FAMILY TALK: Sexual Integrity
Pastor Steven Osborne
Transcribed by DaVinci Resolve 18
Church is for the Sick
One of the big things for us is to encounter God, and so that we can become healthy and whole people. It’s a good thing to be healthy, amen? To live in that righteousness and to grow and to mature and to be in a place where we allow the Holy Spirit to bring transformation in our lives, to change our hearts and impact our hearts. The image that came to mind to me as we think about this—because when we want to be honest, when we want to be a church where we can talk about anything, and where we can talk about hard things, then we need to get comfortable with some of these topics. And so the image that came to mind for me is: imagine you cut yourself cooking, all right, at home, and now you rush to the hospital, and there’s blood everywhere, and they’re like, “Oh, sorry, we don’t deal with that type of injury.” That will be insane. In the same way with us as a church, to say, “Oh, we’re going to just talk about certain topics, but some of these topics is kind of a no-go zone. It’s too uncomfortable for us,” right? Then we miss out on some of the things that most of us, and all of us, are dealing with. And to be in that space where the Holy Spirit then can really minister to us, and we’re reminded that church is a hospital for the sick, amen? Are you awake this morning? Amen?
And so we can act like we have it all together. But at the end of the day, this is a place for the sick, where people can come in, and we can say, “Man, we’re going to deal with all kinds of injuries and challenges in our lives.” And we don’t want to act like all shocked, where it’s like, “Oh, I’m dealing with this, and they were like, ‘*Gasp*, really?! This is church. What do you mean?’” Right? And it’s like, we want to be a place where people can just come, where they’re not going to experience shame and guilt. Yes, when we talk about some of this stuff, there is conviction. Whenever we read God’s Word, the Spirit will bring conviction in our lives. And that’s a good thing. We all need the Holy Spirit to bring conviction to our lives, because that will lead us to repentance and to change to happen in our lives. But we don’t want to be a place where we put guilt and shame in people’s lives or over them. And we want to be a wonderful place of encouragement.
We’re In This Together
And so this morning, we’re talking about sexual integrity, but even more so, really we can put any type of addiction in this. Again, just our focus this morning is sexual integrity. And again, even now, this morning, if you’re dealing with some things or addictions and there’s already kind of like, “Oh, there’s a shame here,” push that spirit of shame away, because I want you to just hear God’s words this morning through his words. And if you’re not dealing with any of that stuff right now, if these things aren’t issues in your life, praise the Lord! You have another job then to do, and that is to pray for those that are dealing with something, and to be maybe a mentor to somebody. And so nobody is allowed to check out this morning because we all have a role to play. We are paddling together.
And again, we want all of us to experience the freedom. It doesn’t help we just sing about songs about freedom, and we don’t experience that. We somehow want to bring those songs to life and say, “Okay, now it’s gonna really impact my heart. I want to be a person that can live in that absolute freedom.” Amen? And so that’s why we’re gonna talk about some of these things.
Build a Wall
And our first passage this morning is actually in Matthew 18, verse 9. And again, just kind of the image that came to mind for me was the Lakewalk. Now, for most of us, we love walking by the Lakewalk. Maybe not this time of the year, but in the summer. And it is just beautiful. I love walking there in the summer, like an hour before sunset, and you have people with their dogs, you have people that’s on bikes, people eating ice cream. And you just feel in shape almost just walking there in the summer, right? Like with all of the activities. And then it’s like, “Okay, let me go and get an ice cream.” I mean, it is just so cool. It’s like, “Oh, I get to live here,” and then you laugh at the suckers that are coming from the Cities that have to drive and spend all that money to experience all of this. Like, “Ugh, sorry for you, Sunday you got to drive back,” right? And it’s like, “Man, this is my home,” until January, February. Then we want to drive to Florida. But so several years ago, we know about some of those storms and the flood and how that ruined the Lakewalk for us. And then they tried to fix it. And again, another storm, and it ruined it again. And then the city got smart and said, “Okay, we got to invest all of this money to build this wall to protect the flooding and to protect our investment.”
