A friend of mine, we’ll call him Mark, was a highly successful man. He had an accomplished career as an engineer and the director of a department with a large city. He was the father of two great kids and a pillar of his church family. All of that changed when he was caught looking at pornography on a work computer. In that one moment, everything Mark had built began to crumble.
Mark’s problem was a problem of self-control. The Proverbs warn us about this.
A man without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls.
Proverbs 25:28
How do we make sure our walls are strong so that we can enjoy stability and security? The Bible gives us a few strategies:
- Know your values, goals and priorities.
- Create space between stimulus and response.
- Create space between temptation and your passions.
- Tap into a resource greater than yourself.
Through the gospel, Mark was able to come clean with his problem of self-control and enlist help in rebuilding the walls around his life and family with these strategies.
Tom Brown is the planting pastor of Vintage Faith Church in Wichita. Tom and his wife, Mandy, have worked together in ministry for 18 years and have four children. More about Pastor Tom Brown