94% | Pastor Chris Kouba

It's good to see you.

My name is Chris Cooper.

I have the privilege of being the lead pastor here at United City.

Let me encourage you to grab your Bibles and open them up to 1 John chapter 2.

1 John 2 · chapter mention

1 John chapter 2 is where we're going to spend a little time today.

1 John 2 · chapter mention

I want to take this opportunity to welcome all of the men and all of the women at our correctional facilities.

Let's give them a hand and celebrate so many joining us today.

The title of the message today is 94%.

If you were to take a test and you get a 94% on the test, you would get an A and you would be considered to be a master of the material that was presented to you.

If you were in an election and you got 94% of the vote, you would have said to have won, but not only have won, but you would have won in a landslide in every way.

If you live to be the age of 94, you are a baller and you have some things that you want to share with somebody else, right?

You have definitely got a lot of great things in your life living to the age of 94.

On the flip side of that, if you are in a dance competition and you scored a 94, most likely you would not be in the top three.

If you were to go to the doctor and the doctor begins to take your blood pressure and the blood pressure comes back at 120 over 94, you're going to get a talking to about your blood pressure.

You may even be put on medication to try to help deal with the issue of your high blood pressure.

If you get pulled over and the police officer says that you were going 94 miles an hour, I can assure you your biggest problem's not going to be a speeding ticket.

Most likely you're going to be going straight to jail.

None of these things that I've told you have surprised you.

None of these things that I've told you have shocked you.

What if I told you 94% of boys and girls have seen pornography by the age of 14, and the average age of first exposure is 11.

The pornography industry creates more revenue than the Major League Baseball, NBA, and NFL combined.

The pornography industry creates more revenue than NBC, ABC, and CBS combined.

This morning we're continuing in our series called The Things We Hide.

Looking at first John chapter 2, verses 15 through 17.

1 John 2:15–17

Let's look and read them together.

I'll read it to you.

I want you just to take in these words.

If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

For all that is in the world, the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and the pride of life is not from the Father, but is from the world.

And the world is passing away along with its desires.

But whoever does the will of God abides forever.

Last week we talked about how all of us have a choice.

And the choice is very clear.

The choice is either to take a step that is going to lead to the world, which is going to ultimately lead to destruction.

Or the other step that we have to choose is to take a step towards Jesus, and that step will lead to life.

We can't have it both ways.

We may be able to think and disillusion ourselves that we can pull it off, wanting both things to be true, but eventually we're going to be faced with the decision.

And the choice that we make in that moment will determine the outcomes of our lives.

We learned that the verse there in verse 16, which speaks about the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes, the word desires is the word epithumia.

It's a word that begins to describe not that the desires in and of themselves are bad.

The problem is when those desires begin to have an epithumia, a overdrive to them.

It's when they become over-desires.

It's when a good thing turns into a God thing.

And what we're going to look at this morning is the second phrase that is found there in verse 16, and that is the desires of the eyes.

It's very important for you to understand something at the outset of this message.

I'm going to first of all ask if everyone would please take out something to write with or take out your phones to take notes with.

I know that a lot of times I say, hey, I want to encourage you to take notes, and some of you do that, and you're more spiritual, and some of you don't, right?

And the rest of you that that is the case.

Today is one of those days that I am going to be talking about and addressing a subject that I know statistically in the room, many people in this room need help.

And what I don't want is for anyone to feel guilt or shame by taking notes when maybe they haven't previously taken notes.

And so therefore, for the sake of your friend, for the sake of your neighbor, for the sake of the person in front of you or behind you, I want every single person to grab something to write with, and I want everyone to take notes, whether you have any desire to take notes or not.

Because I believe that the very act of you taking notes may help someone else, or maybe what you will discover is that the very act of taking notes, you may realize this message actually is for you too.

The desires of the eyes is the topic.

Let me also state this at the outset of this message.

It's super important that you hear me say this as a pastor in a church.

This is not an anti-sex message.

I want you to know that God is not anti-sex.

