The Lure of Lust | The "S" Word | Trinity Sermons

Hello, and welcome to this week's episode of

Trinity Sermons. This week we are continuing

our sermon series titled The S -Word, where we

dive into the seven deadly sins. And this week's

sin is a little bit awkward to talk about, but

also really important. And that is the sin of

lust. And so join us as Rob talks to us more

about what lust is, what it looks like in our

lives, and most importantly how we can move forward

from shame into the freedom that Christ offers

us. Today's reading, Trinity, comes from the

book of Genesis chapter 39 verses 4 to 21. Joseph

Genesis 39:4–21

found favour in his eyes, and became his attendant.

Potiphar put him in charge of his household,

and he entrusted to his care everything he owned.

From the time he put him in charge of his household

and of all that he owned, the Lord blessed the

household of the Egyptian because of Joseph.

The blessing of the Lord was on everything Potiphar

had, both in the house and in the field. So Potiphar

left everything he had in Joseph's care. With

Joseph in charge, he did not concern himself

with anything except the food he ate. Now Joseph

was well -built and handsome, and after a while

his master's wife took notice of Joseph and said,

Come to bed with me. But he refused. With me

in charge, he told her, my master does not concern

himself with anything in the house. Everything

he owns he has entrusted to my care. No one is

greater in this house than I am. My master has

withheld nothing from me except you because you

are his wife. How then could I do such a wicked

thing and sin against God? And though she spoke

to Joseph day after day, he refused to go to

bed with her or even be with her. One day, he

went into the house to attend to his duties,

and none of the household servants was inside.

She caught him by his cloak and said, Come to

bed with me. But he left his cloak in her hand

and ran out of the house. When she saw that he

had left his cloak in her hand, and had ran out

of the house, she called her household servants.

Look, she said to them, this Hebrew has been

brought to us to make sport of us. He came in

here to sleep with me, but I screamed. When he

heard me scream for help, he left his cloak beside

me and ran out of the house. cloak beside her

until his master came home. Then she told him

this story, that Hebrew slave you brought us

came to me to make sport of me. But as soon as

I screamed for help, he left his cloak beside

me and ran out of the house. When his master

heard the story, his wife told him, saying, this

is how your slave treated me. He burned with

anger. Joseph's master took him. and put him

in prison, the place where the king's prisoners

were confined. But while Joseph was there in

the prison, the Lord was with him. He showed

him kindness and granted him favour in the eyes

of the prison warden. This is the word of the

Lord. Thanks be to God. So we're working through

this teaching series on the seven deadly sins.

And we've talked about pride. We've talked about

envy. We've talked about sloth. We've talked

about greed. We've been there. We've done that.

You can watch them all on YouTube. And today

we come to the deadly sin of lust. And therefore,

there's probably like three different groups

of people here who are in the church this morning.

There's one group who is genuinely interested

to hear and watch me squirm up here as the pastor

tries to talk about lust. In fact, you've been

waiting for this one. You've been rubbing your

hands and you've been. and like this is gonna

be good. There's another group of people here

this morning and those are you who are visiting

or you're new here this morning and right about

now you're beginning to think you've made a horrible

mistake. And then there's a third group of people

here, basically my own children, who right now

are burying their head in their hands. They are

just mortified that their dad is going to stand

up in front of hundreds of people and talk about

lust. They're going to be scarred for life. But

listen, as Salt and Pepper said in the 90s, let's

talk about sex. And you know, there is, at the

beginning of that song, I didn't realize, but

they have this little exchange. They say, yo,

I don't think we should talk about this. Come

on, why not? Well, people might not understand

what we're trying to say, you know, but that's

part of life. Yes, that's actually true. It is

part of life. And even though this is awkward,

the very fact that it's awkward might be a sign

that we need to talk about it more, not less,

because not talking about it hasn't worked out

that well either. And in fact, it was Howard

Hendricks who said that we should not be ashamed

to discuss what God was unashamed to create.

