Satan the Master Pickup Artist
Tim Wemple
Post a Comment
I'd like to start this blog with a quote from a book I'm sure all you Christian men out there have in your library "The Mystery Method" by none other than Mystery. "FRAME CONTROL The frame is the underlying meaning. It's the context, the implication--the unspoken assumption in everything you say." (I'm sorry but I've found truth can be found almost anywhere you look and understanding how men and women react to each other is a big part of getting over this addiction to pornography. Just another thing I learned from the Christian philosopher Francis Schaffer. We can't be afraid of our culture, we must know it and expose it.) I had this crazy idea last night, what if Satan was a master pickup artist, could he be manipulating us for his own purposes? I remembered this section in Mystery's book about "Frame Control" and things just started to click.
In the pickup artist world they have a saying, “He who controls the frame controls the communication itself.” In other words the strongest frame wins. Controlling the frame is about controlling the meaning of a conversation or circumstance. If I were to say, “Don’t shut the door.” You could think I was talking about a physical door I didn’t want shut or I could be talking about a relationship door, the context or frame would determine the meaning. In the pickup world “frame control” is all about making yourself appear to have high value in a woman’s eyes by controlling the context of everything you say and do. But Satan uses frame control as well. Look in Genesis how Satan starts his conversation with Eve. “Indeed, has God said, ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden?’” Satan sets the stage for his deception by framing the question of sin in terms of eating. By making it about food, about the physical, he knows he has Eve in the right context for his deception. Eve immediately follows his lead because she says, “God has said, ‘You shall not eat from it or touch it, lest you die.’” She adds “touch” indicating the physical aspect. In other words death had something to do with the tree, not disobedience. Then what was the first motivation for her sin, “She saw that the tree was good for food.” Satan reframed the situation to be about eating and not about disobedience--subtle, but highly effective.
Jesus on the other hand immediately sees what Satan is trying to do in the wilderness and reframes the first temptation, to turn stones into bread. He reminds Satan that God’s word is the source of all reality. In other words God says stones are stones, not bread. Jesus uses the circumstance from Exodus where the manna from heaven came down to feed the people. It was not only a way to feed the people but a test. The test was are you going to trust me and only collect one days worth of food, or are you going to trust your own wisdom and collect more. Those that collected more of the manna rotted, those that trusted in God’s word the manna did not rot. You see Jesus did not let Satan reframe his reality into just the physical. Jesus knew that reality was framed by God’s word and refused to see it any other way. Eve could have said to her self, “I know it looks good for food, but I also know everything created was created by God’s word, so I will trust God’s word and not let Satan reframe my reality into just the physical.”
Pornography addicts have also had their world reframed by Satan. Sex is just about the physical as well and not about the spiritual. But not only has Satan reframed sex into just the physical he has as in the garden reframed it into a source of power as well. Satan has used the media to make sex a power issue, and pornography is the answer to that issue. But we must see what has happened so we can fight this reframing of our reality.
For example let’s say you’re at work and they have this new girl working. She is very attractive in the Matrix kind of way and is openly flirting with you. In the old frame you would have thought she wants to have sex. In the pornography frame you are the god and all women want sex. In the new frame you understand that she also is aware of power and may be using her flirting to gain favor with you or she may just like you. In God’s world, the real world, sex is relational it doesn’t happen if people are healthy emotionally and spiritually without commitment and a relationship. Understanding the real frame of this situation allows you to act in a more open and honest way. Before your only options would have been to stay as far away from this girl as possible, rejecting what you thought could be a sexual relationship, or you could completely misunderstand her attentions and she would have to reject you. I personally think however we must be able to have relationships with women that are not framed by Satan. It is part of our recovery. When you as a man can have a relationship with a woman that is absent of fear you know you are well on your way to complete recovery because the power issue has been resolved. Even your body will change when that happens. Women seen in the proper "frame" will resolve any power issue and therefore any need for pornography and experience is the only way to retrain our bodies reaction to women.
Satan is constantly trying to frame our reality into a context that suits his purposes. We must be aware of this framing and reframe it with God’s truth as Jesus did. By reframing our relationships with God’s truth we can actually have meaningful relationships with women. Something you may not have thought possible until now. Instead of rejecting the new girl you could take it for what it is, either an attempt to gain favor or a genuine liking of you, but not as a desire for sex. This will sound ridiculous to women I’m sure, but men need to hear this because they really are deluded about the nature of sex.
