Abstaining from Abstinence

By Phil Scovell



Have you ever, upon feeling sad or discouraged, turned on
Christian radio or TV in hopes you would hear something that might
lift your spirits?  I have probably done that thousands of times
over my lifetime.  I thought that was mostly what Christian
broadcasting was all about but it doesn't seem to be most of the
time.

     I switched on the TV to watch some late night news.  I
listened until everything began to repeat itself and then thought
I would surf the Christian TV channels on our satellite service. 
I was feeling that sadness and discouragement and God as my
witness, I thought maybe somebody would be talking about something
that would encourage me.  I will always think that way although,
over the years, and the thousands of times I have done this,
rarely has anything I heard lifted my spirits, encouraged me, or
answered any question I had about my walk with the Lord.  I wonder
why?  I know why; I'm just thinking out loud.  Anyhow, I made the
same mistake this particular night, but, as I said, I'll never
stop doing it and I am thankful for all the Christian radio and
Christian TV we have today so don't jump my case for being honest.

     I tuned just four stations.  Two of the 4 were asking for
money to support their ministry and spending the entire show
doing so.  Nothing knew there.  In fact, the first one was asking
for 1,000 dollars per person and he would pray a special
intercessory prayer of financial blessing for you.  I guess that
means the rest of us couldn't be blessed.  A third channel was a
man telling people who had the most authority in the church today. 
Dumb me.  I thought it was Jesus but it didn't sound like that was
what he believed so I changed channels once again for the fourth
time.

     A Christian movie filled the screen.  I had never seen one of
these Christian movies before, although people had told me about
them, so I began to listen.  It was pretty neat at first, great
acting, and it was all Christian in nature.  You've probably heard
of Seventh Street Theater?  I had heard of it but didn't remember
until the movie was over and they said the name but this was my
first time seeing it.  Unfortunately, I only saw the last 10 or 15
minutes of the movie.  I wanted to puke  and hit myself on the
head with a hammer for even watching that little of the movie but
like I have already said twice, I will continue doing the same
thing I did tonight until Jesus comes.  Then it is no more
Christian radio or TV for me ever again.

     As I have said, the acting was as good as any I have seen. 
The Christian flavor really made it feel and sound real and I
thought it was really cool.  My complaint wasn't the movie, the
content, the acting, or anything else other than the advice given
in order to help a man with a problem he faced.  Let me set this
up so you'll understand what it was about.

     Apparently, a man had come to visit a Christian family.  He
was not born again.  I believe he came with his brother who knew
this Christian family.  As I said, I got in on the last 10 or 15
minutes, maybe it was 20 minutes, of the movie so I don't know how
all this developed, but the man who was not a Christian
continually was going upstairs and checking his email.  The
Christian wife of the house used the same computer but started
getting porno popup advertisements on her computer.  The husband,
or man of the house, realized one day that it all started when
this visitor came to the house.  He approached him one day and
literally asked him if he was hooked on pornography.  The man
denied it and things got pretty tense between them.

     Soon after this confrontation, the unsaved man used the
computer again.  Gage was the name of the man who owned the house
and had approached the man about the pornography.  Gage walks into
the room just as the man tried accessing his email and pointed out
once again, the porno popups started only after he came and
started using his wife's computer, and told him he could help him
if he would allow it.  Fast forwarding a little, the man gave in
and said he was hooked on porno.  Gage began talking a lot of
good Biblical stuff to him and eventually seemed to lead him to
Christ, although this part was very shallow to me, but then I've
led quite a number of people to Christ in my life and I like to be
sure the person understands and is showing commitment when they
pray compared to what I saw in this movie.  It was just a movie so
I guess it isn't all that important.  Not!  Anyhow, Gage did a
good job helping the man and explaining things but then from
there, everything went downhill fast, and the wheels came off his
theology, and the conversation crashed and burned spiritually and
Scripturally.

     First, Gage told his friend that if he became a Christian,
not only would Jesus help him with this problem, but He would fix
the problem.  So far, so good, I figured, because that was a true
statement but incomplete.  So I wanted to see what came next.

     Gage told the man how Jesus would fix the problem for him. 
Are you ready for this?  He told the man that he had to deal with
his problem.  Wait!  I thought Jesus was going to do all that for
him.  I guess not because now, Gage was telling this man that he
had to solve his own problem.  How?  Thank you for asking.  Gage
said, the only way he could solve his problem, get a hold of your
underwear now, was to give up computers completely.  What?  You
heard me.  He told the man the only way God could help him is if
he gave up computers totally in his life.  The man said, "Gage, I
can't do that.  I build and repair computers for a living.  How
could I give them up?"  Gage literally told him he had to get
another job.  He said, "Look, what is the last thing an alcoholic
needs?"  Of course, the man said a drink.  Gage said, "There you
go.  You have to give up computers just like a drunk has to give
up alcohol."

