No Greater Joy Ministries » Addictions http://nogreaterjoy.org Over 500 articles from Michael and Debi Pearl on Child Training, Homeschooling, Family, Marriage, Christianity, the Bible, Missions, Simple Living, Gardening, and other topics! Wed, 22 May 2013 20:39:17 +0000 en-US hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5.1 Certified http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/certified/ http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/certified/#comments Tue, 15 Jun 2004 11:10:36 +0000 Michael Pearl http://nogreaterjoy.org/?p=644 1287061_27729222

My son-in-law Gabriel and my daughter Rebekah came for a two-week visit. At my request, Gabriel examined the web history on my computer to confirm that I have not visited any porno-sites since the last time he was here. I never erase my web history. Someone else does it for me after examining it. Someone may ask, “What is wrong, don’t you trust yourself?” My answer to them is, I want my wife to trust me. I want my son-in-law to trust me. I want you to trust me, and I want to make myself accountable to someone—just as you should. I don’t trust anyone who erases his own web history on a regular basis. Just think about it. God keeps a file of all web searches. Nothing is ever erased, except your entire past sins history when you got saved. After that, in the day of the judgment seat of Christ, you will give an account for every deed done in your body (II Cor. 5:10). No amount of confession and sorrow will prevent you from having to answer for every deed since you got saved. By the way, I passed. I have never viewed as much as one single porno image on any computer—ever! My Lord and my wife deserve no less. Having done what is required of me, I am just an unprofitable servant; I have only done that which was my duty to do (Luke 17:10), as any normal Christian does. Dear lady, if your husband’s office was in the same building as a strip joint, just one curtained glass door separating him from the view, would you be comfortable trusting him to never pull back the curtain and look in on the smut? Would you trust your young untested sons—even when you are gone to the store, and they are there alone? That is exactly what the web is—a ready window to the most vile pornography that the devil and his demons can produce. It is pure Sodom and Gomorrah. And it is right there in your home, all the time, waiting day and night to reach though the screen and grab the lusts of a boy or man. I avoid it like Hell. I cannot say this too forcefully. You are gullible beyond belief if you have in your home a computer with access to the web and it is not on a password, completely inaccessible to your sons. Every single boy from eight to sixteen years old—without exception—will get on the web and look at porn if he can find the opportunity. He will get up in the middle of the night. He will play sick and sneak in when you are gone to the store for medicine. He will arrive home early, stay up late, rise before you do, or go to a friend’s house and get on their computer when they are not home. If you are the best parent and child trainer, with the best of spiritual instruction, and the finest education, and your sons view pornography on the web, you have wasted your time. You lose. They lose. God loses. The devil wins. Christian men develop the fortitude and discipline to obey God and walk in holiness against all temptation, but few boys before the age of eighteen have that kind of discipline. Any husband that expects his wife to “trust him” is a scoundrel. Never put you wife in the position to have to depend on blind trust. Make every moment a walk in the light. I take my wife everywhere, or else she knows where I am and who I am with every moment. Every Christian man should invite his wife or a friend to view his web history on a regular basis. Every computer should be in a public place or facing an open door (or a glass door) where the wife and kids can see what is on the screen. A man who refuses to do so is guilty of something, if only pride. Dear Christian brother, make yourself accountable to you wife and your friends. Sweet, gullible mother, get as mad as a mother goose and protect your boys and men. Safeguarding the Internet I have been looking for a simple, effective solution to controlling an internet connection for some time now. I have recently come across a simple, inexpensive utility called Conntroll. It works on Windows 2000 and XP, and allows one person to control the use of the internet using a password. It completely blocks email, instant messages, web browsing, and other types of file downloads. It is primarily made for single computer environments and is extremely simple to install and use. Please see the “Certified Porn Free” link on www.nogreaterjoy.org for more information about obtaining and installing Conntroll. -Gabe Anast Michael Pearl]]> 1287061_27729222

My son-in-law Gabriel and my daughter Rebekah came for a two-week visit. At my request, Gabriel examined the web history on my computer to confirm that I have not visited any porno-sites since the last time he was here. I never erase my web history. Someone else does it for me after examining it. Someone may ask, “What is wrong, don’t you trust yourself?” My answer to them is, I want my wife to trust me. I want my son-in-law to trust me. I want you to trust me, and I want to make myself accountable to someone—just as you should. I don’t trust anyone who erases his own web history on a regular basis. Just think about it. God keeps a file of all web searches. Nothing is ever erased, except your entire past sins history when you got saved. After that, in the day of the judgment seat of Christ, you will give an account for every deed done in your body (II Cor. 5:10). No amount of confession and sorrow will prevent you from having to answer for every deed since you got saved. By the way, I passed. I have never viewed as much as one single porno image on any computer—ever! My Lord and my wife deserve no less. Having done what is required of me, I am just an unprofitable servant; I have only done that which was my duty to do (Luke 17:10), as any normal Christian does. Dear lady, if your husband’s office was in the same building as a strip joint, just one curtained glass door separating him from the view, would you be comfortable trusting him to never pull back the curtain and look in on the smut? Would you trust your young untested sons—even when you are gone to the store, and they are there alone? That is exactly what the web is—a ready window to the most vile pornography that the devil and his demons can produce. It is pure Sodom and Gomorrah. And it is right there in your home, all the time, waiting day and night to reach though the screen and grab the lusts of a boy or man. I avoid it like Hell. I cannot say this too forcefully. You are gullible beyond belief if you have in your home a computer with access to the web and it is not on a password, completely inaccessible to your sons. Every single boy from eight to sixteen years old—without exception—will get on the web and look at porn if he can find the opportunity. He will get up in the middle of the night. He will play sick and sneak in when you are gone to the store for medicine. He will arrive home early, stay up late, rise before you do, or go to a friend’s house and get on their computer when they are not home. If you are the best parent and child trainer, with the best of spiritual instruction, and the finest education, and your sons view pornography on the web, you have wasted your time. You lose. They lose. God loses. The devil wins. Christian men develop the fortitude and discipline to obey God and walk in holiness against all temptation, but few boys before the age of eighteen have that kind of discipline. Any husband that expects his wife to “trust him” is a scoundrel. Never put you wife in the position to have to depend on blind trust. Make every moment a walk in the light. I take my wife everywhere, or else she knows where I am and who I am with every moment. Every Christian man should invite his wife or a friend to view his web history on a regular basis. Every computer should be in a public place or facing an open door (or a glass door) where the wife and kids can see what is on the screen. A man who refuses to do so is guilty of something, if only pride. Dear Christian brother, make yourself accountable to you wife and your friends. Sweet, gullible mother, get as mad as a mother goose and protect your boys and men. Safeguarding the Internet I have been looking for a simple, effective solution to controlling an internet connection for some time now. I have recently come across a simple, inexpensive utility called Conntroll. It works on Windows 2000 and XP, and allows one person to control the use of the internet using a password. It completely blocks email, instant messages, web browsing, and other types of file downloads. It is primarily made for single computer environments and is extremely simple to install and use. Please see the “Certified Porn Free” link on www.nogreaterjoy.org for more information about obtaining and installing Conntroll. -Gabe Anast Michael Pearl]]> http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/certified/feed/ 6 The Challenge http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/the-challenge/ http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/the-challenge/#comments Mon, 15 Apr 2002 11:30:24 +0000 Michael Pearl http://nogreaterjoy.org/?p=486 1200X800-TheChallenge

There was a time when somewhere in every large city there was a dirty building, dimly lit, tucked back where decent folks would never go. Nearby was a liquor store and a cheap motel that rented rooms by the hour. It cost more if you wanted clean sheets. An XXX and a blinking neon sign, sporting a girlie silhouette, marked the building. Only the sleaziest characters in town would go to such a place, and then they hurried in with their collars up or their hats pulled down low. Zoning laws prevented the placement of these hellholes close to residential areas or churches. Those ordinary fathers who might have lusted to know what tantalizing secrets lay behind the black door and painted windows had more self-respect, or at the least, concern for their reputations, than to risk being seen patronizing those outposts of Sodom. The Canaanites, whom God slew down to the last woman and child, would have been destroyed sooner if they had obtained this 16-millimeter sin. Twenty years ago most of us didn't even know one person who patronized these places. It was unheard of and the buildings were seldom seen. The law and the courts treated those "Adult Book-stores" like spilt sewage. In the early nineties, most of us heard about people who owned computers in their homes. Then we heard about something called the web. What is that? Something like a spider web? Do I remember a famous line from one of the books we used to read, something about, "O the tangled web we weave…?" "They are looking at dirty pictures on their computers," someone said. "Doesn't look like they could see much on those lousy screens." "Oh, they are improving the monitors every day; they will soon be as good as the TV." "Thankfully, the computers are too expensive for most people to have one in their home, and they are too hard to operate, so the children won't be exposed to that stuff. Anyway, they will soon make it illegal." Well, here we are just one decade later, and the Supreme Court of the United States of America has protected the rights of profiteers and perverts to display images of child molestation on the web. It is illegal for public libraries to filter out pornography. While the Ten Commandments are considered offensive and are being removed from government property, taxpayers are forced to support the government supply of pornography to the masses, free of charge. Most homes now have computers with monitors that are more realistic than the TV. Children can operate them better than the adults; and over 20% of everything on the web is pornography or worse. Half of the Christian families in America now have the XXX store right in their homes. Families lie down at night and sleep just a few feet from the black door of Sodom. People who would have been outraged to have found a stack of porno magazines under a mattress now have a stack 30 miles high, right in their home. There was a time that if a man was 10 minutes late getting home from work an explanation was expected; today men retreat to rooms with closed doors and take trips to Bangkok, Thailand or the skin joints of New Orleans. Fifteen years ago less than 1% of men used pornography. Today, according to recent polls by Christian ministries, more than half of the professing Christians "use pornography" regularly. Preachers who would have been too proud to have ever gone to a porn