I remember whenever I was in middle school and I asked somebody at our church a question about the issue of sex, and I could tell rather quickly, based upon their response, this is not a safe place to have this conversation.

And the last thing that I would want you to do is to have a question or wonder about what this means, and you not feel like the Church of Jesus Christ is a place to talk through this because what I hope that you will discover is not God is anti-sex, God created sex.

God is the one who actually birthed it and originated and made it in such a way for us to be able to enjoy.

And so don't hear for a second that God is anti-sex.

Instead, what I want you to see, he is so pro-sex, but he wants you to see how he created it, and he wants you to see the boundaries which he has created to protect it.

In fact, God's word actually has a book of the Bible called Song of the Songs, which basically talks about a relationship, how it was formed, it talks about their wedding night, and it talks about their marital sexual relationship.

It was so explicit that young Jewish boys were not allowed to read it for fear of temptation.

That's how much God loves sex.

Unfortunately, though, because of the culture and because of experience and because of so many other things, maybe some of you have a different view of sex.

Maybe your thought of sex is this: sex is gross.

Sex is gross.

Perhaps sex is an issue in an area of your life where you've experienced abuse.

Maybe along the way something happened to you, or maybe you made decisions along the way that have brought shame and that have brought guilt on your life.

And so, therefore, whenever you think about the sexual relationship, you don't think about it as something that is joyful and good.

You instead think about it as something that brings shame and guilt.

I think the purity culture had good intentions, but the purity culture, particularly the one that I grew up in, basically we were told over and over again sex is bad, sex is bad, sex is bad, sex is bad.

You're not allowed to have sex until you're married.

Sex is bad, sex is bad.

And then all of a sudden you get married and it's supposed to be like a light switch, it's supposed to all of a sudden be good.

And it's super confusing.

How do these things kind of go together?

And so it's it's only taught about the bad things instead of recognizing that God instead presents sex something way differently, which is good.

Sex as well, another thing many people have turned this into is they begin to not only think sex is gross, maybe some of you think sex is God.

This is where you talk about sex all the time, you think about sex all the time, all you're trying to do is figure out when and who you're going to have sex with the next.

And here's what's happened the culture has added fuel to this fire, and now what you are being told is that what you believe about your sexual ethic and what you believe about who you want to have sex with and when you want to have sex with that person, not only is a choice that you get to make, it's an identity that you now have to assume.

It's the most important thing about you.

It's so important that at a very young age, we want to make sure that you are taught how you can choose what sex you want to be and who you want to have sex with, because we are taught that is so important, it is the lens by which we must see all other things in life through.

But what we have discovered over and over again is sex is a terrible savior.

Instead, I believe God's word teaches something very different.

It says that we are to use sex for his glory.

Genesis chapter 2, verse 25.

Genesis 2:25

It's a it's a really amazing verse.

Here's what it says it says, and the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.

This is given to us prior to the fall in Genesis chapter 3, meaning this.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

God created it, we screwed it up.

God gave it for our benefit and for our good, that it wouldn't be a shameful thing, it wouldn't be a thing that needs to be hidden or exploited.

It instead could be a thing where they were naked and they were without shame.

Becomes a beautiful thing.

What I want you instead to see today is that sex is glory.

God has created this and given this gift to us for the purpose of not only enjoyment, but to bring him glory and the beautiful expression of the sexual relationship, when done in the confines of what God says is there to protect it, actually brings him glory.

The world talks about sex.

The Bible and God talks about intimacy.

And what I want you to know, I tell this about couples all the time that we've done premarital counseling with that you have sex for the first six to nine months, and then after a good knockout, drag out fight, and you reconcile and you work through all the tension that comes in the midst of the marital relationship, that's when intimacy starts.

Because the hard work and the frustration and the conflict and all the things that come along with a sinner marrying a sinner leads to this beautiful thing that gives God's glory when intimacy begins to take place.

I don't know if y'all know this or not, but it's supposed to be cold this week.

