Okay, let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this wonderful time you have given to us to study your word together and learn some wonderful things about how we can live a sexually pure life in a morally corrupt world. We are living in a culture bombarded with sexual temptations, and how difficult it is for men and women today to be the true followers of Christ and to live a life of sexual purity. But we can, O Lord Heavenly Father, by the power of Your grace and by the teaching of Your Word, and especially by the atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus on the cross, we have hope to live a holy life in this world. So we pray that this morning you speak to our hearts, open our eyes to see wonderful things, and maybe not simply be the listeners, but be the doers of your word, and take your word seriously to our hearts, and devote ourselves to practice it. We thank you for this opportunity to learn the word of God together. In the name of our Lord Jesus we pray, amen, amen. As you know that the title of my message this morning is A Man Conquered and Ruined by Lust. A man conquered and ruined by lust. Purity lessons for Christian men and women from the life of Amnon. I don't know how many weeks it will take, probably two weeks I'm supposing, but it may extend beyond that. But this is a proposition I want to give before I go ahead and share from the word of God. And this is what I would like you to listen. Why we need to listen to this message? Why so important for our generation, for the churches to listen to this message? Sex has become number one pursuit and pleasure in the world today. And no doubt, no argument against it. We all know that it's a number one pleasure and pursuit that people are seeking today. We live in a sex-saturated world. And the Bible doesn't say anything wrong about sex. Sex is a beautiful gift, physical pleasure that God has gifted to man and woman. It's a blessing of God. However, pursuing sexual satisfaction before and beyond marriage. Listen to this carefully. Pursuing sexual satisfaction before marriage. before you make a covenant of marriage and beyond marriage. That is, you are not only trying to seek sexual satisfaction with your spouse, but also beyond your spouse. According to the word of God is a sin against a holy God, bringing destruction to one soul and disgrace to the community. With this in mind, I want you to listen how important it is for us to apply some wonderful lessons from this message. You know, the beautiful thing about the Bible is that it doesn't hide the moral failures of its people. It plainly, transparently records about how people morally failed in the history of the world. When it comes to sexual temptation, a lot of us think about David, right? How he fell in adultery. Or they think about Samson, deceived by Delilah. Or they think about Joseph, how he overcame the temptation of Potiphar's wife. I challenge you that many of us do not think about Amnon. In fact, many people hear this name for the first time in their life. Amnon and Tamar. But we have wonderful lessons to learn even from their lives. And we have heard this morning the scripture passage read from 2 Samuel chapter 13 verse 1 and 2. It is very clear before us that how Amnon infuriated by lust violated sexually his half-sister, and then the consequence that he faced as a result of it. So we will go step by step and see what lessons can we learn from this man who was conquered and ruined by lust. One thing we need to understand that the grand purpose, why this passage is there in the entire Bible, why God has let this be recorded in 2 Samuel chapter 13. And the bigger purpose that we need to understand about this passage is that this story is there because in the grand purpose, what we understand is that 2 Samuel 1 Samuel is a record of the history of the rise of David's dynasty. Amnon is there because of David. He was the son of David. The firstborn son of David. And David's dynasty and his rulership ultimately points to the person Jesus Christ who came from the lineage of David. And he became the eternal heir of David's throne. This is the grand purpose that we see from this passage. But the secondary purposes that we also learn is how a man can ruin his life when he is conquered by lust. And I want you to understand what wonderful lessons that we can learn in order to live a sexually pure life. And I believe that. Recently, after the pastor's conference, we were having, some of the leaders were having a conversation. And in that, we were thinking about what should be the topic. And I proposed that we can have the disciplines of a godly pastor. And then one of the things that I presented was also sexual purity is one of the disciplines that we need to be having. And then in our discussion, one brother was there, he's one of the key persons, and I asked him, do you think you're sexually pure? And he said, no. And what he meant by that is that even though I may not commit physical adultery, I cannot say that I am absolutely pure in my thought life. What he wanted to say is that almost every person lives in sexual impurity because of the thoughts