shop, can now go to the worst joints in the world, knowing they are absolutely secure against accusing eyes. How can this ministry help parents train up their children in the way they should go when fathers are racing toward hell through fiber optic cables? There is an epidemic. The churches are either dead or alive with lust. No Greater Joy Ministries receives hundreds of letters every month. Eight years ago we never got letters that confessed that pornography was a problem. But over the last three or four years, an increasingly large percentage of our mail reveals that fathers are shutting out the family and shutting themselves in to cyberspace. Marriages are failing and fathers are molesting their daughters. Young sons are finding their way on the web and practicing on their sisters. Preachers are silent. When they do speak out against the sins of digital Sodom, you would think the sins were nothing worse than gluttony or laziness. "Christian" counselors are practicing therapy on porno addicts—helping them "work through" their "addictions." In just a few short years the church has accepted pornography and child molesting into its lists of "christian" sins. Thus the sins of Sodom have been normalized in the "christian" church. This sin is so pervasive in our society that if all the child molesters were arrested on Friday night, there wouldn't be enough people show up for work on Monday to operate the country. Prisons that now have 1,000 inmates would have 100,000. I am heartsick, head sick, and nauseated at my stomach. I am angry. If I knew which direction was out of Sodom I would turn my face and feet that direction and never look back. If God does not damn America and all the Western world in the next 10 years, he will have to resurrect the Canaanites and Sodomites and apologize to them for being so narrow-minded and bigoted. Men of God are a shrinking minority in the "christian church." It no longer means anything to be called a Christian. I feel the need to add an additional qualifier. We have a dozen computers in our home and office hooked to the web. I pay men to come in unannounced and search the web history of every computer for signs of accessing pornography. When my son-in-law comes to visit, I have him search our web history. I have no fear that anyone in my home would fall prey to the tangled web of debauchery, but I want to be certified along with the rest of my office workers. I want everyone concerned to know that my Lord is worthy of my devotion. I challenge you. Let us who name ourselves after the holy man of Galilee make a statement to the "church" and the world. Let us proclaim in no uncertain terms that we believe Jesus is worthy of our whole hearts. Let us demonstrate that there is a remnant that does indeed walk in truth. Let us get certified as real Christian men. Find three or four other Christian men who will covenant with you to certify that you are free from porn on the web. You will place your computer in such a position that everyone in the house can see the screen when it is in operation. You will never stay up late and operate the computer when no one is looking in on you. You will account for your time to your wife. When you go to town, you will never go alone. Your wife, one of the children or another man will go with you. Your computer will be open to inspection at any time by any of the men with whom you have entered covenant. You will never erase the web history on your computer unless in the presence of one of the other men. You will welcome one of your covenant brothers to walk in unannounced and search your web history periodically. You will do the same for each of them. As a group you will make it known that you have been certified, and you will challenge others to form additional groups and maintain their certification. Men who have the web and will not open themselves to inspection should be noted as not walking in truth. "Provide things honest in the sight of all men" Romans 12:17. "Abstain from all appearance of evil" 1 Thessalonians 5:22. "And herein do I exercise myself, to have always a conscience void of offense toward God, and toward men" Acts 24:16. "For there is no man that doeth any thing in secret, and he himself seeketh to be known openly. If thou do these things, shew thyself to the world" John 7:4. "He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy" Proverbs 28:13. Michael Pearl]]> 1200X800-TheChallenge

There was a time when somewhere in every large city there was a dirty building, dimly lit, tucked back where decent folks would never go. Nearby was a liquor store and a cheap motel that rented rooms by the hour. It cost more if you wanted clean sheets. An XXX and a blinking neon sign, sporting a girlie silhouette, marked the building. Only the sleaziest characters in town would go to such a place, and then they hurried in with their collars up or their hats pulled down low. Zoning laws prevented the placement of these hellholes close to residential areas or churches. Those ordinary fathers who might have lusted to know what tantalizing secrets lay behind the black door and painted windows had more self-respect, or at the least, concern for their reputations, than to risk being seen patronizing those outposts of Sodom. The Canaanites, whom God slew down to the last woman and child, would have been destroyed sooner if they had obtained this 16-millimeter sin. Twenty years ago most of us didn't even know one person who patronized these places. It was unheard of and the buildings were seldom seen. The law and the courts treated those "Adult Book-stores" like spilt sewage. In the early nineties, most of us heard about people who owned computers in their homes. Then we heard about something called the web. What is that? Something like a spider web? Do I remember a famous line from one of the books we used to read, something about, "O the tangled web we weave…?" "They are looking at dirty pictures on their computers," someone said. "Doesn't look like they could see much on those lousy screens." "Oh, they are improving the monitors every day; they will soon be as good as the TV." "Thankfully, the computers are too expensive for most people to have one in their home, and they are too hard to operate, so the children won't be exposed to that stuff. Anyway, they will soon make it illegal." Well, here we are just one decade later, and the Supreme Court of the United States of America has protected the rights of profiteers and perverts to display images of child molestation on the web. It is illegal for public libraries to filter out pornography. While the Ten Commandments are considered offensive and are being removed from government property, taxpayers are forced to support the government supply of pornography to the masses, free of charge. Most homes now have computers with monitors that are more realistic than the TV. Children can operate them better than the adults; and over 20% of everything on the web is pornography or worse. Half of the Christian families in America now have the XXX store right in their homes. Families lie down at night and sleep just a few feet from the black door of Sodom. People who would have been outraged to have found a stack of porno magazines under a mattress now have a stack 30 miles high, right in their home. There was a time that if a man was 10 minutes late getting home from work an explanation was expected; today men retreat to rooms with closed doors and take trips to Bangkok, Thailand or the skin joints of New Orleans. Fifteen years ago less than 1% of men used pornography. Today, according to recent polls by Christian ministries, more than half of the professing Christians "use pornography" regularly. Preachers who would have been too proud to have ever gone to a porn shop, can now go to the worst joints in the world, knowing they are absolutely secure against accusing eyes. How can this ministry help parents train up their children in the way they should go when fathers are racing toward hell through fiber optic cables? There is an epidemic. The churches are either dead or alive with lust. No Greater Joy Ministries receives hundreds of letters every month. Eight years ago we never got letters that confessed that pornography was a problem. But over the last three or four years, an increasingly large percentage of our mail reveals that fathers are shutting out the family and shutting themselves in to cyberspace. Marriages are failing and fathers are molesting their daughters. Young sons are finding their way on the web and practicing on their sisters. Preachers are silent. When they do speak out against the sins of digital Sodom, you would think the sins were nothing worse than gluttony or laziness. "Christian" counselors are practicing therapy on porno addicts—helping them "work through" their "addictions." In just a few short years the church has accepted pornography and child molesting into its lists of "christian" sins. Thus the sins of Sodom have been normalized in the "christian" church. This sin is so pervasive in our society that if all the child molesters were arrested on Friday night, there wouldn't be enough people show up for work on Monday to operate the country. Prisons that now have 1,000 inmates would have 100,000. I am heartsick, head sick, and nauseated at my stomach. I am angry. If I knew which direction was out of Sodom I would turn my face and feet that direction and never look back. If God does not damn America and all the Western world in the next 10 years, he will have to resurrect the Canaanites and Sodomites and apologize to them for being so narrow-minded and bigoted. Men of God are a shrinking minority in the "christian church." It no longer means anything to be called a Christian. I feel the need to add an additional qualifier. We have a dozen computers in our home and office hooked to the web. I pay men to come in unannounced and search the web history of every computer for signs of accessing pornography. When my son-in-law comes to visit, I have him search our web history. I have no fear that anyone in my home would fall prey to the tangled web of debauchery, but I want to be certified along with the rest of my office workers. I want everyone concerned to know that my Lord is worthy of my devotion. I challenge you. Let us who name ourselves after the holy man of Galilee make a statement to the "church" and the world. Let us proclaim in no uncertain terms that we believe Jesus is worthy of our whole hearts. Let us demonstrate that there is a remnant that does indeed walk in truth. Let us get certified as real Christian men. Find three or four other Christian men who will covenant with you to certify that you are free from porn on the web. You will place your computer in such a position that everyone in the house can see the screen when it is in operation. You will never stay up late and operate the computer when no one is looking in on you. You will account for your time to your wife. When you go to town, you will never go alone. Your wife, one of the children or another man will go with you. Your computer will be open to inspection at any time by any of the men with whom you have entered covenant. You will never erase the web history on your computer unless in the presence of one of the other men. You will welcome one of your covenant brothers to walk in unannounced and search your web history periodically. You will do the same for each of them. As a group you will make it known that you have been certified, and you will challenge others to form additional groups and maintain their certification. Men who have the web and will not open themselves to inspection should be noted as not walking in truth. "Provide things honest in the sight of all men" Romans 12:17. "Abstain from all appearance of evil" 1 Thessalonians 5:22. "And herein do I exercise myself, to have always a conscience void of offense toward God, and toward men" Acts 24:16. "For there is no man that doeth any thing in secret, and he himself seeketh to be known openly. If thou do these things, shew thyself to the world" John 7:4. "He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy" Proverbs 28:13. Michael Pearl]]> http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/the-challenge/feed/ 1 MORE OF SODOM http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/more-of-sodom/ http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/more-of-sodom/#comments Mon, 15 Apr 2002 11:15:43 +0000 Michael Pearl http://nogreaterjoy.org/?p=494 1200X800-More-of-Sodom-1

Dear Michael, I am a husband and a stepfather of a three-year-old. I'm hooked on pornography. I sometimes think I can't make it without it. I read your pamphlet Pornography, Road To Hell, and it fit me. I'm 29 and I need someone to talk to. I need lot's of prayers. I want to stop this bondage I am in. I could use some help. God bless your website.
