Adultery & Lust - #008

Have you ever struggled with sexual sin but didn't know what to do about it? Our culture says "Don't worry about it; go ahead and enjoy it," but Jesus knew how dangerous this was, so He had some strong words for us. We can't beat this, so we need Him to break this. Listen as Pastor Mike teaches through Matthew 5:27-30—teaching us how to take drastic measures to defeat destructive desires.

Transcript

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Dependent on the everybody. Welcome back to Miking Disciples. This is uh our next episode. It seems like it's been a while since I've talked with you, but appreciate all the feedback you've been giving me and those of you that keep listening and and uh keep letting me know that you're there with us. And you know, this uh whole idea of Miking Disciples is developed because uh my name's Mike Willis, and I'm the ministry development pastor here at High Point Church. And I'm looking to make men into disciples of Jesus. And so, what what does that mean to be a disciple, first of all? What does it mean to follow Jesus so deeply, uh so consistently and so regularly that we actually become more like him? That's the goal that we're after. That every time we talk and every time we think about what this is and what the topic is, it's really one more aspect of letting Jesus take control of a certain area of our life. And we've been working through, you know, when we do these teaching lessons, uh, sometimes we have guests on here and we got more lined up, and so those are going to be great throughout this summer. You're gonna hear those. But when I don't have a guest, it's me sharing with you a little bit of what it means to be a follower of Jesus, to be a man of God that's following after him and actually wanting to do the things that he tells us to do in his word. So if you've been with us, you know that we started months ago and we've been looking and working our way through the Sermon on the Mountain, which I still think is one of the finest, if not the finest overall discipleship tool that you will ever find in the Bible for any one of us to follow. And it all starts with us understanding that when Jesus saw the crowds, Matthew 5 says, he went up on the mountainside and his disciples came to him and he began to teach them. And he's laying out the blueprint for us of what we need to do in order to be a disciple of Jesus. We need to come to him, we need to realize that we can't do these things on our own, that someone stronger than us, someone more powerful than us, has to be changing us from the inside out. And when that happens, when we come to him and he starts changing us by us, first of all, for asking for forgiveness of our sins and choosing to follow him for the rest of our life, then we get in a place where he is teaching us and training us and molding us, pointing out those things in our life that are good and the goals that we should be after, and those things in us that are bad, that are sinful, that we need to lay at his feet and surrender to him and ask him to change about us. And so we've worked our way through this. We've talked about how to be salt and light in today's world, how to live the blessed life and have all that we need because we have him. We've talked about how to fulfill the law and have a righteousness that's surpassing that of those that are living in a legalistic way. Our last teaching session was on anger and murder, and uh Jesus starts to point out as he's working his way through chapter five, he says these phrases, you've heard that it was said, and he takes an old testament concept and starts talking about it, some of them from the Ten Commandments, that you shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, some of those things. And so he's gonna talk about that again today when we look at this passage where he says, talking about adultery, you have heard that it was said, you shall not commit adultery. But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. And if your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It's better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It's better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell. And so basically, what he's really getting at here is just this idea of when when we have heard that it was said, yeah, don't commit adultery, do not have sex with someone that you're not married to. Period. That that's it. That's how you we don't commit adultery, is we don't go outside marriage, we stay with the wife that we've been married to, we don't go with anyone else and get into bed with anyone else. And Jesus is saying, Oh, yeah, by the way, take that a step further then, because if you take the further step and you never look at a woman lustfully, then it's very hard to get into a place where you're committing adultery with her. So he's really trying to point out what is the heart issue that's going on inside you as a man that makes you desire and sometimes unfortunately pursue someone that you're not married to. And so we we really need to talk about this. You know, we we need to think about what are some of those things that cause us to do that? What's going on in our heart, what's going on in our mind, what are some of those things that we're seeing and thinking and looking at and dreaming about that make us desire someone that we're not married to? And if we just stuck to what he says, if we just looked at the wife that we're married to and thought how beautiful she is and how much we can pour into her and