     I was dumbfounded.  I thought he had told the man that Jesus
could solve his problem for him.  Then I hear the only way this
man can be free is to give up all computers?  Holy Cow!  So what
if the guy was fat, like me.  Does this mean he should give up all
food, never go to the grocery store, Dairy Queen, or a fast food
place, give up can openers, his pop can collection, and stop
drinking water, too, just in case?  This psychological behavioral
modification methodology crap sneaked into the church clear back
even when I was a little boy growing up in the Baptist church.  I
was born again, on the other hand, in an Evangelical Free Church
but I digress.  I was taught, both in the Christian home by a
father who was a preacher and a pastor, as well as in the church,
and Bible college I attended, that abstinence was God's way of
solving Christian's problems of habitual whatever.  This included
going to movie theaters, which was a sin, watching to much TV and
in one church, even having a TV at all was wrong, smoking,
drinking, sex outside of marriage, that was a given, masturbatory
practices, hand holding, kissing, and a number of sexually related
things we all tossed in on top of this rule, no pun intended,
mixed swimming, when I was very young, and that means boys and
girls swimming in the same pool together, or lake, or ocean,
missing a church service no matter how sick you were, and a few
hundred other legalistic rules and regulations.  Now, I am not
suggesting some of these things are not indeed sin but I am
suggesting the movie I watched and am writing to you about right
now was not only stupid but unscriptural.  Stay away from all
computers?  Get a different job where you aren't working were
computers around?  What sort of job could that be, I wonder. 
Anyhow, I will now address why this theology is wrong.

     In a word, or two, it doesn't work, never has, and never
will.  Let's first, since the movie was focused on pornography
addiction, address that topic as an example.

     Do you honestly thing, a man, or it could be a woman I
suppose, was addicted to porno, that by not watching it,
exercising a ton of self will in the process, that such a man
would be free?  hell no, he wouldn't be free.  He'd be in hell all
the time, in a manner of speaking.  Let me use myself as the first
example.

     One evening, a couple of men picked me up to go to the
church.  It was a week night and we were all elders, in a very
large Baptist church, although we were called deacons, and I was
21 years old and the youngest deacon the church ever had.

     As we were riding down the street, I was in the back seat,
one of the men said, "Boy brother Scovell, you are lucky."

     "I am?" I replied; not having the foggiest idea what in the
Sam hill he was talking about.

     "Yep," he sighed.  "You are blind so you can't see all the
half naked women walking down the street during the summer like
this."

     "I wanted to say, and nearly did, "I'd give anything to have
enough sight to see those half naked women walking down the
street," but I was a good Christian and said nothing.  In my mind,
however, I said two things to myself, "Is this guy looking at such
naked women walking down the street right now?  If so, let's hear
about it."  Then I thought, "Does this guy honestly believe if you
are blind, your brain isn't working?"  My point should be obvious. 
You've heard it before; I'm sure.  Your sex organs aren't between
your legs; they are between your ears.  In other words, it is your
brain and your mind and your feelings and your emotions God uses
to create intimacy; the rest is simple biology.  Outside of
marriage, it is sin.  Period.  Nothing less no matter how much
others rationalize it; in or out of the church.

     Here is another example.

     A former homosexual came to a Christian counselor and told
him he had been straight, that is, he had withheld sexual
expressiveness from himself for 15 years.  The problem was, he
confessed, "I'm not free.  I can't get it out of my mind.  I go to
homosexual support groups, I'm faithful going to church, I read my
Bible, I pray, I've given up all my old friends, and I stay as far
away from other gays as I can.  Yet I still feel the pull of the
life style.  I've lived with it because I just thought this is how
it is supposed to be once you become a Christian."

     After about three different prayer sessions, the man was
shown the lie he had been believing and three years later, wrote
the counselor a letter and said that he had no more urges and even
the desire itself had not returned.  He was free!

     So I asked you again, do you think that this man, who was
addicted to pornography, by giving up computers, would walk free
the rest of his life?  Someone is saying, "Well, yeh, sure.  If he
truly became a born again Christian, those desires would be gone." 
Is that how you got saved?  Has it worked for you; abstinence I
mean.  Don't answer that question because I already know.

     Let's step outside the box and see what God can really do.

     Let's say you are a pastor and a man comes to you for
counseling.  You set up the first appointment and once he arrives,
you both soon slip into a casual conversational time of sharing
and soon you begin to get a picture of what you think this man has
come to you for.  The first hour session is pretty productive and
common, nothing you haven't experienced before, in other words. 
Since there is nothing new, you give him a lot of books to read
and a hundred bible verses to memorized, and have him swear on the
Bible laying on your desk that you use for funerals, that he will,
to the best of his ability, never miss any church services as long
as he shall live.  Well, it is the same Bible you use at weddings,
too, so what the hay.

     Next week, the man returns.  More information is shared but
nothing of a personal nature.  Well, he admits he masturbates
occasionally and he likes women, so you give him a couple of books
written by Christian psychologists, some who say masturbation is
ok, and others who call it sin, and expect him to figure it out on
his own.  Of course, the pastor can't admit he does the same thing
and that he has begged got for years to help him and that he has
tried everything he's heard about but still cannot stop doing it,
but this guy doesn't need to know all that.

