“If your hand or foot causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you. It is better for you to enter into life lame or maimed, rather than having two hands or two feet, to be cast into the everlasting fire.” Matthew 18:8 NKJV
If your smartphone causes you to sin, should you keep it? No. Smash it to pieces, incinerate what remains, then scatter the ashes. If watching movies on Hulu triggers your lust and causes you to sin, should you keep watching? No. Cancel your subscription. If scrolling through youtube.com causes you to sin, should you keep visiting the site? No. Block it with porn-blocking software.
Getting victory over pornography is an exercise in subtraction. Whenever you discover that something, or someone, or somewhere causes you to sin by looking at porn, listening to porn, or reading porn, you subtract it from your life. And then you take preventive measures so that you never use that thing or meet that person or visit that place again. The path of sexual purity for the Christian man is one of elimination.
This is what Jesus has in mind when he commands you to cut off your hand or foot and cast it from you if it causes you to sin. Jesus says conquering sin requires drastic action, action that costs you something. After all, your hands are useful to you, right? You need two of them to do most jobs and activities of daily living (tying your shoelaces, for example). Your feet are practical. You need two of them to walk, play soccer and climb stairs. Going through life with only one hand or one foot is inconvenient. But that’s the point. If anything valuable, or practical or convenient causes you to sin, you must cut it off, cast it from you, and have no more dealings with it. Period.
Taking drastic steps to eliminate porn and sexual sin from your life is inconvenient, even costly. Navigating an unfamiliar city is hard with only a flip phone and without Google Maps. Keeping in touch with distant friends and family is tough when everyone is busy on Facebook—except you. Discussing the latest episode of that new sitcom is impossible when your television is in the landfill. But subtracting every source of sexual temptation from your life is worth it. You walk with a limp, but it’s worth it.
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