It's gonna be pretty awesome.

Anyone excited about the fact that the weather's dropping, right?

Okay, this is a big deal, all right?

Let me tell you what's gonna happen in my house.

I've seen it happen year after year after year, all right?

Whenever the weather gets below like 60 degrees, Hillary's firing up that fireplace as fast as she possibly can, okay?

We don't really need it.

It actually puts zero heat out in our house or whatever.

But the very fact that it gets kind of cold, there's just something where if you have a fireplace in your house, what do you want to do?

You want to start a fire.

And whenever you start a fire, it's a beautiful thing.

It's kind of an ambience.

It kind of creates just this mood and this kind of feeling that just takes place.

And some of you, maybe that's what you, you just want to have a fire just because you want to feel like it's cold in Houston, right?

And so therefore, you just you just trick yourself into thinking that you may walk over to the fire and kind of warm your hands, even though it's, you know, 65 outside, but still, you just you you want to buy into it as long as you possibly can and kind of keep it going.

And it's a beautiful thing whenever you have a fire.

There is an aspect of heat that it releases.

There's an aspect of the fact that it, again, provides a beauty and an environment.

It's just an awesome, awesome thing.

But a fire is so important that it's made in a fireplace.

Like there's these boundaries that are that exist in the midst of that fireplace that allows it to be something enjoyed and admired.

If you, though, were to take that very same fire that is found in that fireplace, and you were to take it outside and you were to put it in your living room outside of that fireplace and start the very same fire with the very same logs, with the very same flame, that would also produce a fire.

But the difference between this fire and that fire over there is this one is contained in a safe box, which it was designed to be able to be admired and to provide beauty and to provide heat.

The one over here is without those boundaries.

And guess what will happen?

If you start a fire in the middle of your living room, eventually the entire living room will catch on fire, and eventually your whole house will catch on fire.

And what was intended to be something that you enjoyed has brought destruction not only to you but the whole house.

You gotta understand something.

God is pro sex, and he doesn't give you boundaries to limit you, he gives boundaries to protect you.

He knows that this is not something to be messed with.

And so, in light of that, he's given these beautiful guidelines so that you can enjoy his gift not only the best way, but you can enjoy the gift without it burning the house down.

So he gives us instructions and he gives us guidance and he gives us help.

John 10 10, the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.

You gotta know this.

The enemy is gonna try to convince you to minimize or to rationalize or to choose the things of the world.

But I want you to know Jesus says that I've come that you may have life, and then I want you to have it abundantly.

Your problem is not that you think God is anti-sex, your problem is you don't know how pro-sex God actually is.

And you're instead settling for something that's an imitation that's only gonna lead step by step by step by step to a path of destruction.

I want to address today uh the issue of sexual immorality, but I want to specifically speak about the issue of pornography.

Uh and you'll see why here in just a moment.

Uh, but what how I want to approach this topic is I want to look at it from some lies that the enemy tells you about the issue of pornography.

Some lies.

The first one I want you to write down is this.

Again, I'm asking everyone to take notes, regardless of whether you think you're a note taker or not.

Today is the day I'm asking you for somebody else to take notes.

Number one, write this down.

Porn isn't a big deal.

A lie that we are told is porn isn't a big deal.

Some of you may be thinking, why are you bringing this up?

Are you just trying to get clicks?

Are you trying to get, are you are you trying to get people to watch?

I mean, I there's plenty of preachers out there that if they're all of a sudden trying to get a sideshow and trying to get people all worked up, then they're gonna bring up sex, right?

That that kind of sex sells, right?

That's the whole concept.

We we do it because we preach faithfully the word of God and it speaks about here the desires of the eyes.

But again, you may be saying, okay, what's the deal?

Why does this need to be addressed?

This isn't my issue.

This isn't something that I struggle with.

Yeah, I've perhaps seen some things online that maybe I I wish I wouldn't have, but it's not like something I'm go looking for and I'm I'm I'm searching for these various things.

