The enemy knows that both men and women have a desire to be loved emotionally but also have sexual desires that when not kept between husband and wife in the context of marriage can have devastating effects on people and especially ministries. Therefore we must all be vigilant to live a life that is holy and righteous before the Lord or else the enemy will use our sin against us to come against our ministry and cause people to become disillusioned, angry and to look upon us as hypocrites. Sexual sin is one of the main devices that the enemy uses to come against godly people (the other device is financial corruption) as it causes guilt and shame between the two people who committed it, confusion and anger for those who have relationships with the two people and anger and desertion for those who were following them whether in ministry or distant relationships.
So now more than ever we must live a consecrated life of righteousness and be sexually pure as Satan wants to bring down anyone and everyone whether you are in ministry or calling yourself a Christian. The Lord has shown me and others in ministry to be on high alert for the enemy is stepping us his attacks to seduce men in ministry to sin sexually (pornography, illicit relationships with women, sexual harassment, anything to shut down good ministries, etc.) and several have already been exposed for improper relationships and behavior which is affecting their ministries and those who follow them. The Lord gives us all time to repent to humble ourselves but if we won’t then He has no choice but to expose the truth in someone’s life in order to save them from their ungodly behavior for their eternal salvation.
Proverbs 21:3 NKJV
3 To do righteousness and justice
Is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice.
When a person involved in a ministry has an impure personal life then it affects their ministry life in negative ways that can infect those following the ministry. When we are not pure sexually we allow demonic spirits to gain access into our souls and then it manifests through us onto other people through improper messages, viewing of pornography, improper emotional or sexual affairs and lifestyles that are not aligned with the Lord. This grieves the Holy Spirit and will negatively impact a person’s calling and ministry and often times shut it down. There are millions of people involved in ministries and churches who are not living a consecrated life of holiness and righteousness today and are living in hidden sin (and the longer they are in the sin their conscience becomes seared and are more prideful and brazen with no shame).
2 Timothy 2:22 NKJV
22 Flee also youthful lusts; but pursue righteousness, faith, love, peace with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart.
Men are allowing their eyes to gaze upon women with lust and women are also involved with either pursuing men in ungodly ways or luring and seducing them. It used to only happen when you were physically in contact with meeting someone, working with them, at church, but now it is so easy with social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter to connect with a person you don’t know and then to begin communication that can lead to ungodly sexual affairs that corrupt people and ruin ministries which is the goal of Satan and is increasing at rates not seen before as we approach the End times.
Matthew 5:27-28 NKJV
Adultery in the Heart
27 “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ 28 But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
It all starts with a gaze, a look that lasts too long, and then that leads to connecting via messages and then on the phone and then in person. A man after God’s own heart, David, had an issue because he gazed too long at Bathsheba one morning which led to a sexual encounter, murder and then consequences of death of the child.
2 Samuel 11:1-12:23 NKJV
David, Bathsheba, and Uriah
11 It happened in the spring of the year, at the time when kings go out to battle, that David sent Joab and his servants with him, and all Israel; and they destroyed the people of Ammon and besieged Rabbah. But David remained at Jerusalem.
2 Then it happened one evening that David arose from his bed and walked on the roof of the king’s house. And from the roof he saw a woman bathing, and the woman was very beautiful to behold. 3 So David sent and inquired about the woman. And someone said, “Is this not Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?” 4 Then David sent messengers, and took her; and she came to him, and he lay with her, for she was cleansed from her impurity; and she returned to her house. 5 And the woman conceived; so she sent and told David, and said, “I am with child.”
6 Then David sent to Joab, saying, “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” And Joab sent Uriah to David. 7 When Uriah had come to him, David asked how Joab was doing, and how the people were doing, and how the war prospered. 8 And David said to Uriah, “Go down to your house and wash your feet.” So Uriah departed from the king’s house, and a gift of food from the king followed him. 9 But Uriah slept at the door of the king’s house with all the servants of his lord, and did not go down to his house. 10 So when they told David, saying, “Uriah did not go down to his house,” David said to Uriah, “Did you not come from a journey? Why did you not go down to your house?”
11 And Uriah said to David, “The ark and Israel and Judah are dwelling in tents, and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord are encamped in the open fields. Shall I then go to my house to eat and drink, and to lie with my wife? As you live, and as your soul lives, I will not do this thing.”
12 Then David said to Uriah, “Wait here today also, and tomorrow I will let you depart.” So Uriah remained in Jerusalem that day and the next. 13 Now when David called him, he ate and drank before him; and he made him drunk. And at evening he went out to lie on his bed with the servants of his lord, but he did not go down to his house.
14 In the morning it happened that David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Uriah. 15 And he wrote in the letter, saying, “Set Uriah in the forefront of the hottest battle, and retreat from him, that he may be struck down and die.” 16 So it was, while Joab besieged the city, that he assigned Uriah to a place where he knew there were valiant men. 17 Then the men of the city came out and fought with Joab. And some of the people of the servants of David fell; and Uriah the Hittite died also.