that he or she cannot control. So don't think that just because we don't commit a physical act we are sexually pure. It is a common battle every person is facing. For unbelievers, it is not a battle because they are saturated in that. But for believers, it is a battle because they want to live a sexually pure life. But before that, let me tell you who is Amnon. Who was Amnon that we see in 2 Samuel chapter 13. I want you to take back to 2 Samuel chapter 3 to understand who Amnon was and Absalom was and Tamar was. 2 Samuel chapter 3 verses 2 to 3 and this is what the scripture records and sons were born to David at Hebron King David and He had some multiple wives, which is not actually the design of God But the Bible records that he had some multiple wives and his firstborn was Amnon of Ahinoam of Jezreel, and the second, Caleb of Abigail, the widow of Nabal of Carmel, and the third, Absalom, the son of Mekah, the daughter of Talmai, king of Geshur. And Tamar was born to Maka. the daughter of Talmai, king of Geshur. She was the own sister of Absalom and half sister of Amnon. Absalom, Tamar, and also if you see Amnon, they had the same father, but they had different mothers. So Tamar was half sister of Amnon. What we see about this man is that he is a great example standing before us. Because if you read 1 Corinthians 10, it says that all things have been recorded to exhort us, to warn us, to instruct us. And he stands as a great warning about what happens to us if we yield to the sin of sexual immorality. A wise person learns from the mistakes of a fool. And if you are wise, we learn from this foolish man how we ruined his life. But before we listen what is lust and how a man will be conquered by lust, I want to define what lust is because people may have different understanding on that. And this is how Charles Swindoll defines what lust is. L-U-S-T. Charles Swindoll defines lust as a desire to have and enjoy the body of an individual, even though such pleasure is illegal or immoral. It's a desire. It's not an act, people. An act is called adultery or whatever it is. But lust is actually a desire to have and enjoy the body of an individual, even though such pleasure is illegal and immoral. Now let's see from 2 Samuel 13 verse 1. What is the first lesson we can learn from this man who was conquered or ruined by lust? And how we need to be careful as we battle against this temptation in our own life every day. 2 Samuel chapter 13 verse 1, this is what it says. Now Absalom, David's son, had a beautiful sister. Observe that word, beautiful. sister, whose name was Tamar. And after a time, Amnon, David's son, loved her. Amnon, David's son, loved this woman, half-sister, Tamar. I was doing a study, what are the descriptions of this word when it says loved her? Because when you really read the passage, it doesn't seem that he really loved her. It sounds the way the love is happening in the world today. When a person says, I love you, it means I lust you or want to have sex with you. And this term is used as loved in the world today. And I was really interested to do some word study on that. And on this word, there are different descriptions of the word love. And in the Hebrew, it is called Ahav. And one of the descriptions of this word, loved, is a strong feeling of liking sexually. A strong feeling of liking sexually. You know, actually, what he was loving? He was loving her body. It was not the actual love. He was loving her beauty. It was a sexual fascination. The very first lesson that I want you to observe here is this. Fascination. That is a very powerful tool that is ruining the lives of many people. What is fascination? Fascination means it's a physical attraction. And then when you're physically attracted, you imagine all kinds of things in your mind. It's a battle that happens in the mind, fascination. You're attracted and you imagine because of the beauty that you see in the other person. And this is what I want to tell you that in lust, we love the physical body. But in love, we love the person as a whole. Unless people love only the physical body, but in true love, In true love, people love the person as a whole. But if you look over here, Amnon only looked at her lustfully. He was sexually fascinated by her and he was imagining all kinds of weird thoughts towards her and he couldn't control and yielded to the temptation. Now the question is this, how did Amnon look at the beauty of Tamar? I say that he looked at the beauty of Tamar the same way for women. Listen to this carefully. How Potiphar's wife looked at Joseph and how David looked at Bathsheba. Let me show to you how they looked and this is how exactly Amnon also looked at Tamar. Women, especially this is. Genesis chapter 39 verse 6 to 7. You see what it says about here. Genesis chapter 39 verses 6 to 7. Now Joseph was handsome in form and appearance. I told you right fascination is always the result of The way you look at the beauty and beauty is subjective people. It's not the same thing to the same people. Some people, even when they're short and when they're in big height or when they're dark or maybe they fail, whatever it is