Can we talk about midnight? About that time of day that has been called “the witching hour,” “the middle of the night,” and “the dead of night?”

What if midnight is more an opportunity than an oppression? What if people are watching us in the dark, hoping that we’ll give them glimpses of light? What if we saw midnight the same way Paul and Silas did: as a time to praise our God?

About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. (‭‭Acts‬ ‭16‬:‭25‬, emphasis mine)

We often think that people pay attention to us when we’re celebrating, but Paul and Silas knew that people pay more attention to what we do in the dark, at midnight.

“The other prisoners were listening to them…”

Perhaps you’re facing a midnight season, a dark night of the soul? A time when it appears that God is as far away from you as the outside of the prison was from Paul and Silas? Can I remind you that you’re being watched? I don’t mean that as some strong-armed threat to perform for the masses, but rather as an encouragement that what you do now in this dark season will go a long way toward bringing freedom to the ones who are taking notice of you.

People always watch followers of Jesus when Jesus leads those followers into hard places. Why? Because they want to know that what we’ve said is true is actually true! When you and I stand firm in our faith and our praise in the very hour that it seems hopeless, people receive hope and freedom.

So, about midnight. It’s not the middle of the night, but rather the beginning of the next day. It’s the threshold we cross over on our way to freedom and victory, and when we break through the midnight hour with praise, we lead a host of others who were always hoping that someone would stand strong, not just at noon, or suppertime, but about midnight, too.

Photo by Adrian Dascal on Unsplash

Reading Time: 5 minutesA couple of months ago, I spent the better part of 2 days on the road traveling across the central and western parts of North Carolina, and that means I saw a TON of billboards.  Those things are EVERYWHERE and most of them have a picture of a WOMAN on them. Ever wonder why?

It isn’t because the advertisers have a bias toward females (although they may), and it definitely isn’t because they’re advertising stuff that females want.  It’s because the people paying the money to fund the ads know that the best way to secure revenue is to throw sexual images on a billboard because, while the actual product being advertised may not get the male driver’s attention, that woman probably will.

And it isn’t just billboards.  Lately every Hardee’s commercial is less about the food and more and more just some girl’s 30-second audition tape for a career in soft-porn.  From NFL cheerleaders to swimsuit editions, sex sells.  Sure, we protest most of it while we watch it (“Man, can you believe how little she’s wearing?” or “Victoria’s Secret should NOT have a prime-time special.  Good thing my kids are in bed.  They’re way too young to see this!”), but it’s not going to change anything for one simple reason:

Too many men are worshiping their penis.

I’m sure there’s a nicer way to say it, but maybe it’s time to just be brutally honest.  Maybe it’s time to stop blushing about a problem that has grown into an epidemic.

Did you know that the porn industry rakes in more revenue every year than the major professional sports leagues COMBINED?

Did you know that the average age of a guy’s first exposure (pun intended) to porn is ELEVEN?

Did you know that 1 in 3 PASTORS are actively viewing this stuff?

Epidemic.

It all starts out so innocently, doesn’t it?  A Hooters billboard here, a Hardee’s commercial there, and before you know it, you’re ticked at your wife or girlfriend because she doesn’t look nearly as good as the last AIRBRUSHED and FAKE PICTURE of a woman you looked at while you worshiped at the altar of your pleasure.

At some point, especially for you GUYS THAT LOVE JESUS, this insanity has got to stop.

There’s a verse in the Bible that comes to mind whenever I think about the pervasiveness of porn and the apparent inability of Christian men to bring it under control.

If your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. (Matthew 5:29)

“Are you serious?  You want me to cut off what??”

Relax, men. I don’t think the point of that verse is castration, but I do think that there’s something extremely important that Jesus was trying to get across.

What captivates you?

What consumes your time, your money, your attention?  What so moves you that it motivates you to look harder, look longer, and look no matter what the cost?  Whatever your answer is to those questions is what you’re worshiping.

The answer, of course, for Christ-followers, should be Jesus, and for MALE Christ-followers, it better be.  If Jesus isn’t consuming us, we’ll never be able to look at our wives, girlfriends or girl friends with the eyes of heaven because our eyes will be clouded by the manipulated images of man.

Now, I know what you’re thinking, especially if you’re a church-going male.  You’re thinking it isn’t that big of a deal and that if I was a “real” pastor I wouldn’t even write something like this.  That’s like me saying if you were a “real” Christian you wouldn’t struggle with this.  But the truth is that Jesus spoke about it because He knew that purity in this area was something that would be a real struggle for real men who really love Him.

Did you notice that the amputation verse is smack-dab in the middle of Jesus’ teaching about lust and adultery?  Did you catch the connection between the eyes and the heart? Jesus told the men of His day what advertisers of our day already know: the eyes capture what eventually captures the heart.  That’s why the top 100 advertisers in the United States spent over 100 BILLION DOLLARS last year alone.  It’s because they know that IF YOU LOOK AT SOMETHING LONG ENOUGH, EVENTUALLY YOU’LL END UP LOVING IT.

We don’t want that to be true.  We want to believe that if we just love Jesus enough, it will all go away.  Yeah, and how’s that working for you?  Not only is the issue not going away, but it’s getting worse, and so it’s time for Jesus men to MAN UP and LOOK UP.

