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To My Children:
“My son, be attentive to my wisdom; incline your ear to my understanding, that you may keep discretion, and your lips may guard knowledge. For the lips of a forbidden woman drip honey, and her speech is smoother than oil, but in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword. Her feet go down to death; her steps follow the path to Sheol; she does not ponder the path of life; her ways wander, and she does not know it. And now, O sons, listen to me, and do not depart from the words of my mouth. Keep your way far from her, and do not go near the door of her house, lest you give your honor to others and your years to the merciless, lest strangers take their fill of your strength, and your labors go to the house of a foreigner, and at the end of your life you groan, when your flesh and body are consumed, and you say, ‘How I hated discipline, and my heart despised reproof! I did not listen to the voice of my teachers or incline my ear to my instructors. I am at the brink of utter ruin in the assembled congregation.'” Proverbs 5:1–14
I am writing this to you because I love you. I want you to have a life filled with joy and satisfaction, but the things you are doing only lead down a path of destruction—of joyless, empty discontentment. If you keep following this path of pornography, it will ultimately lead you to death. I know these things give you momentary pleasure—a quick high that goes away almost as quickly and only leaves you unsatisfied, wanting more. This is an endless void. Trying to fill up your desires with sexual pleasures is like trying to fill a black hole in space—there is nothing you can throw at it that will ever be enough. You will only feel more and more empty, depressed, and maybe even self-hatred.
Jesus tells us that He is the only thing that will ever truly satisfy us—knowing Him, having His love, having our sins forgiven, and loving Him in return. Following Him is the only way to fully and truly enjoy this life, for Psalm 16:11 says there is fulness of joy in His presence and everlasting pleasures at His right hand, and Psalm 63:3 says His love is better than life.
Don’t waste your life on that which does not satisfy. Jesus says to come to Him and have all that your heart desires fulfilled in Him instead of spending all your time and energy on things that don’t satisfy.
Furthermore, the women or men you are looking at or talking to are not objects. They are people, made in the image of God. They were not put here for your own personal pleasure. They may be treating themselves poorly by doing these things, but by participating in them, you are treating them as worthless pieces of trash instead of God’s valuable image bearers. Some of these people are forced into this kind of behavior as slaves of sex traffickers—people who have kidnapped them and forced them to do these things. When you participate in pornography, you are feeding this wicked industry that harms human beings.
It may be hard to imagine your future, but it is important to think about how your current sin will affect your life later. The man or woman you decide to marry will be hurt by this sin in your life. It will be painful and damaging to them to know that you have been looking at other people instead of saving yourself solely for them. If they are a godly person (and I pray they are), they will not tolerate this sin in your life.
I plead with you to end this now while it is still early on. The longer you are entangled in a trap of sin, the harder it is to get out. With God’s grace, it is not impossible, but the battle is so much harder. Flee from it now, my child. Repent and turn to Christ that you may live a truly free and satisfying life. His Word says He can provide escape from every temptation (1 Corinthians 10:13), and that if you confess your sins to Him, He is always faithful and just to forgive and cleanse us (1 John 1:9).
I love you. Grow in godliness and in your love for God.
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