help her become the kind of woman that God wants her to be, she's then in turn going to love us back and we're going to be sacrificially loving her, we're gonna be cherishing her and serving her and thinking about how we can make her better. And when we do that, we're doing that with such a hard attitude that we are putting ourselves in a place where we are uh loving her in such a way that she is without stain or wrinkle or blemish. Is that the way that you love your wife? I gotta confess to you, I don't always do that. Sometimes I fail at that, and I have to confess that to the Lord and to her. But overall, my whole purpose, my whole goal, my whole desire is to love my wife Lana sacrificially, to go all out in ways that I can show her love. So I do that practically. You know, she leaves the house before I do every morning. So there are certain things that I do around the house to help, but there's also emotional ways that I do that that I pour into her and show her love. And so when I talk to her and when I listen to her, and when I hold her hand, and when we spend time together and we dream about the future and all of those things, and we're excited about being together, uh, those are ways that we build into our marriage. And the stronger marital relationship you have with your wife, the less likely you are to commit adultery in your heart, the less likely you are to want someone that's outside that boundary to start looking at another woman. And we just got to be real. There are men that today, nowadays, that are looking at other men. And uh, neither one of those is good because that's not the woman of God that you're married to. And so we've got to set that boundary there. And that's what Jesus is doing in Matthew 5. He's setting a boundary by saying, don't go beyond this wife of your youth. You have have left your father and mother, and you are supposed to cleave to your wife and receive her as a perfect gift from God. So, what can you do to strengthen the relationship that you have with her? I hope that you're excited about hearing that because that's what we're gonna be talking about today. We're gonna be looking at this scripture, we're gonna be talking about some practical tools, and I'm gonna be challenging you about some ways that you can protect your marriage from lust. And when you don't do that, you end up in a way where you're outside the boundaries of marriage and you're in sin, and it's never gonna turn out well for you. So if you'll just take Jesus at his word and think about how far you need to go to protect the marriage that you have, then you will eventually be okay because he'll he'll strengthen you and he'll protect that marriage that you have. So when he says things like, if your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out. Uh, if you lose one part of your body and your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off. Is he really telling you to do that literally and figuratively? No, he's really saying, I guess he's telling you figuratively, but not literally. No, don't poke your eye out and cut your right hand off. But what he's saying is, if things in your life are causing you to sin, do something drastically to stop that. And what he's getting at here is I want you to understand that there are these desires in your heart that can be sinful and can cause you to lust after someone that you're not married to. So years ago, I was uh before I was in ministry, I had a guy, a friend at my church, and um he has to talk with me one day after church, and so it's just he and I talking, and he confesses to me that he has a problem with pornography. Uh, and he needed help because he was in trouble with his wife. First of all, I'm not sure if we were in that mirror that meeting because he was uh wanting to change or because he got caught. And I'm not here to judge him for that. He did have the conversation with me. He had been looking at other women on the computer, someone other than his wife, and he was in trouble because of that. So I agreed to start meeting with him and hold him accountable, and he would do that with me as well. And so we would meet every Friday morning at his office early in the day, like 5, 6 a.m., because he had a job in media where he had to be uh doing things publicly by a certain day, a certain time of the day. So uh we would sit there and we would talk about how he did that week. Did he look at things that he shouldn't? Um why did he do that? When did he do that? What were some of the things that were happening at home that caused him to not feel satisfied and and uh blessed and pleased with the wife that he had, so much so that he would give in to this temptation. And, you know, this was way back before the things like Covenant Eyes came out and other blockers that you can put on phones or devices, and all of those are good. If you're struggling with this, it it's a one tool that you can have, but if you've got a desire to sin by lusting and by looking at someone, uh, you're going to find a way around that. You're gonna find a loophole. And that's the unfortunate part. So that's why it's not just that we have these things in place, but we also have to have something replacing our that void in our heart where that lust is. Once we confess our sin, the Bible says that Jesus is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. But what do we do instead? What are we replacing that with? If sin is no longer there in the place of our heart, there's got to be more of holiness that we replace that with and a deeper