Can I just though speak a little bit of secular statistics to begin to tell you why we should be talking about this a whole lot more than we do?

Did you know over 40 million Americans are regular visitors to porn sites?

The average visit lasts six minutes and 29 seconds.

47% of families in the United States report that pornography is a problem in their home.

33% of women aged 25 and under search for porn at least once per month.

It is the fastest, largest demographic that is growing when it comes to the porn industry is women.

At work.

The most popular day of the week to view pornography is on Sunday.

Matthew chapter 5, verse 27 and 28.

Matthew 5:27

You have heard that it was said, you shall not commit adultery.

But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

Jesus never seems to minimize this issue.

Rather, he always raises the bar.

Anytime Jesus is presented with a sexual ethic question or a marriage question, which is a big question in our culture today, Jesus never redefines it or lowers the bar.

He always raises it.

And pornography isn't just about looking at something hardcore on your PlayStation or your Xbox or your Oculus or your virtual reality or your phone or any your Kindle or your Kindle fire.

Yep, every single thing I just mentioned has porn on it.

Parents, we gotta wake up.

We have given our children access for the porn industry to come after their hearts and their eyes.

All of those things have porn on them.

But what I want you to see is that what Jesus says over and over again, he says, Well, what does it technically mean to commit adultery?

And he says, Hey, hey, whoa, whoa, whoa, it's this.

Ephesians chapter 5, verse 3, listen to what it says.

Ephesians 5:3

It says, But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints.

Other translations say it like this that there should not be even a hint of sexual immorality.

It's the same conclusion Paul has as what Jesus had, which is this if you want to know where the line is, it's up here.

It's not down here.

He raises the bar.

He says to us that we must understand something.

When it comes to the issue of sexual immorality, we are always going to define it in such a way where we're over the line.

We're better than what it says.

But what Jesus says is that, well, the line's actually up here.

This is what I'm calling and asking you to.

Again, some of you are like, but yeah, but why are we dealing with this?

Here's why.

Because this may not be an issue for you, but it is for your boyfriend, it is for your girlfriend, it is for a parent.

It is for a child.

It is for your grandchild.

And so just because you may not struggle with it doesn't mean, statistically speaking, a lot of the people right around you inside of the church are absolutely dealing with it.

1 Corinthians chapter 10, verse 13, such an important verse for us to understand.

1 Corinthians 10:13

It says, therefore, let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed.

Lest he fall.

Well, this isn't an issue for me.

Well, I want you to know this.

The enemy's waiting around so you're the most vulnerable to make it an issue you can't deny.

And because of that, what we must do is we must be vigilant about this issue.

We cannot be passive observers to the culture and the church going down in flames while the enemy just does it under the cover of secrecy.

Instead, we must be understand that we are at all targets of pornography.

Let me give you a second lie we're often told by the enemy about pornography.

Number two, please write this down, everybody doing it together.

Number two, I can stop anytime.

I can stop anytime.

I've been doing pastoral ministry for over 20 years, and I have met with many couples along the way who have found themselves at a crisis that feels as though it is beyond repair.

This crisis has involved a number of things.

Many times it involves somebody stepping outside of the marriage, having an affair, and not one time ever, when I've sat down with the couple, has somebody walked in and you said, Man, I just I never even thought about it, but I just woke up on this Tuesday and I thought, man, today's the day I'm gonna go outside my marriage.

Never happens that way.

It's a step that leads to another step.

To another step.

That leads to another step.

Sin will always take you further than you ever wanted to go, and it will always keep you longer than you wanted to stay.

And so we gotta wake up.

First Corinthians chapter 6, verse 18 says, flee from sexual immorality.

1 Corinthians 6:18

Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body.

Look at what it says there.

Flee from sexual immorality.

Every other sin that is in God's word, it begins to tell us that we are to take up the whole armor of God.

And whenever we take a punch from the enemy, what we're supposed to do is we're supposed to punch back.