     The third week, the mud hits the fan.  I mean, the pastor
took pastoral counseling in seminary and all, and even has his
masters in family and marriage counseling, but he ain't never
heard something this weird.  The pastor has just learned, the man
is a bicycle seat sniffer.  That's right.  No fooling.  Honest. 
The guy cannot help himself.  He sneaks around, mostly at night,
finds bicycles parked in garages, chained up at the YMCA, leaning
against house in the backyard, and he just can't help himself; he
has to sniff the seats.  To the horror of the well train pastoral
counselor, who has had 5 years of psychological training and over
12,000 hours of hourly counseling throughout his ministry, what
comes next totally short circuits his Christian brain and he
nearly goes into a spiritual panic attack.  Why, because what he
is now hearing doesn't fit his Christian training nor his
psychological education.  Well, what is it then?  The man in is
office reports that his disease, addiction, syndrome, disorder, or
whatever the damn thing is labeled, is now out in the open in
broad daylight.  That's right.  His problem has come out into the
open and he even sniffs bicycle seats when he knows other people
are watching.  You're laughing right now but the pastor is
freaked out that such a crazy mentally ill pervert is in his
office and the young man with the disorder, is crying hysterically
and begging for help.  The pastor wants to toss the man out of his
office but instead, admits to this poor young man that this is far
beyond his ability to handle professionally and recommends a good
Christian Psychiatrist 250 miles away that the man must see as
soon as possible.  The session is over and the broken man stumbles
from the office and that night shoots himself.  Thank you Jesus
for nothing.

     First of all, some are saying, "It serves him right, the
crazy guy, I mean.  After all, he was crazy and probably a child
molester, too.  He couldn't be any Christian of any kind.  He
deserves hell."

     Ok.  Stupid, but ok.

     So what about your feelings for the habitual masturbatory
practices of the pastor who now not only is masturbating more than
ever before, but is dialing up porno on the web, and trying his
hardest not to start sneaking out at night to sniff bicycle
seats.

     "Come on, man.  This story is crazy."

     It is?

     "Yes, it is," you say.  "Besides, these people are messed up
in the head.  They need a shrink.  They are mentally ill in the
first place and they need professional help."

     I see.  So you don't believe a pastor, or another Christian,
could help such a person?

     "No, man.  We have to leave such things up to the
professionals."

     Again, thank you Jesus for nothing.  So much for miracles.  I
guess that died out with the last apostle; whoever he was.

     There is one little problem with all this bilge you've been
barfing up.  The pastor?  The masturbatory pastor?  Is somebody
going to tell him he has to stay away from his penis, and all
other penises in the world, if he wants victory over this sin, so
called, and if that is what you are thinking, I wonder how his
wife is going to feel about this advice when she learns you told
him he has to give his penis up?  Ain't as funny, now, is it?

     So, what's the answer.  The movie got it right the first time
when the helping Christian, Gage, told his friend that Jesus was
his answer.  His mistake was, he was wrong when he said that by
getting born again, his problems were over, because God would help
him, and then explained that this meant that God would help him
give up computers.  Wrong, wrong, wrong, and more than a little
stupid, but it was a movie after all and not really real.  Right?

     Several years ago, I heard a news story.  It happened here in
Colorado.  A man in his early sixties, retired, went out to go to
the hardware store.  He turn the engine over, put the pickup in
gear and slowly backed out of his driveway.  Hearing the crunch,
he stopped, pulled forward slightly, and leaped out; running to
the back of his pickup.  He had just run over his 4 year old
granddaughter, riding her trike, and killed her.

     For many years, the picture generated in my mind kept
flashing back into my thoughts.  I could, at times, almost feel it
in my emotions and I grieved for that man.  I often prayed the
Lord would somehow bring someone to him to assist him in dealing
with, not coping with, this horrible tragedy he had suffered.  The
report on the news said he was getting psychological assistance.

     Finally, one day, I sat down and began to think.  "Lord, what
can you do for a grandfather like that?  Anything?"  I just didn't
know and I was serious.  You can believe this or not but in my
mind, the face of Jesus flashed and nearly filled up my entire
inner vision.  I smiled when I saw his face because I cannot think
of this grandfather now without the full face of Jesus appearing
in my inner vision.  I also heard, felt is a better expression,
what Jesus said when I asked Him to show, or tell, me what he
could do for such a person.  His face filled my vision which means
Jesus was saying, "I can be his complete life."  I felt much more
being spoken into my grieving spirit that I felt for this man,
too.  "I can," Jesus said into my thoughts, "Appear to him in this
manner ever single time the horrible pictures and memories flash
back into his mind."  I knew then what Jesus could do for a broken
hearted man.  I know also what he can do for anyone, regardless of
what it is, I know what Jesus can do.  I'm wondering if you know? 
Is it pornography, alcohol, drugs, sex, gambling, or something not
even on the list?  Guess what?  Jesus can fix it once and for all
and it won't be like in the movies either.


It Sounds Like God To Me.
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