desire to please God with how we live our life. And so those are just some things that that we want to think about when we look at um, you know, replacing those or protecting those. But we started looking at, well, why was he doing this? Why was he tempted? Well, because things weren't going the way that he wanted to them to in his marriage. That doesn't give him an uh a reason to go and look at other women, or it doesn't give you a reason to go and look at other women, or worse, date other women, have sex with other women, uh, whatever it is. It doesn't give us an excuse to go outside of our marriage just because we don't like how the marriage is going. We don't have an excuse to go outside of our marriage just because we don't like how marriage is going. That's so good. I wanted to say it again. So we started meeting this guy and and myself every week, and and we're talking about these things and what does he have in place in his life and what is he replacing it with? And after a while, I just started to notice that that things changed a little bit in the conversation. Uh, we would go from talking about it every week and holding each other accountable. Um, and then there will be times where he would say, and I quote, I don't want to talk about this every time we get together. Because there's other things that we can talk about. But the purpose, you got to understand this, the purpose of us talking and meeting together that early Friday morning every week was so that we could talk about it. And so he was already laying the groundwork because things got a little better at home. Um, you know, his wife forgave him, and then after a time, we we just started, we didn't talk about it as much. I went when I went there, um, I would honor that. If he didn't want to talk about it, you know, I'm not gonna force him to do that. I'm not gonna hold a gun to his head and make him talk about his problem with lust. And then it finally ended up where we just stopped talking about it at all. He didn't want to go there, he didn't want to talk about it, he didn't want to talk about accountability, he didn't mind continuing to meet, but we um it was clear to me that he didn't want to talk about what was going on and why we were there in the first place. Those of you that know me know that I'm a big uh Alabama fan. And and you know, we for years we had a coach, Nick Saban, who was uh pretty um vocal when he was upset. And there's a clip of him that you can find on the internet. They're at practice one day and things just aren't going well. Guys aren't doing what they're supposed to, they're not in the place they should be, they're not executing the way they should, and he just screams one day, what are we doing? And that that's kind of how I felt at the end of that time. That I I, you know, sacrificed to meet with this guy every week and uh at his request, and it started out going well. And then after a while, like I said, we stopped talking about it all the time, and then we moved to not talking about it at all. Well, not talking about it at all meant that there was nobody holding him accountable, and because of that, that made it easier for him to go back into looking at it again. And I don't know where he's at in his struggle now. I do uh keep somewhat in contact with him. We don't live in the same area anymore. Um, so I have no clue about where he's at in his walk with the Lord and in his fight against his addiction to lust. But what I do understand is that since then I've learned a lot about lust. Um, sometimes I've learned that the hard way myself. I know that it is one of the hardest sins to overcome and that it carries more stigma than other sins. And I don't think that's really right, but that's the the way it is. Uh if you confess your sin that you are struggling with alcohol or drugs or theft or um any of those things, overspending, people are more apt to forgive you when you do that. They're gonna come alongside you, uh, they're going to welcome you, they're going to embrace you, they're going to help you. But with this sin, with sexual sin, it carries a little bit more of a stigma there. Um, you have a tendency to see people shunned a little more. Now, the church overall, I gotta say, we're getting better at this. We're getting better at talking about this, we're getting better at walking through this with people, and we're getting better at uh let letting people um come alongside us and we're gonna walk through that with them and not kick them to the curb. Um, and I love that. That's what the church should be doing. We should be having these conversations with men regularly. We should be doing the things that we can do to strengthen them, to help them, to show them what scripture says about sexual sin and what we can do to combat that, uh, how we can build up a fortress in our heart and guard our heart to protect us from making those decisions. And so I think we've gotten a lot better over the years, and I'm thankful for that. But this really does come down to being a heart issue. It comes down to uh when I act out on these things, it's because there's something in my heart that makes me justify this is worth it temporarily, the temporary satisfaction, the gratification that I'm going to get. Um, I'll deal with the problems and the concerns and the hurt heart later on. I'm going to do this because I'm selfish and I want to do this. And so it becomes a heart issue there. And that's what I think Jesus is after. He's he's he knows that this is one of the Ten Commandments. Don't commit