And that's the thing, God made us this way. God

made us this way and so of course in your life

sex is gonna show up and of course lust is going

to show up and sometimes when we least expect

it. Like a vacuum cleaner salesman who knocks

on the door, you go there and he was uninvited

and he was unexpected and yet here he is. Lust

has a habit of showing up often at the most unexpected

times and it's not just for guys and it's not

just for young people and it's not just for Hollywood,

It's for all of us and it can happen in the midst

of really good times or it can also happen when

you're rock bottom in the middle of bad times.

Now for Joseph, Joseph's life was going along

just great. He was at like the height of good

times. He had found favor in his master's eyes.

He was put in charge of his household. Joseph's

life had finally turned a corner. He was finally

getting somewhere and then guess what? There

was a knock on the door and who was it? Oh, it

was sex. It was lust. It showed up and it was

unexpected. It was uninvited. But when it shows

up, you've got to figure out how to deal with

it because the way that you deal with it will

actually either make you or break you. And so

today we're going to talk about sex and we're

going to talk about lust. And actually I'm not

going to do so much of the talking, but three

other people are going to do most of the talking

this morning. And that's going to be you and

you. and you. No, the three people that are going

to talk about it. We're going to listen first

to Potiphar's wife. She's going to talk about

revealing what lust is. Then we're going to talk

to Joseph. And Joseph is going to explain us

how to deal with lust. And then Jesus is going

to help us understand healing from lust. So there's

the revealing of it, dealing with it, healing

with it. Let's start with revealing. What is

lust? Now, of course, the Bible even would say

you can be lustful about lots of things. You

can be lustful about power. You can be lustful.

about status, but when it comes to the seven

deadly sins, I'm sorry to say, lust is speaking

about that nitty gritty thing called sex. It's

like when Jesus says that to have even, you know,

when you think of someone lustfully in your heart,

you have committed adultery with them. That's

the connection that we're talking about. So here

is a good maybe definition of what lust is. Lust

is the disordered desire for sexual pleasure

that treats people as objects rather than persons.

Now notice what it does not say. Does not say

that lust is sexual desire. It's a disordered

desire. Lust takes something that is good and

twists it and makes it destructive. So again,

lust is not. sexual desire itself. The Bible

never says sex is wrong. The Bible never says

that sexual desire is wrong. In fact, if you

were to compare the Bible and Christianity to

other religions, you would actually realize that...

has a really, really high view of sex. In fact,

in Genesis chapter one, we read that God actually

created sexuality. He created male and female,

and when he had created male and female, he said

it was very good. He was happy with what he had

made, and in fact, he said, now go, be fruitful,

multiply, go and do it, for lack of a better

word. So God created it. And then in the New

Testament, you got people like Paul who almost

commands husbands and wives to be sexually into

each other. He says, you know, is it good to

have sexual relations? Certainly, Paul says.

And then there is this book of the Bible called

the Song of Solomon that's so graphic in its

talk about sex that little Hebrew boys and girls

weren't even allowed to read the book until they

got older. Stuff like kiss me, let the king bring

me into his bedroom, you know. If you go home

today and your kids are all of a sudden reading

the Bible, really, they're really into the Bible,

you might just want to check what exactly that

they are reading. So it is really, really unfortunate

if the primary message that Christianity gets

across to people is that somehow sex is negative.

It is not. It is not sinful, right? Sex was God's

idea. He invented it. It's not wrong. And actually,

when you do look at the list of the seven deadly

sins, that's the reason why lust is never really

at the top of the list. Pride, envy, sloth, wrath,

those things are unnatural. We weren't built

to kill each other. We weren't built to steal

from each other. We weren't built to hurt each

other, but we were built for sex. So, what does

this mean? What does this mean? What is it about

sexual desire that can go wrong and turn into

lust? Well, the first thing that we see is that

sexual desire becomes lust when that craving

is absolutely out of control. Potiphar's wife,

let's look at her, right? She was out of control.

She wanted Joseph so badly, she threw caution

to the wind. It didn't matter. She didn't matter

that she was a married woman. Didn't matter that

this might destroy her marriage. Didn't matter

that, you know, in that kind of culture, it could

have destroyed her. Didn't matter that Joseph

was saying, no, no, I don't want to do this.