MICHAEL ANSWERS You don't need to talk to anyone. You don't need help. You don't need prayer. You need to repent. Nearly every porno freak to whom I have spoken has expressed a desire to be free from his addiction. The same is true of alcoholics and dopeheads. I have spoken with prostitutes and Sodomites. They all say the same thing. They are miserable; life is a disappointment. They know they are in trouble. They want to quit very badly, but they are “so dependent on it.” I have seen them cry, swear they will never do it again, and then go right back. They will confess their sins, ask for special prayer, let you cast the devils out of them, and then crawl back to their sin. Many professing Christians, preachers and priests included, are caught in a web of debauchery. I said you don't need to talk to anyone, because no one can help you. You don't have an emotional problem that you need to “work through.” You don't need affirmation or understanding. Yours is not a failure of information. You are a sinner, living after the flesh, and you are dead in trespasses and sins. No counselor can help you deal with your sin. I said you don't need help because no one can help you decide what you value. If you love the flesh and do not fear God, if you are not afraid of hell, if you do not value your marriage and your self-respect, if you choose to have the worldview of a baboon—to eat, sleep, and play with yourself—no one can help you except to assure you of the misery you will experience in this life and of damnation in the next. I said you don't need prayer, because God does not help sinners quit their sin. God commands the sinner to repent, and then God places his Spirit inside of believers, and by that Spirit the children of God are all overcomers. Those who are not overcomers are overcome of sin and will continue to be enslaved unless they become truly born again. When you fear God and hell, you will lose your appetite for everything but forgiveness and restitution. You will stay on your knees, fasting, until you touch God and receive the new birth. When you repent to God, you will hate sin so thoroughly that the very thought of a porno image will make you sick to your stomach. You have never been sincere about ceasing to do pornography. By the time you receive this reply you will doubtless have returned to your lonely room of self-love. If you really wanted to quit, you would permanently disconnect from the internet. If you must use computers at work, you would get a job working in lawn care. You would disconnect your TV from the cable or satellite. You would burn all the images you now have, and you would spend your free time in the Word of God—that is, if you were sincere. There are other, more drastic and permanent methods of ridding oneself of the means to lust, but I will not recommend them. I will leave that to the words of Jesus, found in Matthew 5:29-30: 18:9. Paul said, "For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek" (Romans 1:16). I have seen many porno freaks, queers, lesbians, prostitutes, dope heads, alcoholics, and adulterers repent toward God and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and never return to their sin a single time. Either the gospel of Jesus Christ is what it claims to be or it is empty religious nonsense. Either Christ forgives the sinner and delivers him from the acts of sin or we are at the mercy of counselors and therapists. The move is yours, not God’s. God did everything that is necessary to forgive the greatest sinner and to keep him from committing sin. But God cannot save the unrepentant. And, my friend, you have never repented to God. The choice is yours. From years of experience, seeing God change lives, I have every confidence that the same gospel that has worked a change in others will work a change in you—when you are willing. Michael Pearl]]> 1200X800-More-of-Sodom-1

Dear Michael, I am a husband and a stepfather of a three-year-old. I'm hooked on pornography. I sometimes think I can't make it without it. I read your pamphlet Pornography, Road To Hell, and it fit me. I'm 29 and I need someone to talk to. I need lot's of prayers. I want to stop this bondage I am in. I could use some help. God bless your website.
MICHAEL ANSWERS You don't need to talk to anyone. You don't need help. You don't need prayer. You need to repent. Nearly every porno freak to whom I have spoken has expressed a desire to be free from his addiction. The same is true of alcoholics and dopeheads. I have spoken with prostitutes and Sodomites. They all say the same thing. They are miserable; life is a disappointment. They know they are in trouble. They want to quit very badly, but they are “so dependent on it.” I have seen them cry, swear they will never do it again, and then go right back. They will confess their sins, ask for special prayer, let you cast the devils out of them, and then crawl back to their sin. Many professing Christians, preachers and priests included, are caught in a web of debauchery. I said you don't need to talk to anyone, because no one can help you. You don't have an emotional problem that you need to “work through.” You don't need affirmation or understanding. Yours is not a failure of information. You are a sinner, living after the flesh, and you are dead in trespasses and sins. No counselor can help you deal with your sin. I said you don't need help because no one can help you decide what you value. If you love the flesh and do not fear God, if you are not afraid of hell, if you do not value your marriage and your self-respect, if you choose to have the worldview of a baboon—to eat, sleep, and play with yourself—no one can help you except to assure you of the misery you will experience in this life and of damnation in the next. I said you don't need prayer, because God does not help sinners quit their sin. God commands the sinner to repent, and then God places his Spirit inside of believers, and by that Spirit the children of God are all overcomers. Those who are not overcomers are overcome of sin and will continue to be enslaved unless they become truly born again. When you fear God and hell, you will lose your appetite for everything but forgiveness and restitution. You will stay on your knees, fasting, until you touch God and receive the new birth. When you repent to God, you will hate sin so thoroughly that the very thought of a porno image will make you sick to your stomach. You have never been sincere about ceasing to do pornography. By the time you receive this reply you will doubtless have returned to your lonely room of self-love. If you really wanted to quit, you would permanently disconnect from the internet. If you must use computers at work, you would get a job working in lawn care. You would disconnect your TV from the cable or satellite. You would burn all the images you now have, and you would spend your free time in the Word of God—that is, if you were sincere. There are other, more drastic and permanent methods of ridding oneself of the means to lust, but I will not recommend them. I will leave that to the words of Jesus, found in Matthew 5:29-30: 18:9. Paul said, "For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek" (Romans 1:16). I have seen many porno freaks, queers, lesbians, prostitutes, dope heads, alcoholics, and adulterers repent toward God and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and never return to their sin a single time. Either the gospel of Jesus Christ is what it claims to be or it is empty religious nonsense. Either Christ forgives the sinner and delivers him from the acts of sin or we are at the mercy of counselors and therapists. The move is yours, not God’s. God did everything that is necessary to forgive the greatest sinner and to keep him from committing sin. But God cannot save the unrepentant. And, my friend, you have never repented to God. The choice is yours. From years of experience, seeing God change lives, I have every confidence that the same gospel that has worked a change in others will work a change in you—when you are willing. Michael Pearl]]> http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/more-of-sodom/feed/ 6 Pornography—Road to Hell http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/pornography-road-to-hell/ http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/pornography-road-to-hell/#comments Thu, 15 Jun 2000 11:00:01 +0000 Michael Pearl http://nogreaterjoy.org/?p=3619 1200X800-Pornography---Road-to-Hell-

WARNING This article contains information targeting married couples and mature teenagers. You should read it first and then decide if you want your children to read it. Be prepared to answer their questions. Dear Debi, My husband and I have been married for 14 years. During those years my husband has back-sliden several times. During those times he was involved in pornography. For the last nine months he has been praying and reading the Word, fellowshipping, leading devotionals with the family, and serving where he was needed at church. We were growing closer together everyday as a couple and as a family. However, two weeks ago, my husband started watching the sports. He had to go to the house of his employer to watch it because we had thrown out our TV. He knew it was dangerous for him to be around it, but his boss gave him an old one so he could watch sports. I argued with him saying that we agreed not to have a TV. I did not feel safe with it in the house, especially since he put the TV out in his shop where no one else is allowed without his permission. I also told him that I could not join myself to him because I didn't know if he was joining himself to the pornography. He says he is not watching pornography, but he spends all his time out there in his shop, and sometimes even sleeps there by himself at night. My question is, am I wrong? Am I as a wife out of line? Is pornography adultery, as I believe it is? My husband says it is not. He says it is nothing personal. It has nothing to do with me. I could go on and go about the pain it causes me, but I will not. Any type of counseling is out for him because he says I am the one with the problem. If you could, please help me. I know you are busy and would understand if you can't. It just helps to know someone else is there with me. I know, one way or another, the Lord will direct me. He alone is faithful and true.