adultery. People have known that when he said this, they had known that for thousands of years. And and so it, but it never it didn't stop people from doing it. And that's because there's a deeper issue that out of the heart the mouth speaks, and and there's these things in our heart, these desires that we have that we give into. And when we do that, we sin. But the Bible also says that he was tempted in every way like us, but was without sin. And when we are tempted to sin, he offers us a way out. And so the idea is if we will follow Jesus, if we will come to him as men of God, as people that are trying to be disciples of Jesus, when we will come to him and move closer to him and want his heart and his desire and his will more than our heart and our desires and our will, when we do that, he can change things. And so I also want you to understand that there are times when we open ourselves up to this. If I came over to your house today and I knocked on the door and I said, Hey, I need to borrow a cup of sugar, and you go, Great, let me go into the kitchen and grab that real quick. Some of you would have to say, honey, where's the sugar at? Where's the kitchen at? But you you said, uh, hey, just stay here. I'll come back and I'll bring it to you in just a moment. And I um you went to shut the door and I put my foot there in the doorway. That's a foothold. And and so the Bible also talks about that to not give the devil a foothold. Ephesians 4 talks about this. So when we do that, when we leave the door open just enough, those footholds can easily become strongholds. Pastor Jack here at High Point Church talks about that a lot. That when we leave the door open for the devil to do something to tempt us to sin, he can just come in and take over. Unless we're doing things to make sure we keep him out. And so, really, what is the goal here? When we talk about lust and when we talk about battling that, it really comes down to what uh doors and and windows and areas of entrance are you leaving open for the devil to come into? What are you thinking about? What are you looking at? What are you doing? What are you desiring? Um, and I know that a lot of men who are listening to this struggle with it. And the numbers really are higher than you think. Um, my son had a roommate in college, a teammate of his, Christopher Prinato, who wrote a great book called The Truth About Porn. If you want to look for a great resource in that, I encourage you to do that. Uh, there are others, because again, we as the church are talking about this more and more. And I just think it's important for us to continue to do that. So, you know, when you think about that, what is it that you're doing uh to let the to keep the door open for lust and for sin to happen? And so, you know, we really just want you to be aware of that. Um, another one is pure desire ministries. You know, we've been looking at this, and and here at High Point Church, we have celebrate recovery every Sunday night of the year. And we've got a group that meets for sexual integrity. So that's for men that um maybe they have given into lust, maybe they've committed adultery, maybe they have same-sex desires, whatever it is, there is a group that's dedicated of men that are helping each other in that in that way and in that role. And so we've heard about these resources, the truth about porn and pure desire ministries, and there are others as well that are out there. And so more and more Christian men are talking about this, and they're saying, I can't do this alone, I need help. And so that's what I really want to help you understand, also that in order to beat this, you have to break this, and you cannot do this alone. So when we talk about coming to Jesus and being taught by him back in Math at the beginning of Matthew, that's really the important part to start at. We can't do this without him. And so every day you and I, as men of God, have to start saying, Okay, Lord, I can't do this without you. I need you to teach me, I need you to remind me, I need you to keep me from getting into these situations that can cause me to trip up and stumble. And once you say yes to Jesus and start asking for that, keep saying that and keep asking for his help each and every day. Put on that armor and start asking him to help you and protect you. And then also find out, well, why is it you're tempted to look elsewhere? If you're in love with your wife, if you're married to someone, uh, you need to understand that you should be looking to her for support in this. You should be in enjoying the relationship that you have with her. Uh, there should be something about the fact that you knew God brought you together and you're excited about being together. And we don't have to read the Bible very long to see where the first couple was created for each other and being told to be fruitful and multiply. And so, throughout this whole, the rest of the pages, we see people using sex that was created by God. They're using it in the right way, in the context of one man and one woman being married to each other before God for a lifetime. And we also see a whole lot of people doing it the wrong way. And that's what Jesus is addressing here in Matthew 5. And so, Christians, we've really got to be thinking about why do we have trouble in this area? What is it we're not talking about? What questions do we need to ask? Uh, we need to be thinking about all these wrong ideas about sex that crept into the church and still do today. And so, have conversations with your wife about