18 Then Joab sent and told David all the things concerning the war, 19 and charged the messenger, saying, “When you have finished telling the matters of the war to the king, 20 if it happens that the king’s wrath rises, and he says to you: ‘Why did you approach so near to the city when you fought? Did you not know that they would shoot from the wall? 21 Who struck Abimelech the son of Jerubbesheth? Was it not a woman who cast a piece of a millstone on him from the wall, so that he died in Thebez? Why did you go near the wall?’—then you shall say, ‘Your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also.’ ”
22 So the messenger went, and came and told David all that Joab had sent by him. 23 And the messenger said to David, “Surely the men prevailed against us and came out to us in the field; then we drove them back as far as the entrance of the gate. 24 The archers shot from the wall at your servants; and some of the king’s servants are dead, and your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also.”
25 Then David said to the messenger, “Thus you shall say to Joab: ‘Do not let this thing displease you, for the sword devours one as well as another. Strengthen your attack against the city, and overthrow it.’ So encourage him.”
26 When the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she mourned for her husband. 27 And when her mourning was over, David sent and brought her to his house, and she became his wife and bore him a son. But the thing that David had done displeased[ the Lord.
Nathan’s Parable and David’s Confession
12 Then the Lord sent Nathan to David. And he came to him, and said to him: “There were two men in one city, one rich and the other poor. 2 The rich man had exceedingly many flocks and herds. 3 But the poor man had nothing, except one little ewe lamb which he had bought and nourished; and it grew up together with him and with his children. It ate of his own food and drank from his own cup and lay in his bosom; and it was like a daughter to him. 4 And a traveler came to the rich man, who refused to take from his own flock and from his own herd to prepare one for the wayfaring man who had come to him; but he took the poor man’s lamb and prepared it for the man who had come to him.”
5 So David’s anger was greatly aroused against the man, and he said to Nathan, “As the Lord lives, the man who has done this shall surely die! 6 And he shall restore fourfold for the lamb, because he did this thing and because he had no pity.”
7 Then Nathan said to David, “You are the man! Thus says the Lord God of Israel: ‘I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you from the hand of Saul. 8 I gave you your master’s house and your master’s wives into your keeping, and gave you the house of Israel and Judah. And if that had been too little, I also would have given you much more! 9 Why have you despised the commandment of the Lord, to do evil in His sight? You have killed Uriah the Hittite with the sword; you have taken his wife to be your wife, and have killed him with the sword of the people of Ammon. 10 Now therefore, the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised Me, and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife.’ 11 Thus says the Lord: ‘Behold, I will raise up adversity against you from your own house; and I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this sun. 12 For you did it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel, before the sun.’ ”
13 So David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the Lord.”
And Nathan said to David, “The Lord also has put away your sin; you shall not die. 14 However, because by this deed you have given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, the child also who is born to you shall surely die.” 15 Then Nathan departed to his house.
The Death of David’s Son
And the Lord struck the child that Uriah’s wife bore to David, and it became ill. 16 David therefore pleaded with God for the child, and David fasted and went in and lay all night on the ground. 17 So the elders of his house arose and went to him, to raise him up from the ground. But he would not, nor did he eat food with them. 18 Then on the seventh day it came to pass that the child died. And the servants of David were afraid to tell him that the child was dead. For they said, “Indeed, while the child was alive, we spoke to him, and he would not heed our voice. How can we tell him that the child is dead? He may do some harm!”
19 When David saw that his servants were whispering, David perceived that the child was dead. Therefore David said to his servants, “Is the child dead?”
And they said, “He is dead.”
20 So David arose from the ground, washed and anointed himself, and changed his clothes; and he went into the house of the Lord and worshiped. Then he went to his own house; and when he requested, they set food before him, and he ate. 21 Then his servants said to him, “What is this that you have done? You fasted and wept for the child while he was alive, but when the child died, you arose and ate food.”
22 And he said, “While the child was alive, I fasted and wept; for I said, ‘Who can tell whether the Lord will be gracious to me, that the child may live?’ 23 But now he is dead; why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me.”
Therefore this is a warning and wake up call for all of us – to be vigilant to consecrate our lives in the area of sexual purity more than ever. Men do not allow yourself to look at women lustfully and women do not look upon men in ungodly ways to try to seduce them and make sure to dress in conservative ways. We do not want what happened to David to happen to us. There are consequences to sin and if we do not humble ourselves before the Lord then He will expose it and it will not go well for us. Also be aware that God will often expose your sin to others in dreams first and then they will confront you but if you do not repent and change He will expose it on a larger more public scale so that you have to deal with it to humble the pride out of you so that you will choose to repent.
