Sexual Impurity

Disobedience
Whether you're being naive, rebellious, or foolish and neglecting God's standards, mixing in your own standards leads to being ensnared in sin and leading to your destruction spiritually.

In Every Man's Battle, author Stephen Arterburn explains,
We're sometimes naive like Pinocchio, listening to a couple scoundrels who painted a wonderful picture of spending a day at a place called Adventure Island, a sort of amusement park just off-shore. They gave Pinocchio a free ticket on the ferry over, but he didn't know that at day's end all the boys would be turned into donkeys and be sold to pull carts in the coal mines for the res of their lives. Likewise, we can be naive and foolish regarding God's standard for sexual purity as we stumble blindly into wrong "because everyone else is doing it."
But sometimes we choose wrong sexual standards not because we're naive, but simply because we're rebellious. We're like Lampwick, a swaggering boy who takes lead in diverting Pinocchio to Adventure Island. Lampwick comes across as distasteful from the moment he appears on the screen with his macho posturing, spitting, and sneering little voice. You know he's fully aware of the evil he's doing. Whatever the aftermath, he richly deserves it.
Perhaps, with a rebelliousness like Lampwick's, you know sexual immorality is wrong but you do it anyway. You love your trips to Adventure Island, despite the hidden price you pay at the end of the day.

Or maybe you've considered God's standard too ridiculous to take seriously.
Mixture can destroy a people. When the Isrealites left Egypt and were led to the Promise Land, God told them to cross the Jordan Ricer and destroy every evil thing in their gods to powder. God warned them that if they failed to do this, their culture would "mix" with the pagans and they would adopt their depraved practices.
But the Isrealites were not careful to destroy everything. They found it easier and easier to stop short. In time, the things and people left undestroyed became a snare. The Isrealites became adulterous in their relationship to God and repeatedly turned their backs on Him.
As promised, He removed them form their land. But just before the destruction of Jerusalem and the final deportation of her inhabitants, God prophesied this about His people in their coming captivity:

Then in the nations where they have been captive, those who escape will remember me—how I have been grieved by their adulterous hearts, which have turned away from me, and by their eyes, which have lusted after their idols. they will loathe themselves for the evil they have done. (Ezekiel 6:9)

When we entered the Promise Land of our salvation, we were told to eliminate every hint of sexual immorality in our lives. Since entering that land, have you failed to crush sexual sin? Every hint of it? If not, have you come to point of loathing yourself for that failure? If that's where you are, there's hope for you.

Are you Obedient, or are you striving for Excellence?

Author Fred Stoeker shares,
They can speak the Christian language, and they certainly sound excellent. But can they live Christian truth?

Like a businessman seeking the best business practices, Fred was asking himself, How far can I go and still be called a Christian? The question he should have been asking was, How holy can I be?

Sexual Temptation in Men

Let there be no sexual immorality, impurity, or greed among you. Such sins have no place among God’s people.
Ephesians 5:3

When a Kiss Was Something Special
Remember how it used to feel when a kiss was something special? Has it gotten to the point where a kiss means nothing to you? Has it become a joyless prerequisite on the path to intercourse? Then something is deeply wrong.

Purity in the Body
We have countless churches filled with countless men encumbered by sexual sin, weakened by low-grade sexual fevers—men happy enough to go to Promise Keepers but too sickly to be promise keepers.
A spiritual battle for purity is going on in every heart and soul. The costs are real. Obedience is hard, requiring humility and meekness, very rare element indeed.

Foreplay of the Eyes
At times I had wished that God would make me blind. The images I've been exposed to have never left my mind and come back to tempt me.
For males, impurity of the eyes is sexual foreplay. Our eyes give men the means to sin broadly and at will. We don't need a date or mistress. We don't ever need to wait. We have our eyes and can draw sexual gratification through them at any time. We're turned on by female nudity in any way, shape, or form.
We aren't picky. It can come in a photograph of a nude stranger just as easily in a romantic interlude with a wife. We have a visual ignition switch when it comes to viewing the female anatomy.
Women seldom understand this because they aren't sexually stimulated int he same way. Their ignitions are tied to touch and relationship. They view this aspect of our sexuality as shallow and dirty, even detestable. Often, any effort from husbands to put a positive spin on this "vision factor" by suggesting their wives use it to advantage in the bedroom is met with disdainful scorn. Lisa, for instance, said, "So I suppose I have to buy one of those cheap teddies and prance around like some saloon girl!"
Visual sexual gratification is no laughing matter in your fight for sexual purity. Given what the sight of nudity does to the pelasure centres of our brain, and these days it's pretty easy to see many naked to near-naked women, it's no wonder our eyes and mind resist control.

