Missions and Masturbation

September 10, 1984

Masturbation is the experience of sexual orgasm produced by self-stimulation. Virtually every man and almost as many women have tried it. It is a regular practice of most single men.

One of the major forces preventing young people from obeying the call of God into vocational Christian service is defeat in the area of lust. A teenager hears a challenging call to throw himself into the cause of world evangelization. He feels the promptings of the Holy Spirit. He tastes the thrill of following the King of kings into battle. But he does not obey because he is masturbating regularly. He feels guilty. He can hardly imagine witnessing to a pretty girl about the eternal plight of her soul, because he has so habitually looked at girls naked in his imagination. So he feels unworthy and unable to obey the call of God. Masturbation becomes the enemy of missions.

Is masturbation wrong? Let me address the issue mainly for men. I cannot imagine sexual orgasm in the loins without sexual image in the mind. I know there are nocturnal emissions, which I regard as innocent and helpful, but I doubt that they are ever orgasmic apart from a sexual dream that supplies the necessary image in the mind. Evidently God has constituted the connection between sexual orgasm and sexual thought in such a way that the force and pleasure of orgasm is dependent on the thought or images in our minds.

Therefore in order to masturbate, it is necessary to get vivid and exciting thoughts or images into the mind. This can be done by pure imagination or by pictures or movies or stories or real persons. These images always involve women as sexual objects. I use the word “object” because in order for a women to be a true sexual “subject” in our imagination she must in reality be one with whom we are experiencing what we are imagining. This is not the case with masturbation.

So I vote no on masturbation. There may be other reasons why it is wrong. For now I rest my vote on the inevitable sexual images which accompany masturbation and which turn women into sexual objects. The sexual thoughts that enable masturbation do not help any man to treat women with greater respect. Therefore masturbation produces real and legitimate guilt and stands in the way of obedience.

Three encouragements to single men:

1. You are not alone in the battle.
2. Periodic failure in this area no more disqualifies you from ministry than periodic failures of impatience (which is also a sin).
3. Pursue the expulsive power of a new affection. I walked by a whole section of “photography” books at the Walker Art Center last Thursday empowered by the better pleasure of feeling Christ conquer the temptation to look.

For the sake of your power,

Pastor John

By John Piper. © Desiring God. Website: www.desiringGod.org. Email: mail@desiringGod.org. Toll Free: 1.888.346.4700.

Soli Deos Gloria

My heart aches and throbs I can hear it tears swell up I am alone and lonely there is none with me Oh! LORD You alone are faithful and my companion You have given me glory in Christ Satisfied my soul where can I go? Comfort, Rest, Joy, Love where can I find? You, Oh! LORD my God, are the sole giver Soli Deos Gloria!!!

We are far too easily pleased

"The soul would have no rainbow if the eye had no tears" -An old Native American proverb "If there lurks in most modern minds the notion that to desire our own good and to earnestly hope for the enjoyment of it is a bad thing, I suggest that this notion has crept in from Kant and the Stoics and is no part of the Christian faith. Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling around with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased." - C. S. Lewis, Weight of Glory Knowing God, fearing the LORD, serving Him faithfully with all our hearts, obeying His voice, not rebelling against His commandments, following the LORD our God and the reward that we have in this - namely Himself is far greater than anything this world has to offer.

The drill drills on

"It doesn't really matter whether you grip the arms of the dentist's chair or let your hands lie in your lap. The drill drills on." You can't see anything properly while your eyes are blurred with tears. You can't, in most things, get what you want if you want it too desperately: anyway, you can't get the best out of it. 'Now! Let's have a real good talk' reduces everyone to silence. 'I must get a good sleep tonight' ushers in hours of wakefulness. Delicious drinks are wasted on a really ravenous thirst. Is it similarly the very intensity of the longing that draws the iron curtain,... And so, perhaps, with God. I have gradually come to feel that the door is no longer shut and bolted. Was it my own frantic need that slammed it in my face? The time when there is nothing at all in your soul except a cry for help may be just the time when God can't give it: you are like the drowning man who can't be helped because he clutches and grabs. Perhaps your own reiterated cries deafen you to the voice you hoped to hear. On the other hand, 'Knock and it shall be opened.' But does knocking mean hammering and kicking the door like a maniac? And there's also 'To him that hath shall be given.' After all, you must have a capacity to receive, or even omnipotence can't give. Perhaps your own passion temporarily destroys the capacity. C. S. Lewis - A Grief Observed

You are not allowed to be in the church IF..

Anybody who is NOT a sinner is NOT allowed here. I think we need a serious cleansing in our churches today. We should clean out the church with a whip. Anybody who is good, upright, not a sinner, well, whole hearted, can not cry, not broken, righteous, unrepentant, indifferent should be kicked out of the churches. Church must be a haven for bad people, disreputable, sinners, ill, sick, broken hearted, people whose pillows are soaked with tears, broken, poor, contrite, unrighteous...., Remember, Jesus taught us to worship God in Spirit and Truth. He showed the whole world how to worship, the ultimate function of a human being, by teaching it to a woman who was a member of a sect called Samaritans. Samaritans are half Jews, interbred with the pagans, people who sticked their middle finger to the Jews and God by writing their own version of the Torah (the first five books of the Bible), called it the word of God, made their own version of the Temple (where God was suppose to live)... And most of all the first recipient of the knowledge to worship the right way was a woman with five husbands. She was a whore.... disreputable, bad, broken, contrite, whose pillow was soaked with tears...; Yet, God in His great wisdom chose her and opened her eyes and taught humanity how to worship. Even the twelve disciples were not the first recipient of this... On top of the doors of Christian churches should be a sign, "Anybody who is NOT a sinner is NOT allowed here." My fellow broken sinners, lets be a part of the church and worship God. Jesus said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.” (Read here) You can read the story of the woman here.