The grieved wife, This publication is dedicated to child training and family. It would seem that a dissertation on pornography should be confined to a different format. But we receive many letters from wives concerned about their husband’s pornographic indulgence. The letters we receive are from homeschooling, no birth control, go to church, ‘put on a good front’ families. Wives want to know how they can train up their children to follow the Lord when their husbands are secretly following porn queens. At one large meeting of several thousand "Christian" men, over 50% of those present confessed to having "used pornography" in the previous seven days. Most ministers avoid ever mentioning this shameful subject. Of those that do, the majority treat it as a "weakness" that Christians should "overcome with counseling." I disagree. We too have avoided addressing the subject because of its sensitiveness. Some of you who live in isolation (thank God that you do) may be offended at my frankness. But you must understand that the life of many families and the souls of their children are at stake. I would want my children to read this article. The degree to which they understand the words would be a general guide as to how much they are ready to consider. I would then discuss it with them, according to their maturity. But you may not. It’s your choice. Just be apprised of the fact that most kids are exposed to some form of pornography by the time they are ten years old. Now I am speaking to you, fathers. If you isolate yourself in a room and indulge in pornography, you are not sick; you are evil. You are having intercourse with a computer, or with the pages of a publication. In effect you are having an erotic experience with the editor—probably another man. While you are fanaticizing with that commercially produced image, know that there are thousands of others engaged in eroticism with the same image, at the same time as you. You are part of a disgusting group of perverts, all piled onto the same image together. And somewhere there is a sexually dysfunctional editor enjoying the extent of his erotic powers. You are not oversexed. You are not even sexed. You are alone. At best you are copulating with yourself. Don’t tell me that you are getting yourself primed for a conclusion with your wife. It is the priming that draws you back again and again, not the conclusion. You are a pervert. A real man is bigger than his member. He is big enough to say no to his passions. A man whose passions are stimulated to the point of being all consuming is not a man of greater prowess. He is a man whose soul has shrunk until his little member is the strongest thing left. God created us with sexual drive, but he also gave us a steering wheel and a brake to direct and control our drives. If you can’t control yours, it is not a statement of the strength of your drive, but of the weakness of your soul. You are wasting away to the level of an alley cat. Adam fell, but you are falling even further. You are plunging your soul into eternal destruction, moving as far away from God as you can get. You are lost and helpless by choice. You do not deserve sympathy or understanding; you deserve condemnation and scorn. You are not a victim; you are a perpetrator. You justify your addiction by pointing to the many who have fallen as you have, but you are condemned by the many who have not fallen, and by the many who were once where you are but have since repented and been restored to normalcy. While you justify yourself, your own conscience condemns you. You sneak around like a thief as you lie and deceive. Your whole life is dedicated to the dragon. Your body is being consumed as your soul is being digested. You are having communion with the devil – bowing in worship of the flesh. You are a disciple of evil. You have chosen to be part of a group that defiles their own flesh, – "that worships and serves the creature more than the Creator, whose god is their belly, whose glory is their shame." (Romans 1:25; Philippians 3:19). Very few ever return from the pit into which you are sinking. You have taken the downhill slide into Hell, and there is absolutely nothing to stop you except your willingness to apply the brakes. The problem is that you are more addicted today than you were one year ago, and you will continue to fade into the shadows of debauchery until you are one with the evil on which you feed. You are on the road of no return and every day you are less likely to reverse your course. The lust you have created is never satisfied. It is an itch with no scratch, only more itch. Pornographic satisfaction is like the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow – always just out of reach. The lust of pornography draws a man ever deeper into the dark tunnel of promise until he discovers he has missed life and love. Pornography destroys your ability to "make love," and replaces it with the cunning wit to use and abuse. There comes a point when any attempt at a normal relationship is nothing more than assisted masturbation. Your world grows ever smaller until you are alone with your semen. You stink of self. You do not deserve a woman. You have nothing to be proud of. You are not a bull. You are a dog. There are millions just like you. Most are not as hypocritical as you are. Some of them hang around bars, nightspots, and porno shops; but take note, you feed on the same diet. Your soul is a receptacle of the same putrefaction. You may yet join them, sharing not only the same books and videos, but also the same dirty motel rooms with their indigenous occupants.
"Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant. But he knoweth not that the dead are there; and that her guests are in the depths of hell." (Proverbs 9:17-18).
So your wife is frigid? Don’t tell me that pornography is a substitute for a good woman. I was not homeschooled and protected. I am fifty-four years old. I preach in state prisons every week and have done so since I was eighteen. I have ministered in coffeehouses and rescue missions and on the street since I was sixteen. You might convince yourself that you are forced to your actions by an unresponsive wife, but I don’t buy it. I have known of porno-freaks that got married to good women, but found that they liked to be alone better than sharing. We have talked to women who are willing and ready, but their husbands prefer their own company. Pornography and a wife are not alternate ways to fulfill the same drive. The drive for a wife is a natural drive, whereas the drive for pornography is a cultivated, perverted passion that has nothing to do with love and marriage. If a pornographer were to marry a porno queen, he would quickly become dissatisfied with her and crawl back in his little hole, alone with his imaginations and the images created by an industry that makes its money not by satisfying its customers, but by keeping them dissatisfied and hungry for the artificial. Your secret world is revolting to real men who know how to love one woman and dedicate the rest of their energies to creative living. But the most destructive thing about your sin is the effect in has on your children. We live in a spirit world of both righteous and fallen angels. We are surrounded by evil spirits seeking the moral destruction of every human soul. The children of godly parents are protected from unclean spirits by being under their moral umbrella. But when a father gives his mind over to wicked lusts, he removes the hedge of protection around his family and invites impure devils into his home. Wishing them away will avail nothing. Any prayers you pray for their safety are negated the moment you open the pages of a pornographic book or glare at an electronic image. When you tune in to electronic pornography you have established a two-way link with the spiritual underworld. When you lie in bed at night and conjure up wicked images, the devils won’t stop with your mind; they will gleefully rush into the bedrooms of your children and assault their little souls and bodies. Evil thoughts will come to their minds – thoughts you have been thinking that are telegraphed to them by the devils. Your defenseless children will be taken captive, and you are the one that threw the gate open to the enemy. If sodomy is sin, pornography is its "significant other." If the Bible be true when it says that those who commit fornication (Greek porniah, the root of our English word pornography) "shall not inherit the kingdom of God" (Galatians 5:19-21), then the future of any and all pornography users is the suffering of eternal damnation. And in Ephesians 5:6, again speaking of fornication (porniah/pornography), he says, "Let no man deceive you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience." If you think you can indulge in pornography and still be a Christian, you are blindly hoping against the clear statements of Scripture. Disciples of Christ read their Bibles, not the dirty books of Sodomites and lesbians. Every time you retreat into your world of lust, you shut the door in God’s face. You are dangling your soul and the souls of your children over the fires of eternal damnation. I have not been as hard on you as God will be in the day of judgment. You have only one hope, and that is to repent toward God. I did not tell you to repent of your sin of pornography, because as an unregenerate man you will not find the power to forsake your first love. You must repent toward God. This you can do while still in the slavery of your sin. To repent toward God is to prefer God and his righteousness above everything else. It is to desire his holiness in your life – to hate the sin that binds you. Make no mistake. The man that repents toward God is a desperate man, a man that longs for the holiness God will bring into his life. The man that repents toward God will experience restless nights and skipped meals in his search for God. A man that repents toward God will find no pleasure or peace in anything until he can rest in God alone. It will not do for you to walk down an aisle and pray a sinner’s prayer. It will not be sufficient for you to ask for prayer, or to confess your sins, or go to counseling. You must go directly to God through the Lord Jesus Christ with no hope and no confidence but the mercy and grace of God. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God, but it is a blessed thing to stay there until you are forgiven, and cleansed, and then empowered to walk in holiness. The dragon can be killed by Christ alone. Whom Christ makes free he shall be free indeed. I have seen God save and deliver lesbians, Sodomites, and porno freaks as easily as he saves children. Christ is sufficient. I have done you a service by increasing your guilt, by bringing the law down on you like it will in the day of judgment. Your conscience will not be satisfied by anything less than your exposure and punishment. The good news is that Jesus Christ took upon himself the shame of your sin. God laid on him your iniquity. God made Jesus to be sin in your place. He was treated as if he was the pornographer, the guilty sinner. He died the death you should die. Your sin has been paid for in the sufferings of Christ. If you repent toward God, God will forget your sin as if it had never happened. He will put away your sin and remember it no more. He will remove the guilt and free you from sin’s power. It will take years for the temptations to go away. The devils will return every day and night to offer you the opportunity to rehearse the sin you have laid down, but God will deliver you from yielding to the pull of temptation. The gospel of Jesus Christ is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth. He is able to save to the uttermost those that come unto God by him. The next move is yours. Are you so far gone that before the week is out you will return to that dirty place, or will you repent toward God and see your perversion come to an end? I wrote this for one reason – to see some children saved when daddy repents toward God. It’s your move. Your children, your wife, and your God are waiting. To the Wives of Porno-Freaks I recognize that some wives whose husband’s are porno-addicts will read the above article and feel extremely frustrated, helpless, and perhaps angry. You may be well aware of your duties as a wife, but you are so disgusted with your husband for his despicable behavior that you find it extremely difficult to honor him. How do you reverence someone who is risking the souls of your children? How do you joyfully participate in your nuptial duties when you know that you are simply a receptacle for the eroticism stirred up by his vice? I have to admit that it stretches the limits of my faith to tell you that your duty remains the same. You must honor the office, even when it is commandeered by a wicked man. Understand that you are part of a chain of command. God is at the top, then Jesus, after that the husband, then the wife, and finally the children. Children are not given the option of deciding if their parents are worthy of their honor. When a child obeys his parents, he is obeying God. Likewise, when a wife obeys and honors her husband, she is obeying and honoring God. If your husband misuses his office, God is the one responsible to discipline him. You can honor God by honoring the scoundrel God has permitted to be your head. The Bible is clear: If you are married to an unbeliever, you are not to leave him and you are not to turn down his intimate advances. If circumstances are so intolerable, say in the case of violence toward you or the children, or sexual abuse toward your children, if you must leave your husband, you are commanded to remain unmarried as long as he lives, or be reconciled to him.
