The church has a porn problem. I made my case for that in a previous post: The Church has a Porn Problem. It is my aim in these posts to help people understand this problem, both the spiritual and material aspects of the problem. Both sides of this problem are “practical,” so don’t skip over the spiritual elements to “get to” the practical advice. We need both! So let’s start with prayer.
Prayer is the first practical step in fighting this issue. It is not something we do along with practical steps, but a necessary practical step. It’s easy for Christians to blow off prayer in general, but particularly with issues like this. We “know” prayer is important, but we want to get past prayer to the meat of the issue. However, just like building a house, if the foundation is no good, the house will not stand.
Prayer will help you start healthy conversations, practices, and habits designed to protect yourself and/or your family. Prayer will give life, strength, and support to all the other steps you take. You need to pray over this issue. Whether you have personally struggled with porn or you are trying to protect your family, or you are just a church member trying to engage with a real problem in our world, pray over this issue.
I teach my students a working definition of faith: “faith is choosing to live as though the Bible were true regardless of circumstances, emotions, or cultural trends.” Are you living as though what the Bible says about prayer is true? Consider Matthew 7:11, “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him” (Christian Standard Bible). God promises to work through prayer, so pray! Here are some things to pray for:
Pray for yourself. Whether you have struggled in the past or not, everyone is just a few clicks away from this problem. Ask God to protect you and your eyes. Ask God to give you strength and wisdom when you are online or on one of your devices. If you are currently struggling with pornography, ask God to help you recover. (We’ll talk about other steps in another post.)
Pray for your kids and spouse. For those of you with a family. Pray for them. Again, this is a practical step. Prayer works! Pray in secret (when you read scripture or lay down at night), pray for them openly (partner with your spouse to pray for them together), and pray over them (grab your kids and pray for them while you are holding on to them).
Pray for your home and devices. Seriously! Lift up your home and your devices (computers, phones, tablets, and game consoles) to God. Ask him to use those devices for his glory and ask for his help using them wisely. First, I believe that lifting them to our good Father will help you frame them in your mind in their proper place. Second, I believe that God will remind you of your prayer when you pick up those devices. I believe that he will work in your kids’ hearts and minds when they pick them up if you are praying for them.
Pray for a safe circle. We all need good people around us. We all need good friends, you and me and our kids. We need people who won’t lead us towards porn or even towards other things that could lead us there. Most 1st time exposures to pornography come through a friend or a peer. So pray for those kids your kids are around. Pray for the people you are around. God can work in ways that we can never imagine.
I truly believe that if we will begin with prayer, we have a chance to conquer this issue in the church. We have the opportunity to save a generation of men and a large part of a generation of women from this issue. But we have to be in prayer over this issue. Prayer is a practical step that we need to take to deal with this issue.
If you have questions, I’d love to hear from you. You can reach me on FaceBook or by email.
John-David M. Culbertson 