We're supposed to stand up, we're to gird our ground, we're to use God's word as a shield, and we are to make sure that when those flaming darts of the evil one come, we use it to protect us and we pop it back, except for sexual sin.

When it comes to sexual sin, it's the only sin in all of the Bible that doesn't tell us to stand there, take a punch, and punch back.

It says flee, run, run as fast, as far away as you can.

Don't manage this, don't get near this, don't try it out.

You run as far away as possible from that fight.

Folks, the question I used to ask all the time growing up well, how's far too is too far?

How far is too far?

It's a wrong question.

It's a wrong question.

Because that implies that purity is a line, and I want to see how close I can get up to that line and not cross it.

But God's word tells us very clearly purity is not a line, it's a direction.

And so, in light of that, what God says, the best thing that we can do is to get as far away from that line as we possibly can.

We're to go as far away as we possibly can.

There is nothing that you could do to get away from that line that isn't worth it.

Yet I can tell you time after time after time after time after time after time after time, when people get all the way up to the edge, and I'm just telling you, they fall.

And then they find themselves saying, Well, I can just stop whenever I want to, only to realize they can't stop.

Let me give you another one, a third lie.

Encourage you to write this down.

I won't experience any consequences.

I want to experience any consequences.

I want to talk to you about a massive problem and issue related to the issue not only of pornography, but of sexual immorality as a whole, and that is the issue of cohabitation.

The culture basically acts like it's no big deal.

You just stay together before you're married.

The problem is God has something to say about that.

He says to keep the marriage bed pure.

And if you are living together and you're not sleeping together, what's wrong with you?

And so, in light of that, why are you doing that?

Like, why would you why would you put yourself in that situation?

And I've taught on this before, and and I've had it three or four different times.

I've had people come up to me and they kind of come up and you can kind of tell they don't like what I just said.

And they're like, man, hit me on the back, and hey man, come on now.

You'd be a little harsh on us today, weren't you?

I mean, at the end of the day, if I was gonna buy a car, I wouldn't do buy that car without test driving it first.

I'm a dad of two daughters.

My girls aren't cars.

They're not a car.

And they're certainly not here for you to try out.

And it's vitally important that we as believers in Jesus are man enough to where if you're gonna play house, start being the leader of the house.

To where you've got to make a decision, to where you gotta make a decision that you don't want all the benefits of the relationship without any of the work.

And so for some of you, ladies, you're like, well, I just love them and I want them.

Can I please hear me?

Just as my girls are not to be tried out, you aren't either.

You are infinitely valued, made in the image of God.

God has a purpose and a plan for your life.

He sees you as beautiful, and I don't care what any guy tells you for the purpose of trying to make sure to sleep with you and try you on, that is not worth it.

You are worth way more than that.

And what God desires and longs for you is to embrace the God-given reality that He already has for you so that you can protect the very thing that He not only created you but ultimately died for you to be able to have.

And that's the joy and the freedom that comes when you're not bound from a life that tells you you are defined by who you sleep with.

It's so important for us to see this.

I I I my prayer is that I'm gonna have some couples that come up this week and say, Hey, I know that we got a wedding scheduled down the road, but can you make let's let's can we be honest?

God doesn't care about your wedding.

It's a party.

That's all it is, is a party.

If that's the way that you're gonna do things, then get married right now and make the decision to do the right thing or make the sacrifice to go through the the process of you pursuing each other in a godly way so that you can experience the benefits of the fire in the fireplace.

As opposed to making decisions.

Where, yeah, that thing may not have burned the house down yet, but can I just tell you the statistics secularly back up what God's always said?

Those who cohabitate have less marital satisfaction than those who don't.

The statistics will tell you that the sexual relationship is better when you don't sleep together before you're married than whenever you do.

And some of you are like, well, it worked for us.

And I will simply tell you, that's great that it may have worked for you.

And that's the beauty of God redeeming the years the locusts have eaten, but don't project that onto your kids.

You instead protect your kids by making them understand, look, I want you to have way better than I've got.

I want you to preach something even more than what I experienced.

