This is how you’re going to beat lust.
We need to understand that Christ could take lust away from a man just like that. But the reason he doesn’t is the same as with all the passions. The struggle is our salvation. And by actually learning to battle against lust, you will learn the spiritual life. You will learn how to pray in a way that you never would have otherwise.
You’ll learn how to fast. You’ll learn how to do prostrations and how to read the scriptures. You’re going to learn to become better and more fulfilled. And so this struggle will become a teacher. St. Ambrose of Obtino was asked, how did you learn to be such a master of the Jesus prayer? Who taught you?
He said, I had the best teacher in the world, the devil. The devil taught me to pray because every time he attacked, I went and prayed more. And that’s where I learned how to pray. So if we understand this battle properly, It will teach us the spiritual life. And you need to understand that you will never succeed in this fight against lust.
Because if you fight against lust and against the demon of lust, in doing so, all you do is get into a conversation with him. And guess what? He’s much smarter and much more experienced than you in the fight. He’s going to make you fall. What you have to do is want something more than you want lust. You have to fight for Christ.
You have to fight for the spiritual life. You have to fight for all these things for your family. You have to find the things that you’re fighting for more than you’re fighting against lust. And if those become a greater motivator for you and you refuse the devil’s despair, then you’ll have victory in this. It takes time, but that time does teach you the spiritual life and how to become better Christians and better disciples of God.
