I've been dating this guy for a half a year now online. We haven't met yet but, we're planning on it soon. The thing is, a lot of strong sexual urges have become a huge problem in our relationship. It's really taking a toll on both of us in our own spiritual walks. Everytime I engage in a sinful, lustful act, I feel so distant from God. It sets me off on this spiral away from Him, and then next thing you know, I haven't read the Bible in a week. Haven't prayed in weeks. Unable to genuinely give wise counsel. Unable to share about Jesus because I feel so fake for still willingly engaging in sin. Many self-condemning thoughts. Fearful thoughts of God taking this guy away, or allowing me to go through a trial because I keep engaging with this lustful desire. It feels like I'm going into a 'spiritual depression' with all this happening every time I sin lustfully.
Welcome to CF.net!
This is all just what God says will happen when we sin. So, at the very least, your experience described above is very biblical.
Do you know why, at bottom, you're sinning in the way you are with your online boyfriend? The Bible tells you very clearly why. In fact, it explains the Root Cause of all of our sin (which are just symptoms, really, of this underlying Root Cause). Do you know what that Root Cause is? Do you know what God has done about it?
We both repent and we take time to reconnect with God, but it just feels like an exhaustive cycle. It's gotten to the point where the flesh on me is so strong that I just want to please it and be okay with it (which is terrifying to admit), or just hurry up and get married so that it's not a problem. Truthfully it's gotten to a point where 'feeling good' seems to be what I desire more, but I know in my Spirit that something is so OFF.
There's no genuine repentance from a sin to which you shortly return. Real repentance involves seeing the lies that have brought you into sin for what they are and forsaking them for God's Truth, instead. When this happens, when proper, biblical repentance has occurred you won't be like "the dog returning to its own vomit," which is what we all are when indulge again, as children of God, in what we know is sin.
Feeling bad about your sin, feeling shame and guilt about it, is feeling nothing more than any atheist or Hindu with an intact conscience feels when they violate it. Godly repentance, however, is much more than tears and shame about your sin. And it is upon a repentant mind and heart, not mere expressions of shame and emotional tears, that God looks when He determines how to respond to His child.
1 Samuel 16:7
7 ...God sees not as man sees, for man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart."
I remark on this because Christians often wonder why, having shed tears and admitted to their sin, God is silent. He sees through all the weeping, and guiltiness, and confession of sin, to what we
really intend to do about our sin. And it is to
this knowledge He responds with renewed fellowship with us - or silence. If we know, deep-down, that we're going to go back to our sin, if we have no intention of truly leaving off of the thinking and choices that bring us into sin, standing in God's Truth, instead, we should understand that it is to
that intention God responds - usually with silence.
Psalm 66:18
18 If I regard wickedness in my heart, The Lord will not hear;
1 Peter 3:12
12 For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and his ears are open to their prayer. But the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.”
Every time you indulge in sexual sin with your boyfriend, you are telling God what you really think of Him and revealing what you love more than Him. God's getting the message. Is it any wonder, then, that things feel so off spiritually?
If an alcoholic is serious about getting free of his booze addiction can he continue to visit the bar? Can the drug addict who wants to truly be free of his addiction, party with his drug pusher? Of course not. So, then, if your interactions with your boyfriend are regularly leading you into sin, what ought you to do? Here's what God says to do:
Romans 13:12-14
12 The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light.
13 Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy.
14 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.
How serious are you about God and knowing and walking with Him? How you obey - or don't - the above command in regards to your boyfriend is revealing the answer.
I know that both of us in our hearts want to love each other properly and to have God in the center of us. But we both struggle with lust heavily, and since we opened that door, it's been seemingly impossible to keep shut.
This is one of the lies you're telling yourself about your sin. And until you reject it, you will continue away from God deeper into your sin. Remember, sister, God has promised that on that path,
death awaits you. Not only eternal death, but death of fellowship with your heavenly Father and all the wonderful things He would give to you in and through that fellowship, death of inner peace, death of joy, death of psychological stability, death of relationships to fellow, godly believers, and so on.
Romans 6:23
23 For the wages of sin is death...
James 1:14-16
14 But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire.
15 Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.
16 Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers.
Galatians 6:7-8
7 Be not deceived, God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap.
8 For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption...
The truth is that your sinful choices reveal that you
don't want to properly love each other and have God as the Center of your relationship. You want Esau's "bowl of pottage" - immediate, temporary sexual gratification at the expense of long-term, future peace, joy and fellowship with God. And you show this is so every time you "sell" that future for a few illicit moments online with your boyfriend.
I'm not trying to be cruel or mean, only plain and biblical. I'm not at all interested in adding to your shame, or in making you feel bad. My words are what they are because I have counselled and discipled MANY Christian young people caught up in the stuff you are and listened to their stories of the terrible price they've paid spiritually, and otherwise, as they followed their lust rather than their Maker.
But no child of God HAS to go down in flames spiritually, overcome by lust. God has made a "way of escape" for all of His children and it is wishing to help you find and use that escape that prompts my writing of this post.
1 Corinthians 10:13
13 No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.
I really love this guy, and I don't want to end things. yet, I've prayed the prayer so many times "Lord if it's not your will, take him away." He hasn't yet, and I wonder if He wants me to do that on my own.
Remember the verse from
Romans 13 above? It describes action
you have to take, not God. But He does intend that you obey His command in
His power (
Philippians 2:13; Romans 8:13; Galatians 5:16). Do you know how that's accomplished?
I just want to know what I should do at this point. I'm supposed to be fasting to reconnect with the Lord but even in the midst of it I am still engaging with this lustful sin.
Nowhere in God's word are we told that we "reconnect" with God by fasting. There are only three things God commands us to do in order to restore fellowship with Him:
1. Repent. (
James 4:6-10; Romans 12:2; Psalm 119:9-11)
2. Confess. (
1 John 1:9)
3. Submit. (
Romans 6:13; Romans 8:14; Romans 12:1; James 4:7; 1 Peter 5:6)
The desire is just so strong, and I know if I meet this guy soon I will definitely engage in the things I shouldn't. I feel so broken, lost, confused, frustrated, double-minded, and just sad.
Again, this is just what God has promised will happen to us when we choose our own will and way over His. He's not trying to ruin our fun, remember. His commands are meant to protect us and bring to us blessing, peace and joyful fellowship with Himself.
You will never find in any human person the kind of awesome, eternal, heart-level satisfaction, peace, love and joy that can
only be found in knowing and walking with God. But your sinful choices now with your boyfriend will be sure to bar you from discovering this and, worse, they will blind, deafen and harden you toward God, just as God's word promises all sin does.
Hebrews 12:16-17
16 that no one is sexually immoral or unholy like Esau, who sold his birthright for a single meal.
17 For you know that afterward, when he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected, for he found no chance to repent, though he sought it with tears.