God's Standard from the Bible

You have heard the commandment that says, ‘You must not commit adultery.’ But I say, anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
Matthew 5:27-28

Mark 7:21-23
Acts 15:29
Romans 13:12-13
1 Corinthians 5:11
1 Corinthians 6:13
1 Corinthians 6:18
2 Corinthians 12:21
Galatians 5:16,19
Ephesians 5:3-4
Colossians 3:5-6
1 Thessalonians 4:3-5,7
Hebrews 12:16
Hebrews 13:4
1 Peter 4:3
Jude 7
Revelation 2:14
Revelation 2:20
Revelation 21:8
Romans 6:11-14,18

Masturbation
Oh yes, I'm digging into this subject and I'm not afraid!
Masturbation while fantasizing about another woman besides your wife of "fantasy intercourse" while dreaming is the same as doing it. Remember the standard Jesus set? "You have heard that it was said, 'Do not commit adultery.' But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart" (Matthew 5:27-28).
What else is foreplay? Mutual stroking of the genitals is foreplay. Even stroking the top of the thigh can be foreplay. (Young men may not see it that way, but fathers do! If you saw a boy stroking your daughter's thigh, we would bet that you wouldn't just wink and turn away.) When a girl lays her head in the lap of a teenage boy, that's foreplay. A mild form, perhaps, but that'll get his motor running at levels too high for young motors. Slow dancing can be foreplay, if certain parts of the body are in close contact.
This isn't to say that young couples can't relate physically in ways that aren't foreplay, such as holding hands, walking arm in arm, or even a short kiss. But heavy kissing around the neck and chest leads naturally to stripping, which leands to mutual masturbation, which leads to intercourse.

Who Are You, Really?
Fred Stoeker shares,
Sexual impurity has become rampant in the church because we've ignored the costly work of obedience to God's standards as individuals, asking too often, "How far can I go and still be called a Christian?" We've crafted an image and may even seem sexually pure while permitting our eyes to play freely when on one is around, avoiding the hard work of being sexually pure.
Is there a secret dark side to your Christian image? Who are you really?
If we don't kill every hint of immorality, we'll be captured by our tendency as males to draw sexual gratification and chemical highs through our eyes. But we can't deal with our maleness until we first reject our right to mix standards. As we ask "How holy can I be?" we must pray and commit to a new relationship with God, fully aligned with His call to obedience.

Because your heart was responsive and you humbled yourself before God when you heard what he spoke against this place and its people, and because you humbled yourself before me and tore your robes and wept in my presence, I have heard you, declares the LORD.
2 Chronicles 34:27

Release For Singles
One reason singles can get tripped in their quest for purity is that they feel overmatched. That's why they're quick to say, "It's easy for you to talk about sexual purity—you're married!" But the question remains: What are you going to do with the sexual pressure you sometimes feel?
First of all, you have to take by faith that once you get your eyes and mind under control, the sexual pressure will drop off dramatically. You bring most of the sexual pressure onto yourself through visual sensual stimulation and mental fantasy.
Even so, there remains the male seventy-two-hour cycle of sperm production. Without the impurity of the eyes, the pressure generated by lust is gone, but there's still a natural physical pressure for release, though musch weaker. "What am I going to do about that?" you might ask. "How will I get release?"
God has supplied the way of release, something with twhich you're familiar. Clinically it's called "nocturnal emissions." But somewhere in a dank, smelly football locker room, some kid decided to call it a "wet dream," and that name stuck. The good news for singles is that nocturnal emissions can work for you in your quest for purity. (They also can work for married guys who aren't as sexually active as they would like to be.)
You may wonder how such dreams will work toward purity. After all, some of these dreams are pretty hot and heavy! but those hot and heavy aspects arise form what you're putting into your mind each day. The same pure eyes and mind that keep you from actively seeking release during the day will limit the impurity that your mind can use in dreams at night. Even these dreams will be dramatically purer in scope and content.