Galatians chapter six, or first Corinthians chapter six, verse eighteen.

Flee from sexual immorality.

Or excuse me, Galatians 6.

Galatians 6, 7 and 8.

Do not be deceived.

God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap.

For the one who sows to his own flesh will reap from the flesh corruption.

But the one who sows to the spirit will weep from will reap from the spirit eternal life.

You are crazy if you don't think that your actions are producing incredible consequences.

Whenever you begin to resort to cohabitation or whenever you begin to resort to pornography, essentially what you are doing is taking away all of the stress and the and all of the issues of life, and you're trying to find a pleasure-filled, fantasy-free world.

And what I want you to see is that you are making sex become something that is selfish and self-centered.

Pornography is all about masturbation.

Masturbation is all about having sex with yourself.

So if I'm having sex with myself, I'm not having to invest in another person.

And what God says is that the beauty of sex is meant to be with the struggle of relationship.

And so, therefore, if you find yourself addicted to pornography, let me just tell you, you're not addicted to lurid images that you should not see.

You are addicted to pride and self-centeredness.

Because ultimately that's what you're choosing, is I want all the benefits, but I don't want any of the work.

Committed to serving themselves, do whatever they can to find a convenient way not to die to yourself, which is the nature of a relationship.

Pornography is cheating the system and it's gonna lead to destruction.

The God tells us that the marriage relationship is a man who is serving his wife as Christ loved the church, and you can't serve the church when you're obsessed with self-centeredness.

1 Corinthians 6, 19 and 20.

Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God?

You are not your own, for you were bought with a price.

So glorify God in your body.

What you do matters.

Sex is deeper than skin.

What you do in this area of your life will affect the other areas of your life.

You can even say, Well, I'm having safe sex.

I would tell you, you're missing the point because the medical, while they have done amazing and they've done created so many different things along the way, and scientists have come up with all these different wonderful gifts that God has given to us.

Please hear me.

They do not make a condom for your soul.

And this is deeper than skin.

This instead is your very heart.

Let me give you the last lie.

Write this down, please.

I can never change.

I can never change.

Some of you may be full-fledged addicted to pornography.

Some of you may be in relationships where you've crossed every line that exists and you're connected and you feel stuck.

Some of you are considering, even right now, making decisions to act out on your desires of the eyes that you swore you would never do just a few months ago.

1 Corinthians chapter 6, verse 9 through 11.

1 Corinthians 6:9–11

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?

Do not be deceived, neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

That is a really clear passage.

And such were some of you.

But you were washed.

You were sanctified.

You were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And by the Spirit of our God.

This doesn't have to define you.

This doesn't have to be the last chapter.

I want you to understand something.

The enemy is going to tell you, man, you're too far gone.

You've promised enough and you've said enough things and you've never come through in all those promises.

And I would tell you, Jesus Christ has says here that there are so these people who will not inherit the kingdom of God.

But here's the list of all of those who have saved, who have sanctified, who have washed, who have changed who they are.

And that can be your story too.

1 Thessalonians 4, 3 through 5, take heart in this, for this is the will of God, your sanctification.

That you abstain from sexual immorality, that each of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor.

Not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God.

I want you to understand God's desire, his will for your life is that you would be free, not that you would be judged, but that you would be free.

And here's what I want you to know: that our God is not going to call you to something that He's also not going to equip you and give you the ability to actually do.

He has a vested interest in your purity.

He wants you to thrive in this area.

He wants you to be able to experience his grace and his mercy.

If your house is burned down, he wants to build it back up.

Here's what it's going to require.

Matthew chapter 5, verse 29 through 30.

Matthew 5:29–30

If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away.

For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell.

And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away.

For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.

This is not saying that you can manage this.

Let me give you two points of application.

I encourage you again to write these down.

The first one is this take radical action.

Take radical action.

Get help immediately.

Go to celebrate recovery.

It meets on Wednesday nights, and what you will find is a group of people who have found themselves through choices that they have made bound to addiction, but God's setting them free.