sex. Uh, talk about the frequency. How often can that happen in our marital relationship? Well, what's acceptable and what's not? Um, what time of the week is is good? Is there a night that you're tired? You can talk with your wife about that. You should talk with your wife about that. And don't be pushy and don't get angry when you don't get an answer that you want. But I promise you this: if you're pouring into her and doing everything you can to build her up as the woman that she needs to be, then that's going to be something that you enjoy between the two of you. God created for you it for you and your wife to enjoy. I don't know if anybody ever told you that, but that's true. Sex was created by God to develop intimacy between a husband and a wife. And anytime that we get outside of that original intent, that's when the trouble starts. And so I told you about my friend Christopher, who wrote this book. And he says the consistent testimony of the Bible is that sexual activity outside of God's ideal for marriage results in damage, destruction, and death. And I don't think that any of those Ds are ones that we want. And so we need to be understanding the Bible's standard for this. And you know, in my book, She Needs a He, I talk about this. There's a whole chapter on this on fellowship and building a relationship between you and your wife. You should have a relationship with your wife in such a way that you enjoy looking at her when she's changing. You should have such a relationship with your wife that you enjoy being with her sexually. And oh, by the way, you should have a relationship with your wife that means you enjoy being with her even when you're not having sex with her, because you're just enjoying being with her, period. And if you do that, that's how you're building into her and strengthening the love that you have one for each other. And so as a result of that, have conversations, engage in sex with your wife, and make sure that the marriage is honored by all and that the marriage bed is kept pure. That's from Hebrews 13 4. And so the whole idea is if you're going to keep your marriage bed pure, you better be thinking about what it is that you're looking at, who it is that you're looking at, what are you desiring, and how does that compare with what you have and who you're married to? So if you're so enamored and in love with the wife that you have and you're not tempted to look outside of that relationship, that's a great thing. You need to continue to do that. You need to keep making sure that you say keep your love with your wife that pure and that strong. And it's not just about uh, well, I can look but I can't touch. No, because looking is is the eye, the Bible says that the eye is the lamp of the body. And when we start looking at women and we start, then we're gonna start desiring those women and we're gonna notice things on them that we don't see at home. And that's where looking leads to lusting. And even though lusting is far more than just looking, I want you to understand that when you see a pretty girl, that doesn't mean it's a b a bad thing if you notice that they're pretty. But it's when you really go even further, when you take that further step, and and like Jesus is talking about your right hand or your eye causing you to stumble. When you start thinking, oh man, I I would love to see her without any clothes on, and you're undressing her in your mind, or you're wishing that you could be with them instead of your wife, that's when you've crossed the line. And that's when you've really got to take drastic measures, like he talks about in Matthew 5. And when you start wishing that you were married to them instead of the woman that you're married to, that's when you really need to come back to the Lord and confess that and get some help. And so I just, you know, I'm kind of giving you these practical tools here about what to think about when you're dealing with lust. Jesus said, Yeah, you've heard that was said, don't commit adultery. That's great. But it goes even further than that because if you stop yourself before you do actually commit it, that's when you're going to be thinking about it and looking about it and desiring it and wondering what it would be like to be with someone else. And if you can stop yourself there and then replace that with a healthy and holy desire for your wife, well, then that will protect you from ever getting into a situation that you shouldn't be in. So, like I said, make sure that you are in love with your wife. Do things to cultivate that love, to build that love, to renew that love, spend time with them, talk to them, understand who they are. God created your wife and he created somebody good that's gonna be a suitable helper for you. And so when you take your time to build them up and understand them and love them and learn them and study them, that's going to strengthen the relationship that you have with her. And if you'll do that and look at her that way by really looking at her, it's gonna help you to not look at others. Here's something that years ago, if I had known this, I would have loved to have said to my friend Mike when we were meeting every week. Um, don't isolate. You're in this office by yourself every morning uh before the rest of the world gets up, before the roosters are crowing, and before the the uh street lights have gone off. Um you need to get around some other men, some other men that are going to talk with you and challenge you and tell you the truth and get in your face if they need