She was out of control. She was willing to take

all those risks. And although we have so many

jokes in our culture about sex, ha ha ha sex,

out of control lust is no joking matter, right?

It will destroy you. It will destroy everything.

It will destroy your mind. It will destroy your

heart. It will destroy your family life. It will

destroy your marriage, your relationship, your

reputation. Even this story, it can make you

violent when it's out of control. We are told

it all just started when Potiphar's wife took

notice of Joseph. See, it just says she took

notice of him. You might say that doesn't seem

fair, just taking notice of someone. That doesn't

seem like that should be a sin. But you have

to understand that in the Hebrew there, that

word essentially means she cast her eyes on Joseph,

which is way different than noticing. That is

fixing your gaze on someone with desire. desire

and longing. Oh look, he's well built and handsome,

right? AKA, he's got a great body and he's got

a great face to go along with it. She was focused

on this. She could think of nothing else. The

way to think of it is lust is not a passing glance.

It is a practiced gaze. Or put another way, she

didn't fall into lust. She fed into lust. And

that's the thing about our culture. There are

so many ways that we can feed into lust, whether

it's internet pornography, whether it's OnlyFans,

or maybe you're just watching Game of Thrones

or something like that. It is absolutely everywhere

you look. Here's a good example. I don't know

if you guys watched the Oscars this year, but

the best picture at the Oscars this year was

a film by the name of Anora. I haven't seen it.

It might be an amazing film that makes some really

incredible But the point is, the story is about

a young stripper from Brooklyn. The film is full

of graphic nudity and sexuality. In fact, on

the IMDB, the Internet Movie Database, under

sex and nudity, it says severe. This is the best

picture of the year. This is the Oscar -winning

best picture of the year. It's the one that everybody

needs to see, right? So it's where we cast our

eyes either feeds into lust or leads out of lust,

depending on what we do there. Thomas Aquinas

said that lust is like a lion staring at a gazelle.

All it can think about is its next meal. And

Potiphar's wife was staring at Joseph. Joseph

was her next meal. And as Tim Keller said, she

had gone to bed with him so many times in her

mind. that finally she just had to go to bed

with him in reality. She couldn't stop herself,

right? Because lust is craving without control.

Now, you might say, bro, come on. Sex is a normal

appetite. You're right, it is normal. It should

be normal, but this is not normal. C .S. Lewis

has this great way to imagine how out of control

our appetites are. He says, imagine you went

to visit this different, strange country. And

when you got to the country, you went to a convenience

store and up on the top rack, you know where

all the nudie mags are usually kept, where the

little boys and girls can't see them, there were

these magazines and the covers and people would

come in and they would take these magazines and

they would take them home and then at night they

would unfold these amazing high glossy pictures

of hot dogs and hamburgers. And then in the college

dorm rooms, the guys are all putting these posters

on their walls and they're running around from

room to room staring at these posters of like

spaghetti and lasagna steaming and dripping with

cheese. And then people at night in their dark,

they pull out their phones and they start scrolling

through their phones where no one can see them.

And they're looking at these high -res images

of baked potato and steak. And then actually

you can go to these little clubs, dimly lit clubs,

where for a price, a girl will come over to you

and slowly and seductively reveal a plate full

of cake and pie. If you visited that country,

you'd be like, something's not right here. Right,

what is going on? Yes, it's okay to enjoy food,

but this is excessive. In fact, you'd probably

say the people in this country must be starving,

but they're not starving. They've actually got

lots to eat. The problem is, is that the appetite

is completely out of control. That's what love

is. That's what lust is, pardon me. It is not

craving. It is not craving sex. It's an out -of

-control craving, out -of -control appetite for

sex. Okay, that's the first thing about lust.

The second thing you gotta know about lust is

that it is passion without a promise. Passion

without a promise. You see, it is great to be

passionate, but sex was meant to take place between

two people who have made a promise to each other

and that promise is called marriage. Joseph knew

that. Joseph knew that. Look, Potiphar's wife,

she says, let's go to bed, Joseph. Let's do it.