Get involved in the group.

Let me mention this one.

This may sound crazy, but I promise you, whatever radical action you may be thinking is not radical enough, get rid of your phone.

How am I gonna do that?

I'll work, got a job.

Then make it a dumb phone.

Lock that thing down so much that you can make phone calls and you can text message certain people, but do not play with fire and expect not to get burned.

Get rid of that relationship.

Some of you are in the middle of a relationship where you have just blown past the lines that you set up.

And as a result of that, you're stuck, but you're not.

Get rid of it.

Flee.

Run away from it.

If you're too flirty with that person at work, then you start being awkward with that person at work.

You do whatever you gotta do in order to run the opposite direction.

Please hear me, parents.

Giving your children unfiltered access to the internet on your phone, on their phone is a horrible, horrible, horrible idea.

In fact, it's such a bad idea, you shouldn't even have unfiltered access on your phones.

You gotta wake up.

We cannot put these things and the devices, these devices of all kinds into our kids' hands and expect them not to be addicted to pornography.

I know some of you are thinking, well, how am I supposed to catch all of it?

And I would tell you, you're probably not, but what you can do is you can raise the fence to where it's harder to jump over.

And you can do everything you can to have a fighting chance when it comes to this issue.

We're gonna talk about this more in a couple of weeks at the parenting conference.

Interaccountable relationships that have teeth with them.

Not just, hey, did you do something you weren't supposed to do this week?

Okay, we'll do better next week.

Here's the consequences if I do this.

You're gonna tell this person, you're gonna tell this person, and I'm gonna go see this person.

Have accountability that has teeth with it.

Everybody grab your phones if you would, please.

I want everyone to do this.

I want you to open up your text message and I want you to text.

And I want you to look at the body of your text message.

I want you to text, it makes a no difference what's capitalized and what's not.

UC Freedom.

Text the words UC freedom.

Everybody do it.

It's gonna send you a text message back that has a link to a resource page.

This resource page on it has a number of different things that are designed to help you in this issue.

It's designed to help you if you find yourself even today struggling with pornography.

It's got a number of different books that use God's word as a guide and as a help to be able to help break free from these things.

It begins to talk through and walk you through parents, some guides and some helps to be able to put in to your kids.

It talks about how to set up safeguards online with their phones and all of those things.

There's some great software programs that you can go on here as well and be exposed to that you can put into your home and put onto your kids' phones as well as your own.

This website begins to walk you through the different resources we have as a church, which begins to help you understand or celebrate recovery.

We also have a men's group that meets as well.

We want to expose you to these things.

You can sign up and you can register on this website for all of these things.

This can be a place that you can go back to that can kind of help you begin to find freedom in this area.

I can just assure you of this.

Whatever action you're thinking, do more.

Do more.

One of the things we'll talk about at the parenting conference as well is the fact that we hold to a philosophy that we basically want to talk early and often about this issue with our kids.

Because I can assure you of this, the pornography industry is trying to talk earlier and earlier and more often to your kids about it.

So there's no reason for you to be late to the party.

I encourage you, it talks through some different guides as to how to have conversations with your kids, how to begin to bring these types of things up, and for you to begin to talk through this.

A great, great place.

Good pictures, bad pictures, another great resource that you can use, especially with younger kids as well.

Last thing I want to mention to you, point of application is this.

Confess and be cleansed.

Confess and be cleansed.

The darkness wants nothing more than to hide in the darkness.

The more you conceal, the less you are cleansed.

James 5, 16 says, Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another that you may be healed.

The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.

The Lord gives us a gift, but it's really hard to do.

It's freeing beyond belief.

It's through confession.

1 John 1, 8 and 9 says, If we confess, if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Do you want to be cleansed today?

Would you bow your heads and would you close your eyes?

All of you here, as well as all of you joining us online.

I'm going to ask that you would just give me a few more moments.

Please, no one leaving.

If you're here today, please, no one looking around.

