Yes. You can. Some people act like it is not possible. But of course, that is ridiculous. You can make good decisions. Job says he made a covenant with his eyes. That’s like a contract. He negotiated a contract or signed a deal with his OWN EYES.
“I have made a covenant with my eyes not to look lustfully on a woman…. Does He not see my ways, and count my every step? … If my heart has been enticed by a woman… then may my wife grind another man’s grain, and may other men sleep with her. For that would have been wicked, a sin to be judged. It is a fire that burns to Destruction; it would have destroyed my harvest.” Job 31:1,4,9-12.
Job considers lustful eyes a wicked sin, a sin deserving judgment. He says it is a fire that burns to Destruction, and one that would destroy his entire life’s work. That is probably an unusual perspective today. Many people today seem to think sin is no big deal, and lust is certainly no big thing, right? Everybody does it, so it must be okay.
But God does not change His view with the times. Even if “everybody does it,” God does not just shrug and say, “oh, well, what are you gonna do?” Not at all.
Instead, God still says, “Be holy, even as I am holy.” 1 Peter 1:16. Job understands that: we are expected to be holy. God challenges us. He is challenging YOU—do not tolerate lustful eyes. Make a covenant with your eyes. Stop taking a second look. Instead, BE HOLY.
Pray with me. Dear God, give us the guts to demand holiness of ourselves. Give us that kind of strength from you. Help us to hate evil, and to seek holiness. Show us how to strive for purity and never settle for anything less than that.
Show us how to do like Job did, and make a covenant with our eyes to NOT be lustful. Help us to be turned off, repulsed even, by the sin or the lust that lurks in our hearts and in our eyes. Help us to hate that, to hate the sin, and to choose holiness. Remind us that VERY FIRST TIME before we are tempted to take a second look. Remind us to look away and let it go, to NOT look back, to NOT take a second look. Help us to remember that temptation itself is not sin—that it is okay for a bird to fly over our head, but we don’t have to let it make a nest in our hair. In the same way, temptations will come along, but help us to keep them moving on past us, and not let them linger like a bird building a nest. Help us hate lust, FLEE lust, and not take that second look. Help us to love you and to love your Word, and to pursue holiness every moment, every day. Help us to be holy, just as you are holy. We love you.
ΑΩ
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