Life is filled with challenges. Some are life-threatening, such as cancer, drug addiction and war. Some are spiritually threatening, such as porn addiction.
The Bible contains an account of an event, recorded by Moses to provide a great lesson for facing daunting challenges, such as the battle to overcome porn addiction. In this report, God gives us a 4 step approach …
1. Identify the challenge
Numbers 13:1-3
Exploring Canaan
The Lord said to Moses, ‘Send some men to explore the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the Israelites. From each ancestral tribe send one of its leaders.’ So at the Lord’s command Moses sent them out from the Desert of Paran. All of them were leaders of the Israelites.
2. Don’t underestimate the “enemy”
Numbers 13:26-28; 30-32
Report on the exploration
They came back to Moses and Aaron and the whole Israelite community at Kadesh in the Desert of Paran. They gave Moses this account: ‘We went into the land to which you sent us, and it does flow with milk and honey! Here is its fruit. But the people who live there are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very large.
Then Caleb silenced the people before Moses and said, ‘We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it.’
But the men who had gone up with him said, ‘We can’t attack those people; they are stronger than we are.’ And they spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored. They said, ‘All the people we saw there are of great size. We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them.’
3. Realize that God is with His children face when they face challenges
Numbers 14:6-8
Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh, who were among those who had explored the land, tore their clothes and said to the entire Israelite assembly, ‘The land we passed through and explored is exceedingly good. If the Lord is pleased with us, he will lead us into that land, a land flowing with milk and honey, and will give it to us.
4. Walk with God and He will give you victory over the enemy.
Numbers 14:9-12
Only do not rebel against the Lord. And do not be afraid of the people of the land, because we will devour them. Their protection is gone, but the Lord is with us. Do not be afraid of them.’
But the whole assembly talked about stoning them. Then the glory of the Lord appeared at the tent of meeting to all the Israelites. The Lord said to Moses, ‘How long will these people treat me with contempt? How long will they refuse to believe in me, in spite of all the signs I have performed among them? I will strike them down with a plague and destroy them, but I will make you into a nation greater and stronger than they.’
God has given us a proven strategy to utilize when facing struggles, such as the pornography battle in our lives.
1. Identifying the challenge;
Pornography is not entertainment or a hobby, it is an attack on our fellowship with God. It burdens us with guilt and can ruin the life (family, work, community) that we currently have.
2. Don’t underestimate the “enemy”
Pornography is not the enemy, Satan is and he is a formidable foe. Lust and pornography are merely Satan’s weapons of choice. We must never minimize him, or the power that lust has over our flesh.
3. God is with His children throughout the challenges we face.
Once we accept that this battle is serious, we must realize that with God victory is ours, just like Joshua and Caleb had faith that God would give them victory over their enemy in the Land of Canaan. The other 10 scouts, however, were viewing the battle as overwhelming because they were seeing themselves without God in their corner.
4. Walk with God and He will give you victory over the enemy.
We need spend time in communion with God, reading His Word, praying, fellow-shipping with other Christians. When we do this, we don’t allow the enemy to get a foothold in our lives.
At the end of the day, Jesus has already defeated sin for us. We need to allow ourselves the opportunity to enjoy the victory.