But look at what he says. My master's withheld

nothing from me except you. Because why? Because

you are his wife. And how could I do such a wicked

thing? He says, we can't do this because you

are his wife, AKA we can't do this because you're

not my wife. That's the problem. Joseph is saying

this is not a sin because it's sexual. This is

a sin because we're not married. And the Old

Testament and the New Testament are crystal clear.

Sex is designed to take place in an exclusive

permanent commitment that is called marriage.

You can't have the passion without that promise.

Oh, Rob, you know, I thought Trinity was relevant.

I thought we were kind of a forward -looking

progressive kind of church. This sounds so old

-fashioned. Even high schoolers today are talking

about body counts. What's the big deal? Well,

it's actually a really big deal. See, sex is

supposed to be a way of creating a complete life

unity between two people. The physical union.

It's supposed to go along with the emotional

union and the legal union and the social union

and all those personal unions. They're all supposed

to go together. Sex is a way of saying these

two people have become one in every way, not

just in one way, not just in one way. And that's

why Paul says this. Paul says, don't you realize

that if a man joins himself to a prostitute,

he becomes one body with her? The two are united

into one. Sex is supposed to be a way of saying

all the parts of my life are joined together

with all the parts of your life, not just the

physical part. Potiphar's wife, she just wanted

the sex part. She didn't want the commitment

part. She didn't want the ongoing relationship

part. She didn't want the emotional part or the

legal part or the social part or any of those

parts. She says, just give me that part of you.

Joseph says, I can't give you that part of me.

I can't give you one part of me without giving

you the whole of me. That is, in fact, the Christian

view of sex. You can't rip one part off of the

whole part. Sex in the Christian view holds together

body and soul, body and spirit, body and emotion.

It won't let you separate them. Potiphar's wife

wants to rip one of those apart and just do that.

And that actually, if you talk to somebody who

has been involved in a lot of sex without commitment,

that's how they feel. They feel ripped apart.

You've ripped one part of this off of the rest

of it. Again, C .S. Lewis, he has a great way

of talking about this. Again, he likes to talk

about food, but he says, imagine someone who

likes to chew, chew, chew food just to get the

taste out of it, but then they spit it out. They

don't want to actually ingest it. They don't

want the food to actually go in and become part

of them. They just want the pleasure of tasting

it. Now, when that happens with food, you know

what we call it? We call it a disorder. But is

that okay then? Is it with sex? No, it is also

a disorder when it comes to sex. Hookup culture

is a disorder. You can't just separate the physical

pleasure. from the spiritual and the emotional

and the legal even side of this. The passion

and the promise have to go together. And that's

the last thing to know about lust is it's not

just craving without control. It's not just passion

without a promise. It's also pleasure without

the person, right? Lust is the opposite of love.

Love says, I want you the person. And the pleasure

is optional. But Lust says, I want pleasure,

but the person, you the person, are actually

disposable. And that's exactly what you see happen

with Potiphar's wife, right? When she realizes

she can't get the pleasure that she wants, guess

what? She says, I don't want the person either.

She accuses him of something that's actually

a capital offense. She's willing to send this

guy off to his death because. He wouldn't give

her the pleasure she wanted. And when that happened,

she didn't actually care about the person, Joseph.

It was just what he could give her. And so, because

he won't give it to her, he's gonna discard him,

right? So sin, this is what it does. It takes

a really good thing, sexual pleasure, sexual

desire, and it turns it into craving without

control, it turns it into passion without a promise,

and it turns it into pleasure without a person.

Now, that's what we learned from Potiphar's wife.

But what can we learn from Joseph? What can Joseph

teach us about how we deal with lust? When it

shows up, because it will show up. And he's gonna

essentially show us two things. That the way

he deals with it is by, first, controlling his

actions, and secondly, focusing his thoughts.

First, what he does is he controls. He does a

couple of really important things here in the

heat of the moment to deal with lust when it

came knocking at the door. The first thing he

did was he just stayed away. He didn't just refuse

to go to bed with her. He refused to even be

near her, right? Look at this, right? And though

she spoke to Joseph day by day, he refused to

go to bed with her or even be with her. Now,

some people, again, will say, oh, Joseph, you're

so weak. Come on, you're such a prude. How cowardly.

