The Purity Test

Welcome to Worship in the Word with Pastor Robert Morris. We're in the series From Dream to Destiny where Pastor Robert talks about character building tests from the life of Joseph that we all must go through to realize our dreams and step into our destiny. Well, in today's message, Pastor Robert shares three areas upon which impurity has an impact and why God wants us to live in purity. There's some incredible things in this message, so let's join Pastor Robert now. We are in a series called Dream to Destiny, and we're basing it on the life of Joseph. Every person—I want you to hear this. I'm saying this every week, but it's very important that you hear this—every person has a dream from God.

God has a dream for your life, and every person has a destiny that God wants you to fulfill. But the one word that will stop us from fulfilling our destiny is the word character. And Joseph had to go through 10 character tests before he could fulfill the destiny on his life. We've talked about the pride test. We've talked about the pit test. We've talked about the palace test. This is number four. This is the purity test.

The purity test. Genesis 39, look at verse 7. And it came to pass after these things that his master's wife cast longing eyes on Joseph. I want you to notice these words, longing eyes on Joseph. And she said, Lie with me. But he refused and said to his master's wife, Look, my master does not know what is with me in the house, and he has committed all that he has to my hand. There is no one greater in his house than I, nor has he kept back anything from me but you, because you are his wife.

How then can I do this great wickedness? I want you to notice what Joseph calls sexual immorality, great wickedness and sin against God. So it was as she spoke to Joseph day by day, notice how the enemy attacks, that he did not heed her to lie with her or to be with her. But it happened about this time when Joseph went into the house to do his work, and none of the men of the house was inside, that she caught him by his garment saying lie with me, but he left his garment in her hand and fled and ran outside.

I want you to notice that he ran from immorality. This is congruent with 1st Corinthians 6 that says, Flee or run from sexual immorality. So I want to show you some things that sexual impurity will affect in every person's life. And then I want to give you a very, very practical key to being able to overcome and be pure in this area of your life.

All right. So here's number one, impurity affects your family. Impurity affects your family. David fell morally in 2nd Samuel 11 and his kids fell in 2nd Samuel 13.

I believe that he was not able to see the attack against his children because of the blindness in his own life. Here we have Joseph and it would affect his family. It would affect his destiny.

It would affect his future if he fell in this area. Now I want to blow away a lie of Satan. And here's what Satan tells many, many people in regard to lust. They say as long as you don't transgress, as long as you don't step over the line, as long as you never physically do it, it's not going to affect your family even though you allow this in your mind or you look at pornography or something like that. Please understand when the Bible talks about sin, it talks about an inward motivation and an outward movement.

And let me give you the words for it. Transgression is an outward movement. The word transgress literally means in the Hebrew to step over a boundary line. Our English word would be trespass. If a person steps over a boundary line onto someone else's property, he is trespassing. In the same manner, that's what the word transgress means.

It means we step over a boundary line. The Bible uses another word for sin called iniquity. Iniquity is an inward bent or an inward motivation toward sin. And it is sin also. And I want you to understand that many people don't understand this because iniquity is lust.

Lust is in our heart. It's an iniquity. Transgression then would be adultery. And so many people think, well, as long as I don't transgress that boundary, I'm okay and it won't affect my family.

Listen carefully. The Bible doesn't say that the transgressions of the fathers go to the children to the third and fourth generation. It says the iniquities. The iniquities of the fathers. In other words, sir, if it's in your heart, it will affect your family. We even have a saying in the world that what one generation does in moderation, the next generation does in excess. That's because if it's in the heart of one generation, it's in the hand of the other. Iniquity is inward motivation.

If you're taking notes, you ought to write that down. Iniquity is inward motivation. Transgression is outward movement.

But please, please, please hear me clearly. If it's in your heart, it will affect your family. Don't allow it to stay in your heart. By the way, the Bible is so perfect. It is so perfect because the Bible fits together perfectly. Remember, transgression is outward. Iniquity is inward.

Let me just read you one scripture. Isaiah 53 verse 5 says, He was wounded. That's an outward. Wounded outwardly for our transgressions.

He was bruised. That's inward. Inward bleeding for our iniquities. So Jesus died to pay for all of them. So an impurity affects your family.

Here's number two. Impurity affects your faith. It affects your walk with God.

It not only affects your walk with others, it affects your walk with God. Let me explain this to you. And I'm going to tell you something extremely practical here. One time I was speaking to a group of young people and I opened in this area about purity and I opened up for questions and answers.

And a very, a question came that was just a question that really exemplifies what a lot of young people feel. This person said to me, if we love each other and we're going to get married anyway, what difference does a piece of paper make? And here's what my answer was. None.

