Scourge of Pornography

Introduction

Good evening, everyone. Good evening. My Bible’s open to John chapter 8, and I need you to open your Bible there right now, please. John chapter 8 is verse 44 that I want to read to start with. John chapter 8 and verse 44. What a delight to see you this evening. I’m so pleased that you’re here. I just have a lot of folks here who are special to me from other situations and circumstances, and it means a lot to me that they are here. But I’ll tell you this. What really means a lot to me is that a whole bunch of you are here tonight after long days at work or long days chasing ghettos around the house, and it’s been a long and tiring day, and you had every reason to say, well, we just can’t.

I just don’t think we can get there tonight. And you know what? You got here tonight, and you’ve come to worship the Lord and to hear about his word and about his ways, and God knows where you are, and the Lord knows that you’re putting him first in your life and making every effort to serve him. I appreciate that more than anything, though the Lord appreciates that. I’m glad that you’re here. And I think after singing those good songs together, you’re glad that you’re here too, aren’t you? Let’s try the word of God in John chapter 8. John chapter 8 and verse 44. There, Jesus says, You are of your father the devil, and your will and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and has nothing to do with the truth.

Because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies. That’s a great place for us to begin this evening because I want to talk about deception. I want to talk about this little guy right here. In 1869, these moths were introduced in the United States. What you’re looking at there is a pretty good picture of a gypsy moth. They were brought here to jumpstart the American silkworm industry, and it was, by all accounts, an unmitigated disaster. The moth rapidly got away from the silkworm folks and began to reproduce and multiply everywhere. Gypsy moths love trees like we have here in America, maples, elms, and oaks, and seemed to have almost no natural predators.

They expanded rapidly to be completely out of control. And in the last hundred and fifty years, there’s no telling how many millions of acres they’ve eaten up and destroyed of good American forest. In fact, it seemed like there was no way to control the gypsy moth until about 1969 when scientists discovered that the male gypsy moth finds its mate by following the scent of the female gypsy moth. The scientists isolated that scent. It’s called a pheromone, and they reproduced it in the lab. Then they got some little bitty pellets and they indoctrinated those pellets with that pharaoh and they dropped those pellets out in the wild. What do you think happened? What happened was that gypsy moth reproduction rates fell dramatically because the male moths drawn to that pharaoh to that scent were confused.

They weren’t able to find a female because they were smelling all of this false scent everywhere. In fact, scientists found after a while that the male gypsy moth actually came to prefer the stronger smell in the pellet, even though it was artificial and fake. Deceive me. I want to talk with you about the scourge of pornography. And I’m talking with you about this evening because pornography is a visual pharaoh. It confuses men today and destroys families and marriages everywhere in its wake. In all the lessons that I am presenting this week about building strong families, I believe this sermon tonight is absolutely the most important lesson. Because all across this country, pornography is eating up homes left and right. It’s destroying the lives of teenagers. It’s destroying the lives of adult men.

Even more so, it’s frightening to see. It’s making inroads even in American women. And everywhere it goes. Everywhere where people believe the lies of pornography, all kinds of destruction result. You need to understand the degree of the problem, the staggering consequences of this particular trouble in our world today. For example, you should know that in our pornified culture, that’s a pretty good term for America today. Every day, there are two and a half billion pornographic emails sent. That is eight percent of the total volume of email traffic is carrying or soliciting people to come and see pornography. We’re talking about a porn film being produced in this country every 30 minutes. And they’re not making those movies because nobody’s looking at them. In fact, every second, 30,000 people are viewing pornography.

25% of all search engine requests are requests to find pornography. It is an enormous industry that has America firmly in its slimy grasp. You realize how big it is? We’re talking about an industry that makes more money than Microsoft, Google, Amazon, eBay, Yahoo, Apple, and Netflix. Combined. Think about the kind of dollars we’re talking about there. That is the scourge of pornography in our world today. What used to involve tremendous risk going to a shady side of town to go to one of those so-called adult bookstores where you could be seen going in or coming out, be discovered, be exposed for what you are. Now, just with the click of the mouse, absolutely anonymous in your home, you can receive the most foul and disgusting images possible.

Our world is truly pornified. One expert in this field said that it is easier today to get pornography than it is to avoid pornography. Sadly, I believe that expert is exactly right. Now I’m confident on Tuesday night of a gospel meeting, everybody came knowing this is wrong, knowing this can’t be right. But unfortunately, I’m afraid sometimes we don’t understand everything that goes on with pornography. We don’t understand just how wicked this really is and what it will do to our young men and what it will do to our homes and marriages and families. Still too often there’s that attitude of boys will be boys, and that’s just kind of part of growing up. That’s just something that men do out behind the bar.