that people are attracted to beauty in different ways and they have their own fascination about beauty. But this is what it says. Now Joseph was handsome in form and appearance. And after a time, his master's wife, Potiphar's wife, and observe the phrase that is used here, cast her eyes. In Telugu, we say, kannu padadhi. Figuratively. What does cast her eyes mean? It means that she looked at his handsomeness, physical stature, lustfully. In other words, she desired his body. She wanted to have sex with him. That's how she looked at him. and said, what did she say? Lie with me. Have physical intimacy with me. And this is a warning and this is a word to the sisters here. My dear sisters, how do you look at the men? How do you look the men in the church? How do you look the men in your neighborhood? How do you look the men in the workplace, wherever you go? How do you look the men when you see a movie? There is a great, great warning over here that women can also be lusted. Women will also lust. It's not that lust is a problem only of men. Lust is also the problem of women. And women should be careful about that. And for men, 2 Samuel 11 too. This is how Amnon also looked. It happened late one afternoon when David arose from his couch and was walking on the roof of the king's house and he saw, observe the word, saw. How did he see? He didn't see normally, he saw abnormally, lustfully from the roof of a woman bathing and the woman was very beautiful. Verse 4, so David sent messengers and took her and she came to him and he lay with her. What does it speak to us, my dear brothers and sisters? It speaks to us that be careful about how you look at the beauty of the other person. Because fascination is one struggle that we have to face when we look at the beauty of the person. Here, Amnon looked at Tamar, the beauty of Tamar, the body of Tamar, sexually, lustfully, not with the pure intent of the eyes, not as a sister, but as something to be sexually enjoined. The question to us is, how do we look? Do we look like Amnon, or do we look like Job, who said? But before telling of that, we need to understand, when I say that, how do you look, I mean three things. One is, the real person, how do we look? Secondly, the images that come on your phones, that you look at the wall posters, the images that we see everywhere. And you know that, every image that you see is an image of a beautiful person. That's how advertisement, that's how the media tries to capture men and women because beauty is a medium of fascination. How do we look at the videos that comes in our mobiles or that comes on the television and whatever way that you have access to on the internet, how do we look at it? We look here that these people have looked lustfully and have ruined their lives. And let me tell you, my dear brothers and sisters, a lot of people have not committed adultery. I mean, physical adultery in their lives, not because they are steadfast, fearing God, and they are very right. The only thing is they have not gotten an opportunity. Are you understanding what I'm saying? Given an opportunity, many people will commit sexual immorality. Why? Because they have been entertaining fascinating thoughts already. They have already fallen in their mind. When people fall in their mind, it takes only an opportunity to fall in action. That's why Amnon fell because he was fascinated, entertaining sexually immoral thoughts. And Job says here how he could keep himself pure. You know what he says in Job 31 verse 1? I made a covenant with my eyes not to look lustfully at a woman. That's where Amnon faced. He didn't have any covenant with his eyes. He didn't have any covenant the way he looked at a woman. And because of which he fell in adultery or fornication when the opportunity came. And I love even what verse 7 says in Job 31 verse 7. You know what it says? My heart has not been led by my eyes. You know people how dangerous our eyes is? Very, very powerful. Very powerful our eyes are. The way we look at the person, nobody may know. We may be looking nice, we may be looking decent, well-behaved people, but no one knows the way we look at the people. But the Bible tells us, be careful of what you look at, how you look at, for that determines whether you live a sexually pure life or an immoral life. Amnon, because of lust, he couldn't control himself. And we know that Jesus said very clearly in the New Testament. What did He say? He said very clearly in Matthew 5, 27 to 28. What did He say? He said that you have heard that you shall not commit adultery, which He meant physical adultery. But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent or every woman who looks at a man with lustful intent has already lustful intent means seeing and imagining. has already committed adultery with their heart. According to this, I'm not asking you to raise our hands. Who is a person sitting here without committing adultery? According to the words of Christ, who is a man, woman, sitting here telling that, I have never lustfully looked at a man, looked at a woman. Maybe every person who is sitting here or listening to this message, or even me, fallen