1 Corinthians 7:3-5, 10-14 3 Let the husband render unto the wife due benevolence: and likewise also the wife unto the husband. 4 The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband: and likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body, but the wife. [You cannot say no to his advances, except in the case of attempted Sodomy or some other deviant and degrading perversion.] 5 Defraud ye not one the other, [don’t hold out on him] except it be with consent for a time, that ye may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again, that Satan tempt you not for your incontinency. 10 And unto the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord, Let not the wife depart from her husband: 11 But and if she depart, let her remain unmarried, or be reconciled to her husband: and let not the husband put away his wife. 12 But to the rest speak I, not the Lord: If any brother hath a wife that believeth not, and she be pleased to dwell with him, let him not put her away. 13 And the woman which hath an husband that believeth not, and if he be pleased to dwell with her, let her not leave him. 14 For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband: else were your children unclean; but now are they holy. [The presence of one saved parent is sufficient to set the children apart unto salvation.]
If your situation is intolerable, commit it to God. I am talking a miracle. Appoint a time to get alone with God and formally turn the situation over to him. Take your hands off of it and allow God full latitude to take charge. You must be willing to endure humiliation and to remain patient indefinitely. You must be willing for God to terminate your husband’s job and destroy him financially. You must be willing for him to go to jail. You must be willing to see him – the whole family – suffer humiliation. You must be willing to see your husband come down with a terrible disease. Finally, you must be willing for God to kill your husband if he will not repent. I am not suggesting that God will do any of the above, but when you place it in his hands, you must trust his decisions. God loves to be trusted. He will come to your aid if you will take your hands off of the situation. You can wrestle with it for years and never get any relief, but once you learn your lessons in faith and trust, God can work the miracle of deliverance. If your husband is sexually abusing the children, or if he is bone-breaking violent, take it to the church. If he does not immediately repent and come under discipline, call the law and have him arrested. Whining promises followed by promises and broken promises and more promises is not acceptable. After being confronted for sexually abusing the children, if your husband does not repent in sackcloth and ashes, to never do it again, turn him over to the authorities. Testify against him, and when he gets three to twenty years in the pen, go to visit him and faithfully wait for him to get out. God can and will work to defend you and the children if you will truly commit it all to him and perform your duties cheerfully. It is fine for you to confront your husband concerning his pornography and let him know that you are praying for his salvation. It would be proper for you to burn any books that you find lying around the house where a child could possibly access them. If the older children are aware of your husband’s pornographic indulgence, make them aware of two things. First, that your heart goes out to your husband, that you love and honor him, and that you are kindly concerned for the salvation of his soul. Second, that you are grieved that he is going to hell for the lack of Christ in his life. Let them know that you pray for his salvation and are ashamed of his sin. Make it clear that his actions are of Satan and will bring damnation. Do this without bitterness or anger. The great pitfall for a woman is becoming self-righteous and using this situation to dominate the relationship spiritually. Wives are inclined to dominate their husbands in the best of circumstances. Many women love to claim the higher moral ground. They have always been rebels at heart and resent any authority over them. That their husband is unworthy to be a leader is absolutely satisfying to these women. They will resort to nagging and parcel out their intimate favors as a way of controlling his behavior. Sure, they will represent themselves as promoting the interests of God and righteousness, but it is the seat of control that they covet. Cantankerous wives can provoke their husbands to all kinds of anger and bitterness. Wives that do not enjoy the intimate relationship will leave their husbands open to temptation. But let me be clear, a lousy wife – a lousy sex partner – is not responsible for a husband turning to pornography. You do not have to carry that guilt. Just make sure you are not guilty of pride and bitterness. That combination can damn the children just as surely as pornography. When you have a pornographic husband and a dominant wife, you have a vicious, endless cycle. It will certainly end in divorce. And even worse, the children will magnify the fruit of bitterness. Children will be hurt by a pornographic father, but they will become bitter by a nagging, domineering, condemning mother. Someone must repent and do his or her duty regardless of the spouse. Finally, there is hope. Put it in God’s hands and wait patiently. Others have seen the victory. You can too. And when you have responded to your wicked husband in kindness and love, when you have made yourself available, when you have honored the dishonorable, and your husband repents to God and gets saved and delivered, and you end up with a wonderful marriage and children faithful to God, you will be my hero.]]> 1200X800-Pornography---Road-to-Hell-

WARNING This article contains information targeting married couples and mature teenagers. You should read it first and then decide if you want your children to read it. Be prepared to answer their questions. Dear Debi, My husband and I have been married for 14 years. During those years my husband has back-sliden several times. During those times he was involved in pornography. For the last nine months he has been praying and reading the Word, fellowshipping, leading devotionals with the family, and serving where he was needed at church. We were growing closer together everyday as a couple and as a family. However, two weeks ago, my husband started watching the sports. He had to go to the house of his employer to watch it because we had thrown out our TV. He knew it was dangerous for him to be around it, but his boss gave him an old one so he could watch sports. I argued with him saying that we agreed not to have a TV. I did not feel safe with it in the house, especially since he put the TV out in his shop where no one else is allowed without his permission. I also told him that I could not join myself to him because I didn't know if he was joining himself to the pornography. He says he is not watching pornography, but he spends all his time out there in his shop, and sometimes even sleeps there by himself at night. My question is, am I wrong? Am I as a wife out of line? Is pornography adultery, as I believe it is? My husband says it is not. He says it is nothing personal. It has nothing to do with me. I could go on and go about the pain it causes me, but I will not. Any type of counseling is out for him because he says I am the one with the problem. If you could, please help me. I know you are busy and would understand if you can't. It just helps to know someone else is there with me. I know, one way or another, the Lord will direct me. He alone is faithful and true.
The grieved wife, This publication is dedicated to child training and family. It would seem that a dissertation on pornography should be confined to a different format. But we receive many letters from wives concerned about their husband’s pornographic indulgence. The letters we receive are from homeschooling, no birth control, go to church, ‘put on a good front’ families. Wives want to know how they can train up their children to follow the Lord when their husbands are secretly following porn queens. At one large meeting of several thousand "Christian" men, over 50% of those present confessed to having "used pornography" in the previous seven days. Most ministers avoid ever mentioning this shameful subject. Of those that do, the majority treat it as a "weakness" that Christians should "overcome with counseling." I disagree. We too have avoided addressing the subject because of its sensitiveness. Some of you who live in isolation (thank God that you do) may be offended at my frankness. But you must understand that the life of many families and the souls of their children are at stake. I would want my children to read this article. The degree to which they understand the words would be a general guide as to how much they are ready to consider. I would then discuss it with them, according to their maturity. But you may not. It’s your choice. Just be apprised of the fact that most kids are exposed to some form of pornography by the time they are ten years old. Now I am speaking to you, fathers. If you isolate yourself in a room and indulge in pornography, you are not sick; you are evil. You are having intercourse with a computer, or with the pages of a publication. In effect you are having an erotic experience with the editor—probably another man. While you are fanaticizing with that commercially produced image, know that there are thousands of others engaged in eroticism with the same image, at the same time as you. You are part of a disgusting group of perverts, all piled onto the same image together. And somewhere there is a sexually dysfunctional editor enjoying the extent of his erotic powers. You are not oversexed. You are not even sexed. You are alone. At best you are copulating with yourself. Don’t tell me that you are getting yourself primed for a conclusion with your wife. It is the priming that draws you back again and again, not the conclusion. You are a pervert. A real man is bigger than his member. He is big enough to say no to his passions. A man whose passions are stimulated to the point of being all consuming is not a man of greater prowess. He is a man whose soul has shrunk until his little member is the strongest thing left. God created us with sexual drive, but he also gave us a steering wheel and a brake to direct and control our drives. If you can’t control yours, it is not a statement of the strength of your drive, but of the weakness of your soul. You are wasting away to the level of an alley cat. Adam fell, but you are falling even further. You are plunging your soul into eternal destruction, moving as far away from God as you can get. You are lost and helpless by choice. You do not deserve sympathy or understanding; you deserve condemnation and scorn. You are not a victim; you are a perpetrator. You justify your addiction by pointing to the many who have fallen as you have, but you are condemned by the many who have not fallen, and by the many who were once where you are but have since repented and been restored to normalcy. While you justify yourself, your own conscience condemns you. You sneak around like a thief as you lie and deceive. Your whole life is dedicated to the dragon. Your body is being consumed as your soul is being digested. You are having communion with the devil – bowing in worship of the flesh. You are a disciple of evil. You have chosen to be part of a group that defiles their own flesh, – "that worships and serves the creature more than the Creator, whose god is their belly, whose glory is their shame." (Romans 1:25; Philippians 3:19). Very few ever return from the pit into which you are sinking. You have taken the downhill slide into Hell, and there is absolutely nothing to stop you except your willingness to apply the brakes. The problem is that you are more addicted today than you were one year ago, and you will continue to fade into the shadows of debauchery until you are one with the evil on which you feed. You are on the road of no return and every day you are less likely to reverse your course. The lust you have created is never satisfied. It is an itch with no scratch, only more itch. Pornographic satisfaction is like the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow – always just out of reach. The lust of pornography draws a man ever deeper into the dark tunnel of promise until he discovers he has missed life and love. Pornography destroys your ability to "make love," and replaces it with the cunning wit to use and abuse. There comes a point when any attempt at a normal relationship is nothing more than assisted masturbation. Your world grows ever smaller until you are alone with your semen. You stink of self. You do not deserve a woman. You have nothing to be proud of. You are not a bull. You are a dog. There are millions just like you. Most are not as hypocritical as you are. Some of them hang around bars, nightspots, and porno shops; but take note, you feed on the same diet. Your soul is a receptacle of the same putrefaction. You may yet join them, sharing not only the same books and videos, but also the same dirty motel rooms with their indigenous occupants.
"Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant. But he knoweth not that the dead are there; and that her guests are in the depths of hell." (Proverbs 9:17-18).
So your wife is frigid? Don’t tell me that pornography is a substitute for a good woman. I was not homeschooled and protected. I am fifty-four years old. I preach in state prisons every week and have done so since I was eighteen. I have ministered in coffeehouses and rescue missions and on the street since I was sixteen. You might convince yourself that you are forced to your actions by an unresponsive wife, but I don’t buy it. I have known of porno-freaks that got married to good women, but found that they liked to be alone better than sharing. We have talked to women who are willing and ready, but their husbands prefer their own company. Pornography and a wife are not alternate ways to fulfill the same drive. The drive for a wife is a natural drive, whereas the drive for pornography is a cultivated, perverted passion that has nothing to do with love and marriage. If a pornographer were to marry a porno queen, he would quickly become dissatisfied with her and crawl back in his little hole, alone with his imaginations and the images created by an industry that makes its money not by satisfying its customers, but by keeping them dissatisfied and hungry for the artificial. Your secret world is revolting to real men who know how to love one woman and dedicate the rest of their energies to creative living. But the most destructive thing about your sin is the effect in has on your children. We live in a spirit world of both righteous and fallen angels. We are surrounded by evil spirits seeking the moral destruction of every human soul. The children of godly parents are protected from unclean spirits by being under their moral umbrella. But when a father gives his mind over to wicked lusts, he removes the hedge of protection around his family and invites impure devils into his home. Wishing them away will avail nothing. Any prayers you pray for their safety are negated the moment you open the pages of a pornographic book or glare at an electronic image. When you tune in to electronic pornography you have established a two-way link with the spiritual underworld. When you lie in bed at night and conjure up wicked images, the devils won’t stop with your mind; they will gleefully rush into the bedrooms of your children and assault their little souls and bodies. Evil thoughts will come to their minds – thoughts you have been thinking that are telegraphed to them by the devils. Your defenseless children will be taken captive, and you are the one that threw the gate open to the enemy. If sodomy is sin, pornography is its "significant other." If the Bible be true when it says that those who commit fornication (Greek porniah, the root of our English word pornography) "shall not inherit the kingdom of God" (Galatians 5:19-21), then the future of any and all pornography users is the suffering of eternal damnation. And in Ephesians 5:6, again speaking of fornication (porniah/pornography), he says, "Let no man deceive you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience." If you think you can indulge in pornography and still be a Christian, you are blindly hoping against the clear statements of Scripture. Disciples of Christ read their Bibles, not the dirty books of Sodomites and lesbians. Every time you retreat into your world of lust, you shut the door in God’s face. You are dangling your soul and the souls of your children over the fires of eternal damnation. I have not been as hard on you as God will be in the day of judgment. You have only one hope, and that is to repent toward God. I did not tell you to repent of your sin of pornography, because as an unregenerate man you will not find the power to forsake your first love. You must repent toward God. This you can do while still in the slavery of your sin. To repent toward God is to prefer God and his righteousness above everything else. It is to desire his holiness in your life – to hate the sin that binds you. Make no mistake. The man that repents toward God is a desperate man, a man that longs for the holiness God will bring into his life. The man that repents toward God will experience restless nights and skipped meals in his search for God. A man that repents toward God will find no pleasure or peace in anything until he can rest in God alone. It will not do for you to walk down an aisle and pray a sinner’s prayer. It will not be sufficient for you to ask for prayer, or to confess your sins, or go to counseling. You must go directly to God through the Lord Jesus Christ with no hope and no confidence but the mercy and grace of God. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God, but it is a blessed thing to stay there until you are forgiven, and cleansed, and then empowered to walk in holiness. The dragon can be killed by Christ alone. Whom Christ makes free he shall be free indeed. I have seen God save and deliver lesbians, Sodomites, and porno freaks as easily as he saves children. Christ is sufficient. I have done you a service by increasing your guilt, by bringing the law down on you like it will in the day of judgment. Your conscience will not be satisfied by anything less than your exposure and punishment. The good news is that Jesus Christ took upon himself the shame of your sin. God laid on him your iniquity. God made Jesus to be sin in your place. He was treated as if he was the pornographer, the guilty sinner. He died the death you should die. Your sin has been paid for in the sufferings of Christ. If you repent toward God, God will forget your sin as if it had never happened. He will put away your sin and remember it no more. He will remove the guilt and free you from sin’s power. It will take years for the temptations to go away. The devils will return every day and night to offer you the opportunity to rehearse the sin you have laid down, but God will deliver you from yielding to the pull of temptation. The gospel of Jesus Christ is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth. He is able to save to the uttermost those that come unto God by him. The next move is yours. Are you so far gone that before the week is out you will return to that dirty place, or will you repent toward God and see your perversion come to an end? I wrote this for one reason – to see some children saved when daddy repents toward God. It’s your move. Your children, your wife, and your God are waiting. To the Wives of Porno-Freaks I recognize that some wives whose husband’s are porno-addicts will read the above article and feel extremely frustrated, helpless, and perhaps angry. You may be well aware of your duties as a wife, but you are so disgusted with your husband for his despicable behavior that you find it extremely difficult to honor him. How do you reverence someone who is risking the souls of your children? How do you joyfully participate in your nuptial duties when you know that you are simply a receptacle for the eroticism stirred up by his vice? I have to admit that it stretches the limits of my faith to tell you that your duty remains the same. You must honor the office, even when it is commandeered by a wicked man. Understand that you are part of a chain of command. God is at the top, then Jesus, after that the husband, then the wife, and finally the children. Children are not given the option of deciding if their parents are worthy of their honor. When a child obeys his parents, he is obeying God. Likewise, when a wife obeys and honors her husband, she is obeying and honoring God. If your husband misuses his office, God is the one responsible to discipline him. You can honor God by honoring the scoundrel God has permitted to be your head. The Bible is clear: If you are married to an unbeliever, you are not to leave him and you are not to turn down his intimate advances. If circumstances are so intolerable, say in the case of violence toward you or the children, or sexual abuse toward your children, if you must leave your husband, you are commanded to remain unmarried as long as he lives, or be reconciled to him.
1 Corinthians 7:3-5, 10-14 3 Let the husband render unto the wife due benevolence: and likewise also the wife unto the husband. 4 The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband: and likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body, but the wife. [You cannot say no to his advances, except in the case of attempted Sodomy or some other deviant and degrading perversion.] 5 Defraud ye not one the other, [don’t hold out on him] except it be with consent for a time, that ye may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again, that Satan tempt you not for your incontinency. 10 And unto the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord, Let not the wife depart from her husband: 11 But and if she depart, let her remain unmarried, or be reconciled to her husband: and let not the husband put away his wife. 12 But to the rest speak I, not the Lord: If any brother hath a wife that believeth not, and she be pleased to dwell with him, let him not put her away. 13 And the woman which hath an husband that believeth not, and if he be pleased to dwell with her, let her not leave him. 14 For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband: else were your children unclean; but now are they holy. [The presence of one saved parent is sufficient to set the children apart unto salvation.]
