Repeated burns

Proverbs 6:27 Can a man take fire to his bosom, and his clothes not be burned?

Many years ago, during my misguided youth, I was outside melting plastic. Hey, it makes a cool sound and I was a kid so what did I know. As the hot molten plastic dripped, it somehow found its way to the back of my hand. My instinctive response was to press my hurting hand against my blue jeans. This maneuver managed to weld my hand to my pants. I wobbled inside to inform my father of my predicament and hopefully obtain medical assistance. My father responded “I guess that hurt like (location of eternal damnation and unceasing fires), I bet you won’t do that again.” With this new profound insight, I limped off to the bathroom with spatula in my one free hand to pry my affixed hand from my pants.

The pain of my poor judgement remained for several days and I vowed to take my father’s sage advice and never do that again. I never burned myself in that fashion again but I have been burned by other means too many times to count since that occasion. I have found the same thing to be true when our secret sexual sin is exposed. The pain of this exposure is so great we vow to never relapse into this sin again. Just as I vowed to never get burned again and failed, so does the sexual addict when the memory of this pain fades. You see pain doesn’t produce change. It only gets our attention. The pain only informs us “Hey, what you are doing is not working. You are in rebellion to God and rebellion causes pain.” The goal is not to figure out a way to avoid pain. The goal is obedience and to submit our rebellious nature to the Lord. If you are in a repeated pattern of falling into sexual sin then seek The One who can heal your pain and empower you to walk in obedience.

Has the pain of your sexual sin got your attention? Visit our website for avenues of hope and healing.

Jonathan Jones, President and Founder of Perfect Hope Ministry