already in adultery because of lustful intent. Listen to this, people. What your eyes captures is what your mind imagines. What your eyes capture is what your mind imagines. And what your mind imagines is where your feet will run into. Don't underestimate the power of the sight. Don't underestimate the power of the look. Every person who has fallen in pornography or fornication or adultery or whatever it is, it all begins with the fascination. They failed the way they look at the person. What your eye captures is what your mind imagines. And what your mind imagines is where your feet will run into. If you fail to resist our sight and thoughts, in other words, if you fail to resist fascination, we fail to abstain our feet. No way, no way that we can run away from. And in my own battle with lust, and I tell you that I have learned to conquer that only by first dealing with thoughts. And I have seen that as long as I have failed to deal with my thoughts, I have often failed into lustful intent. And when I took my thoughts seriously, in fact, honestly speaking, for the first time in my life, I came into accountability with the person even about my thoughts. And I went to the person and told him that, every day you ask me whether I looked anything, any person lustfully in my heart. You have every right to ask me that. And sometimes when that person doesn't ask, I poke him and say that, hey man, you're not asking me, what is the problem with you? Because I know that only when I'm sexually pure in my thoughts, and I struggle with that, only then I can be sexually pure in my life. There is no sexual purity without sexual purity in the mind. And I agree with what John Stone, a very famous theologian said. You know what he said? He said that the secret of holiness is in the mind. The secret of holiness is in the mind. Why his feet was uncontrollable to sexually violate Tamar was because Amnon couldn't control his thoughts. He already fell in that. Randy Alcorn, in his book, Sexual Temptation, I encourage every person, I have the PDF copy, free copy, actually in the future through Ecclesia Books, I wanted to translate that and publish it, a small booklet. In that, Randy Alcorn says this, you know what he says? A Christian man once told me, I fell into this adulterous relationship without warning. It just happened. I didn't imagine that I will fall in adultery. You know, John Piper's Desiring God, one day they wrote an article about how people fall in adultery. Everywhere people are falling in adultery, people. Because of the bombardment and exposure of explicit sexual material that we are facing today. And they said that one of the reasons why people fall in sexual immorality is this. You know what is that? They never thought they will commit that sin. Self-confidence. They thought that no, no way I could commit this sin. They fell. And he was telling about, I met a man who told me that, without warning I fell in that. It came out of the clear blue sky. And you know what Randy Elkins said? I asked him questions. Some questions he asked him. It became evident that he had cultivated a mind for immorality. He was sexually imagining, lusting, fascinating, and that eventually led him to commit adultery in action when opportunity came. When opportunity came. If you don't resist sexual attraction and thoughts at the very first sight, we will soon be captivated and battered by lust. People, listen to this carefully. Whether you and I live a sexually purely life is decided only in one or two seconds. It's only a matter of a second. You cannot sexually imagine for a couple of seconds and think that, no, I can live a life of purity. No. The very first thought, the very first imagination that you get it in the first two seconds decides whether you and I can be sexually pure life, whether in thought or in act. I don't know how many of you have seen the Hollywood movie which came in 2005, King Kong. It is one of my favorite movies. And my favorite director is Peter Jackson, who is the director of Lord of the Rings and Hobbit. And if you have seen King Kong movie, and you know that they all go as a film crew to an island of skull. And then there, we see that this King Kong, 25 feet long gorilla, captures this heroine. And then after some time, this gorilla was fascinated by the beauty, the dancing and the beauty of this woman. And when the time came for her to escape, the gorilla was chasing actually. It was very nice in the forest. Just because of the woman, he was chasing because he wanted to get the woman back. and not be away from the forest. And then, the filmmaker captures that gorilla by giving chloroform. And after that, the gorilla will be gone to the city, and for a public performance. And all the city people came, looking at the gigantic, great gorilla. And then this King Kong breaks the chains, and again runs after the beauty of this woman. And finally, the US Army comes with airplanes, and they kill this gorilla as the woman was right in her hand. And at the time when Gorilla died, this King Kong died, Jack Black, who was the filmmaker, you know what he says? He makes a very powerful statement. You know