You can't control yourself, but no, Joseph is

not being weak here. He is being wise here. He

knew that proximity breeds vulnerability. In

fact, it takes more courage for you to set some

kind of boundary when it comes to sex than it

is for you to tiptoe all over the boundaries

to see how close you can get to the edge, how

long you can linger in the wrong place without

caving in. And I think if we're honest, Are there

places you're hanging out online or in person

where your integrity is being eroded and when

you are getting worn down? Joseph teaches us

just stay away from those places. But it doesn't

even work for him. He tries to stay away but

he can't, so he has to do the next thing which

is run away. He left his cloak in her hand, and

he ran, ran, ran out of the house. When she made

her move, Joseph didn't stick around to, let's

talk about this. He didn't stick around and say,

listen, let's pray about this. No, he just ran,

and sometimes the most spiritual thing you can

do in these situations is just run like crazy.

You may only have a few nanoseconds to make this

decision, but as Paul says, flee from sexual

immorality. You know, don't overestimate your

self -control. Oh, I can handle it. Can you?

No. Instead, just... But it wasn't just Joseph's

actions, it wasn't just that he stayed away,

it wasn't just that he ran away, but also Joseph

had focused his thoughts on this matter and that

is also what saved him. It wasn't the momentary

decision he made in the heat of the moment, but

it was, he had decided well ahead of time what

he believed about lust, what he believed about

sex, and what he believed about marriage. Joseph

had clearly thought through the meaning of marriage.

He knew what he thought about it, right? He says,

how could I do such a wicked thing and sin against

God? Why is Joseph bringing God into this, into

sex? Because for Joseph, sex wasn't something

that was casual. It was sacred. It was a God

thing. My question to you is, is God part of

your thinking about sex? Do you think it's sacred?

You don't have to agree with Joseph, right? But

you just need to know that for the past 2 ,000

years of church history, whether it's Orthodox

or Protestant or Roman Catholic thinking, they

have all understood, they've all agreed on this.

Even Judaism and Hinduism and Islam for centuries,

these religions have disagreed on many, many

things, but they all agree. Sexual intimacy is

a God thing that belongs in marriage. So like

Joseph. You gotta bring God into your thinking

about sex and marriage and let Joseph do it ahead

of time because the backseat of a steamed up

car is not the place to think about what do I

think about sex and what do I think about marriage?

So Joseph had clearly thought through the meaning

of marriage, but he also, or at least we also

should consider the mystery of marriage. You

see, lust says sex is purely physical, but the

Bible says, no, no, no, actually, something deeper

is happening, right? When two people become one

flesh, there's a mystery going on. And the mystery

is, it's about Christ and the church. What this

means is, let me try to explain, sex isn't just

union between two people, it's actually a symbol

of the intimacy and the love that God has for

you. In fact, Ronald Rolheiser, he goes so far

as to say sex is a sacrament. Just like we come

to this table, today we're gonna come to this

table, communion as a sacrament to remember and

to kind of relive the reality of Christ's sacrifice,

that's this sacrament. Sex within marriage is

a sacrament that points us to the reality of

God's covenant love for his people. where he

called his bride in the Bible, right? So this

is a love, this is a love that no spouse or no

fantasy or no partner could ever match. So the

point is that lust is not just wrong, it's actually

too small, right? It aims too low. Lust seeks

this moment of pleasure when we were made for

this eternal intimacy with God and sex is meant

to be a pointer, a sign, a reminder of that love.

So, so. How do we deal with lust? Like Joseph,

control our actions. And like Joseph, we focus

our thoughts. You gotta be ready to run when

the time comes, but you also gotta do some thinking

now. But what is the meaning of marriage? What

is the mystery of sex? Understand that before

we get ourselves into hot water. But there's

one more thing we just gotta say before we end.

And that is, Well, frankly, some of us are less

like Joseph and we're more like Potiphar's wife.