to. And oh, by the way, don't set boundaries alone. Don't come up with, well, this is what I'm going to do to protect me. You need some other men in place that are going to challenge you, that are going to help you, that are going to strengthen you. So get some brothers around you and get some tools to help you, whatever that is. If you need some some uh software on your computer or on your device, that's great. Again, understand that that's not the only thing that's going to help you, though. You're going to need some other men around you, some other tools, some other things that are going to help you. Most of all, you're going to need the help of the Holy Spirit working in you. You're going to need his power filling your life and changing those desires that you used to have. You're going to need him to break those things in your life, those things that maybe you used to give into and get pleasure from. Now you're going to have to actually think about, well, what is it I need to replace in that? Do I need to spend more time in the Word? So if I'm getting up and I'm watching something on TV that I shouldn't, maybe I should be reading my Bible more or listening to Christian music more. Or maybe I should be reaching out to a brother and I know that that accountability is going to keep me straight. Whatever it is, I need to be having those tools in place that are going to help me. And here's the other thing I'll tell you get some professional help if you need it. Don't be afraid to ask for help. If there's one thing I can compliment and commend my friend Mike on, is that he did ask for help years ago. I don't know that I did a great job helping him, um, but uh I was there and he asked for help, so I did that. Um, but I wasn't a professional at that. And that was just me meeting with him and talking with him. But sometimes there are things that have happened in your upbringing, some trauma that have have caused you uh to be opened up to these desires, uh, you know, sexual abuse, uh exposure to pornography, whatever it is. Um that's really sad when that happens. So you might need some professional help, a counselor, uh a group that uh that you can help you with, an accountability group or a group that's gonna help you recover from it. Uh those are out there and they're available. And if you need help finding one, reach out to us here through the show notes and we'll be happy to connect you. Our goal overall is to help people live out their faith in such a way that they become disciples as men of God. And so if there's anything that we can say or do that can help you with that, we're gonna do that. That's why we're talking about this today. That's why we have other podcasts. Uh, my friends Nick and Ashley Soler lead one for marriage, and my friends Megan and Larson lead one for women. And uh, there's just all kinds of different podcasts that you can find here through our church on the Godcaster app. Uh, you can hear this in small groups that we offer here. Uh, you can be a part of Celebrate Recovery. We can help you with other recovery groups as well. There's a group called Recovery Church that meets in town every Wednesday night here in Lake Wales. And maybe you're not in Lake Wales. And so you go, well, what do I do? Well, reach out to us. That's where I would love to help you. I will do anything I can to point you to someone that can help you in this. But you've got to be willing to ask for help. That's where my friend Mike started out. Well, and you got to be willing to accept the help that people are giving you, no matter what you think about it. Uh, if they're going to say, well, you need to do these three things, then you need to do those three things. Be prepared to do this for the long haul. Make this a lifestyle change, not just something that's a habit for a temporary amount of time. Uh so look out for help. Ask for people to help you. Um, reach out to a brother because chances are that brother or someone close to him knows exactly what you're going through, or they can put you in touch with someone that does. And so you can't do this on your own. You need some people around you, you need some tools in your life, and you might need some professional help as well to dig into your heart and your past to figure out, well, why do you have this desire? Why is this temptation such a struggle for you? You know, I always say, um uh the devil isn't going to tempt me to rob a bank. Uh, that's just not something that I'm inclined to do. And so you might be tempted in one way and not tempted in other ways. And for for those of you that are listening, there's got to be somebody, probably a lot of you, that are listening to this and going, man, uh I am right there. I am struggling with this temptation to look at pornography or to lust after someone else. Uh, maybe I sit around the coffee pot at work a little too long talking to someone I'm not married to. Uh, maybe I am walking through a certain part of the building or going to making an appointment to see a certain customer. Whatever it is that you do for a living, uh, maybe you're just you haven't crossed a boundary yet. You haven't committed adultery, but you're you're uh toying with that idea. You're wondering about it. Umthers of you have already made an appointment to go spend time with someone that you're not married to. I just want to tell you, stop it, break it, cancel it, don't show up, do something else instead. Uh confess that to another brother and then get some help there. Don't go to that appointment. Don't go to be