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christian counseling today
VOL. 22 NO. 1
T
he telephone rang. At the
other end of the line I heard
sobs from a lady I barely
knew. She said through
the tears, “I have just discovered my
husband owes thousands of dollars to a
pornographic Web site.” I was across the
table from a parishioner in a restau-
rant. His voice was hushed when he
said, “Pornography has so dominated
my life that I no longer have an attrac-
tion to my wife.” Another couple sat
in silence for a moment, and then the
wife exploded on her husband. “My
husband has been hiding his ‘girly’
magazines from all of us until this week
when my son found them. He said if
his dad could look at the pictures, why
shouldn’t he? His dad is a pastor.”
Well, I think you get the picture.
Pornography has become one of the
central players in the downturn of
morals around the world, and espe-
cially in the United States. It breaks
up marriages, changes our perspec-
tive on sex and its beauty, and acts as
an airbrushed substitute for genuine,
God-given relationships… but you
know that. However, did you know
that in the last few years, the revenues
from the global porn industry have been
cut in half? Do you know why? The
answer is because pornography of any
kind may be accessed by those of any
age or sex just by the click of a button
on a cell phone or computer. It is the
silent destroyer of the very thing that
God created for healthy communica-
tion between a man and a woman to be
strong, genuine, loving, and committed.
Flee Immorality
In one translation (NLT), the writer
of Proverbs warns, “Guard your heart
above all else, for it determines the
course of your life” (4:23). From I
Corinthians 6:19, “… your body is
the temple of the Holy Spirit….”
Ephesians 5:2, “Let there be no sexual
immorality…”—not even dirty joking.
The Apostle Paul wrote to Timothy,
“… Keep yourself pure” (I Timothy
5:22).
In our world, there have been many
warnings for all of mankind to be
alert to those things that can destroy
the normal, natural functions of life.
That is why the Apostle Paul wrote
to the Corinthians, “Flee from sexual
immorality. Every other sin a person
commits is outside the body, but the
sexually immoral person sins against his
own body” (I Corinthians 6:18).
It becomes so simple to fall prey.
Just consider the following. Very
innocently and unexpectedly, a picture
flicks across a media device of one kind
or another. Rather than fleeing and
moving on, a person becomes enamored
with what he or she has just seen, and
then becomes trapped. A once-seen
image invades an unguarded mind and
heart, and obsession sets in. What do
you do? “… Therefore honor God with
your bodies” (1 Corinthians 6:20).
Do you know who is not fleeing?
Nearly everyone, because pornography
does not have a demographic. Consider
the following from Covenant Eyes, an
With a Blink of an Eye
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H.B . LONDON, JR ., D.D.
the word applied