Confession
I used to think we should confess to everyone and be very specific in our confessions. Just saying I'm a sinner really doesn't mean much, saying exactly why you are a sinner is a whole lot harder. It seemed to me to be a necessary thing to bring humility into ones life. I came to this conclusion because I had been in AA meetings and pornography addiction groups and seen the benefits of confession. Their was a closeness I had never experienced anywhere else in the church. But my thoughts have changed a little over the last few years about when and to whom we should confess. So I thought I would bring it up in my blog because it is an often asked question when dealing with addictions. Here are the four times and people I think scripture says is appropriate for confession.
1.) We need to confess to God all our sins. Ultimately God is the one we are sinning against when we are disobedient, He is our creator. So we need to confess to God always and often. I John 1:9 says, "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us of all unrighteousness." Confessing to God then is a way of cleansing ourselves.
2.) We need to confess when fellowship could be promoted. I often confess sins to men I am meeting with if I think it will promote our fellowship with one another. I John 7:1-10, says we need to confess so that fellowship can thrive. He doesn't say specifically to one another in these verses, but I think we can see it is implied by the context. It is unfortunate that preachers are excluded from this fellowship because we do not allow them to be human. Some may be OK with this but I think the church would be much better served if everyone in the church was allowed to be a sinner.
3.) We need to confess to righteous men, and ask them to pray for us. James 5:16 says we need to confess to one another so that healing can occur. The prayers of a righteous man James says can accomplish much. So confess to those you know will keep you in their prayers and will not look down on you because of your confessions.
4.) We need to confess to those we have hurt. This is part of repentance I believe. If our confession will help another person heal that we have hurt, we need to confess. Confession can be a way of cleansing our conscience and stopping those repeating messages within us that we are not worthy of God's forgiveness.
Back to Home Page
Deceit and "He who has ears to hear, let him hear."
This is an important blog today because I need to explain a basic principle of how Satan works. I was meeting with a guy today and he said to me, “I do know the truth, I know I shouldn’t be watching pornography.” First just knowing you shouldn’t watch pornography is not the truth I’m talking about. Paul said I know what I want to do and I practice the very thing I don’t want to do. Slavery is not removed simply by knowing we shouldn’t do something. Obviously sin is not completely removed from our life even after accepting Christ. Truth still needs to be shined on areas of our life we have not become like Christ.
So how are we kept in the dark even after we have accepted Christ and his teachings about pornography? Remember Eve, Satan started the conversation with a question of what Eve was not to do and then he makes a bold face lie, “You shall not die.” But that didn’t stop Eve from eating from the tree did it? Why? Because Satan doesn’t end his conversation with the bold face lie. No. Here is were the true deception lay. He cleverly hides his second lie. Remember it was deceit that caused her to sin. The lie that was cleverly hidden was you can be like God. Eve thought if she ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, she would be wise. But the only thing she got was the knowledge of good and evil, and death. Eve became like God in that knowledge of good and evil, but she did not become like God in wisdom.
Satan has hidden a lie in pornography as well. It really is about the same lie told to Eve. That we can be like God, but instead of wisdom, the issue is power. Recognizing the power issues involved in pornography are the beginning steps to freedom, not just knowing I shouldn’t do it. We all know that doesn’t lead to freedom, though some people act as if it should. Two other important truths we must understand as I say in my book, are a knowledge of what true beauty is, and an understanding of forgiveness in the light of fate.
The second thing to consider about this issue of knowing the truth is, do you remember from scripture Christ’s often used phrase “he who has ears to hear, let him hear.” This phrase is used by Jesus about nine times in the gospel accounts. What do you think he meant? Do you think he meant that some people were so blinded by their culture they couldn’t understand what he was saying. This is so important you understand. Yes, everything I’m telling you in this book you may have heard before. Yes, you may say I already know that to be true. But please listen. Those listening to Jesus could hear what he was saying couldn’t they? If you asked them afterwards, “What did Jesus say?” they would have been able to tell you. But they still didn’t understand. We can say I know what you are talking about, and I’ve heard these things before. But until you check-out of the matrix long enough for your thinking to be free from its influences you will not understand. The power of the truth will be lost, because what you think you know you really don’t. You are going to have to take my word for this, I can’t explain color to a blind man, and I can’t explain truth to someone that is so totally immersed in lies. Even though you may be hearing the words, you really can’t understand what I‘m talking about until you clear your mind of the matrix’s influences. This is so important because there is a possibility that you will just read this stuff and say, “That is all very interesting.” and move on to something else without really understanding what I am talking about. You must experience it, to know it.