what he says? He said in that movie that, it is not the airplanes. It was the beauty that killed the beast. It is not the airplanes. It was the beauty that killed the beast. And how many men and women have been killed, battered, conquered, ruined because of the beauty? Because of the fascination that we cannot control. And Proverbs was right in telling in Proverbs 31, 30. We know that very well. What does it say? Charm is deceptive. Be careful. Be careful when you look at the beauty. And beauty is fleeting. What this Proverbs says is, beauty is nothing. You know why? Because the physical beauty is not the guarantee of the inner beauty. Physical beauty is not a guarantee of the inner beauty. That's why beauty is fleeting. Now let me tell you that. I have been counseling couples for years. Never once a couple came and said that, we are having problems because my husband is not handsome and my wife is not beautiful. You know, always the problems were, the problems were the problem of the heart. Problem of the heart is the heart of the problem. That is the biggest problem. And beauty is vain because physical beauty will not be there forever. I had some very favorite heroines in the past. Now I look at them, gone. All the wrinkle, skin that is there now. What does it show that beauty? Fades. Be careful of how you look at the beauty of another person. Now here, not as a main factor in the passage, but in the footnote, in the parenthesis, I want to talk just a little bit to the sisters here, which is very, very important. Since it is natural for men to be attracted physically, it is very important for women about how they dress. We don't have this problem at EF. But I know this message goes to a lot of people, and it's very important for women to dress modestly, as 1 Timothy 2.9 says, I also want women to dress modestly. But you know, this is a question every sister, when you dress, ask this question. You know what is the question? How does my dress help the men around me not to become lustful? How does the dress that I wear help the men around me not to become lustful. This is one question that sisters don't ask, women don't ask, they only want to impress without understanding how it is ruining the thoughts of Men. But some women say that, you know, it doesn't matter whatever way I dress and in whatever way I project myself, men should control themselves. It's not my fault. They should learn how to live a self-control life. Yeah, that's true. All men are responsible for sexually looking at a person and lustfully intending a person. Definitely that is true. But the Bible also says one thing. You know what? Listen to this what Jesus said in Luke 17 verse 1 and 2. And he said to his disciples, Luke 17 verse 1 and 2, Temptation to sin are sure to come. Temptations will come, but woe to the one through whom they come. Do you see that? Everyone is responsible for their sin, but woe, curse on the person through whom temptation come. In other words, curse on the woman who dress so immodestly that men become lustful. It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were cast into the sea, then he should cause one of these little ones to sin. What the scripture tells us is that we should not only abstain from temptation, we should not cause anyone any temptation also. That's what the scripture also says. In late 80s, there was a supermodel who was beautiful. Now, men, don't go and Google it, OK? Her name was Kim Alexis. She was a beautiful supermodel in the 80s. But she changed her heart in a lot of many things. And this is what she said, you know what she said? Many women are playing with fire in the way they dress. Dressing like a floozy, that means wearing clothes to sexually attract people, tells the world, look at me, want me, lust after me, I am easy and you can have sex. That's what women are projecting. Displaying parts of your body, intimate parts especially, is a form of advertising for sex. She's not a Christian. A secular woman said this. You know, there is a booklet called, now men and women, please go and Google it and get this book. You know what? The Sin of Bathsheba. This is a booklet actually written by a person whom we don't know and this is a book, beautiful book which speaks about Bathsheba publicly in a way she was bathing that king could look at her and lust her and finally he commits sin with her. And in that he says this, just a little passage I want you to understand, especially sisters, women should listen to this. There is nothing at all wrong or evil about your physical beauty. It is a creation of God and is like all that God created, very good. It was designed by God for a specific purpose. You know why God gave you the specific purpose of the beauty? It was for the man for whom you were made, not for every man. Beautiful. The perfectly obvious design of your beauty is to ravish and satisfy the heart of a man. But a man, not every man. If God has joined you to that one man, then by all means give that beauty to him. Thus used, the beauty of your body will glorify the God who gave it to you and serve the man for whom it was given. But if you put it on display and prostitute