By Dr. Sam Serio, Pastor, Neely’s Creek Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, Rock Hill, SC
October 1993 – A travel agency sued the Yellow Pages that printed a big advertisement in the local phone book that the agency specialized in “erotic tours.” Oops!!! This ad was supposed to say “exotic tours!” Just a difference of one small letter in the alphabet caused an avalanche of telephone calls from people who were either interested or angry. And yes, there was an eventual lawsuit.
Mark Twain was right when he said that “the difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between the lightning and the lightning bug.”
Choosing the right words is one of the most important yet difficult tasks of preachers. Mere words make good or bad sermons. Death and life are in the power of our tongue. Whether it be in daily conversation or Sunday sermons, the wise preacher will always struggle with choosing certain words over other words. The choices are almost endless but always crucial.
Especially when it comes to choosing certain words about sex! You can lose your church and upset your members in the twinkling of an eye! The pulpit has a trap door whenever you approach sexual topics.
AFA Journal encourages preachers to preach about pornography and not just read about it in this magazine. Preachers may use examples and materials gleaned from AFA and incorporate them into their Sunday sermon. But how? Which words should I choose and say? When it comes to sermon preparation, they quickly realize that reading this magazine and preaching about porn are not the exact same thing.
Most people who attend church agree that pornographic movies and magazines are not things which God approves of and wants for us. There’s not a lot of heated debate in a Sunday School class on whether pornography is good or bad for the Christian. Most people are not going to disagree with the preacher at the door about his sermon denouncing porn magazines in the local drugstore. In fact, the louder and angrier sermon from the pulpit will usually elicit a better and kinder response from the pews! As with the issues of abortion and homosexuality, pornography has also become a calling card and battle cry among most evangelical Christians. Preachers won’t raise too many eyebrows or ruffle too many feathers when they make mention of porn from the pulpit.
But preaching AGAINST porn is not the same as preaching ABOUT porn. There is a huge difference that we need to understand.
Many preachers turn away people who struggle with this sin. Whenever they make mention of porn from the pulpit, they leave the strong impression that God has no mercy for this kind of sinner and offers no deliverance from this kind of sin. Yet how sad—and untrue! Many speakers leave those two truths out of their messages.
Remember Galatians 6:1? When one is caught in a sin, your goal is to restore, not just rebuke.
While some boys and men will deny their addiction, there are many others who realize they need help to break this habit. And there are many women who feel humiliated, inadequate, and dirty because of their husbands’ consumption of porn. There are millions who silently suffer from porn and the preacher can draw these people out from the pews and into the office for healing—if he chooses and says the right words about porn from the pulpit.
One of the great challenges in preaching about any sexual topic (like pornography) is to turn the hearer towards you, not away.
In sermons about sex, we get consumed with the issue and forget the individual. When you hear or give a sermon with comments about sexual sin, ask this question: “Would the person in the pew now be more or less inclined to ask the person in the pulpit for counseling, help and hope?”
Below are examples of carefully constructed words and ideas that could be used in biblical messages or counseling sessions which will help you minister more effectively in restoring people who are deeply affected by pornographic materials.
Samson and Delilah: Judges 14-16
Samson had roving eyes. He loved to look. And finally his eyes rested upon a woman who eventually became his undoing. Delilah—today, we associate the mere mention of the name not only with beauty, but also with treachery. Do you have roving eyes? And did you know that you can end up like Samson?
Delilah was out to trap Samson. First she used her body, then her brains. Samson was captivated by her beauty and lust. Day by day (v.16), he lost control until finally, he lost all his strength. He realized too late that he could not set himself free. (v.20-21)
Many men are like that when it comes to pornography. Roving eyes aren’t satisfied and they must have more and more. They love to look. Like Samson, they have slowly lost their strength to fight temptation. They’re at the point where magazines are not enough. They must have more. Like Samson, they are in bondage and cannot set themselves free from the lifestyle of lust that has consumed and now laughs at them, just as the Philistines laughed at Samson.
But God didn’t give up on Samson. God rescued him and did a mighty work through him. And Jesus Christ can do that for you, a modern-day man just like Samson, who got himself into trouble due to his roving eyes. God can deliver you from any sin, no matter how long you’ve been trapped in it. Pornography does not have to have the final say in your life.
Keeping the Marriage Bed Pure: Hebrews 13:4.
First, God tells us to honor marriage. Second, He tells us to keep the marriage bed pure and undefiled. Most people think they need to be experienced; God wants you to be pure.
The first item that comes to mind about this text is God’s prohibition of premarital sex and fornication. When you have sex before marriage, you defile the marriage bed, whether it was with the person you married or someone else.
But this text doesn’t refer only to fornication; it can apply to pornography. It’s not right to enter the marriage bed with pictures of imaginary partners in your mind. And men who enter marriage with previous PICTURES defile the marriage bed almost as much as those who enter marriage with previous partners.
