God’s Standard
Ephesians 5:3
But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of
any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God’s holy
people.
以弗所书 5:3
至于淫乱并一切污秽，或是贪婪，在你们中间连提都不可，方合圣徒的体统。
Page 92
Holiness is not some nebulous (模糊的) thing. It’s a series of
right choices. You needn’t wait for some holy cloud to form around you. You’ll
be holy when you choose not to sin. You’re already free from the power of
sexual immorality; you are not yet free from the habit of sexual immorality,
until you choose to be – until you say, “That’s enough! I’m choosing to live
purely!”
Page 104-105
Your goal is sexual purity. Here’s a good working definition of it –
good because of its simplify: You are
sexually pure when no sexual gratification comes from anyone or anything but
your wife.
Three parameters of
1.
With
your eyes.
Think of the first
parameter (your eyes) as your outermost defense, a wall with “Keep Out” signs
around it. It defends your eyes by covenant (as Job did: “I made a covenant
with my eyes to bounce
from objects of lust. Your eyes must bounce from the sensual, something they
aren’t currently doing.
2.
In
your mind.
With the second
perimeter (your mind), you don’t so much block out the objects of lust, but you
evaluate
and capture
them. A key verse to support you here is 2 Corinthians 10:5 “We take captive
every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” You must train your mind to take
thoughts captive, something it doesn’t currently do.
3.
In
your heart.
Your third objective
is to build your innermost defense perimeter – in your heart. This perimeter is
build by strengthening your affections for your wife and your commitment to the
promises and debts you owe her. Your marriage can die from within if you
neglect your promise to love, honor, and cherish your wife. Honoring
and cherishing
are your key actions in establishing this defense perimeter. (And this applies
even if you’re single: You want to honor and cherish every date, just as you
hope every guy is honoring and cherishing your future wife when he goes out
with her.)
So there’s your battle plan. That’s it. Nothing more, nothing less. Setting
up defense perimeters and choosing not to sin. You’ll have freedom from sexual
impurity as soon as those defense perimeters are in place. Sexually, your outer
life will finally match the inner life God created in you.
Page 108
Impurity of the eyes and mind lives like a
habit but fights like an addiction.
Page 127 – 153
VICTORY IN YOUR EYES
To set up your first defence perimeter with your eyes, you want to
employ the strategies of bouncing your eyes and starving your eyes as well as
the tactic of taking up a “sword” and a “shield”.
Bouncing
Train your eyes to bounce away from sights of pretty women and sensual
image immediately.
Starving
Adjusting/limiting/fasting the required volume of sexual gratification
to some extent. By controlling the sexual images entering your eyes and min,
your system may become used to living on less, but in the end, you still have a
certain volume of sexual gratification you need to fill. The bowls of
gratification should be filled from your single legitimate vessel, the wife
whom God provided for you.
Sword
A single attack verse.
約 伯 記 31: 我 与 眼 睛 立 约
Job 31: I made a covenant with my eyes…
Shield
A protective verse that you can reflect on and draw strength even when
you aren’t in the direct heat of battle, may be even more important than your
sword, because it places temptation out of earshot.
歌 林 多 前 書 6
18 你 们 要 逃 避 淫 行 。 人 所 犯 的 ， 无 论 甚 麽 罪 ， 都 在 身 子 以 外 ， 惟 有 行 淫 的 ， 是 得 罪 自 己 的 身 子 。
19 岂 不 知 你 们 的 身 子 就 是 圣 灵 的 殿 麽 ？ 这 圣 灵 是 从 神 而 来 ， 住 在 你 们 里 头 的 ； 并 且 你 们 不 是 自 己 的 人 ；
20 因 为 你 们 是 重 价 买 来 的 。 所 以 ， 要 在 你 们 的 身 子 上 荣 耀 神 。
1 Corinthians 6
18 Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a person commits
are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually, sins against their own body.
19 Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who
is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own;
20 you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.
Page 158 - 188
VICTORY IN YOUR MIND
Properly processing the attractions, we can capture and
eliminate impure thoughts.
歌 林 多 後 書 10
5 将 各 样 的 计 谋 ， 各 样 拦 阻 人 认 识 神 的 那 些 自 高 之 事 ， 一 概 攻 破 了 ， 又 将 人 所 有 的 心 意 夺 回 ， 使 他 都 顺 服 基 督 。
2 Corinthians 10
5 We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up
against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it
obedient to Christ.
Starving the Attractions
We can shield ourselves from the early attraction phase until
they become “only friends”. This proper processing is called starving the
attractions.
In summary, you have a mind that runs where it wills. It must be tamed.