it to the gaze of the whole world, you only glorify yourself and serve the devil. And those who have daughters in our church, please be careful how you bring your daughters in this. because they are tempted by looking at the girls in their school and college or workplace and they want to dress like them because that attracts men to look at them and they can find gratification that I'm important. We should be very, very careful. I wish such movies would come today, but one of my favorite movies that I saw in my college days, and these days, such movies will not come. I think you know the movie, Mene Pyar Kiya. These days people don't appreciate. You know, the hero wants her to wear a dress actually. The only thing that he wants is that, I want to wear this only for your sake. And I want to show my beauty only for your sake. And I don't want to expose myself before anyone. But today you see the movies today, they flaunt with all the modest dress, exposing themselves to all kinds of women, and men look at them lustfully, and they think that the love and admirer when they all want is that they want to sleep with you. Is this a response that women want when they dress immodestly? But this is what is happening. So there is one point that I see that is very important. even sisters don't think that, women don't think that, this is actually the problem. And I want to just tell this, but before that, I want to use a euphemistic word. I want to say this, people, because many women don't know about this. And I want to say this, because women should know this, and very, very important. And I want to use a word, because my wife is a physiotherapist, and she taught me one word. This is a word that is a better word for this, and that is gluteus maximus. It looks like a Roman word. But actually, gluteus maximus means this, buttocks. Now listen carefully, I'm using gluteus maximus in the place of buttocks. Now please understand, I've taken this from secular world, how they themselves are saying. If Christians say, oh, Christians are biased. But I'm quoting secular psychology today. And I'm reading this. I cannot look at the woman when I say this, but I want women to really understand this, and I speak with decency for you to understand. Before I make an application, I want you to understand this, so that only then you will see why I'm saying this. In psychology today, it is revealed that two most parts that sexually, sensually attracts men are women's breasts and gluteus maximus. Female gluteus maximus may actually be more tempting to males than her breasts. In the journal, Archives of Sexual Behavior, examining the results of 184 males, the authors found that 59% of them revealed greater attraction to females' gluteus maximus, whereas only 38.5% showed more of a preference for their breasts. Popular culture expert, This is not from Christianity. Popular culture expert, Ray B. Brown, observed that a woman's gluteus maximus as a sexual signal for women was receiving increased emphasis, which he attributed primarily to the huge popularity of tight-fitting jeans. And you know how tight-fitting jeans and pants today are very popular? Even among Good Christian women, not knowing how powerfully sexually attractive and how media wants to, or the cloth textiles want to use this as a bait to make money. And this is my application. All of the sisters, women, please listen carefully. I don't want to be legalistic, but I tell because of what is happening these days. If you wear tight-fitting pants or jeans outside, or if you wear casual pants or track pants at home, please make sure that you wear T-shirt or garment which is long till your lap, covering one's gluteus maximus. It is good to avoid wearing till waist. I go to gym, and I see how some of the women wear tracks till waist. And you know how the women, men look at them? I was seeing one woman, I think just a few days back, she was doing a treadmill, and right behind her, a young boy was sitting. Women have no understanding about this. My wife, I asked her actually, once she wore like that, because she didn't know the tracks like that, I told her, never please wear like this at home. Even when the people come, especially when the people come, and from then to now, my wife always wear T-shirts at home when she wear pants, which is still lap. And I really appreciate her for her cooperation and for being a submissive wife. And I tell you sisters, please be careful about how you dress. Fascination is a big problem. And this is what I want to say and go ahead to the next point. Your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, not a showroom to display your beauty. Remember that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, not a showroom to display your beauty. This is the first factor that I want us all to understand, the fascination, which is a common factor because of which leads to different problems. The second one I can share, and then I will close. And then we will continue the next Sunday. The second one is this, you know what? The second factor that we learn from Amnon is this, frustration. Fascination, led to frustration. And this frustration