Publishing World and Accountability Partners
Several things on my mind today. First trying to get my book published. I’ve been trying to get my first book published “Hope of Purpose” for about seven or eight years now. Actually it has been so long now I’ve nearly forgotten how long it has been. I’ve only had one publisher actually read it, and they said they liked it, but it didn’t fit their market. Every publishing house I have looked into says the same thing, “We‘re not taking unsolicited manuscripts.” Which just means they’re not taking manuscripts from new authors. All the big publishers a culling down there authors to the one or two million dollar sellers. In other words if you’re a new author your pretty much out of luck. Even good published authors are finding it difficult to get their books published. At least that’s what I’ve heard. What that means is that the only voices being heard out there in the country toady are from a select few people you already know. It is getting near ridiculous when you look at the books at your Christian book store. What you are seeing more and more is ten books, most that say nearly the same thing, written by one author, the million dollar seller. It is going to get to the point where you can go to a Christian book store and select from 10,000 books, but there all going to be written by one or two people.
I guess my point is when thinking about the matrix is, what if those million dollar sellers are wrong? What if those one or two author’s that have a monopoly on the subject have been influenced by the matrix and haven’t seen the truth? Fat chance of anyone pointing it out. Fat chance of anyone even having a different opinion. All the other voices have been silenced by the almighty dollar. Which brings me to my second problem. Money. I surfed a few web sights last night to see what was out there again on this problem of pornography. What I found in a few cases was, “We have the secret to helping you overcome this sin.” Just send me $12.95 for my book and I will let you in on it. I thought is this what I want to do? What is it costing me right now for people to read my book? About $165.00 dollars a year for a web hosting company, and I may have even over-paid at that. So am I going to get this book “The Pornography Matrix” published and then take this free access off my website and make people buy my book if they want to be free? Can we really in good conscious charge people to hear the truth? I know I’m a radical, but radicals you will find are created when you step out of the matrix. A business model for a ministry just seems matrix kind of stuff. I would like for people to be able to buy my book in paperback if they want. But I promised myself last night I would never take my book off the internet where it can be downloaded for free. It kind of reminded me of the radical Keith Green when he got started in the recording business. He didn’t want to make money off his music either. I know we have to have money to keep things running, all I’m saying is I have very low overhead compared to some, so I can offer the truth that sets you free for free. It has a nice ring to it doesn’t it. Remember the whole purpose of the matrix’s existence is for monetary gain. So lets not become the matrix ourselves.
The other thing on my mind was a discussion I had with my son today at lunch. He strongly disagreed with me about the need for accountability partners. I said we don’t need them, he said we do. But I think our disagreement was more about “names” than the principles. His point was that accountability partners were good because men need encouragement, young men needed to learn from older men, and that we need to share our lives with each other. I absolutely agree. All those things are necessary. But I asked him about the accountability part, you see none of those things are really at the heart of what accountability partners are about, they are encouragement things. To me those two things are light years apart. He finally admitted he didn’t like the part about, “How did you do this week.” and that it wasn’t that effective in stopping our behavior. I’m all for encouraging partners. If the church wants to rename their programs encouraging partners, mentoring partners, etc. I’m all for it. It’s just that I see the church using “accountability partners” as a way of controlling pornography and it just doesn’t work. My fear is the church will think it is doing something about the problem with these types of relationships when they aren’t. Most accountability partner relationships usually devolve into encouragement partners, mentors anyway so why not just call them what they are. We need encouragement and wisdom from other men. But these relationships can’t be looked on as freeing us from pornography, only the truth can. So what I would say is just don’t say you’re fixing the problem of pornography addiction with accountability partners, you’re not.
One last thing on this subject. What about confession. My wife who was at lunch with us also said isn’t confession to each other necessary, and isn’t that what accountability partners are about. First let me say that one of the greatest joys I have experienced in the church is being in addiction groups, whether it was alcohol and drugs, or pornography. The joy comes from the fact that you have a very sweet and close fellowship with people because of confession. I think this is what John is talking about in I John 1:5-10. True fellowship is found in confession. But notice John doesn’t say we are to hold a person accountable by their confession, he says we are all sinners and need to confess. It is the recognition that every single person needs to confess that gives us true community. I confess things to the Lord when I’ve sinned, and when I feel a brother needs to know I can understand his problems I am more than willing to confess my sins to him as well. There is healing James says in confessing to one another. But it has a whole different purpose. It is to bring us together, not to hold us accountable. I encourage men to confess when they need to, but not so I can hold them accountable, but so they can have fellowship with me because I am willing to confess my own sin to them. It is the difference between night and day.