Adult magazines or movies leave their mark on the memory and the man enters the marriage bed with impurity. He’ll compare his precious, new wife to the hundreds or thousands of other women. He’ll remember the things he saw in videos or movies and compare. He is impure and defiled by what he has done or viewed before his marriage.
Any man or woman who thinks sexual expertise and performance is what matters on the wedding night is wrong and has defiled the marriage bed. Unfortunately, that’s what TV, movies, school textbooks, and people tell us. But porn teaches us this lie.
Achan’s Secret Sin: Joshua 6:17-19; Joshua 7—especially verses 21-25. Supplemental material 2 Samuel 11:2-4.
Achan was a member of the congregation of Israelites. He blended in with the rest of the church. But God singled him out. God knew what he had done and what he had hidden. It was something Achan wasn’t supposed to have, so he hid it.
But Achan got caught.
Some men today are similar to Achan. Many men see and want so badly that they take, rape, or molest in order to have what they saw in the movie or magazine.
There’s still hope. You don’t have to wait until your whole world comes crashing in, like Achan did.
King Herod and Salome: Mark 6:21-29; Matthew 14:6-12.
Herod had a weakness and it was women. We know he had a woman—Salome—who was his brother’s wife.
Salome dances in, bringing great pleasure to Herod. The Greek word for “dancing” here implies a suggestive and sensual dance. What Herod sees, he wants. And he’ll give away anything to get it—or her. Herod is hooked. He was willing to give away half his kingdom, just to be able to look at her dancing. This is the picture of a man enslaved to his passions, enslaved to pornography.
There are many men today just like King Herod: enslaved to a lifestyle of looking and lusting. They are addicted and feed their habit of pornography.
And a lot of innocent people end up getting hurt. You still have time. It’s not too late for you to give up this lifestyle and ask Jesus to make you clean.
Repentence at Ephesus: Acts 19:17-20.
What a wonderful day that must have been in Ephesus! What a relief it must have been to be rid of these books that caused such heartache and other evil practices. These people really were converted. They became new creatures in Christ. They began to obey His commands and change their lifestyles. They didn’t keep their books stashed away at home in the cellar; they knew they had to come clean and destroy these scrolls. If they kept them, they would have been tempted to return to them.
The same needs to happen today. People who claim the name of Christ need to get rid of the pornographic books, magazines, movies, and videos in their own homes. Are you willing to destroy the things that are trying to destroy you?
The text says the value of these scrolls and books was 50,000 drachmas. A drachma was worth about a day’s wages—137 YEARS of wages that were burned, as a love offering for the Lord. I don’t know how much money you might have spent on those materials, but it doesn’t matter. You, too, have got to get rid of them!
The fire of the Holy Spirit came down when the fire from these evil books came up. Isn’t that what you want in your life? Isn’t that what you need to do in your life?
Contentment, Comparing, Envying: Exodus 20:17; 1 Timothy 6:6; Genesis 3:1-13; other verses on being content with what you have. Add 1 Cor. 7:2-4 to supplement.
Each of us has inherited the nature of Adam and Eve, believing that what he doesn’t have is a whole lot better than what he does have. We have the innate tendency to want what doesn’t belong to us. We want things and we want people that don’t belong to us. Yes, even people.
A man will see a woman—sometimes in person and sometimes on a page in a men’s magazine—and he likes her. He wants her now, more than he likes or wants his wife. He loses his contentment for his wife. He begins to compare, and whenever you have a comparison, somebody always comes up short. Unfortunately, it is usually his wife. Because of pornography, the husband has broken not only the seventh but also the tenth commandment.
The Moabite Women Seduce The Men of Israel: Numbers 25
Men within the church at Israel were engaging in sexual immorality with pagan Moabite women. The women invited the men and the men went wholeheartedly. In fact, one man brought a woman to his family and into his own home. His name was Zimri; her name was Cozbi.
I see this story happening all over again with many men in our nation and churches. A man brings women into his home and hides them somewhere in the house—wherever a magazine will fit.
Or men bring women into their homes through the TV or VCR. And like the Israelite family who saw the adultery and perversity of their father, many children also happen to stumble upon these pornographic magazines or movies.
You need to be a Phinehas. He wasn’t seduced or deceived by these Moabite women. Instead he was angry enough to do something about it. How can you act like Phinehas in our land?
Maybe you can start at home first. Clean out your own house. Get rid of the movies, the magazines. Cancel the cable channel with the adult shows late at night. Go to your local store that advertises the Moabite women to young boys and men. Stop the plague. Avert the wrath of God before it’s too late. Come for help, now.
Conclusion
One of the greatest joys in all of life is seeing how God can minister in the depths of someone’s soul to bring about change and comfort. It happens every day, but my prayer is that it would especially happen on Sunday as we hear God’s Word and power flow from the pulpit.
May today’s and tomorrow’s preachers be the doctors and nurses who will heal and restore the wounded ones of the sexual revolution. 
This article is a portion of Dr. Serio’s completed doctoral work at Westminster Seminary in Escondido, California on “Preaching to the Sexually Wounded.”