Our best tactic is to starve the attractions, limiting the generation of
impure thoughts and the damage they bring to our marriage relationship.
Defense
1st line of defense -> Proper mindset: This attraction
threatens everything I hold dear.
2nd line of defense -> To declare: I have no right to
think these things.
3rd line of defense -> To heighten your alert (1. Bounce
your eye, 2. Avoid her, 3. When you are in her company, play the dweeb呆子,笨蛋)
Some examples
i.
Red alert! Red alert!
ii.
Shields up! Shields up!
iii.
I have no right to think these thoughts, and I
have no right to return these signals!
iv.
Spend absolutely no time alone with this woman,
even in public spaces.
v.
Flee from her.
vi.
Prepare with “war game” simulations.
vii.
Send absolutely no return attraction signals.
viii.
Let them eat static!
ix.
Play the dweeb.
To summarize: If you are attracted to a woman, it doesn’t mean you may
never again have any sort of relationship or friendship with her. It only means
you must enact your defense perimeter. Once you have starved the attractions
and she’s safe distance away, you can have a proper relationship, one that is
honoring to your wife and to the Lord.
Page 191 - 219
VICTORY IN YOUR HEART
Honoring
and cherishing
are your key actions in establishing this defence perimeter.
We’ve known very few men consumed by their marriages, and fewer still
consumed by purity, but both are God’s desire for you. God’s purpose for your
marriage is that it parallels Christ’s relationship to His church, that you be
one with your wife.
To cherish
Means to treat with tenderness and to hold dear, and you
want to feel the romantic urge to do those things, despite our feelings
I must protect her beauty and grace and spotlessness.
Touching Example
1. I began to treat her with tenderness, holding her dear in spite of
my feelings. I decided to get up with my son every time he awoke at night even
though Brenda didn’t work outside the home after Jasen was born. Logically,
since she didn’t work and could rest at different times during the day, she
could have been the one to get up. But she was married to me, and she was my
little ewe lamb. I cherished her, helping her out when she needed it most. How
could I do that? She was no longer the person I thought I married, and I didn’t
always feel tender toward her, but I did it because it was right. The tender
feelings followed later.
2. I made a promise to my wife that I would never go to bed with the
kitchen dirty. I knew what that promise would cost me. Because of her exhaustion,
it meant she would often head off to bed and leave me alone to do all the
dishes and scrub all the pans. It meant that often she would be asleep when I
got to bed, and I would miss out on sex. It meant that I would miss out on
precious sleep, but I also knew that I could cherish my ewe lamp in ways she
never thought possible. I never broke my promise.
撒 母 耳 記 下 12
1 耶 和 华 差 遣 拿 单 去 见 大 卫 。 拿 单 到 了 大 卫 那 里 ， 对 他 说 ： 在 一 座 城 里 有 两 个 人 ： 一 个 是 富 户 ， 一 个 是 穷 人 。
2 富 户 有 许 多 牛 群 羊 群 ；
3 穷 人 除 了 所 买 来 养 活 的 一 只 小 母 羊 羔 之 外 ， 别 无 所 有 。 羊 羔 在 他 家 里 和 他 儿 女 一 同 长 大 ， 吃 他 所 吃 的 ， 喝 他 所 喝 的 ， 睡 在 他 怀 中 ， 在 他 看 来 如 同 女 儿 一 样 。
4 有 一 客 人 来 到 这 富 户 家 里 ； 富 户 舍 不 得 从 自 己 的 牛 群 羊 群 中 取 一 只 预 备 给 客 人 吃 ， 却 取 了 那 穷 人 的 羊 羔 ， 预 备 给 客 人 吃 。
2 Samuel 12
1 The Lord sent Nathan to David. When he came to him, he said, “There
were two men in a certain town, one rich and the other poor.
2 The rich man had a very large number of sheep and cattle,
3 but the poor man had nothing except one little ewe lamb he had
bought. He raised it, and it grew up with him and his children. It shared his
food, drank from his cup and even slept in his arms. It was like a daughter to
him.
4 “Now a traveler came to the rich man, but the rich man refrained from
taking one of his own sheep or cattle to prepare a meal for the traveler who
had come to him. Instead, he took the ewe lamb that belonged to the poor man
and prepared it for the one who had come to him.”
Page 226
Worth? Possible?
When Jasen, my son, was twenty-three, I watched him take his newly
minted wife in to his arms at his wedding and kiss a girl for the very first
time, ever!
Source: Every Man's Battle: Winning the War on Sexual Temptation One
Victory at a Time
by Stephen Arterburn & Fred
Stoeker (2000)
No comments:
Post a Comment