And the same way with this passage, I believe Jesus is sharing with us to say, build a wall. Here’s the wall of protection when it comes to sexual integrity. So Matthew 18, verse 9. And we’ll read through many passages. Please go and visit the Bible app. I have today’s sermon, I have tons of resources in there for you. All right, verse 9, and this is Jesus speaking:
And if your eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell.
Obviously, he’s not talking here about us gouging out our eyes, right? That would be a little awkward. There’s gonna be a lot of us that’s going to come in with no eyes on Sunday mornings if this was the reality, right? Because we all have different things that we’re dealing with. But Jesus, I believe, is trying to, again, give us a wall of protection because there’s all kinds of storms that is coming our way—temptations, and the enemy is busy, right? And he’s saying, “I need you to protect your eyes, what you’re taking in, so that you can protect your heart. Because if you take in bad things, it’s gonna impact your heart, and that will impact your soul. And if you keep taking bad things in, obviously, that’s not going to lead you to a healthy place, where it actually can lead you to hell.” And so there’s just this beautiful image from Jesus and warning, and it seems extreme, but actually, at the end of the day, it is extreme. What if we become a church that really take God’s word and put it into action, and to say, “Man, I am gonna go after holiness. I’m gonna go after sexual integrity. I am gonna do everything I can to protect my heart because my heart is valuable.” It is so important that I protect this because when everything else is impacted, my relationships with my family, my relationships with church, my relationship with God, when my heart is impacted in the wrong way, then it’s really hard. And so then for us to say, “Okay, I want to be super intentional about protecting my heart and making sure that my heart is healthy. And that’s why I believe that Jesus was sharing this very powerful warning to his audience and to us as well.
I think a lot of this stuff, when it comes to sexual integrity, we really play around with it, and we don’t understand the consequences on some of these things. And we don’t always understand what is at play behind the scenes. And so much of this happened—there was a big part of this that happened in the 60s. You know, just with “make love, not war,” and the sexual revolution that happened in the 60s, it really opened up the door for a lot of stuff that we’re experiencing today. Some of the craziness, when it comes to human sexuality, is not stuff that happened overnight. Probably a lot of it started in the 60s and the 70s, and obviously, even before this, I mean we see some of the same things. Actually, when you go and study, there’s a great podcast by a theologian—I added that for you in the app—he talks a lot about sexuality within a biblical concept. And there was one talk that he shared about how the sexual revolution impacted the Roman Empire, how that caused them to fall. And so some of this stuff is not new. But really, when it comes to America’s history and the stuff that we’re experiencing right now, a lot of that is from the open door that was created from the 60s and the 70s. And we had no idea. It’s like, back when they were opening up and kind of saying, “Hey, we got to deal with some of these walls and boundaries that were set up, moral walls that were set up. In the 60s they said, “Oh, we want freedom. We want some liberty.” And they broke down all of those walls, right?
And now today, we will continue to push those boundaries and those walls, even if—I don’t know if we still have boundaries and walls, right? And if the church doesn’t come and create new walls to protect the Lakewalk, to protect sexuality according to God’s word, we will continue to run into trouble. And so I believe God is calling the church. And it’s hard work because, I mean, when we think about Hollywood, when we think about our world, and all the stuff that is going on, a lot of crazy things, how then as a church do we say, “We got to start to build a wall up again,” and to say, “We got to protect what is important for God.” And so at some point, we really got to take this to heart. We got to talk about this stuff and to say, “I’m gonna do my part in all of this. I’m gonna live with sexual integrity in all aspects of my life and with all kinds of addictions—anything that is hindering my relationship with God—I want to deal with some of that.”
Pornography in the Church
So let me just ask you this morning, do Christians struggle with porn? Yes! Great, thanks for the brave ones. I appreciate that. All right? So let me say this: Yes, the church struggles in this area. There’s some of you that might be sitting here today and it’s like, “Man, I struggle in this area.” And this stuff is now so easy to access, right, through our cell phones and the different things that is going on, that I think it’s just getting harder and harder for the church. We have to be super intentional not to overstep some of those boundaries.