It’s time for Jesus men to take seriously the wisdom that David wrote about after his eyes almost cost him a kingdom.

I will set before my eyes no vile thing.  The deeds of faithless men I hate; they will not cling to me. (Psalm 101:3)

David learned the truth he wrote about after a forbidden peep show led to murder (you can read it for yourself starting in 2 Samuel 11).  David didn’t wake up one morning and put “being a murderer” on his bucket list anymore than you woke up this morning hoping to be an unfaithful husband to your current (or future) wife.  It never ends as small as it begins, and according to Jesus and David, it begins with a distant gaze that grows into a consuming blaze.

The question, then, is what will we look at and what will consume us?

For some men, the answers will be tragic.  They will choose to place worthless things in front of their eyes through screens of all shapes and sizes that will spark a wildfire that will burn and never be satisfied.  In its wake will be broken families, trafficked women and bankrupted souls.

But for others – for the Jesus men who recognize the fight and refuse to shy away from it – the answers will be transforming.  Everyday we will live out the truth of Hebrews 12 that begins with our eyes fixed on Jesus and ends with our hearts worshiping a God Who is a consuming fire.  In our wake will be a generation who knows more freedom than failure and lives more as victors than victims.

Will it be easy?  No.  Swimming against the current of culture never is.

Will there be mistakes?  Yes.  No war was ever won without lost battles along the way.

Will we win?  Every single time we choose to keep fighting.

**********

If you’re choosing to fight, let me leave you with a few practical steps that can help you as you do.

ONE, tell somebody.  I love James 5:16…”confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.”  There is tremendous strength in honesty.  I love how Tyler – one of our elders at The Gathering – says it: “Porn is such a big secret for most because of the shame it brings.  To nail it to the cross requires one to be completely open, completely honest and submitting to godly leaders that hold you accountable. It’s not easy denying yourself by yourself.”  That last comment is why the second step is so important.

TWO, find community.  This almost needs to go hand in hand with number one because accountability is nothing without community.  At The Gathering where I pastor, we’re working hard to create a community where people are encouraged to grow in grace.  You’ve got to have people in your corner who understand that grace takes time and grace gives time.  That’s so important when we’re fighting sin because some days are better than others. Community reminds us that the grace of Jesus doesn’t change with our wins and losses.

THREE, go public.  No, I don’t mean tell the whole world.  I just mean move your computer to a family room and/or get a filter for your browser or device that alerts others about what you’re viewing.  The folks over at XXXChurch can probably come in handy here.

Those are just three that come to mind, but I’m sure you’ve got some, too.  Feel free to share them in the comment section below.

Reading Time: 3 minutes

Mark 14:6
“Leave her alone,” said Jesus. “Why are you bothering her? She has done a beautiful thing to me.”

Lots of things are beautiful for the moment. The color of leaves in the fall, the potential go-ahead score late in a game, the celebrities we watch daily on TV and in the movies (I offer the accompanying picture of Ashley Tisdale as Exhibit A). So the fact that Jesus said something was beautiful in this verse doesn’t surprise me. We see beautiful things all the time. What blows my mind is that just 3 verses later He said that it would be beauty that would last forever. Now that gets my attention.

I want to be someone who does the beautiful thing, who worships Jesus in such a way that other people – including Jesus – take notice of it. I want my worship to be a topic of conversation, not because I am the object of it, but because my passion for Him is the subject of it. It is interesting to note that when we worship in this beautiful way, our worship will bother people. I guess it’s kind of naive to believe that we can worship passionately without being noticed, pointed to, whispered about, and gawked at. I think I’m growing to a place where I’m okay with that, and if nothing else, I want to make the choice to accept that how He sees me is a whole lot more important than how any one person, group, or religious establishment sees me.

He saw it as beautiful, timeless, epic. He saw this woman’s outrageous worship and made sure He hit the pause button on the remote long enough to add His divine flashing neon arrow to it. “LOOK! LOOK! TRUE WORSHIP! ETERNAL BEAUTY!” He made it a point to, well, point. What religion had pointed to and gawked at moments earlier, He also pointed to as an eternal example of beauty that would last. He said her act would be mentioned everywhere and every time the gospel was preached in the world.

If we’re honest, our worship is forgettable, but her worship was unforgettable. Our passion is momentary, but hers was eternal. Our sacrifice is cheap, but hers was costly. And while our beauty fades under the hot lights of criticism, hers did not.

It would be nice if this story ended with everyone grabbing expensive perfume and pouring it on Jesus’ feet. That is what we expect when we passionately worship, isn’t it? We expect everyone to be so moved by us that they can’t help but respond with the same level of intensity. But that’s not what we see here. Instead we find that this type of passionate, costly, unforgettable and un-hide-able worship did just the opposite: it was the tipping point for Judas. If he had been on the fence about whether or not to betray Jesus, this woman’s worship is what pushed him off. He went straight from this outrageous display of passion to the religious leaders and offered Jesus to them.

Beautiful worship does that. It draws a line in the sand and people find themselves on one side or the other, and when they find themselves on the wrong side of it, things can often turn out quite ugly. This woman was okay with that, because, well, she was on the same side as Jesus.

I want to be, too.