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Masturbation
- Thread starter FatefulFluke
- Start date
I know you mean the best, but I hope you realize someday that you are making things unnecessarily hard on yourself.
These people have been right to press you on this issue because it seems to them and to me that you've gone off on a view that is too extreme.
Wanting things, sexual or otherwise, is not a sin unless it's covetousness, which is wanting what someone else has and you don't have, whether their car or their wife, which is the biblical definition of "lust". That's why greed is a sin, and the desire to have sex (or food, as another example) is neither. Unfortunately, the word "lust" has taken on a sense of simple "desire" only, which is not what the bible condemns.
I hate to see people stumble on this because it can cause them a lot of needless pain and guilt that originates in misunderstanding and not God.
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Dragons87
The regal Oriental kind; not evil princess-napper
Yes, but if sex is done in a way that is pleasing to God it can be announced in public (i.e. women becoming pregnant), and people rejoice alongside you. The same cannot be said for masturbation, or any other form of sexual relationship.
That, if I may be honest, at least from the words alone, makes me think that no, you do not know what I've gone through in this respect. I condemn myself to nothing anymore. I used to try to stop myself from the act, but I was weak, and I couldn't do it. But when I humbled myself before God, I was able to break the habit. That, I stress, was only possible because of God's grace. Today, I do not trust Christ only for His atonement for my sins, but His continual guidance so that I stay away from sin.
Your comments, if I may be honest in a loving and slightly chiding manner, is akin to telling an alcoholic, "yes, alcohol is fine if you drink in moderation". Do you think the alcholic doesn't know moderation is the key? We all know that drinking alcohol is perfectly fine, but saying that to an alcoholic can not only be unhelpful, be misleading and disastrous.
Again, I plead, and I mean plead:
"We know that we all possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up." 1 Cor 8:1
"Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak. For if anyone with a weak conscience sees you who have this knowledge eating in an idol's temple, won't he be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols? So this weak brother, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. When you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall." -- 1 Cor. 8:9-13
Please, I pray, seek love, and a humble understanding of your Brothers' weaknesses, and do not become their stumbling blocks. Eating food sacrificed to idols is not a sin in itself, says Paul. But for the sake of his Brothers he refuses to eat them--not because eating itself is a sin, but causing Brothers to fall is a sin.
Yes, but there are certain pleasures that make people more open to falling. Our responsibility as Brothers is to watch out that others do not fall to sin because of their pleasures, and that our actions do not encourage others to sin.
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Sure, but the problem with an alcoholic is not alcohol, but the alcoholic. Did Jesus lead anyone into sin by turning giant bottles of bath water into excellent wine? Your problem sounds like it was one of self-control not masturbation per se, in the same way it's not alcohol per se for an alcoholic. And learning self-control is just part of life.
I agree with you that masturbation is nothing to be proud of, as I wrote earlier, but it can't be called a sin either when the Bible doesn't call it that.
Making alcohol into a sin will not make the alcohol better or drink less. I was only saying that similarly making masturbation into a sin will not make you less likely to do it. I'm glad that you aren't saying that self-condemnation will make you a better person and that the grace of God will because I was afraid you didn't understand that.
I agree with you that masturbation is nothing to be proud of, as I wrote earlier, but it can't be called a sin either when the Bible doesn't call it that.
Making alcohol into a sin will not make the alcohol better or drink less. I was only saying that similarly making masturbation into a sin will not make you less likely to do it. I'm glad that you aren't saying that self-condemnation will make you a better person and that the grace of God will because I was afraid you didn't understand that.
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Dragons87
The regal Oriental kind; not evil princess-napper
I think we can agree that certain substances or habits, including masturbation, can lead us into sin. And I hope you will agree with me that beyond this academic debate, edification of Brothers is what we are aiming to do.
I hence rest my case.
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i don't really agree that things outside ourselves lead us to sin, if that's what you mean. The Bible makes it pretty clear that it's our own fallen nature that does that, and always will. I just see way too many Christians trying to blame others and things for their failings rather than taking responsibility for them and thereby accepting God's forgiveness and grace.
Does that make sense?
Does that make sense?
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Dragons87
The regal Oriental kind; not evil princess-napper
Yes, I can see where you are coming from, and I agree.
However, it is useless on a practical level, especially if you are speaking to or trying to counsel an addict, to insist that there is "nothing wrong" with masturbation. There is something very wrong about it if that is how your sinful nature is breaking out into the open. It is certainly not the root cause of sin, and fighting it as a sympton is useless, but it is still "wrong" on a practical sense.
I hope that I have expressed the subtlety there successfully.
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- Aug 3, 2004
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The assumption that 'our sinful nature' lies behind masturbation cannot be accepted at face value. Rather its our normal sex drive that is seeking expression. We must not confuse the two.
John
NZ
John
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cowboysfan1970
Forum Regular
Not now but for most of my life I was conditioned to at least be very suspicious of anything that was considered to be funny, enjoyable, things like that. I have to constantly fight with my mind to want to go back to its default settings that immediately thinks anything pleasureable is wrong. Unfortunately that is taught in some highly conservative or dogmatic churches to this day. When you have believed something for so long it's hard to change how you think about things. That's why I'm trying to figure out if that's how David thinks because from what he posts it seems like he has that mindset also.
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Yes, of course, and it's a very important point in all this, and, in fact, in the Christian life in toto.
I would never recommend masturbation to anyone or tell them it's a good thing to do and I would also never tell anyone it's a sin that will separate you from God, which is an infinitely worse thing to do. All of us have the sinful nature that leads us into "addiction" but condemnation only tightens the chains and separates us from God even further. Grace doesn't say something is OK, it says it's not OK but God accepts us fully despite it because of the atoning death of Christ on the cross, and we receive that, not by stopping what we're doing, but by faith. It's God's grace and his Spirit that make us righteous, not our own self-will, so it's to his credit, not ours.
Does that make sense?
I would never recommend masturbation to anyone or tell them it's a good thing to do and I would also never tell anyone it's a sin that will separate you from God, which is an infinitely worse thing to do. All of us have the sinful nature that leads us into "addiction" but condemnation only tightens the chains and separates us from God even further. Grace doesn't say something is OK, it says it's not OK but God accepts us fully despite it because of the atoning death of Christ on the cross, and we receive that, not by stopping what we're doing, but by faith. It's God's grace and his Spirit that make us righteous, not our own self-will, so it's to his credit, not ours.
Does that make sense?
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I did read the post and the word "excessive" wasn't even in it.
Here is the post I was responding to again:
"Lust: You want to be with someone/something more than you want to be with the Lord.(Usually sexual)
^^^See it?^^^
If you want someone/something more than God, it is between you and God."
So no, I don't see it. It makes no sense.
Making desire itself, excessive or otherwise, into an evil is Buddhism, not Christianity.
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