1 Corinthians 6:18 – Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body.
I get this question a lot both from single and married guys and, to both of them, pornography will neither teach you how to have a future healthy intimate relationship with a wife nor encourage intimacy with your current spouse.
Porn doesn’t start with a true connection of two human beings and no woman can live up to the physical standard set by a porn star, nor would they want to. It’s not love, connection, intimacy, or without shame, as God intended it.
New brain science says you build neurological pleasure pathways and, if you continue down a pleasure pathway, that opioid hit in the brain takes you down into an addiction cycle. That can be sex, drugs, alcohol, pornography, or any other kind of dangerous activity.
So much of pornography is just trying to hijack your brain and get you addicted. If you’re married and you’re wanting your spouse to jump on that negative neurological pathway by watching pornography together, it only leads to death. You need a new neurological pathway that goes towards marriage, obedience, holiness, and your spouse.
Job 31:1 (NLT) says “I made a covenant with my eyes not to look with lust at a young woman”. Paul says the same thing of a leader in the church, that he needs to be the husband of one wife or, in the original Greek text, a one-woman man. Your desires, interest, time, energy, and effort should go towards one other person of the opposite sex from you.
To ask whether you can watch porn, especially with your spouse, is an attempt to go up and down at the same time, and you can’t do that. You either have to choose to live Kingdom Down, building biblical intimacy with your wife, or live Hell Up, giving into a negative neurological pathway that will take you down to the pit of Hell.
Porn is both sinful and harmful. Because it is sinful, it separates you from a close relationship with God. Because it is harmful, it separates you from a close romantic relationship. Porn is one of the many ways that the father of lies wants you to enjoy a short moment of pleasure for a lifetime of pain. Those who continue down the porn path become addicted, and eventually incapable of healthy, normal marital relations. God made you for more, and through the Spirit of self-control, you can live not like animals who do what feels good but as a worshipper who waits for God’s best.
If you’ve ever watched porn, there’s forgiveness for you and, if you repent and turn from this sinful act, God can help change your desires and replace them with new desires.
Text DEVOS to 99383 to be woken up with bold, unapologetic Bible teaching straight to your phone Monday-Friday bright and early.
Message and data rates may apply. Reply STOP to opt out or HELP for help. Visit https://realfaith.com/faq/ for privacy and terms info.