If your situation is intolerable, commit it to God. I am talking a miracle. Appoint a time to get alone with God and formally turn the situation over to him. Take your hands off of it and allow God full latitude to take charge. You must be willing to endure humiliation and to remain patient indefinitely. You must be willing for God to terminate your husband’s job and destroy him financially. You must be willing for him to go to jail. You must be willing to see him – the whole family – suffer humiliation. You must be willing to see your husband come down with a terrible disease. Finally, you must be willing for God to kill your husband if he will not repent. I am not suggesting that God will do any of the above, but when you place it in his hands, you must trust his decisions. God loves to be trusted. He will come to your aid if you will take your hands off of the situation. You can wrestle with it for years and never get any relief, but once you learn your lessons in faith and trust, God can work the miracle of deliverance. If your husband is sexually abusing the children, or if he is bone-breaking violent, take it to the church. If he does not immediately repent and come under discipline, call the law and have him arrested. Whining promises followed by promises and broken promises and more promises is not acceptable. After being confronted for sexually abusing the children, if your husband does not repent in sackcloth and ashes, to never do it again, turn him over to the authorities. Testify against him, and when he gets three to twenty years in the pen, go to visit him and faithfully wait for him to get out. God can and will work to defend you and the children if you will truly commit it all to him and perform your duties cheerfully. It is fine for you to confront your husband concerning his pornography and let him know that you are praying for his salvation. It would be proper for you to burn any books that you find lying around the house where a child could possibly access them. If the older children are aware of your husband’s pornographic indulgence, make them aware of two things. First, that your heart goes out to your husband, that you love and honor him, and that you are kindly concerned for the salvation of his soul. Second, that you are grieved that he is going to hell for the lack of Christ in his life. Let them know that you pray for his salvation and are ashamed of his sin. Make it clear that his actions are of Satan and will bring damnation. Do this without bitterness or anger. The great pitfall for a woman is becoming self-righteous and using this situation to dominate the relationship spiritually. Wives are inclined to dominate their husbands in the best of circumstances. Many women love to claim the higher moral ground. They have always been rebels at heart and resent any authority over them. That their husband is unworthy to be a leader is absolutely satisfying to these women. They will resort to nagging and parcel out their intimate favors as a way of controlling his behavior. Sure, they will represent themselves as promoting the interests of God and righteousness, but it is the seat of control that they covet. Cantankerous wives can provoke their husbands to all kinds of anger and bitterness. Wives that do not enjoy the intimate relationship will leave their husbands open to temptation. But let me be clear, a lousy wife – a lousy sex partner – is not responsible for a husband turning to pornography. You do not have to carry that guilt. Just make sure you are not guilty of pride and bitterness. That combination can damn the children just as surely as pornography. When you have a pornographic husband and a dominant wife, you have a vicious, endless cycle. It will certainly end in divorce. And even worse, the children will magnify the fruit of bitterness. Children will be hurt by a pornographic father, but they will become bitter by a nagging, domineering, condemning mother. Someone must repent and do his or her duty regardless of the spouse. Finally, there is hope. Put it in God’s hands and wait patiently. Others have seen the victory. You can too. And when you have responded to your wicked husband in kindness and love, when you have made yourself available, when you have honored the dishonorable, and your husband repents to God and gets saved and delivered, and you end up with a wonderful marriage and children faithful to God, you will be my hero.]]> http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/pornography-road-to-hell/feed/ 28 Broken Circles http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/broken-circles/ http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/broken-circles/#comments Sun, 15 Mar 1998 12:10:01 +0000 Michael Pearl http://nogreaterjoy.org/?p=3531 1200X800-Broken-Circles

The names and some details have been changed to protect the guilty, but the events are true. Ruth is five years old. Her mother just recently left her daddy because he drinks too much. The home life was not good, but it wasn’t all bad. It was a small circle that included a warm house, a mama and a daddy, some siblings, and a sense of security. The older siblings were doing well in school, and even though mama and daddy yelled a lot, it was still home. Now little Ruth lives in an apartment with her mommy, although she spends at least three nights a week at home with Daddy. Mommy said she didn’t want Daddy to mess them up, so she left him, but she’s lonesome and needs to go out, so she asks Daddy to keep the kids more all the time. If someone asked little Ruth where she lives she would look confused, stare off into space, and finally answer, “With mommy at the apartment.” Now her life revolves in two part circles. She has two places to live, she has two authorities, which often disagree, but she no longer has a sense of security—that has been replaced with fear. Mommy now has a friend. He lives at the apartment with them. He is a strange man and Ruth is uncomfortable around him. She doesn’t understand why, but in her tiny, broken circle she no longer feels at home. Mommy had a date and a babysitter came. Mommy didn’t come home until real late and Ruth did not wake up for school. Daddy called, but older brother was afraid to tell him why they weren’t at school. The next day all the kids went to stay at Daddy’s house. The house is different now. Less furniture, messy, it smells funny, but it’s more familiar than the apartment, so it’s better. Daddy’s friends came over. Mommy doesn’t like Daddy’s friends. They drink a lot, and one friend wants to hold Ruth, and she is afraid. So much fear, so much uncertainty, so much turmoil. Children are so flexible; they can take so much and still do just fine. That’s what I’ve always heard from parents who bend their children a lot. When Grandma called she could tell something was wrong, and she told Ruth, “Get outside on the porch with the other kids, I’m coming right now.” Ruth feels better. Grandma’s house was once a place to visit and eat candy, but now it is another partial circle, a safe partial circle, warmly secure with Grandma and Papa, the same house with the same stuff in it. And Grandma is always the same. There’s no fear there, but it is not Ruth’s house, only another partial circle in her ever widening flow of circles—now that the real circle is broken. Ruth is learning to use her circles. If she doesn’t like doing something she can just cry and say she wants Daddy. If Daddy will not let her have something, she can just beg to go stay with Mommy. If she has to go to school when she doesn’t want to, she can be sick and ask for Grandma. Ruth has learned that where there is more than one circle there is really no circle at all. No authority, no security, the only absolute is what Ruth wants. Ruth has no one to protect her from herself, from her own lusts. Grandma can be a loving grandparent protecting her from the bad guy at Daddy’s house. Daddy can make her feel happy. Mommy can love her, but the authority has been given into her tiny hands by default. When Ruth was a little girl Grandma's house was a place of security, but now that Ruth is thirteen years old, it is just a dull, boring, old place. Candy bars and TV no longer satisfy her appetite. Her flesh has grown, and with it has grown the habit of getting what she wants. Over the years she has learned how to cover her tracks when she wants the freedom to have some fun. She tells Dad, “I’m at Grandma's,” and tells Mom, “I’m spending the weekend at Dad’s.” She tells Grandma, “Dad said I could stay over with friend Marsha.” The tight circle that God placed her in to protect and guard her was removed by Mommy’s and Daddy’s sin. Ruth has been left uncovered. Some parents rip that covering off their children, not by divorce, but by disagreement in policy. A mother will whisper to her daughter, “You can go, but don’t you dare tell Dad you did.” That daughter has lost her covering for all times and all occasions. Mother has taken it from Daddy as well as from herself. Some Daddy’s give it away. Daughter begs, gets angry, yells, pleads, and Daddy finally yells, “Just get out of here, I don’t care what you do, just give me some peace.” Daughter learned this from Mama. Then some daddies just pretend they don’t notice, after all Daddy’s little girl has always done real well. Daddy wants to be the sweetheart. He gives his girls complete freedom so “they’ll know I trust them.” Poor little girls grow up doing “what is right in their own eyes.” Little girls and boys need a complete, secure circle to grow up to be well adjusted. God designed that the man should be strong and wise as the head of his wife. A girl, having spent her entire youth growing up with a daddy that watched over and protected her in her day-to-day activities, will be ready to assume her role as a wife that will bring honor to God and her husband. So many little girls are growing up today without that circle of protection and authority. They grow up with fears and insecurities on top of the rebellion and fleshly indulgence. When they enter marriage they don’t know how to be submissive, confident wives because they never were submissive, confident little girls to their Daddies. The only way they can find fulfillment is by “doing what’s right in their own eyes.” A great majority of women are depressed, discouraged, angry, and totally out of control in their flesh. They live in some kind of a silly fantasyland. To make matters worse, their husbands are selfish, defeated sissies. Soul sickness is at epidemic proportions. Divorce is a terrible crime against all. And not only divorce, but also the spirit of defiance, of “getting my rights,” is quickly destroying any hope of happiness. Many women will read this and say, “I knew I was doomed from the start, so why try, it is my parents’ fault.” It is true your parents did fail you, but now you stand before God to give an answer for your own sin. It’s no good crying over spilled milk. It’s time to get a cloth and clean up the mess, being careful not to create any more spills. Are you content to continue passing this burden down to your children? Each person stands before God either to obey or to dishonor. Because of your up-bringing you might have a propensity to be selfish, get angry, or to manipulate your surroundings, but it is ultimately your choice to obey God or not. As you seek God and seek to obey his Word you will begin to mature in the way God meant for you to mature while you were growing up. When God says in his Word for the woman to reverence her husband it will not seem like an archaic translation. When the Scripture says, Sara called her husband lord, it will not appear sacrilegious. So, mama, are you unhappy with that selfish, “no-good” husband of yours? God has made a way, and His way is still your only way to raise your little girls to be an honorable little mama. The way to raise obedient, serving little girls is by example. How you treat Daddy will in a great degree decide how they will respond to authority and ultimately to God. You can’t change Daddy, but you can change your side of the world. Do you treat your husband with affection, but little honor or respect? Do you slip behind his back to go shopping, or waste your days reading romance novels? When you dishonor him, you dishonor God. He knows it, you know it, and your children know it. You limit God’s blessing in your life. The slide is down hill. Every child is selfish and will get more selfish. As parents we need to seek to obey God against all odds; that’s what sanctification is all about. Our job as mothers starts with being good wives. Your role as mother will go no further than how you fulfill your role as wife. When parents break their own circle, they break their children’s circle as well. Neither broken marriages nor broken relationships produce whole children. Even when all goes well our children will not be perfect. They will have their own hurts and weaknesses to overcome. But they don’t need to start life handicapped by dragging along the added burden of the sins of their parents. Life will throw enough mud at the children without them leaving home carrying a load provided by parents. There is still an abundance of grace and love to be poured on those who will repent toward God. When you lay yourself on God’s altar, your children reap the blessings of the sacrifice. When we flush the garbage out of our own lives, our children experience the cleansing.]]> 1200X800-Broken-Circles