around that other woman. Spend time with your wife instead and start asking God to change the way you see your wife. When you do that, when you start asking God to help you see your wife the way he sees her, then that's going to change a lot of things as well. And then you can start saying, God, okay, now point out things in me that are not pleasing to you, things that you want to change about me. And when that happens, then you're going to start hearing his voice speaking to you about the things that you're thinking about or looking at or entertaining thoughts that you shouldn't be entertaining. And so I just wanted to share these things with you today. I wanted to come on and talk about the next passage. And uh, some of you have been down this road, and uh, as a result of that, um, unfortunately, it's ended your marriage. And we're gonna talk about that next time. The next teaching segment is gonna be on divorce. And uh, you know, with it the high percentage of divorce rate that we have in our country and in our churches nowadays, this is still a relevant topic. It all comes from the fact that we start wanting something in marriage that we don't have, or we start wanting someone outside of marriage that we don't that we're not married to. And that starts because we don't appreciate and love and welcome and accept the people that we are married to. And so if I can say one thing to you as men, go home. And when you go home, be excited about being home and being around your wife, spend time with her, put your phone down. Um, don't go play golf that one time. Take her out instead. Hold her hand in the car, talk to her, ask her questions, enjoy being around her again because you used to. That's how you got together years ago. Something about her made you say, I want to marry this girl. And now, as a result of that, now that you are married, you don't see her the same way. So ask God to help you do that. Ask God to open your eyes and open your heart to who she is and what her beauty is and what she brings to this family that you have. And I just wanted to challenge you with this today and get you to be thinking about that. So as you look at this and you're coming to Jesus and He's teaching you, what is it He's saying to you? What are some of those things that he's pointing out in your life that aren't pleasing to him? What are some of the people that you're thinking about or looking at or talking to that you shouldn't be doing that with? And how can you have healthy conversations with your spouse instead? How can you date her again? How can you look at her the way you used to when you first got together? How can you enjoy the woman that you're married to? And I just gotta tell you, I think if we would do that as men, if we would uh put ourselves in that position, instead of wanting out, we would start asking God and telling God that we want him to change something about us so that it can strengthen our marriage and restore it, I think we would see a lot less uh problems in this area because of this. Sure, the temptations are out there and with the internet and the accessibility that we have, it's so much easier. When I was a young kid, I had a friend who uh his dad had a uh subscription to Playboy, just being real here. And we would go and steal those from his dad's room and sneak them into his bedroom and look at them. But we had to be sneaky about that. We had to sneak across the hallway and get one of those and sneak it back in. Nowadays, all I have to do is pick up my phone to look. And sometimes I don't even have to be searching it out, it's just going to jump there because of search engines and all the the algorithm and all of those things. So, what am I doing to protect my eyes, to protect my heart, to protect my marriage? When you start asking God to point those those things out to you, He'll do that, and then you need to be willing to do whatever he says. And when you do, don't just do it for a little while. Do it every day where you're asking him to make you into the man he wants you to be. Well, that's all the time we have today. I I appreciate you listening. I hope this has been helpful. I hope it's been challenging. And listen, I really do mean it. If you need help, reach out to me. You can find my contact information in the bio here. You can also email me at mike at highpointlw.com. I'll be happy to talk with you, to meet with you, to direct you, to guide you into some relationships with men that are going to be there to strengthen you. And so our goal every time we do this, like I've said, Miking disciples is all about making men into disciples of Jesus. And so start asking him what that means in the area of your sexuality when it comes to adultery, when it comes to lust, and ask him to change those things about you. Well, I do appreciate you listening today. And uh, if you have any questions or comments, I would love to hear from you. Reach out to me through the bio. And like I said, I already gave you my email address. But just know that every time we get together, our goal is to take you deeper in your faith and help you become more like him. So I'll talk to you later where we'll come back again and hope to help every man become a godly man. Thanks for joining us today for this latest episode of Miking Disciples. If you have any comments or questions, I would love to get for you to go to the comments or questions link that's found in the description of the episode. And I really would love to hear your thoughts. Thanks for joining us today. We'll talk to you later.