Habitual Impurity and Opposition
Sexual impurity is a habit, we have to train ourselves to change those bad habits when we look at a woman in a busty shirt or spandex shorts, by bouncing our eyes away. We can use habits for our advantage. Capture our sinful nature and use it as a double-edged sword against the enemy. Take hold of your bad habits and replace them with good ones. Once we set a habit in concrete, we can forget about it. The habit will take care of business with little conscious thought, enabling us to focus our attention on other things.
While there may not be spiritual oppression involved in your battle, there'll always be spiritual opposition. The enemy is constantly near your ear. He doesn't want you to win this fight, and he knows the lies that so often break men's confidence and their will to win. Expect to hear lies and plenty of them.

Accountability
The first issue is accountability. For men who are willing to fight for sexual purity, and important step is finding accountability support in a men's Bible study group, in a smaller group of one or two other men serving as accountability partners, or by going to into counseling.
For an accountability partner, enlist a male friend, perhaps, someone older and well respected in the church, to encourage you in the heat of battle. The men's ministry at your church can also help you find someone who can pray for you and ask you the tough questions.
Sometimes you need encouragement. Sometimes you need to be challenged to do what's right. Int he end, though, it comes down to whether Nathan has made a decision to win, a decision for purity. Accountability works only when coupled with a firm commitment to win.

The Heart of a Woman in Every Man's Battle
Male sexual impurity can be unsettling, even shocking, to women.
Deena, when asked for her reaction to this book's premise, replied, "This stuff is crazy. Women don't have that problem!"
Fawn decided men and women are so different in their sexual wiring that it defies understanding. "I was surprised to learn," she said, "that Christian men have this problem even after they're married. I found the intensity of the problem to be shocking."
Cathy said, "I did not know the depth that men would go and the risk they would take to satisfy their desires. I was unaware of how intense these temptations are and how much defense a man must muster to avoid stepping over God's boundaries."
Andrea said that from talking with her father and the different guys she dated, she knows men are easily attracted visually. But she never realized the major extent of this problem until she met her future husband. "At the time, he was my closest friend in the youth gruop, but we were not romantically inclined," Andrea said. "He did feel safe enough with me to share his problem with pornography. It was quite a battle for him, as he had first been exposed to it in third grade. I was a little amazed by it all because, although I was attracted to guys by their looks during my dating years, the physical attraction I felt was njothing compared to what a man feels when looking at a women."
Brenda, Fred's wife, also participated in the interviews. She summarized the typical female response: "I don't want to sound mean, but because women don't generally experience this problem, it seems to us that some men are uncontrolled perverts who don't think about anything but sex. It even affects my trust in men, knowing that pastors and deacons could have this problem. I don't like it when men lustfully take advantage of women in their thoughts, although I realize that women can be largely to blame because of what they wear. It's at least some comfort to know that many men have this problem. Since most men are affected, we really can't call you guys perverts."
(Gee, thanks Brenda. Actually you made an important point, and it brings up additional thoughts from a man's perspective. We men understand your shock. After all, we're often overwhelmed in the sexual area, and we loathe it ourselves. That's why we want mercy, although we know we don't deserve mercy. How much mercy can be found in a woman's heart when she looks upon this problem? Not surprisingly, it depends upon her husband's situation.)
There's a natural tug-of-war in the hearts of women between pity and disgust, between mercy and judgment.
Ellen said, "After hearing about this, I was surprised that married men would have so much trouble. I feel sorry for them. When I asked my own husband about it, he was honest with me that he had some struggles, and at first I was hurt. Then I just felt thankful that he would share with me. He hasn't had a major problem in this area, for which I'm thankful."
Cathy leans toward mercy as well. "My husband is regularly bombarded with sexy images, and I was pleased with his honesty regarding that," she said. "I want to know the temptations he faces. It will only help me be more sympathetic to his plight. I didn't feel betrayed because he's proven faithful in this battle. Other women are not so lucky."
What about those women whose husbands have been losing big in the battle?
"When my husband and I talked about this, he was honest," Deena conveyed, "and I was very angry with him. I was hurt. I felt deeply betrayed because I'd been dieting and working out to keep my weight down so that I would always look nice to him. I couldn't figure out why he still needed to look at other women."
Women told us that they struggle between pity and anger, and their feelings may ebb and flow with the tide of their husband's battle. Let us direct this advice to women reading this book: Though you know you should pray for him and fulfill him sexually, sometimes you won't want to. Talk to each other openly and honestly, then do the right thing.

