(Romans 7:16-24, ESV)
Sin does not only still abide in us, but is still acting, still laboring to bring forth the deeds of the flesh. When sin lets us alone we may let sin alone; but as sin is never less quiet than when it seems to be most quiet, and its waters are for the most part deep when they are still, so ought our contrivances against it to be vigorous at all times and in all conditions, even where there is least suspicion...sin is always acting, always conceiving, always seducing and tempting. Who can say that he had ever anything to do with God or for God, that indwelling sin had not a hand in the corrupting of what he did? And this trade will it drive more or less all our days. If, then, sin will be always acting, if we be not always mortifying, we are lost creatures. He that stands still and suffers his enemies to double blows upon him without resistance will undoubtedly be conquered in the issue. If sin be subtle, watchful, strong, and always at work in the business of killing our souls, and we be slothful, negligent, foolish, in proceeding to the ruin thereof, can we expect a comfortable event? There is not a day but sin foils or is foiled, prevails or is prevailed on; and it will be so while we live in this world.
(John Owen, Overcoming Sin & Temptation, Edited by Kelly Kapic and Justin Taylor, 2006, pp. 51-52).
There is no sin from which a regenerated person is safeguarded in an absolute sense. No one can say: "I shall never fall into that sin." A person will never be delivered from the indwelling corruption of his nature. It will always prevent and defile that which is good, always stir up lusts, and daily cause a man to offend in many things, doing so either out of carelessness, or due to the sudden occurrence of an event. At times there is a very besetting sin, however, which is triggered by the disposition of the body or because the body is repeatedly stimulated due to there being continual opportunity for this sin. The power of this is such that we repeatedly fall into it. This can particularly be true of a sin which occurs in secret, and thus without the knowledge of any other person...It may appear at times as if that sin has been overcome--yes, even mortified--so that we no longer fear it. And yet, it can nevertheless happen that we fall into it by renewal.
(Wilhelmus Brakel, The Christian's Reasonable Service, Vol. IV, Edited by Joel Beeke, 1995, pp. 255-256)
As the DVD full of pornographic videos and images lied scattered throughout my room in pieces, I felt like a decisive victory had been won over my struggle with pornography. A great burden had been lifted off my shoulders. I breathed a deep sigh of relief, as I wiped my tear-drenched face dry with my bed sheets. As I began to gather the shards of DVD peppered around the room, I couldn't help but wonder how long it would last. How long would this overwhelming peace and solitude remain? How long would I live without a constant desire to drop what I'm doing, hop on my computer, and return once again to my sinful inclination to search for pornography? The battle was won, but as I labored to clear the battlefield of the stricken enemy, I waited anxiously for another troop to crest the hill and bear down upon me with their venomous weapons.
The other day, I spoke with my brother about his relentless battle to stop smoking. He told me, confidently, that he finally felt like he had the upper hand in the battle after trying to quit for about a decade. His voice saturated in confidence, boasted that he had been cigarette and cigar free for the longest period since he started the bad habit. With great angst and anticipation, I quickly asked him how long of a timespan he was talking about. He boldly answered: two weeks! Initially, I was disappointed with the anti-climactic answer. Two weeks? That's the longest you've been without a cigarette or cigar over the five or six year period you have been trying to quit smoking? That's it? But then I thought about my own struggles to overcome an addiction. Two weeks can feel like an entire month. One month feels like a year. A year feels like an eternity. I congratulated my brother, and wished him well in his continued efforts to overcome his addiction to nicotine.
Before I was a Christian, pornography was just a bad habit to me. A bad habit, that is, that I was willing to live with. It was like biting your fingernails or picking your nose. It's gross, but its one way to take care of a natural problem. God made us, and He created us as sexual beings with sexual needs, right. Pornography was only natural, therefore. I actually believed that I was doing myself a favor by relieving sexual tension with pornography rather than participating in pre-marital sex. If anything, God should be pleased with my decision. Thus the thoughts of a teenage boy who was desperately trying to justify a sin in his life that he didn't want to think of as sin.
