Anonymous asked:

I’m a girl and I struggle with lust and masturbation. I feel like a freak because my church only ever talks about guys having this problem. I feel like a hormonely charged thirteen-year old boy. I don’t even know how to go about fixing this, I feel like all I think about is sex and I don’t know how to tame these thoughts. I even tried bringing it up with a friend and she made a comment about how it’s a guy thing. :( please help.

I answered:

I read the other day that the woman who wrote “50 Shades of Grey” is making $1.4 million per week from sales. I would think that statistic alone (or combined with the box office gross of “Magic Mike”) would disprove the idea that only guys are interested in sex. You are not a freak. You are just someone who is figuring out how to deal with their sexual desires in a healthy way and you are having a little trouble. The truth is that happens to everyone. 

It is a great failing of the Christian community that there isn’t a more honest dealing with sexual struggles in general, but for women especially. The by product of people deciding that they just don’t want to talk about the fact that women, and young ladies especially, are aware that orgasms exist, is that people like you end up feeling shamed in a situation where they should be getting commiseration and love and help.

Lust and masturbation aren’t good and are something you need to work on in your walk. But they are not the most dangerous thing going on here. You actually have a great sense of how to go about starting to get over this. Realizing it’s not something you want to be doing and starting to talk about it are very big steps, I would say they are over half the battle. You are on the right road. 

The most insidious thing going on here is that there are people and forces trying to make you feel alone and dirty because of this. Starting to let those thoughts gain traction is much worse for your relationship with Jesus than any problems with wanting to look at naked people. Because those feelings are contrary to how Jesus feels about you. You are accepted, you are loved, you are washed clean. Jesus is going to walk through this thing with you, he is not going to tell you its a guy thing or that just get uncomfortable and refuse to talk to you about it.

This struggle does not make you a special brand of sinner, it doesn’t make you a bad person and it doesn’t make you a freak. You need to hold on to that reality. You are doing a good job at that. You had an inkling that it is bogus that your church only talks about one side of this issue, and you knew deep down that your friend was way off base. You are doing a great job at listening to the right voices. Don’t let the wrong ones get in your head and stop you from going on.

Seems to me that satan is putting some pretty heavy resources into screwing with your head about this. I think that is because he knows that once you get over this thing, you will be an absolute force for making sure that women don’t get made to feel the way you did about this problem. You are going to be in such a good position to help others once you get over this thing that Hell is shaking in its goat-hoofed boots. 

-Matt from The Bridge

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