Last updated on September 22, 2020
Question:
I was having a problem with pornography and masturbation, but I have succeeded in killing the desire for porn after I decided to stop watching films and using the Internet. Now, by God’s grace and strength, I can boldly say I am free.
But the giant in my life now is masturbation. Nothing arouses the urge. I just start feeling it. People say the habit is from the mind, but in my own case, it doesn’t enter my mind. I just discover that I am releasing it. One thing I know is that it normally occurs mainly in the night. Sir, please, is there anything I can do? When the night is drawing in I start to fidget and if I don’t do it that night, I feel I am the most righteous one on earth. What can I do even when it is so strong on me and God expects me to overcome?
Answer:
I am glad that you have overcome the problem of pornography. View pornography is a sin. “For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God” (I Thessalonians 4:3-5).
But like most young men, you took this to an extreme. You focused on the physical and concluded that it is wrong to ejaculate. However, God never said that ejaculating, by itself, is wrong.
What you are experiencing is called a wet dream or nocturnal emission. It is even mentioned in the Bible. “If there is any man among you who becomes unclean by some occurrence in the night, then he shall go outside the camp; he shall not come inside the camp. But it shall be, when evening comes, that he shall wash with water; and when the sun sets, he may come into the camp” (Deuteronomy 23:10-11). Being unclean was not a sin. Women became unclean under the Old Law when they had blood flows each month, but that doesn’t mean they sinned. Men had a similar rule. They became unclean when they ejaculated at night. The ejaculation wasn’t sinful, nor was being unclean sinful. All it meant was that certain rules had to be followed to clean up and become clean again.
Feelings don’t determine right and wrong. Feelings are often incorrect. “He who trusts in his own heart is a fool, but whoever walks wisely will be delivered” (Proverbs 28:26). It is God’s word that determines the truth.
You are a normal, healthy male. Your body produces semen constantly, but the glands producing it can only hold so much. God designed the male body to ejaculate the old semen to make room for the new semen. That is what you are doing at night. Your body is just following the instincts God gave it to maintain itself.
Question:
You mean it isn’t a sin, even though I want to stop it?
Answer:
God defines what is right and wrong, not individuals. You can decide that you never want to eat again, but you’ll have to in order to survive — you don’t have a choice in the matter. You can decide you are never going to pee again, but it is going to come out regardless of your personal desire. In the same way, the male body is designed by God that it has to ejaculate. Whether you want to or not, you will have ejaculations. Ejaculations require touch to trigger the sequence, so you will end up masturbating either while awake or in your sleep. It is just a fact of life.
What God doesn’t want you to do is use pornography or lust to get yourself sexually excited. You aren’t doing that, so you aren’t violating God’s commands.