Once your husband engages in the battle for sexual integrity, here are some things you can pray for him:

1. Pray that God would keep him from wavering and stumbling. Ask God to put more light on his path and more courage in his step.
2. Pray against spiritual opposition in the form of lies. As you know, Satan will lie to him to weaken his will to win. Pray that Satan's efforts to confuse him will be ineffective.
3. Pray against possible spiritual oppression. Ask God to release power to break any spiritual oppression over your lives and your home that has resulted from his sexual sin.

Along with prayer, there are other ways you can help him win this battle. Once he tells you he's going cold turkey, be like a merciful vial of methadone for him. Increase your availability to him sexually, though this may be difficult for you since your husband might have told you some things that repulse you. Since your sex drive, as a woman, is tied to relationship, you may feel betrayed, just as if your husband had an actual affair.
It may help you to view this form a male's perspective, where "relationship" and "sex" do not have such a tight bond. Please don't misunderstand us. His lusting was definitely a moral betrayal, but it wasn't necessarily a betrayal of the heart. You may still be his one and only true love, the one he could never, ever leave. He has a fractional addiction to the chemical high, but don't assume his heart for you is untrue. Mercy is probably your best tack—with accountability, of course.
On another issue: Do you believe that God has given you, as a wife, a responsibility to be a role model of godliness and holiness to your husband? We received some interesting comments to this question.
Some women don't feel modeling godliness for their husbands is their role at all. Cathy said, "My responsibility is to love him, and that will manifest itself in godliness. But I feel the role model responsibility is primarily his, since he's the leader of our home."
We don't disagree with Cathy's statement, but we want to point out that since you're one flesh with your husband, you have a right, even a duty, to play such a role as well.
If a wife acts as a role model, how should it look in everyday life?
Heather said, "My first responsibility as a role model is to be pure and true sexually to my husband, as I expect him to be."
Wendy said, "I don't try to get Mark to do things that we both know are wrong, like watching sensual movies," she said. "I don't do things that would be a stumbling block to him, like leaving Victoria's Secret catalogs lying around open."
Many women feel that they care more about godliness than their husbands do. (As men, this is our shame.) Andrea said, "Lately, through the preaching of several men and worship conference a year ago, I met God in a new way and have changed more in the past year than ever before. God has given me a deep desire to purify my life and my home. It's been frustrating at times, though, because there have been many things I've wanted to change, but I've met resistance from my husband. He's a wonderful Christian, but in talking with my sister recently, we've concluded there's a tendency among men to brush off women's attempts to purify our homes. For example, I'm no longer comfortable with certain movies. I don't like to watch them, nor do I like my children to watch them. But rather than come across as a holier-than-thou person, God has helped me to keep my mouth shut after voicing my concerns and instead pray about the situation and to pray for my husband."
Cathy added, "I've never felt I cared more about holiness than my husband, but I think I pur more energy into it. Maybe it comes more easily to a woman; I don't know. If he seems to be struggling in a certain area, if I conform him or try to be a leader, it has much less effect than when I pray and fast for him."

Acknowledgment: I encourage ever man to read Every Man's Battle. There is so much I would like to share with you about the "problem" men have with sexual immorality. But I'd just recommend that every man read this book. Women also can read it, there are sections dedicated for women in almost every chapter, and also single men. Every Man's Battle will change your life, your relationship with God, your relationship with women, and even change your church.

Reference: Every Man's Battle by Stephen Arterburn, Fred Stoeker with Mike Yorkey.