None. The piece of paper that the license is written on makes no difference at all. It's not the piece of paper that makes the difference. It's the blessing of God that makes the difference. And when God tells us not to do something, it's not because He doesn't want us to have fun or He's a prude. He doesn't want our lives destroyed. When we tell our children not to play in the street, it's not because we don't want them to have fun. It's because we want to save their lives because we want them to have fun. We want them to be around and alive long enough to have fun. So when God says flee sexual immorality, there's a reason.

And I want to tell you what that reason is. All sexual immorality opens up the door to numerous sins. One of the sins would be deception.

One is manipulation. One is lying. You have to sneak around for any set type of sexual immorality. And so you open up a door to lying to be deceptive.

David himself when he was sexually immoral then had to commit murder to try and cover it up. And so when you have premarital sex, you learn how to lie and be deceptive, which affects your relationship with your family. It affects your relationship with God. It puts a deception in our lives that affects us. And here's what happens. We come to church and we have sexual impurity in us and we stand with our hands raised and our hearts covered. And you learn to be deceptive with God as well. And you're no longer convicted of that this is great wickedness and a sin against God. And let me tell you what else it does. It's going to affect your marriage.

I promise you. Because here's what happens. When you begin to sneak around, you develop an appetite that God never intended you to develop. You develop an appetite for sneaking around sex. And what you have an adrenaline rush when you do that. And then once you get married, have you ever thought about this?

You don't have to sneak around anymore. And that's why maybe the man will say to the woman, it's just not the same. And he'll want to bring things into the marriage to spice up that area of their life. But he won't be able to spice it up because he created an appetite that God never intended him to have. And many, many times, ladies, by you acquiescing and saying yes, you helped to create that appetite in him. And now he now has an appetite.

Now the appetite goes both ways. But most of the time, for men, it's sex. For women, it's romance. You create an appetite for sneaking around sex.

Sneaking around romance. Sex is not as high on the list for women as it is for men. Men normally rate it as number one or number two of their needs. Women in the last poll, they rated sex number 13.

They rated gardening number 12. But what a woman does rate high as her need is romance. So you, listen, in both men and women, you create an appetite that God never intended you to create. And that's why a man will begin to talk to a woman in his office and he'll begin to flirt just a little bit. And you know what's happening? He gets that adrenaline rush because he's fulfilling an appetite that he doesn't even know he has but was created in him before he ever got married. And then eventually that'll turn into an affair. And guess what? To have an affair, what do you have to do?

You have to sneak around. So he is now satisfying the appetite which the two of you created before you ever got married. And what happens then is he'll begin to sneak around.

Now here's something else he'll do. As he's having sex with her, he begins to feel with her what he felt with you before you got married. And he associates that feeling with love. And so he'll begin to believe because all sexual immorality has at its base deception, he'll begin to, because he's deceived, he'll begin to believe that he loves her and not you. Now let me tell you how stupid this cycle is with Satan. He'll divorce you and marry her.

Just think about it. Now what happens? He doesn't have to sneak around anymore. So after a few years he'll say to her, it's just not the same. It's not the same.

And he'll begin to sneak around again. That's why some of our friends have been married three and four times. Because they're trying to satisfy an appetite that God never intended us to have. When God says flee it, flee sexual immorality, he's not saying it because he's a prude, he's saying it because he loves you and he doesn't want your life and your children's lives destroyed by this.

It's very important. So you might be thinking, well, we're guilty. We bought the lie. We had premarital sex. We've never been with anyone else but we had premarital sex.

What do we do? Well, you treat sin like any other sin. You have to confess it and repent of it. So many times we say we're not going to talk about it anymore or we don't even see it as sin because it was just a piece of paper.

What did the piece of paper matter? It was sin. And so the two of you need to confess it to each other.

You don't have to broadcast it. Confess it to each other and maybe another couple or a pastor or a counselor. Come into accountability. Confess it. Repent of it and close that door because as long as you leave that door open in your marriage, you don't want to leave any door open to Satan in your marriage.

So that's how he comes in. And it affects your family. It affects your faith, your relationship with God. Here's the third thing it affects. It affects your future.

It affects your future. Here's what Satan probably told Joseph. Man, you're a slave. You've been sold as a slave. All these dreams you have, they're not going to come to pass. God's never going to be able to use you because your brother thwarted God's plan for your life. Let me just make a very, very clear statement here. There's only one person in the world that can thwart God's plan for your life and that's you.