But I want to just give you some stats here from covenanteyes.com. Again, the link is in the Bible app. You can go and read through some of that. CovenantEyes, if you don’t know, it’s a website. They’ve got software that you can have on your computers, and then there’s an accountability partner, and you get kind of a report on some of the things that people are watching. And over the years, I’ve had several guys that have made me an accountability partner. So really good resource, a lot of good stats that I trust. They have a good pulse on what’s happening in the church and pornography. But here’s kind of an intense one: 1 in 5 youth pastors and 1 in 7 senior pastors use porn on a regular basis and currently struggling. That’s more than 50,000 U.S. church leaders.
So is the church struggling with porn? Yes, absolutely, right? And we have church leaders that are dealing with it. Praise the Lord, at least in this season of my life—and I pray that the Lord will protect me—this is not an issue. Obviously, I’ve got hundreds of other issues, right? And so it’s probably a little easier for me to share this. But if I’m honest with you, yes, I was exposed to some of this stuff in the early days, or as a teenager and stuff. I got to see some magazines that I probably wasn’t meant to see. And then later on in high school, some guys and saw some videos. And so definitely exposed to some of this. And I’m so grateful that the Lord really protected me, that it didn’t become a bigger issue. It definitely could have become a bigger issue. And actually, the Lord really helped me. There was a day in Bible college that my professor just prayed over me, and it was such a supernatural hand of God where God’s love flooded my heart, and it was like a real deliverance ministry piece to me, and it just really wasn’t an issue. But like I said, just because I’m standing here today and say, “This isn’t an issue,” I’ve got other issues. Just talk to Venessa. And so I’ve got other areas that I got to work on.
Maybe this is an area that you have to work on. And it is. And if you look at all of the stats, it is in our churches. And I’m not going this morning and saying, go, “Ooh, you’re struggling with that?” It’s like, no. We all struggle with stuff. And this is one slice of the pie that we got to just talk about this morning because we want to create a church, be a church, where we can talk honestly about these hard things, so that people can come in to the hospital and say, “I’m here for healing. I’m here for healing.” If you’re here this morning and you are perfectly healthy, you probably would not be here. And then you actually shouldn’t be here; you should be in the streets evangelizing, right? But really, all of us are here this morning because we know we need fellowship, we need community, and there’s some areas in our lives that the Lord needs to work out.
64% of Christian men and 15% of Christian women say they watch porn at least once a month. So I’m just again sharing this with you to say, it is a struggle. And it’s easy when you’re dealing with this to say, “Oh, man, I’m isolated. It’s only me. I’m dirty. I’m broken. God can’t use me.” And again, what we’ll see a lot of times when people are trapped in this area, they will withdraw from church leadership and to volunteer because you don’t feel like you’re worthy enough. And so we want to try and sort this out and get you healed so that you can be actually on a place where you can experience freedom where God can use you, where you can stand and be part of the worship team, where you can be a greeter, where you can—without the guilt and the shame.
72% of non-Christian males age 13 to 24 watch porn, compared to 41% of Christian males age 13 to 24. 55% of males 25 years and older watch porn. 23% of Christians 25 years and older watch porn.
And then 17% of non-Christian females age 25 and up watch porn. 5% of Christian females 25 and up watch porn.
And so again, we just kind of see that it’s male and female. So many times we have made this a male thing. But this is not the reality anymore. Women struggle.
And there’s kind of an average stat where they’re saying that most kids are exposed to porn at ages between 8 to 11, right? And so think back, when you maybe were exposed to some of this stuff, it’s like, it’s dramatic. It’s heavy. So how does an 8-year-old or an 11-year-old deal with that? And what type of doors does that open up and type of impact can that have on somebody’s life? And so we got to hate porn, not because of just somebody dealing with this, but it’s like how it destroys lives, how it put people in bondage.
68% of divorce cases involved one party meeting a new lover over the Internet. Just imagine, again, how many marriages have been impacted through some of this.
Here’s the risk of doing nothing. Obviously, there’s probably 20 risks for not doing anything about this. Diminished trust between intimate couples. The abandonment of the hope of sexual monogamy. The belief that marriage is sexually confining. And that list can go on and on and on.
Pornography in Our Culture
They have found that only 7% of all churches actually have resources to deal with this topic. So if this is so huge, and if there’s only 7% of churches that’s speaking to this, we have trouble, because then where are people going? Where can you and I go to find freedom and find ministry?