is a result of uncontrollable fascination. You know why a lot of people watch porn, or masturbate, or when they want to pursue physical intimacy with people, you know why? It is because they get frustrated. And they cannot live in that state of frustration anymore, so they want to seek gratification and feel relief from that frustration. But how do they get into the frustration? It is because they don't deny the fascination. This is how the scripture says to you then. See what it says. 2 Samuel chapter 13 verse 2. When he yielded to fascination, the Bible says that, and Amnon was so tormented. Do you see that word, people? In verse 2, he was tormented. By what? By fascination, by lust, he couldn't look at the beauty of Tamang. And what does the Bible say even? And he made himself ill. I love it says that. It didn't say that he became ill. It says he made himself ill. It is his choice. He couldn't resist the fascination in his thoughts. And what did he reap as a result? Frustration. Mentally ill. Because of his sister Tamar. For she was a virgin and it seemed impossible to Amnon to do anything to her. And in 2 Samuel 13, verse 4 again it says, And he, Jonathan, said to Amnon, Why? What did he say? O son of the king, why are you so haggard? Why are you so frustrated, depressed, disappointed? Your face has lost the joy. What has happened to you? Morning after morning, morning after morning. People, this is what we need to understand. This is how it goes. First comes the sight. That's why we need to be very careful how we look at and what we look at. First comes the sight. And the second comes the thoughts. And third comes the imagination. And finally, comes frustration. You wrestle like a fish taken out of water for sensual gratification. You know, someone described lust like this. L-U-S-T. I love the way that person described. Lust, L stands for living. U, U stands for under. S stands for sexual. T stands for tension. living under sexual tension. A person who is lustful, a person who is dominated by lust, constantly live under tension and frustration for gratification. What is the frustration? Frustration to sexually fantasize. Frustration to watch pornography. Frustration to masturbate. Frustration to see the person or to talk with lustful intent. Frustration to have sex. And people need to also understand, when this person was frustrated, he also loses focus. You cannot see frustration and focus together. When a person falls into frustration, he also loses his focus. You will never find a man or a woman who is frustrated by sex and tells that I am having consistent sound devotional life. You cannot see that. Because when he opens the Bible, that's what falls into. When he prays, mind goes somewhere. Because he is battered by fascination, frustrated that he cannot pray, he cannot have a meaningful relationship in his family, he cannot study the Word of God properly, he cannot be committed to the church and listen to the Word of God. How many men and women who listen to the Word of God and they are lost sexually? Because they have done something before that. And they came to the church, and they are still haunted by these lustful thoughts. You know what is the biggest deception, people? You know why people go and do something when they are battered by lust? You know why? Because they think that it releases them from frustration. And that's a big, big deception. Gratify lust and you will feel relieved. Oh, if you are frustrated by watching pornography, instead of fighting against it, against it, watch it. And then you will feel the relief. Masturbate it, you will feel the relief. Go and sleep, you will feel the relief. That's a big, big deception. Now listen to this. important factor that you and I should know people in our battle against lust. I'm telling you a very important truth. When you resist yielding to lust, your frustration will be for a while. It's not that when you're battling against it, there is no frustration, but listen to this carefully. When you resist yielding to lust, your frustration will be for a while, but later you will enjoy steadfast peace in the Lord. But when you yield to lust, you receive relief for a while, but later you will suffer from continuous frustration. When you fight against lust, that frustration will be there only for a while and then you will enjoy the steadfast peace. But when you yield to lust, you will have peace, relief, happiness only for a while. But after that again, watch porn again. Go and talk to her again. Sleep with her again. Sleep with him again. Watch that video again. Watch that image again. There is a continuous frustration. Do you and I want to face frustration for a while by battling against it? Or do you want to continuously be frustrated by that continuous frustration. One Christian brother writer wrote it this way. Listen to this. When I feed lust or sexual fantasies in my mind, what I reap is only frustration. I get so frustrated that I feel the pressure of gratifying lust again and again. This is the problem, people. You want to gratify it again and again. There is no end to this struggle. My frustration reaches to such a peak