christians learn to channel change? When will Christians have some self-control?
We all have problems with what we see. Many want to see what they cannot experience for themselves. People see themselves on Bachelor in Paradise dilly-dallying with beautiful exposed people. People see themselves being as the world. I wish that I was immune, but humbly submit that I am not. I do find pornography reprehensible but that disgust is not from me, that repulsion is from God. I wish that I found all lasciviousness repulsive but I'm not there yet; Dad said that I never will be, but God says that I will!
When I am glorified in Heaven there will be no more sexual arousal: "For in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven" (Mat 22:30). Why do we focus so much on the temporal things of the world when celibacy is ordained for eternity. Satan supplies the answer to that: Get your fill while you can; you won't truly die! Sexual temptation is the Serpent's most often used ruse.
Now for my apologies to my parents, my wife, my children, my neighbors, and to God: Forgive me for my trespasses or weaknesses; I pray often that God will temper them, and that my eyes be for those I love; those same people commencing with my wife! That's why I have my her: "It is better to marry than to burn" (in Hell and with lust). (1 Cor 7:9). Marriage tempers the interference from other signals, and there are many, many sources of signals in the world.
With this written, I suppose I should pack my bags. No one wants to admit that they have problems with the eyes and flesh. No one wants a spouse which does either. I am no better than David; I hope not to his extreme, but my prayer is the same as his - Psalm 51. Few women are any different than Bathsheba. I bet she could have found a better place than on stage for her to bathe with David as audience! The lusts of the flesh and eyes not only belong to the men, but women as well. The radical feminist movement demands that women can lust and pleasure as flagrantly as the men.
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