You won’t hear messages like this from too many of today’s pulpits. Preachers are afraid they might offend someone. However the word “offend” denotes; causing someone to stumble. But, how do you make someone stumble who’s already flat on their face? I don’t want to offend anyone either, but I must speak the truth that can pick people up and make them free.
Pornography continues to be the number one addiction among men and boys. However, tragically now there are increasingly more women and girls visiting porn-sights and shops where they’re seeing things so depraved that even the demons should blush. By featuring lingerie and “sex toys,” porn shops are catering to women and couples. They want to portray themselves as “romance enhancement” specialists. They offer an illusion of a more exciting romantic experience, hoping to project an aura of legitimacy.
Hopefully, most women aren’t buying into their scam, but too many others are degrading themselves by curling up with one “romance novel” after another. Books like; “Fifty Shades of Gray” and magazines like “Cosmopolitan” are basically pornography for women. They teach women, if they want to catch and keep a man they’ll have to feed into his fantasies and gratify his lustful dreams. So some emulate what they’ve seen to become someone’s personal porn-star. They foolishly put on something meant for the beach and end up at the mall, or maybe at church. All pornography is evil. It teaches us to love ourselves and to use others, making us “ugly as sin.”
While it’s normal for women to want to be “attractive,” many fail to see the problems they are creating for themselves, as well as, for the men they’re attracting. What’s sad is; they may be attracting someone else’s man.
Where the adage, “beauty is merely skin deep” is true, and the line; “but ugly goes clear to the bone” sounds funny, it’s true too. Sadly though, many women are now focusing on outward appearances rather than on nurturing the true beauty found in the hidden person of the heart, the graceful character evident in a woman living in the splendor of Christ’s Spirit.
Jesus told us not to sin in our hearts by lusting after women with our eyes (See Matthew 5:27-28).
Men were designed to be stimulated by what we see, but God never intended for us to see so much, or to be so stimulated. Even so, today we have women at church wearing deeper plunging necklines and higher climbing hemlines. Their shorts are too short to cover what should be covered and their skin-tight pants and jeans look like they’ve been painted on. They come to church “dressed to kill,” where they’re causing scores of unstable brothers to stumble. Please ladies, you’re killing us and that’s just ugly.
Years ago, I spoke with a young waitress whose skirt was really, really short and her blouse showed way, way too much. Just a few years before this, I would have enjoyed the view and tried to get her phone number. But Jesus had changed my heart, so I was seeing her through new eyes.
I gently asked her what kind of guys she’d like to meet. She mentioned hair and eye color, nice looking, a good dancer and a cute butt. Finally I asked; “What about his character?” Here she added some better answers.
That’s where I offered her a couple of fishing tips. Whenever fishing, make sure you’re fishing in the right places and using the right bait. Avoid sharks; they’ll drag you in and devour you and your bait. The same is true when fishing for the right guy. You’ll catch him in the right places using the right bait. But never make yourself “shark-bait.”
She got it...
Don’t be fashionable, be yourself! The real you is all you’ve got. If a guy wants something else, let him find someone else. Being overly “fashionable” or pliable can make you putty in the wrong hands, so that you “fit in” to the mold of this world. (See Romans 12:2)
When it comes to marriage, most guys look for a “girl next door” type. However, should he find her; chances are he’ll ruin things by plowing headlong into lust, rather than waiting patiently in true love. So if she caves because she doesn’t want to lose him, he’ll always wonder if she’s that pure girl he was dreaming of, or if he should keep looking.
Lots of naive young girls think they just look “cute,” while guys are thinking something else. Please girls, your innocence is a priceless treasure, protect it! This is what makes you truly beautiful. Don’t throw it away or let anyone steal it from you. But if you’ve already squandered your honor through compromise or even pornography, remember; it’s never too late to take it back. Call on Jesus now, He can completely forgive you, and His blood can still cleanse you from all unrighteousness, leaving you totally pure and righteous in His loving eyes. (See 1 John 1:9)
Still, sadly there are too many women who know exactly what they’re doing; and just don’t care. Seductive women have been around from the beginning of time. They work their charms to entice one man after another and it keeps working.
So the beat goes on; Women using sex to get love, and men using love to get sex. “Users” aren’t lovers…because real love doesn’t use people! Users are takers, trying to control and dominate others; not submitting to one another in love. Herein is “the battle of the sexes,” where everybody loses.