Availability and a Lie
I was thinking today how to boil this whole thing down into even simpler terms. I was thinking about sin and trying to distill it down to its purest ingredients. Two things really became clear as I thought about this and how it relates to the matrix’s influence. The best marketing plan in the world is to make something readily available and then make it sound to good to be true with advertising. There are only two things that are absolutely essential for sin to occur, availability and a lie. It has been like this from the very beginning, i.e. the garden of Eden. If those two things are present sin is always a possibility, you might even say and inevitability. Remember, a lie hides the truth, if you are aware of the truth then one of those essentials is removed. So it’s no fair to say I would never do that if you know the truth. The problem we have faced with pornography is many, even most men I would say, have no idea what the lie is or the truth that can set them free. Women may know it because the lie is about their nature and they know that their sexuality is about more than a willingness to exploit their skin, but men are being told by the matrix twenty four seven it is something else.
This brings up something else. Sin has nothing to do per say with our past experiences, good or bad. If all that is necessary for sin to occur are availability and a lie experience really is not an issue. Eve didn’t have an abusive childhood or bad experiences from her past that would make her want to disobey God did she? No. But the availability of sin was present, the tree she was told not to eat from, and the liar was present. We can’t justify our sin by our past experiences and we can’t heap guilt on ourselves because of a lack of bad experiences. Abuse in our past may be playing a huge role in providing a lie for us to believe, but ultimately it is the lie that is causing us to sin, not the experiences. We could turn this around and also say that just because you had a good childhood doesn’t mean sin was not available to you, and that lies were not present in your life. Guilt and shame must be removed by recognizing fate’s role in sin and its role in our forgiveness as well.
This is one of the great paradox’s of Christianity I believe. That we can retain our hatred of sin and accept God’s forgiveness even when we know we are sinners. We keep our shame, but we also accept God’s forgiveness because as Paul says I do the very thing I do not want to do. It explains how God could love us while we were yet sinners, and it also explains how we can love ourselves while we are yet sinners. No one out there is perfect yet are they? It also explains the paradox of how we are told in one verse of scripture we are to make judgments about sin and not judge people. We know what is sinful, but we can not judge other people because we do not know whether that person is under the influence of a lie, or if they have simply rejected the truth. In fact if the person is under the influence of a lie they don’t even know it. Do you see how this frees us from making a judgment by a standard we would not want to be judged by ourselves? We don’t know what has been made available to people, and we don’t know what lies have been told. So we can not judge them. I would dare say if we had lived in their shoes we would be making the same decisions. I truly believe this is at the heart of true humility. When you can see this, and truly let God make the judgments in these areas, I believe God will honor us for it. The stigma of pornography addiction is one of the biggest problems in solving this issue, and until we realize that only two things are necessary for any sin to occur we will continue to judge people. “They’re just a bunch of perverts. It’s disgusting, I don‘t understand why they just don‘t stop looking at it.” You’re right, you don’t understand it, so how can you make that kind of judgment of another person’s heart. You can’t! Only God says he is capable of making that judgment.
I try in my book to eliminate the most important essential ingredient of sin, the lie and all its means of transmission. If we eliminate the lie the power of sin is eliminated, because both availability and a lie must be present. What we have tried to do in the past is eliminate the availability with accountability partners, blocking software etc.. But what we have found is that it is impossible to eliminate all availability. Unless you decide to move to Alaska and live in the wilderness with absolutely no contact with the outside world, pornography is going to be available. If you can move to Alaska and live like this, I would say go for it! I have no doubt it would work. Just three weeks in the wilderness gave me a freedom I had never experienced before. But most of us are not willing to go to these extremes. The other choice is to eliminate the lie. This as well has seemed nearly impossible because, number one we didn‘t know what the lie was, and number two it has invaded our culture to the point you can hardly open your eyes without seeing the lie and its messengers. But the truth is greater than the lie and we can control to a much greater extent our exposure to it than we have been presently doing.
But now I hope you know what the lie is and that knowledge will stop the sin. Availability now becomes a non-issue, where as before it was the whole issue. If Eve would have only been aware that the knowledge of good and evil would not make her wise, she could have seen the temptation for what it really was. Not a chance to be like God in her wisdom, but a chance to be like God in her knowledge of good and evil. Two very different things hidden from her by the deceiver. And don’t let it pass your attention that the flat out lie of Satan did not stop her from eating. Even though God said she would surely die, she disregarded this for the lie. You see the deception really wasn’t in the obvious lie, it was in the hidden one, “You can be like God.” Sure we all know pornography is wrong. But it’s that hidden lie, that we can be like God, that really hooks us.