The names and some details have been changed to protect the guilty, but the events are true. Ruth is five years old. Her mother just recently left her daddy because he drinks too much. The home life was not good, but it wasn’t all bad. It was a small circle that included a warm house, a mama and a daddy, some siblings, and a sense of security. The older siblings were doing well in school, and even though mama and daddy yelled a lot, it was still home. Now little Ruth lives in an apartment with her mommy, although she spends at least three nights a week at home with Daddy. Mommy said she didn’t want Daddy to mess them up, so she left him, but she’s lonesome and needs to go out, so she asks Daddy to keep the kids more all the time. If someone asked little Ruth where she lives she would look confused, stare off into space, and finally answer, “With mommy at the apartment.” Now her life revolves in two part circles. She has two places to live, she has two authorities, which often disagree, but she no longer has a sense of security—that has been replaced with fear. Mommy now has a friend. He lives at the apartment with them. He is a strange man and Ruth is uncomfortable around him. She doesn’t understand why, but in her tiny, broken circle she no longer feels at home. Mommy had a date and a babysitter came. Mommy didn’t come home until real late and Ruth did not wake up for school. Daddy called, but older brother was afraid to tell him why they weren’t at school. The next day all the kids went to stay at Daddy’s house. The house is different now. Less furniture, messy, it smells funny, but it’s more familiar than the apartment, so it’s better. Daddy’s friends came over. Mommy doesn’t like Daddy’s friends. They drink a lot, and one friend wants to hold Ruth, and she is afraid. So much fear, so much uncertainty, so much turmoil. Children are so flexible; they can take so much and still do just fine. That’s what I’ve always heard from parents who bend their children a lot. When Grandma called she could tell something was wrong, and she told Ruth, “Get outside on the porch with the other kids, I’m coming right now.” Ruth feels better. Grandma’s house was once a place to visit and eat candy, but now it is another partial circle, a safe partial circle, warmly secure with Grandma and Papa, the same house with the same stuff in it. And Grandma is always the same. There’s no fear there, but it is not Ruth’s house, only another partial circle in her ever widening flow of circles—now that the real circle is broken. Ruth is learning to use her circles. If she doesn’t like doing something she can just cry and say she wants Daddy. If Daddy will not let her have something, she can just beg to go stay with Mommy. If she has to go to school when she doesn’t want to, she can be sick and ask for Grandma. Ruth has learned that where there is more than one circle there is really no circle at all. No authority, no security, the only absolute is what Ruth wants. Ruth has no one to protect her from herself, from her own lusts. Grandma can be a loving grandparent protecting her from the bad guy at Daddy’s house. Daddy can make her feel happy. Mommy can love her, but the authority has been given into her tiny hands by default. When Ruth was a little girl Grandma's house was a place of security, but now that Ruth is thirteen years old, it is just a dull, boring, old place. Candy bars and TV no longer satisfy her appetite. Her flesh has grown, and with it has grown the habit of getting what she wants. Over the years she has learned how to cover her tracks when she wants the freedom to have some fun. She tells Dad, “I’m at Grandma's,” and tells Mom, “I’m spending the weekend at Dad’s.” She tells Grandma, “Dad said I could stay over with friend Marsha.” The tight circle that God placed her in to protect and guard her was removed by Mommy’s and Daddy’s sin. Ruth has been left uncovered. Some parents rip that covering off their children, not by divorce, but by disagreement in policy. A mother will whisper to her daughter, “You can go, but don’t you dare tell Dad you did.” That daughter has lost her covering for all times and all occasions. Mother has taken it from Daddy as well as from herself. Some Daddy’s give it away. Daughter begs, gets angry, yells, pleads, and Daddy finally yells, “Just get out of here, I don’t care what you do, just give me some peace.” Daughter learned this from Mama. Then some daddies just pretend they don’t notice, after all Daddy’s little girl has always done real well. Daddy wants to be the sweetheart. He gives his girls complete freedom so “they’ll know I trust them.” Poor little girls grow up doing “what is right in their own eyes.” Little girls and boys need a complete, secure circle to grow up to be well adjusted. God designed that the man should be strong and wise as the head of his wife. A girl, having spent her entire youth growing up with a daddy that watched over and protected her in her day-to-day activities, will be ready to assume her role as a wife that will bring honor to God and her husband. So many little girls are growing up today without that circle of protection and authority. They grow up with fears and insecurities on top of the rebellion and fleshly indulgence. When they enter marriage they don’t know how to be submissive, confident wives because they never were submissive, confident little girls to their Daddies. The only way they can find fulfillment is by “doing what’s right in their own eyes.” A great majority of women are depressed, discouraged, angry, and totally out of control in their flesh. They live in some kind of a silly fantasyland. To make matters worse, their husbands are selfish, defeated sissies. Soul sickness is at epidemic proportions. Divorce is a terrible crime against all. And not only divorce, but also the spirit of defiance, of “getting my rights,” is quickly destroying any hope of happiness. Many women will read this and say, “I knew I was doomed from the start, so why try, it is my parents’ fault.” It is true your parents did fail you, but now you stand before God to give an answer for your own sin. It’s no good crying over spilled milk. It’s time to get a cloth and clean up the mess, being careful not to create any more spills. Are you content to continue passing this burden down to your children? Each person stands before God either to obey or to dishonor. Because of your up-bringing you might have a propensity to be selfish, get angry, or to manipulate your surroundings, but it is ultimately your choice to obey God or not. As you seek God and seek to obey his Word you will begin to mature in the way God meant for you to mature while you were growing up. When God says in his Word for the woman to reverence her husband it will not seem like an archaic translation. When the Scripture says, Sara called her husband lord, it will not appear sacrilegious. So, mama, are you unhappy with that selfish, “no-good” husband of yours? God has made a way, and His way is still your only way to raise your little girls to be an honorable little mama. The way to raise obedient, serving little girls is by example. How you treat Daddy will in a great degree decide how they will respond to authority and ultimately to God. You can’t change Daddy, but you can change your side of the world. Do you treat your husband with affection, but little honor or respect? Do you slip behind his back to go shopping, or waste your days reading romance novels? When you dishonor him, you dishonor God. He knows it, you know it, and your children know it. You limit God’s blessing in your life. The slide is down hill. Every child is selfish and will get more selfish. As parents we need to seek to obey God against all odds; that’s what sanctification is all about. Our job as mothers starts with being good wives. Your role as mother will go no further than how you fulfill your role as wife. When parents break their own circle, they break their children’s circle as well. Neither broken marriages nor broken relationships produce whole children. Even when all goes well our children will not be perfect. They will have their own hurts and weaknesses to overcome. But they don’t need to start life handicapped by dragging along the added burden of the sins of their parents. Life will throw enough mud at the children without them leaving home carrying a load provided by parents. There is still an abundance of grace and love to be poured on those who will repent toward God. When you lay yourself on God’s altar, your children reap the blessings of the sacrifice. When we flush the garbage out of our own lives, our children experience the cleansing.]]> http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/broken-circles/feed/ 4 Channel 23 http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/channel-23/ http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/channel-23/#comments Mon, 15 Jul 1996 11:15:22 +0000 Michael Pearl http://nogreaterjoy.org/?p=3379 01-Channel 23

A modern Psalm taken from “The New International Unchristian Perversion.” “The TV is my shepherd, I shall not want anything else. It maketh me to lie down on the sofa. It leadeth me away from the Scripture. It destroys my soul. It leadeth me in the paths of sex and violence for the sponsors sake, Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will enjoy the evil, for blood and sex they excite me. It’s cable and remote they comfort me. It prepares a commercial before me in the presence of my children. It anoints my head with humanism, My coveting runneth over. Surely laziness and ignorance shall follow my family all the days of our lives, and we shall dwell in the house watching TV forever.” But don’t worry parents, as you know the TV doesn’t have any influence on the children of parents who don’t want it to influence them. That’s why the sponsors only advertise products you have already decided to buy.]]> 01-Channel 23

A modern Psalm taken from “The New International Unchristian Perversion.” “The TV is my shepherd, I shall not want anything else. It maketh me to lie down on the sofa. It leadeth me away from the Scripture. It destroys my soul. It leadeth me in the paths of sex and violence for the sponsors sake, Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will enjoy the evil, for blood and sex they excite me. It’s cable and remote they comfort me. It prepares a commercial before me in the presence of my children. It anoints my head with humanism, My coveting runneth over. Surely laziness and ignorance shall follow my family all the days of our lives, and we shall dwell in the house watching TV forever.” But don’t worry parents, as you know the TV doesn’t have any influence on the children of parents who don’t want it to influence them. That’s why the sponsors only advertise products you have already decided to buy.]]> http://nogreaterjoy.org/articles/channel-23/feed/ 2