We've let lust control us. We've suffered and

other people have suffered too as a result. And

you may be sitting here and you feel actually

wounded or betrayed or dehumanized because of

the lustful behavior that someone inflicted on

you. So the question we have to end on is, is

there any healing for this? Is there hope for

people who are suffering from lust? And the answer

is, of course there is. Jesus meets us not in

our perfection, but in our sin, especially he

meets us in our sin. You know, in John chapter

eight, a woman who was caught in the act of adultery

was pulled before Jesus. And according to the

law, she should have been stoned to death. But

what does Jesus do? He looks at her and he says,

I don't condemn you, go and sin no more. Only

Jesus can say something like this, by the way.

Only Jesus can on the one hand call sin a sin

and then say, but I don't condemn you for that

sin. And why is that? Because Jesus himself was

already condemned on the cross for all of your

sins and all of my sins. So there is hope because

Jesus meets us in these moments of struggle and

sin. But there is also hope because your story's

not. If you looked at Jesus' family tree, you

would actually be shocked. It is filled with

people who struggled and in many cases struggled

sexually. These are not people of perfection.

They were shaped by lust over and over again.

You got David, who lusted after Bathsheba. He's

in the family tree. He slept with her. Then he

covered it up by murdering her husband. And then

Judah, he slept with a woman that was actually

his daughter -in -law. and his daughter -in -law

had actually pretended to be a prostitute so

that she could sleep with her father -in -law.

It was all so screwed up. Solomon, he lust took

over for him so much that he had something like

700 wives and 300 concubines. These are not side

characters. These are the people through whom

God brought Jesus into the world. He didn't skip

over them. He wove them into the story. And you

know what, your story might be messy too, but

it's not over. If you've fallen into lust, you're

not disqualified from grace. You are exactly

the kind of person that Jesus came to redeem.

I'm gonna end with a story about a guy who really

struggled with lust, but found healing. His name

was Augustine. And before he became one of the

greatest theologians in Christian history, before

he was a bishop, before he was Saint Augustine,

he was just a young man struggling with lust.

In his teenage years, he became sexually active.

He had girlfriends, I think one girlfriend he

had for a very long time, for years, but he refused

to marry her. He eventually sent her away, and

then he replaced her with somebody else that

he could sleep with. He was longing for meaning.

He was longing for love. He'll actually say he

was longing for God, but he could not imagine

living without the pleasures of lust. And once

he even prayed this prayer, he said, Lord, make

me chaste. But not yet. Not yet. Now that's an

honest prayer, right? That's a deeply human prayer.

But then came the moment that everything changed

for him. One day he was in a garden in Milan

and he was just grieving. He was weeping in the

garden, so tormented by the weight of all this.

And then he heard the voice of a child singing

over and over again, take and read, take and

read, take and read, take and read. Seemed weird,

but then he realized this was actually God speaking

to him. And so he ran inside and he opened up

his Bible, take and read. He opened it up and

the very place he flipped to was Romans chapter

Romans 13 · chapter mention

13. And when he opened it up and said this, he

said, let us behave decently as in the daytime,

not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual

immorality and debauchery, rather clothe yourself

with the Lord Jesus Christ and do not think about

how to gratify the sins of the flesh. And in

that moment, Augustine would later write that

a light, a light flooded into his heart. and

all the darkness and doubt vanished away. Now

his temptations didn't vanish overnight, but

something has changed. His desires had been reoriented.

His heart had been captured not by lust, but

by a greater love, the love of God in Jesus Christ.

He would eventually write this. He would say,

God, you've made us for yourself, and our hearts

are restless until they rest in you. So listen.

Wherever you are in this struggle, whether you're

resisting like Joseph, whether you've fallen

into a mess like Potiphar's wife, or whether

you've lived years with this like Augustine,

story's not over. Lust doesn't have to win. There's

grace for the broken, there's healing for the

ashamed, and there's a new start for all of us

as we turn to Jesus Christ. Thanks be to God.

Amen. Thank you for listening to this week's

episode of Trinity Sermons. This sermon was recorded

at Trinity Church Streetsville in Mississauga,

Ontario on April 6th, 2025.