A bad habit before God graciously saved me from my sins became a nasty sin that I could not seem to gain the upper hand over when God gave me new life in Christ. My eyes were opened to the deceitfulness of my heart, and my spirit was quickened by the Holy Spirit to detest the filth that cluttered my heart. Pornography was not just a bad habit, anymore. It was a sinful nuisance that sought my destruction, and it had to go. It was an idol, and there was no room for idols where God resided. Pornography was not a means to deal with natural urges. It was a means to rebel against God, disobey God's Laws, defy His holiness, satiate my covetousness, and stand for everything that Christ stood against. Despite my ill-will towards pornography and my detestation for it, it remained a problem in my life.
Countless times, I found myself desiring to destroy this lust and proclivity in my being. I developed a new routine for each day that did not include pornography. This helped immensely, as I had included pornography in my daily routine in the past. A change of routine, however, caused some anxiety, and anxiety used to be quenched with pornography. I had to find a new way to deal with anxiety, and I found reading and music to be the most effective means to settle my anxious nerves. However, my music library was tainted with sexually explicit songs, and, therefore, I had to clean out my music library. I played my piano and wrote new songs, I read my new theological titles along with Scripture, I began to write expository thoughts of my own, and I took advantage of several opportunities to remove myself from my room as often as I could, lest I be tempted to avail myself of the lurking monster sitting patiently for my attention in the middle of my room.
My body craved pornography as if it were a narcotic. The cravings often came when I was most vulnerable (i.e. alone in my room at night) and they were intense. A deep breath helped lower the intensity of the craving, and it helped clear my mind of immense temptation. You think you want it, but you really don't, I'd tell myself. The first few seconds of a craving were crucial. If I did not fight the craving immediately, I often found a way to talk myself into falling to temptation. I had to fight instantly, or the ensuing battle would get exponentially worse.
After a deep breath, I would close my eyes. I didn't want to see the computer and just how close I was to it. Out of sight, out of mind. Closing my eyes, however, made me more vulnerable to my imaginations. I couldn't think about what I was trying to overcome, otherwise countless pornographic images seared into my memory would flood my thoughts. I could only imagine who could overcome this problem, and I had to turn to prayer. I prayed that the Lord would be my strength, that He would comfort me by His Spirit, draw me away from temptation, and help me find peace in the means of grace that were at my disposal.
It only took a split second, however, to make the decision to fight the temptation or give in, and if I was not guarding my heart during that initial moment of immense temptation and craving, then I did not stand a chance overcoming my temptation. That initial moment when I was overcome with immense temptation daily felt like an hour's length of time. It was one second, but I felt like I had days to make my decision. Not so much that that one second felt like days, but rather, that I had days to prepare for this moment and, more often then not, I had not.
Some days I won, but some days I didn't. After returning from China, I wanted to put pornography behind me. I didn't want pornography to be a part of my life anymore. I wanted to purify my life, to seek after Christ, and to be holy as my Heavenly Father is holy. I had many sins in my life that needed to be mortified, but the obvious one that was wounding the most often and the most severely was pornography. Initially, the battle ensued every night, and I had to fight the good fight daily. I began to go a few days without falling to temptation. A few days became a week. A week became two weeks. Two weeks became a month. A month of sexual sobriety felt like a year of time had passed. After a month, I felt like I had finally won the war and could let my guard down a bit. I'd overcome my greatest enemy. Or so I thought.
A relentless barrage against a fortress can be effective initially, but after time, your forces steadily decrease while the fortress anticipates and prepares for your every predictable move. However, if you seemingly depart defeated only to remuster your strength, you might also gain the advantage of catching the fortress off-guard later. When we seem to have the upper hand over sin, we cannot grow lazy and lethargic in continuing to mortify it, because when it seems the most quiet, that is when it is preparing to attack the most powerfully.