Now, let’s just look at the Bible. I think this is key for us because we got to really get a pulse on what does God say about sexual integrity? How does he want us to live? Because again, it’s so easy for us to fall into this trap when we look at the culture and say, “Oh, I can just sleep around. Watching porn is nothing.”
Now, let me say this again—I probably should have given you a better definition for porn, because I remember growing up when there was still video stores. You remember that? Video stores, right? Blockbusters? There was several video stores in my hometown, and one of them, small store, but they had this little hidden room, right? And I remember, because I could see guys going in and out there, I was like, “What’s this other video store?” And then later on, I heard as a teenager, it was like, hey, there’s some adult content, hardcore porn, that was there in that little extra room. And so you really needed to be desperate to go and find porn. Today, that is so easy.
And it is not just that type of material. Think about some of the things that’s being revealed to us. And again, I don’t want to put any guilt and shame on you, but just, I think for us to try and raise that standard, one of the things were Game of Thrones, right? I watched half a show, and it was so violent, and there was such crazy nudity that I just said, “There’s no way that I can expose myself to that,” right? And didn’t watch it. And I’ve been amazed—they’ve done some surveys on how many Christians watched it. And so I just think that there needs to be a better standard. If Jesus is warning us and saying, “Man, gouge out your eye,” in a sense, it’s like, build that wall. If we watch that types of things, then we’re not building a wall. And he’s not telling that to us to spoil our fun. He’s protecting us. He wants us to have successful and healthy marriages. He wants us to experience healthy sexual relationships in the context of covenant marriage. And when we’re doing and watching and exposing ourselves, it makes it hard to experience what God wants in our lives.
And so yeah, Game of—I don’t want to put the ladies off. There was another thing I was reading about how Christian women were driving miles to go and buy the book Fifty Shades of Grey. And they were like, “Hey, what if somebody in church sees me in a small community and I buy this book, what are my church members gonna say,” right? And so then they drove miles to a different city, different town, to go and grab that book. I didn’t read the book. I don’t know how bad—and I know it was a movie. It’s kind of the same thing, right? And so all I’m saying is it is not—porn today is not those things that are just in a hidden little closet in an adult store. It’s all around us. And we have to be super intentional just building that wall and to say, “Man, I want to protect my heart. I want to protect my marriage. I want to protect my family. I want to protect my relationship with God.”
The Biblical Approach
So First Thessalonians chapter four:
It is God’s will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality; that each of you should learn to control your own body in a way that is holy and honorable.
And so we need to learn how do we become in control of our body? We don’t want to just run off after fleshly desires and just give in. Hold that wall, right? As a church for all of us.
1 John 2:16:
For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life comes not from the Father but from the world.
And so for us, if we want to grow in this area, we have to continue to seek after the things of the Spirit and God’s Word. If we’re gonna run after worldly things, you will end up in trouble, and it will take you to places and areas that you don’t want to go. And so protect your heart. Stay connected to God. Have strong boundaries.
Colossians chapter three:
Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on…
50 Shades of Grey, right?
… not on earthly things, for you died and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.
And it continues:
When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to the earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires, and greed, which is idolatry. Because of this, the wrath of God is coming. You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. But now you must also rid yourself of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips.
So I just want to say, as a church, if we’re taking our relationship with God serious, and if we want to grow, and if we want to see the next generation experience sexual integrity and holy lives, then we got to look at God’s Word, and we got to actually go and apply it, for us as believers. And so this is such a beautiful invitation and moment for us to say, “If I’ve given my life to Christ, then I got to work on these things. I got to continue to lay down the things of the flesh and the things from my past and so that I can live in holiness.” Amen?
And again, I just want to say this—don’t miss this—you cannot do this in your own power and your own strength. It starts by giving your life to Jesus Christ. That’s the baseline. And then the Holy Spirit will help you to start to deal with some of these things. Because you have given your life to Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit now lives inside of you, it doesn’t mean these things just change overnight. Sometimes he does. That’s amazing how God sometimes just set people free immediately. Sometimes it’s from smoking or drinking, and it happens overnight. But for most people, it’s a process. It’s a process. But he is able and he’s willing. He wants you to be free. But I just want you to know as a church, there’s a call to us to live holy and with purity and to set aside the things of the flesh.