You say, Pastor Chris, I want to be cleansed.

I don't have to know any of those details, but God knows.

No one looking around at all.

Would you just raise your hand so that I can see it, so that I can pray for you?

Praise God for you.

Who else?

I see quite a few in the back here on my right.

Man, tons in the middle here.

I want to be cleansed.

I see you in the back there.

Praise God for you in the middle.

On my left, man, tons over here on the left.

Praise God for you.

You can put your hands down.

I want to encourage you.

Don't hold back on whatever it is that you're thinking you need to do.

If you need to get rid of something, a relationship, if you need to drive a different way, going home from work, going forward.

If you need to turn into the most awkward coworker that's ever existed, if you need to end that relationship, that's way too flirty.

If you need to move the computer out into the middle of the room, if you need to put those guardrails on your phone, whatever it is that God is prompting you to do, I would just ask, would you just commit right now before I pray to do it?

It's a serious issue.

And I hope that you hear with a pastor heart pleading for you to find freedom.

God will meet you when you take the step.

But you got to make the commitment.

Father, I pray that you would be with all of these that raised their hands.

So many I know, God, that needed to, that didn't.

I pray, Father, that you would help them find freedom.

I pray, God, that their lives wouldn't be defined by an addiction.

But instead, God, you would help them to see the root of what is going on here, and that God, you would help them see that you desire, that there is a beauty, there is a warmth, there's a gift that is meant to be enjoyed under the confines of the boundaries you placed upon it.

Lord, may we see you as good, may we see you as gracious.

May we experience, Father, the joy and the kindness of conviction that leads to repentance.

May we bring those things that have been hidden in the dark and may we bring them to the light because God ultimately we know that when these things are brought into the light, that is where freedom comes.

Lord, help us to be bold and willing to experience whatever freedom you would like to give us if we take that next step.

Continue to keep your heads about and your eyes closed.

I want to ask, I know there's people in this room and you've been trying to fight spiritual problems with natural strength.

And the problem is you're never you're never gonna do it.

It's because you need a relationship with Jesus.

God died on a cross, sent his son Jesus to die on a cross for you.

He rose from the dead so that you could experience victory, but he's not gonna do that when you just know about him.

He's gonna do that when you receive his gift of eternal life, forgiveness of all of your sins.

If you're here today and you want a relationship with Jesus, I want to invite you in just a moment to come forward and to tell one of our team members here we're gonna be on the side and we're gonna be up in the front and we want to talk with you and we want to pray with you, and we want to lead you through a prayer today that you can know for certain that you have a relationship with Jesus.

Some of you need to come and join United City Church.

We're gonna be a church that we're not looking for clickbait, we're looking for obedience.

We're looking to teach the whole council of God, and we know that God's word speaks, and so therefore, we're gonna preach it, and we're gonna preach it unapologetically, and we're gonna call you to holiness because we believe that a holy church, a set-apart church, can be a church that God wants to pour his blessing out on and use.

He wants you to find freedom so that we can go and tell others how they can find freedom.

God wants you to join and be a part of United City Church today.

Through formal membership, I'm gonna ask you to lead the way.

Maybe others need to be baptized.

Maybe some just need prayer.

You want to be prayed over?

You want to be prayed with.

We want to invite you to use this time to do that.

Um, Father, we pray these things in your name.

I pray God for boldness and courage.

Lead our people to respond the way you need them to respond.

It's in Jesus' name that I pray.

Amen.

Wow, what an amazing message we got to hear this morning.

I hope the Lord showed himself to you in a fresh, new way.

Hey, if you made a decision today to follow Jesus or a decision for Christ, we would love to process that with you.

And so, text the word next to 55498, and someone from our team will be more than happy to reach out and process that with you.

If you missed the message or you missed the note or two and you want to go back, don't worry.

We've got the option for that as well.

It's going to be available on Spotify as well as Apple Music.

This has been an amazing morning.

We love you guys so much, and we hope to see you next week.

Bye-bye.