Is Masturbation a Sin in Christianity? – All You Need To Know & How To Overcome It

Do you really want to know whether Masturbation is a sin against Christianity or not? CrossWalk has got a piece of detailed information to get you served.

Many of you have asked, “Is masturbation a sin?” First, let’s take a look at what defines masturbation and the heart of the issue.

What is Masturbation?
Masturbation is the experience of sexual orgasm produced by self-stimulation for sexual arousal and pleasure.

Is Masturbation a Sin in Christianity?
Let me address the issue mainly for men. I cannot imagine sexual orgasm in the loins without a sexual image in the mind. I know there are nocturnal emissions, which I regard as innocent and helpful, but I doubt that they are ever orgasmic apart from a sexual dream that supplies the necessary image in the mind.

Evidently, God has constituted the connection between sexual orgasm and sexual thought in such a way that the force and pleasure of the orgasm are dependent on the thought or images in our minds.

Therefore in order to masturbate, it is necessary to get vivid and exciting thoughts or images into the mind. This can be done by pure imagination or by pictures or movies or stories or real persons.

These images always involve women as sexual objects. I use the word “object” because in order for a woman to be a true sexual “subject” in our imagination she must, in reality, be one with whom we are experiencing what we are imagining. This is not the case with masturbation.

So I vote no on masturbation. There may be other reasons why it is wrong. For now, I rest my vote on the inevitable sexual images which accompany masturbation and which turn women into sexual objects.

The sexual thoughts that enable masturbation do not help any man to treat women with greater respect. Therefore masturbation produces real and legitimate guilt and stands in the way of obedience. – Excerpt from John Piper, Missions and Masturbation.

How to Handle the Temptation to Masturbate
James gives us a lot of insight in how to handle temptation … after raising a number of sins that his audience was committing (3:13-4:4), he then proceeds into the solution to their sin. (James 4:5-10, NKJV) “5 Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”? 6 But He gives more grace.

Therefore He says: “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” 7 Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded. 9 Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. 10 Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up.”

Let me sum this passage up with some action steps:

1. Be humble.

The key to overcoming this (or any) sin is … our humility. Notice how James begins by pointing out that the Holy Spirit, who indwells all believers, is yearning within us jealously. He is yearning for us to stop our sinning ways. Our only hope of overcoming this sin is to depend upon God. This being the case, we are told that God resists the proud, that is, He doesn’t help those who do not recognize their need for Him. Rather, it says, He gives grace to the humble. (Grace is God’s undeserved goodness in our life.) Our humility is crucial to overcoming sin. The reason for this is that when we are humble, we admit that we have a sin problem. In this case, we’re in love with pleasing ourselves! (It feels good!) Although pleasing ourselves is not necessarily a sin, as we have already seen, with masturbation it is. So the first step is humility.

2. Submit to God.

Your only hope in overcoming your urges and desires is to have God’s help. Surrender your thoughts and desires to the Lord and place them
under His authority.

3. Resist the devil.

If we keep doing the same things in the same way under the same conditions, is it any wonder that we get the same results? If you masturbate by looking at or reading pornography … get rid of every piece of pornographic material that you have. If you go to pornographic sites on the Internet … do whatever it takes to block your access to those sites. If that doesn’t work, get rid of the Internet altogether! There is nothing on the Internet that is near as important as your remaining pure! If it happens at a certain time of day or under certain conditions that repeat themselves, do something to change your life so that you are not available at that time or under those conditions. Regardless, make drastic changes … do whatever it takes … don’t mess around … flee!

4. Draw near to God. (He will draw near to you.)

As you run away from Satan, run to the Lord. This means make pursuing God your No. 1 purpose. If you continually focus on not masturbating,
your eyes are in the wrong place. Your vision should not be on what you are not supposed to do, but on what you are to do. The way that we do this is through making God’s goals our goals. Draw close to Him … chase after Him. Make your desires His desires. When you do this, He gives you a promise: He will draw near to you, which is exactly what you need to overcome this temptation. If you try to overcome it yourself, without His power, you will surely fail!

5. Stop goofing off; stop being foolish; take it seriously.

One of the biggest deceits that you will hear about this subject is that masturbation is actually healthy for you since it makes you feel good and it doesn’t hurt anybody. If you buy into that notion, it won’t be long until you’ll be hooked to this addiction of pleasing yourself. If you don’t take this matter seriously, you will be its slave for a long, long time.

I hope that this has been a help to you. For those of you who are struggling with this problem, I want to encourage you with this … fight the good fight … have faith in God … trust in Him. And if you fail, remember this: God still loves you! Whenever you fall, He will pick you up if you call out to Him. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9 NKJV). Praise Him for that!