You're the only one. There's no one else that can stop God from doing what He plans to do through you except you if you make the wrong choices. And if you make this choice, Joseph would have thwarted God's plan on his life. Now, I'm not saying that if you've fallen that you can never fulfill God's destiny for your life because I've told the congregation this.

I've told you this many, many times before. I had a fall when I was in my early 20s in ministry and saved. This is why I'm so strong on the baptism in the Holy Spirit, inner healing and deliverance because I didn't know anything about that. I want every person in the church to go through kairos and freedom ministry and be baptized in the Holy Spirit because we have to have supernatural power to live victoriously in this world.

We have to. So, please hear me. You're looking at a restored person, but it's not because, I'm telling you, the reason that I am now walking in the destiny is because God dealt with that in a biblical scriptural way and I allowed Him to deal with that and I've become open and accountable and transparent now in my life for over 24 years since that happened. So, please understand. I'm not saying that if you've fallen, you can never fulfill your destiny. I will say this though. If you continue to walk down that road, you will not be able to fulfill the destiny God has for your life.

You won't be able to. So, it affects your family. It affects your faith.

It affects your future. So, before I give you point four, let me tell you where I'm going with this. So, what's the answer? I really believe that God takes the most complex things and makes them simple. Just like last week, we talked about it.

We boiled it down very simply to hear the Word of God, which will build faith in our lives. Okay, listen to me. I'm going to tell you how impurity begins and most people believe it begins in the heart. It doesn't begin in the heart.

It affects the heart. It doesn't begin in the heart. Here's point number four. It begins, impurity begins in the eyes. Impurity begins in the eyes. Do you remember what we read?

And I told you, remember these two words? It says, his master's wife cast longing eyes on him. You know why she had lust in her heart? Because she looked. That's why.

He was a handsome person. Now listen, I started to name this point, don't look. So, you want to even put that in parentheses. Here's the, don't look. Don't look.

It says Joseph was a handsome person. All right, listen to me. Don't look at handsome people. I'm telling you, look away. I have trained myself not to look because if you look, you lust. You have to look to lust. And listen, turn to Matthew five.

Let me show you. I promise you Jesus is going to back this up. People know this scripture, but they didn't know. It's just so clear here.

Watch this. Matthew five, verse 28. Jesus said, but I say to you that whoever looks, whoever looks, looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. There's two things I want you to notice about this scripture.

First of all, it blows away. The Pharisees think, well, if I don't transgress, it's not sin. If I don't step over the line, then it's not sin. Jesus said, huh? If it's in your heart, it's sin.

If it's in your heart, you've already done it. But then he gives us a progression. Whoever looks to lust has already committed adultery.

Look at the progression. Look, lust, adultery. Listen, if you don't want to commit adultery, don't let lust stay in your heart. And if you don't want lust in your heart, don't look. Looking empowers lust. Don't look at pornography. Hear me, don't look at it. You say, I got a lust problem. No, you have a looking problem.

That's what you have. Stop looking. Don't look at any movie. My wife and I, I love movies. I really, I just love movies.

But we will not go where there's nudity in a movie. Because I've been an alcoholic in this area. Do you understand? An alcoholic can have one drink.

Not one drink. Listen to me. You can't, some of you can have one look.

Because it stirs it up in you. And you have to become accountable in this area. Now I want to explain how I've had victory now for over 24 years in this area in my life.

Here's the way. I confess everything to Debbie. You have to. People say, well, confess it to another man. You can't confess it to your wife.

I've even had men who work in men's ministry. Councilmen, don't tell your wife this. You're wrong.

You're wrong. She's the one person that needs to know. You have to. Listen, if you want to write down again, write down two words. Struggle together.

Struggle together. And ladies, please, can you please, please, please, will you hear me? Will you not condemn him when he admits it to you?

Will you not feel insecure? Please understand. If he says he has a problem with lust, listen to me carefully. It's not love that he has a problem with. It's lust. Lust is never love. It is never love. That Potiphar's wife didn't love Joseph. If she had loved Joseph, she wouldn't have let him sat in a prison for 13 years.

She didn't love him. It's always lust. And ladies, when a man tells you, young ladies, when a man tells you or a boy tells you, if you'll give it, if you love me, you'll give it to me, listen, the very thing you give him to keep him will be the very thing that causes you to lose him.

Satan's a liar. I'm telling you, believe me in this area. So you struggle together. So when I struggle, and I'm not saying I haven't struggled in 24 years, but I'm telling you this, I struggle with Debbie. And she doesn't get insecure about it because she understands.

That's been an area of weakness for him. Now, this is not the same thing. I wish I could have come up with a better analogy, but I didn't. And I understand the brevity of these two is not the same.

