Is Porn Really Bad?
Today's Three-minute Bible Study
Print, Study and Apply
Title: Is Porn Really Bad?---------------------------------- Date: 10/21/2000
Keywords:
"conflict" "desires" "nature" "sinful" "Spirit"
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to eXXit, the web site designed to help you stand strong in the face of sexual
temptation.
Passage: Galatians 5:16-18*
16. So I say, live by the Spirit and you will not gratify the
desires of the sinful nature.
17. For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Sprit, and
the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so
that you do not do what you want.
18. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under law.
Questions
1. How can we determine what is right and wrong?
2. Are desires bad or sinful?
3. Do you always do what you want?
Practical help
If we look to the Bible as an extensive rulebook, something that
will tell us what we should do and not do if we only look hard enough and find the right
scripture, then we fall into a trap that religious people have fallen into for ages.
Bottom line -- try as hard as we might, we can't fulfill any person's rulebook perfectly,
much less God's idea of right and wrong. There will always be some crack in our facade,
some place in our life where we are not exactly doing what we want (here it is assumed
that we WANT to do good -- not always the case).
If we look to the Bible for rules about pornography, we won't find
any definitive answer to the question asked by the title for this study. There's no
"Thou shalt not..." specifically in regard to making or using images of naked
people for sexual stimulation or gratification. But there are certainly plenty of
Bible-based spiritual principles upon which we can say without hesitation that porn is
bad. Nevertheless, finding the right scripture to prove Porn wrong is not the point. Verse
18 tells us two things: as Christians we do not need to define a new set of legal
standards to control our behavior; and we have another source of discernment: the Spirit
of God, whom he has given to dwell inside us. Learn to listen to the Spirit's urgings.
Even in the midst of the strong pull of Satan through porn, there is another pull, maybe
not as demanding, but with his own quiet strength. You know porn is bad, don't you?
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*Scriptures are from The Holy Bible: New International Version © Copyright 1973,
1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. All rights reserved.