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Not being perfect is not going to hold God back from sending Blessings. I believe that blessings that are given with real intent of helping the person combined with their faith in it is what obligates God to answer them . As mentioned before if you had to be perfect to give blessings none would ever be given !!! I don’t think you can be an axe murderer and give blessings but if you are really trying God will not hold back !!!!!!!!! Look in the OT .. There were plenty of people giving blessings who were not worthy. Lack of worthiness did not invalidate blessings. There is an LDS culture of “perfection.” I want to shout out, “But what about the atonement?” We are not supposed to be perfect. In some ways, we are perfect in our imperfections and so very human. Are LDS peeps trying to state that they don’t need the atonement for anything significant? That they need the atonement for only the unknown sins and insignificant actions — like the tea in the juice?
We are here to live life. If we are not making any mistakes, we aren’t really living the kind of lives that God wants us to live. He set us up to need repentance.
I think our lives are supposed to have texture and depth and experiences. Joys and pains and regrets.
When I look at people who have created and accomplished amazing things, they tend to be those who drew outside the lines a lot. Church culture tells us to always color carefully within the lines. I’m not sure God is always thrilled with that answer.
If someone is worried about worthiness and porn, pray about it. What is God’s answer? I suspect He is more accepting than your local congregation.
Just listen to the first part of this and how someone was able to stop watching too much porn. It is close to how I also did it. Get rid of the shame and the compulsion drops. http://rationalfaiths.com/100-ask-mormon-sex-therapist-part-14/ ” class=”bbcode_url”> http://rationalfaiths.com/100-ask-mormon-sex-therapist-part-14/ As a young man before my mission I wrote in my journal that if I was not able to overcome that particular issue then I would never find fulfillment. I really wanted someone to love me and support me but I felt that my habit would destroy all of that. Either “she” would not want me or I would never be able to be content with a “real” woman. I really did feel like this was THE central issue in working out my future happiness. I went to the temple and felt that I would be endowed by power from on high. Like a fortress, I was now impenetrable to the forces of evil. I lasted for some time before succumbing. Afterwards I felt so horrible. I felt like I had opened the back door and let in the evil spirits to occupy and destroy my sacred fortress. I had betrayed my God who had given me every tool to stay true.
A few years after my mission I met and started dating my future wife. At the time, it was really hard to keep our hands off of each other so that we could get married in the temple. “M” was very helpful during this time period.
I now find fulfillment in my relationship with my wife. I was wrong to believe that my happiness would hinge on something so relatively minor. In my marriage, we still use “M” sometimes when circumstances prevent us being intimate as much as we might like. We do not see this as sin as much as mutual accommodation. I have found my desire for images to be much more manageable. I believe that this has to do with two factors: 1) Is that as a married man I do not have the same pent up sexual energy as before and 2) emotionally, I have in large measure found the acceptance, love, and support that I so longed for. I believe that my habit was a self soothing mechanism for among other things – my loneliness. I am no longer alone.
In summary, I wish that I didn’t beat myself up quite so much as a young man. I was doing many things right and I did not give myself enough credit for that.
My $0.02
Another thing to consider — I’ve heard it a lot from other people, particularly those who have been married for some time — that their spouses don’t look after their physical needs. Yet God created us with that persistent, chronic pelvic ache to encourage child bearing and sex. Some people, not content with anything but full blown intimacy go after a different person for casual sex or even a whole new relationship. They leave broken families behind them and break serious commandments that can lead to loss of membership — yet another consequence of unmet physical needs. What is better in that situation? To look after those needs through personal “M” or other means, or to get yourself into a new situation with a new person, wreaking havoc with your existing family over that one issue?
“The greatest good for the greatest number” seems to apply.
One thing I am thankful for is “nature’s anesthetic”. The choreograher to the stage production Oklahoma used that comment years ago when I was watching an interview as a very young man. She said that as you get older, you get less attractive and the feasible partner pool shrinks dramatically. At the same time, your body gets less “on fire”. She called it nature’s anesthetic. I have to say that is one of the benefits of aging for which I’m eternally grateful. When I was a young man there was a book called “‘Sex without Guilt” that was popular. I thought of writing my own book called “Guilt without Sex” given how much my church experience encouraged me to beat myself up over “unclean thoughts”. So much mental effort wasted at that time, when I look back at it. I didn’t view porn but beat myself up over imagining situations with attractive members of the opposite sex etcetera. This is an example of how religion can cause you to LOSE inner peace, rather than promoting it. I am thankful that as we get older, God seems to ease up on that part of it. It was torment as a young adult for many of us.
Sheldon wrote:SilentDawning wrote:Once a sister came to me and confessed to breaking the WofW. She said she had purchased a fruit drink in a can, and after she had drank it, she read the can and saw it it contained black tea in addition to the fruit juice. She was devastated. I tried not to laugh as I told he that yes it was wrong to drink tea, but she did not have to give up her TR. I told her just to be more careful in the future. I think this applies to what SilentDawning is saying. I had to say it was wrong, but was it really?
First, I’m still often confused by the people out there who are mortified of even the slightest WoW violation, but think nothing of bearing false witness or worse.
Second, even the most conscientious Orthodox Jews I’ve known all agreed that breaking Kosher restrictions without knowledge or intent was no sin, and only bothered to read through every ingredient of a product lacking a Kosher marking if they had some other reason to suspect it. (Processed meats always got checked, since they’re usually a mix of whatever was cheap and/or left over from other products. Bread, cheese, etc. was more of a “someday I’ll be bored at the table with nothing to read but the package from this, and if I’m not supposed to eat it I’ll stop then.”)
If youfeel that you are unworthy to give a blessing because of sin, then you should do something about it instead of ignoring it. I’ve never had continuing to do things I feel bad about make me feel better about myself or feel closer to the Spirit. As for whatto do about it, whatever it is you decide, make sure it is something you’re fairly certain you’ll actually do. If you tell yourself “I’ll stop viewing porn” or “I’ll talk to my bishop/parents” when you have no intention or won’t actually follow through with it, you’re doing a disservice to yourself. Make some smaller goals that you’d be willing to action on. Be honest and prayerful about it. I’m assuming that you are habitually viewing porn, and didn’t just stumble across it once. In the latter case, then this is like the accidentally drinking black tea “issue” where you don’t need to worry about it.
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