After a month of sexual sobriety, I let my guard down. I did not spend as much time in prayer as I did when I was preparing to fight temptation every day. I did not remain consistent in reading the Word and meditating upon it. I spent less time reading my theological books and writing about my meditations upon God's Word, and I spent more time watching television, movies, and playing video games. My taste in music switched from wholesome, uplifting music to Top 40 hits and popular hip hop. As sin crept through the dark forest that surrounded the fortress of my heart, it saw me removing guards from the watchtowers and inviting unruly entertainers in by the boat load. Furthermore, the chaplain in the fortress could no longer gain the king's ear, but rather, those with slippery tongues infiltrated the fortress in order to tickle the king's ears with their deceitfulness. Sin found it's opportunity, and barraged the fortress of my heart, left unguarded, with a full assault with perfect timing.
It could take days before I regained the upper hand in the battle. I had to re-train the guards in the watchtowers. I had to forcibly remove the riff raff I had invited into my fortress. I had to find the chaplain, and beg him to encourage me once more to seek after the Lord and to find solace in Him alone. I was not prepared for a battle, and the damage done to the fortress before I could put everything in order was extensive. In Christ, the fortress could not fall, but my un-guarded heart was nevertheless deeply wounded as I neglected to mortify the sins of my flesh with the required intensity daily.
I soon began to notice a pattern in my struggle with pornography. I would go two weeks, and then I would fall to temptation. Once in a while, I would go a month before I fell. The longer I went without falling to temptation, the more depressing and destructive the eventual fall to temptation was. I was deeply distressed about my walk with the Lord. I kept telling myself that I needed to repent. True repentance would indeed be made manifest by my willingness to put this sin to rest once and for all, and to move on to mortifying other sins in my life. However, as much as I wanted to destroy the sin of pornography, there seemed to be a part of me that didn't. I seemed to do that which I did not want to do, and I seemed unable to do that which I wanted to do. I couldn't help but wonder: What's wrong with me?
I was a odds with myself. I was warring against myself. What a relief it was to find Romans 7. It was as if the Apostle Paul knew exactly what I was going through. It was as if God knew exactly what I was going through. My problem wasn't anything new. It's a battle that every Christian must fight with the old man (i.e. indwelling sin) that still clings to the new man rooted in Christ. In this life, there will be no utter destruction of any particular sin. Yes, we can and we must seek to mortify every sin that bewitches us and turns us away from the Lord, but there is no nuclear bomb in the arsenal that will completely destroy every remnant of the enemy within us. We must always be on guard, we must always avail ourselves to the means of grace which are effectual to overcome sin and temptation in our lives, we must always rest in the completed work of Jesus Christ, we must always pray to our Heavenly Father for wisdom, sanctification, and an increase in our faith, and we must always depend on the comfort and help of the Holy Spirit who perfects a good work that He began in us, conforming us to the perfect image of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Mortification of sin is an ongoing battle throughout all of our days, because we will not leave the old man clinging to us behind until we die and are resurrected with new bodies on the last great day.
The constant battles marked by victories and defeats can take a toll. More than anything, they constantly cause you to distress and doubt your faith in Christ. You will find yourself repeatedly questioning whether or not you are resting in Christ because part of you continues to draw you towards sin. As long as you desire to mortify sin in your life, struggle with sin's captivity over you, hate it because of its precious cost to Christ, hate it because of its disobedience to God, despise it for its separation from a holy God, and loath it because of its grieving of the Spirit within you, then you need not doubt your heart of repentance. You might fall to temptation, you might lose the struggle at times, but you will continue to fight and struggle because you desire to love God with all of your heart, soul, strength, and mind and God continues to graciously equip you to do so. You might despair and wonder who can deliver you from your body of death, like Paul did. You might feel like you will always be plagued by a law waging war against the law of your mind. You might always feel like you are being held captive to the law of sin that dwells in your members. Nevertheless, remember Paul's answer concerning him who saved and delivered you from sin once and for all:
Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin. There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.
(Romans 7:25-8:2)
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