Finally Free: Fighting for Purity with the Power of Grace

by Heath Lambert

When this seems like it isn’t true, it’s because you are thinking more about yourself and your porn than you are about Jesus and his grace. You can be free, but freedom requires grace.

Transforming grace works when you believe that Jesus gives it to you. The moment you believe in Jesus’ grace to change you, you are changing. The more you continue to believe it, the more you will continue to change.

Mental punishments are not helpful because they deal with sin in a self-centered way instead of a Christ-centered way.

Self-talk and self-condemnation do nothing to lay hold of God’s forgiving and transforming grace. Repentance does.

Jesus’ grace to change you is stronger than pornography’s power to destroy you.

The issue is not whether a person is sad; instead, it is what they are sad about. The focus of worldly sorrow is the world. People experiencing worldly sorrow are distressed because they are losing (or fear losing) things the world has to offer.

A sad person consumed with worldly sorrow is concerned about losing stuff—no matter how honorable or dishonorable that stuff is.

Worldly sorrow hates the consequences of sin.

Godly sorrow hates the sin itself.

Worldly sorrow is sad because people know about your sin. Godly sorrow is sad because God knows about your sin. Worldly sorrow is sad because of a disrupted relationship with a spouse, kids, or others. Godly sorrow is sad because of a disrupted relationship with God.

When your tears result in your running away from people instead of toward them, your tears are worldly tears.

You will never be free from pornography if all your efforts to stop are recycled expressions of your own selfishness. As long as your sorrow is like your sin and focused on the things you want, you will return to porn again and again.

You will not experience dramatic change in your struggle as long as you use accountability to describe your sins instead of declaring your need for help in the midst of temptation.

Accountability must function properly if it’s going to work. It’s better to avoid driving than to drive a car with no brakes.

If a person wants purity, it is not enough to avoid having a physical, sexual relationship with someone who is not his or her spouse. If they want purity, Jesus says, they must not want sex with

someone who is not their spouse. Jesus raises the standard of purity from physical acts of fornication to lustful intentions of the heart and lustful looks of the eyes.

God does not forbid sexual immorality because he wants you to be miserable; God forbids it because sexual immorality leads to brokenness, sadness, emptiness, death, and hell. Righteousness, on the other hand, leads to fullness, joy, peace, and life.

You look at porn when you have the desire to see it, when you have the time to look at it, and when it is available to you. Nobody looks at pornography without all three of these elements coming together.

You will not have victory over pornography until you first have victory in the battles that come before you look.

Since our sin turns us into inventors of evil (see Romans 1:30), you may find other creative avenues for accessing porn,

especially as technological advances make it even more accessible.

If you are enslaved to pornography, God will not usually change your desires instantly but by degrees (see 2 Corinthians 3:18). Radical measures allow the space and time needed for you to direct your attention toward Christ instead of porn.

There is no mercy or favor for those who arrogantly cover their sin and keep it hidden. You will find God’s grace to change only when you humbly confess your sin—not just to God, but to all those you have wronged, whether they know it or not.

the circle of your confession should be as broad as the circle of your sin.

Instead of blaming them for their response and dulling your confession with an accusation, put yourself in their shoes. View their shock, hurt, and anger as another reflection of the seriousness of your sin and the deep wounds it has left in the hearts of those you love.

Men look at pornography out of an arrogant desire to see women in a way that God does not allow.

The root problem with men who look at porn is not neediness—it is arrogance.

Malice means I want bad things for you, and envy means I want your good things for myself.

Greedy lust, however, perverts desire either in degree or in direction. Greed perverts desire in degree when you want a good thing too much. If you’re hungry and want a sandwich so badly that you’re short-tempered with the server at the deli, or if you’re thirsty and want a drink so badly that you don’t share with others who are thirsty, then your good desire is perverted in degree. Greed perverts desire in direction when you want things you shouldn’t want or you want to satisfy your desire in the wrong way. Sexual desire is not sinful in itself, but when you desire sex with a woman who is not your spouse, your desire is pointed in the wrong direction and is lustful.

Porn is only consumed by thankless people. The desire for porn is a desire to escape from what the Lord has given you into a fake universe full of things you do not have and will never have. Porn is the trading of gratitude for greed.

Every greedy glance at pornography is a missed opportunity to be thankful to the Lord and to others for all the good things in your life.

People hooked on porn fail to change, even when they want to, because they believe nothing besides porn will ever make them happy.

Recipients of grace should act radically different than rejecters of grace.

Pornography invites its consumers to think only about themselves and the selfish pleasures its actors can offer.

Show me someone who refuses to forgive others, and I’ll show you someone arrogantly refusing to consider the number of sins for which God has forgiven them.