So here’s the good news. Here’s the promise. First John 1:9, I want you to highlight this:
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
Can I hear “amen?” Okay, weak, weak, weak, weak. Can I hear “amen?” Amen! He is faithful. When you are a believer, when you’ve given your life to Christ, you and I don’t have to live in that cycle of shame. God is faithful. He will set us free and we can live in that righteousness. We can beat that. Amen?
First Corinthians 10:13:
No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.
Whenever there’s temptation in front of us, no temptation is so big where it takes your hands and eyes and say, “Oh, I don’t have control. I don’t have control.” The Spirit—if we’re really seeking God’s help in that moment, we can overcome all kinds of temptations, amen? And so the Holy Spirit will help us. So really there is no excuse. The only excuses may be that you haven’t had the tools to maybe deal with some of these things. You maybe just haven’t had the community around you to help you with some of these things. But this is God’s promise: you can be set free.
Reasons
Over the years, just in ministry and listening to people’s stories, I’ve realized that there’s many reasons that affects us, to drive us to some of the things that we do. And the church needs to have a lot of compassion and not judgment because we don’t know. We don’t know. And here’s just some of the reasons: Loneliness—right, big thing—a lack of education; emotional trauma—it’s amazing how that can really open up a door—Sexual abuse; early exposure; and mental health. Just some of the factors that can open us up and where that can open up a door to addiction.
Lies That Will Keep You Stuck
This morning I want you to know this. There’s several lies that will keep you stuck in addiction. Not just sexual addiction, but other addictions too.
“I need the escape of porn and masturbation to ease my stress and anxiety.” And maybe you need to put something else in there. Maybe you say, “I need the escape of alcohol.” “I need the escape of shopping.” “I need the escape of food,” right? Whatever it might be to deal with my stress and anxiety. No, we don’t need any of those things. We got to figure out what healthy resources is out there and how do we tap into the power of the Holy Spirit to be able to experience the freedom and how to deal with our stress and anxiety in a healthy way.
We might say—another lie is, “Nobody’s getting hurt.” At the end of the day, you are getting hurt emotionally, spiritually. And a lot of times our spouses gets hurt. And at some point you will hurt your marriage. Sin always leads to death and destruction.
“I have tried so many times; I can never be free.” Lie, lie, lie. Amen? Again, you just maybe have missed out on some healthy resources.
“I’m a shameful failure as a Christian and uniquely defective.” Join the club. But we got to switch your thinking and your identity.
Cycle of Addiction
I don’t have time to go into this, but there’s kind of a cycle of addiction. And it starts with, a lot of times, it starts with our wounds—right, some of the things that we’ve experienced—and then how that triggers us, and then it kind of leads to this cycle. And so we have to learn how do we start to deal with this. A lot of times we want to jump in right here and say, “Oh, I’m so sick of watching this or doing this. I got to stop the acting out,” but we’re not getting to the fruit of things. And we got to start here and deal with our heart and bring that to God. And then some of the other stuff is going to fall into place.
Next Steps
So next steps, two steps:
Freedom begins when we stop hiding. As long as we hide, and as long as when we’re at church and we say, “Oh, we’re not talking about this topic,” or we’re gonna point fingers, then people will be forced to stay in darkness. And so we got to bring—create a space where we can say, “Man, we’re in this together and I’m not gonna hide.” And that’s not easy. It is not easy, because shame will always tell us, “If people find out who I really am, they might not like me.” And then that stops us to reveal some of the challenges that we have.
And then the next step is this: you gotta want it. You gotta want it. You want healing. You want to live in that righteousness. We all crave it, and as believers, we all want it. But maybe today, it is just taking that next step to addiction and getting healthy. And let us be the church to come around you. Let’s have honest conversation. Let’s support one another in this. It’s gonna be a big ask for you to show up and to address some of these areas in your life that you’ve maybe been hiding for a long time. But let’s do it. Let’s go on this journey. And I know God is faithful. He’s gonna bless you. I’ve experienced some of that; when you’re honest, and when you’re in community, and you spoil your heart, it’s like, “Whoa,” what God can do. It’s amazing.