that I cannot look at the opposite sex with absolute purity. When I talk to the opposite sex, although my speech seems nice and decent, my mind is entangled by lustful thoughts. Oh, what a fool I am to gratify lust, because what I reaped was not satisfaction, but frustration. If we understand this, people, We will be saved from being ruined constantly by lust. One fact that we need to understand is this. You can never satisfy lust. Never. You can never satisfy lust. The more you try to satisfy, the more it becomes stronger. That is the power of lust. The more you're satisfied, the more it becomes stronger and leads you to frustration. Starve lust if you want to save yourself from gratification and frustration. You know starve means? Starve lust means don't yield to that. Let it suffer and die. Lest you suffer and you die by gratifying sexual temptation. Shall we all stand up and pray? and continue to learn some lessons as we go ahead. And I think there are some eight lessons for us to learn. Today we have looked into two factors, which are very important. Raimund was fascinated by the beauty of Tamar. It all began from there. And secondly, that led to frustration. And at this time, Let's examine our hearts, my dear brothers and sisters. How are we dealing with fascination? And how are we dealing with frustration? At this time, let us repent of our sin. If we have yielded to fascination, thinking that, oh, I'm not committing inaction, it's okay, I can commit in thoughts. Jesus said, you have already fallen. But the good news is that Jesus forgives every sin. There is no sin that He cannot forgive. And secondly, there is no sin from which He cannot save us. That's the power of the cross. And there is hope, my dear brothers and sisters, that we can live a sexually pure life in a sex-saturated world. We can live. And our hope is not in ourselves. Our hope is in the cross. on which Jesus died and rose again to offer forgiveness and deliverance from the bondage of sin. And at this time, I encourage you and encourage myself to come to the cross and cry out to Him and say, the Lord, forgive my sin of sexual fascination. I failed in my thoughts. I'm looking lustfully at the persons, at the images and videos Forgive my sin, O Lord, which is leading to frustration. There is no peace in my life because of that. I don't have sound focus in my life because of that. Heavenly Father, we thank you for teaching us wonderful things from the foolish mistakes of Amnon. Help us not to fall into the same trap in which Amnon fell. and ruined his life alone. And we will look further about the disaster he has brought upon himself for momentary pleasure. Momentary pleasure. Oh, how the world today is running after this number one pleasure alone. And how even Christians also are becoming victims of that. Because all because we are not running away from what we watch. The very first sight We are not running away from that. Pray that you forgive the sin of the men here. Forgive our sin, O Lord. As men, we confess for looking lustfully at women. We ask you to forgive us, O Lord, and let your fear fall upon us, and you guard our eyes like Job who made that covenant. Help us to make that covenant that we will not look at a woman lustfully, O Lord. And we can do that. If Job can do under the old covenant, even before the old covenant, why can't we do under the new covenant? When we have Christ and His grace and the indwelling Holy Spirit, we can live a sexually pure life. Let us not believe the lie of the world, lie of the devil that you cannot be sexually pure. No, we can do all things through Christ because of His divine power in us. Oh, we pray for the sisters to understand the struggle of man and dress modestly. at home and even outside. Oh, may they help men to live a sexually pure life. And let that beauty be enjoyed by that one man to whom they are married. May we not follow the world alone, which is corrupted by lust and sexual immorality. May we not pay the price of frustration because of that. Help us to enjoy our life alone. What joy it is. When we say no to porn, say no to sexual fantasies, say no to adultery, say no to sexual pleasures that is outside of the world, what joy that we get along, what peace that comes into our heart when we live a sexually pure life. But yet for that momentary pleasure, we sell our integrity, we sell our holiness, we sell our peace. O Lord, help us to know that the power of the pleasure of holiness is greater than the power and pleasure of sin. Help all of us, O Lord, men and women, to walk in sexual purity. And you preserve our souls till the end. And may we enter into eternal kingdom of God, where we have pleasures, wonderful pleasures, forevermore. In Jesus' name, amen. Yeah. Thank you for listening to the message. We believe you are being greatly encouraged in your heart. Stephen David also writes articles that are relevant to today's generation. You may read them on his blog www.messageforourage.blogspot.com I repeat www.messageforourage.blogspot.com You may also email him at cstephendavid at gmail.com. I repeat, c-s-t-e-p-h-e-n-d-a-v-i-d at gmail.com. Grace and peace be to you.