People aren’t even aware, I’m afraid, of how many people are involved in pornography. In a study released very recently, 80% of all boys see pornography before they reach the age of 18. 70% of those boys have spent at least 30 consecutive minutes looking at and viewing pornography. I said it’s used was rising among women. 23% of those girls have spent at least 30 minutes or more consecutively viewing pornography. All that boils down to say this. Only 3% of boys reach adulthood without ever seeing internet porn. The average age when a boy sees pornography for the first time has dipped to the all-time low of eleven years of age. How wonderful porn is. Wrecking marriages today and promising to destroy marriages even in the future. What do you know about this sin?

1. What Pornography Is

What happens in a home where pornography comes to live? What if you know too much about pornography this evening? What can you do to stop it and get it out of your life? I want to talk with you about those kinds of things in very practical sorts of terms this evening. I want us to understand exactly how evil pornography truly is. Let’s just begin with the question that everybody has. What are we talking about here? Especially I know some of our younger audience members. What’s this pornography stuff that the preacher’s talking about? What’s going on there? Well, let’s just think about that. In Genesis, please. Look at me in Genesis chapter 2. In Genesis chapter 2, let me put some passages together that I think will help us.

In Genesis chapter 2, I’m reading there in verse 25. In Genesis 2 and verse 25. There we read about Adam and Eve. Adam is so delighted when the Lord presents him with his wife. We read in verse 24 that God says, a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast unto his wife. They shall become one flesh. The power and beauty of the marriage relationship for the very first time in the garden of paradise. Now, verse 25. And the man and his wife were both naked, and they were not ashamed. We understand about that. We can see that between a husband and wife, nothing is hidden. They can be together. There’s not anything shameful about that. So, kids, get home from church tonight. Your mom and dad go back to the bedroom to put on their pajamas.

There’s not anything wrong about that. They can be there together, nothing shameful about that. But what if somebody said, hey, I want to go back there and watch you all change clothes. Hey, you can’t. That’s not right. That’s sick. That’s not appropriate in any shape, form, or fashion. What if somebody wanted to take pictures of someone taking clothes? Changing clothes. What if somebody took those pictures of a woman not properly clothed, put them up on the internet, or put them in a message? Oh, that’s not right. That’s not right at all. You see, that’s exactly what pornography is. Pornography is taking what belongs in marriage between a husband and wife and making it public. That’s exactly what pornography is. The wonder of the marriage relationship is out for everybody to look at.

That’s not right, can’t be right. In fact, let me add a passage to this. Look in 2 Samuel 11, please. In 2 Samuel chapter 11, read with me there, beginning in verse number 1. In 2 Samuel chapter 11 and in verse number 1, we read that in the spring of the year, in the time when kings went out to battle, David sent Joab and his servants and all of Israel, and they ravaged the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained at Jerusalem. 2 Samuel 11 and 2. Now it happened late one afternoon when David arose from his couch and was walking on the roof of the king’s house. That he saw from the roof a woman bathing, and the woman was very beautiful. Now, I’m not going to talk this evening about Bathsheba’s culpability here.

Whether she knew the king would be walking and would he see it, that’s not the point of this at all. I just want every person here to realize what happens when a man sees a woman not properly attired. Even a great and godly man like David, a man after God’s own heart, a man who wrote the songs, all shipwrecked because of what he saw and how he acted upon what he saw there. When we look at 2 Samuel chapter 11, what we’re looking at here is a warning for all of us that David’s disaster can be duplicated in our lives, especially in a world where seeing Bathsheba is only a click away. Yet I say again, there’s a lot of confusion about this issue today. Lots of men think it’s positively unmanly if you don’t look at girly pictures when they’re passed around.

2. Pornography Is Sinful and Wrong

A lot of young men are going to be made fun of by their friends. What’s wrong with you if you won’t look at this website? I need to talk with you then about what you need to know about pornography. Let’s just start by saying it is sinful and wrong. Now, again, I expect everybody understood that, but it’s always good to begin with the Bible. Let’s look in Galatians chapter 5. In Galatians chapter 5, I’m reading there in verse 19. Paul writes here about the works of the flesh in Galatians 5 and verse 19. Notice the terminology that he uses at the outset here. In Galatians 5 and verse 19, the works of the flesh are evident. Sexual immorality, impurity, and sensuality. Those words speak to wrongful sexual behavior and the things that drive and create lust that create wrong sexual behavior.

Those things are said to be parts of the works of darkness. You need to understand very clearly. That’s where pornography is. That’s what pornography is. In fact, look in Hebrews 13 and verse 4. Part of the objection to pornography even further would be that pornography wants to pretend that every sexual relationship is just fine and even to be desired. Yet what does the Bible tell us? In Hebrews the 13th chapter and in verse 4, Scripture says there, let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous. I’m not going to in any way belabor this point, but it is vital that we have understanding from the outset tonight. The scriptures teach that pornography is wrong.

It can’t be right. Listen to me. It’s wrong everywhere and every place. All the time, without fail, is