I understand that. But let's say that a man struggles. This is an appetite of the flesh. And let's say a woman struggles in her appetite. She struggles because she loves sugar.

Well, it doesn't mean if a woman says to her husband, I have to have a Krispy Kreme. I have to. It's been three months. I just need one dozen. That's all I need.

That's all I need. The man doesn't hear that in the way that she doesn't love me. She doesn't love me anymore. She doesn't desire me. He doesn't hear that. Please, ladies, please, please, please. The pride of life, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes.

They're all there together. When a man says, I'm struggling in this area, he's not saying I don't love you. He's saying I have an unhealthy appetite that I should have never developed.

And I'm struggling. When I would travel. Now, we have a policy. Listen, I never travel alone. But I used to before I play in a gateway church.

There wasn't a policy where I was. And there were times when I'd travel alone. If I get to struggling in a motel room, hotel room, I just, I would call Debbie. Debbie, I'm struggling. And we struggle together. I just can't emphasize, ladies, if your husband has a problem in this area, the number one person he should come to is you.

He ought to be able to come to you. I told Debbie years ago when I finally came clean, I said to her, I want you to know all my past. I told her everything about my past sexually.

Everything. And I mean, I really thought when she hears this, she's going to walk out the door yelling pervert on her way out. But I'm going to tell her everything about my past. And I told her everything. And I said, that, that's me. That's me. And when I finished, you know what she said?

She said, Robert, I knew you were bad when I married you. But what I saw in you was a desire to serve God. And I saw in you a desire to bring me into your struggles. Can I, can I, listen to me, listen, this is very important.

Sir, listen to me. She can probably forgive the lust. It's very difficult to forgive the lying. The number one thing we have to deal with, with couples where there's been immorality is not even the immorality.

It's the deception. That's what we have to deal with. And Satan works in darkness. So ma'am, if he has a difficult in this area, don't make him work in darkness in this area. Try to, try to overcome it.

Let him bring it to the light and bring it to the light every chance you get. Let me show you a couple more scriptures. Psalm 103 verse three says, I will set nothing wicked before my eyes. It begins in the eyes. Proverbs 27, 20. Hell and destruction are never full. So the eyes of a man are never satisfied.

Matthew 6, 22 and 23. The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness.

Listen to me. If your eye is bad, if you look at darkness, you got your whole body's full of darkness. Look at light, your body's full of light. One other scripture Job 31 one, I've made a covenant with my eyes. Why then should I look upon a young woman? I have made a covenant with my eyes.

Why then should I look upon a young woman? When the Lord showed me this truth about looking, I would tell Debbie out that I was struggling and things like that. But then God showed me, don't look, stop looking, stop looking. So and he said, I want you to come into accountability with Debbie on this area.

So I went to her and I said to her, the Lord has shown me, I have a problem with looking. You know what she said? You think. You know, men think if they confess it that they look at other women that it's going to shock their wives. They know.

Guys, just let me let you know. They already know. They see you. So I said, well, I want you to confront me and pray for me when I, when you, if you see me looking, I want you to confront me and pray for me. Now, the problem is I look back on this was I did not fully define the word confront. And shortly after this, we were at a swimming pool on vacation and which don't, don't go to a swimming pool.

Uh, if you have a problem and say, it's like an alcoholic going to a bar, it just, and say, I'm just going to sit and watch, you know, the drinking, you know. So we're at the swimming pool and, and this lady walked by that did, you know, that she didn't have a bathing suit. She really did. She had dental floss up the back of her.

And I looked and all of a sudden, remember I didn't define confront to Debbie. She reached over and grabbed me on the back of my arm where no human being should ever be grabbed. And she pinched me and twisted. The Bible specifically says thou shalt not twist if thy pinch. And she pinched me and twisted and said, do I need to pray for you? Well, you get pinched and twisted a few times.

Something walks by you. I'm looking at the book. I'm gonna read the book. I'm gonna read the book.

I'm gonna read the book. Now I specifically wanted to end with that testimony. Here's the reason why, because this is a heavy subject and I know that and I know that many, many people, many of us at all the campuses, many of us struggle with this. I want you to understand it's okay to struggle, but let's struggle. Let's struggle. Let's struggle together.

Let's not give up in this area. We want you to take a moment to think about what Pastor Robert shared today and listen to what the Holy Spirit is saying to you. If you want to connect with us or check out some of Pastor Robert's other messages, visit pastorrobert.com. And if you haven't already, go follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter so we can be a part of your community. We're so glad that you listened in with us today. Next time, Pastor Robert is going to share about a test of perseverance. We pray that you have a blessed week.