Pornography is a huge moneymaking business and a disastrous problem in the world today. The pornography industry is bigger than Microsoft, Google, Amazon, eBay, Yahoo!, Apple, and Netflix combined. According to the Barna Research Group, 38 percent of adults believe that looking at pornography is acceptable. Unfortunately, 28 percent among Christians—those who say they’re “born again”—believe (even though they’re aware of Matthew 5:28) that there is no problem with viewing pornography. The saddest reality is to know that about 50 percent of Christians and 40 percent of church leaders admit that they are hooked on pornography.
"Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.” Matt. 5:5
Men and women, young and old, Christian and nonChristian—everyone is vulnerable to this plague. Pornography surrounds the world with its tentacles. Ellen G. White says, “This is an age when corruption is teeming everywhere. The lust of the eye and corrupt passions are aroused by beholding and by reading. The heart is corrupted through the imagination. The mind takes pleasure in contemplating scenes which awaken the lower and baser passions. These vile images, seen through defiled imagination, corrupt the morals and prepare the deluded, infatuated beings to give loose rein to lustful passions.”1
For many in the church, pornography (also known as “lust”) is more than a struggle; it is an outright addiction that enslaves men and women. Unfortunately, pornography has entered the church like a flood, leaving anecdotal and documented evidence that families and churches are being damaged—mostly by Christian men. As Christians and as church leaders, we need to understand the following facts about pornography:2
1. Pornography is a sinful practice. God created sex and sexual expression between a man and a woman in the context of marriage (Gen. 2:24). Pornography is a distortion of something beautiful and sublime created by God. God approves when a man and a woman relate sexually to each other in the context of marriage, but He reproves when the sexual experience becomes trivial and vulgar (1 Thess. 4:3-7).
2. Pornography depicts unreal sex. In pornography, one cannot find romanticism, expressions of tenderness, and the holiness that should be present in the marital bed. Pornography presents a sexual act destitute of love, respect, and intimacy.
3. Pornography steals time. Pornography is a great stealer of time, time that could instead be dedicated to a person’s spouse, children, friends, and communion with God. It also steals time from work, recreation, and sleep.
4. Pornography treats women as objects. A man addicted to pornography has a distorted vision of women, seeing them only as objects of pleasure. He makes the woman in his life feel inferior, betrayed, and incapable of matching the lust within.
5. Pornography steals your money. Pornography steals not only your time but your money as well—money that could be spent on school, family, bills, the mortgage, etc. Pornography businesses gain millions of dollars through private cable signatures, magazines, Web sites, etc. People who habitually access pornography strengthen and expand the industry.
6. Pornography makes people captive. Being addicted to pornography is similar to being addicted to alcohol and drugs. Many people struggle for years to abandon their addiction to pornography, but they are unable to escape. In many cases, long-term therapy and participation in support groups are needed, using the same steps as Alcoholics Anonymous.
7. Pornography destroys marriages. Wives of men addicted to pornography feel they have been traded for virtual women. Many times this betrayal ends in divorce because women are not able to endure such situations.
Church leaders should speak out against pornography and do everything possible to keep people and themselves far away from it. Let us not allow the enemy of our soul to destroy our faith, life, and hope. Ellen G. White affirms, “Those who would not fall prey to Satan’s devices must guard well the avenues of the soul; they must avoid reading, seeing, or hearing that which will suggest impure thoughts. The mind must not be left to dwell at random upon every subject that the enemy of souls may suggest. The heart must be faithfully sentineled, or evils without will awaken evils within, and the soul will wander in darkness.”3
It is my prayer that you and your church members will remember that “whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable; if anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things” (Phil. 4:8).
1 Ellen G. White, Letters to Young Lovers, 60.
2 http://www.clickfamilia.org.br/
3 Ellen G. White, Letters to Young Lovers, 60.
Jonas Arrais is the editor of Elder’s Digest magazine.
