Hijacked by Desire

Good morning. If we haven’t met, I’m Matt, one of the pastors here at Blue Oaks.

If you’re new or just checking things out, I’m really glad you’re here.

We’re in a teaching series called Hijacked — where we’re talking about what happens when emotions don’t just influence us, but quietly take the wheel.

So far, we’ve talked about anger. We’ve talked about worry. And today, we turn to one of the most powerful hijackers of all:

Desire

Because desire is tricky.

Anger feels dangerous.
Worry feels exhausting.
Desire feels good.

Desire motivates us. It energizes us. It moves us toward connection, and pleasure, and meaning, and purpose.

In fact, without desire, life doesn’t really move at all.

So the problem is not that we desire things. The problem is that desire has a way of slowly becoming the driver.

And when that happens, desire doesn’t just shape what we want — it starts shaping what we justify, and what we hide, and where we end up.

Here’s what makes this so important — most people don’t end up in places they never intended to go because they made one big, dramatic decision. They get there because of a series of small decisions — moments where desire felt reasonable, or harmless, or even right.

And somewhere along the way, desire took the wheel.

So today is not a message about suppressing desire. It’s not about pretending we don’t feel strong longings. And it’s definitely not about shaming ourselves for being human.

It’s about learning to recognize when desire is asking for the keys — and how to respond before it decides the direction of our lives.

Because desire is powerful. And power always raises the same question: Who’s in control?

That’s what we’re going to talk about today.

James puts it like this when he talked about desire:

What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. (James 4:1-2)

This is a very profound diagnosis of the human condition.

We have all kinds of problems like quarrels and fights… but those are really symptoms of a deeper problem… and that deeper problem is our desire.

James is saying desire doesn’t just influence us — it hijacks us when left unchecked.

What I want to do is walk us through desire management and how desires can lead us to good or to evil.

And I want to illustrate the power of desire by talking about one particular kind of desire — sexual desire.

But this relates to all forms of desire… and I’ll make that application later on in the message.

I want to start by saying — desire itself is neutral; it’s not necessarily good or bad. It’s like the raw material that we work with.

So I want to introduce you to two people who we’ll call Billy and Betty — Blue Oaks Billy and Betty.

And we’re going to say Billy and Betty have a sense of chemistry in their relationship.

They feel attracted to each other — they’re attractive people in each other’s eyes.

We’re also going to say they’re followers or Jesus — they made that commitment.

We’re also going to say they’re married… but not to each other. They’re married to other people.

Now again, this initial feeling of attraction or chemistry is not a bad thing. It doesn’t mean they’ve done something wrong.

And it’s a real important thing to be aware of this.

It’s just attraction that we have very little control over.

But what everything hinges on is what they’re going to do with it. How are they going to respond to it?

Because this is the moment desire asks for the keys.

They can go down a wrong road, as you can with any desire.
Or they can go down a right road.

Part of what I want to say about going down the wrong road is that a lot of times people go down it all the way to the end.

They get to the end and they wonder how they got there.

For those of us who are followers of Jesus who have the Spirit of God living in us, part of what I want to say is — it’s harder to walk down the wrong road than it is to walk down the right road.

We disguise a lot of the effort that it takes — because our minds can be insidious — but the reality is… there are a lot of steps you’ve got to take to get down the wrong road.

And I want to walk us through a few of those.

The first one may be the most important thing I talk about today… and I guarantee you, if you walk down the wrong road, you will start with this step.

This is something we’ve talked about in this series already.

You’ve got to…

Quench the Spirit.

You’ve got to do this.

Paul writes to the Thessalonian church:

Do not quench the Spirit. (1 Thessalonians 5:19)

It works like this:

Anytime you have a desire or an emotion, if the Spirit is with you and guiding you, the Spirit is going to prompt you to do certain things.

The Spirit will gently prompt you to lay that desire before Jesus and ask the question, “God, what do you want me to do with this?”

And Jesus will never lead you to express or manage a desire in a destructive, harmful, or sinful way. He never will.

So if you want to walk down the wrong road, the very first thing you’ve got to do is you’ve got to quench the voice of the Spirit inside you.

Quenching the Spirit means you’ve got to make sure you never listen to a message on this subject and connect the dots.

It means you’ve got to make sure you don’t pray about this desire with a submitted spirit.

It means you’ve got to make sure you don’t talk about this desire and your sense of vulnerability with other Christian brothers and sisters through whom the Spirit might work to speak to your mind.

It means you’ve got to make sure you avoid Scripture passages that deal with this issue… and if your eyes come in contact with them… it means you’ve got to skim over them pretty fast.

Over and over and over and over again, before you go down this road at all, it’s like you’ve got to make space in your mind for you to be able to sin.

You must quench the Spirit.

No one wakes up one morning and decides to ruin their life. Desire takes the wheel one small decision at a time.

Now later on — when you get real far down the road — when you get in the grip of this desire… then you may hear messages about this subject… and they may cause you a lot of pain.

But by then, you’ll feel trapped… and it’s very difficult for you to get out of it… because at the beginning, you’ll have quenched the Spirit.

And so, part of what you’ve got to do — to NOT walk down the wrong road… is just stay open to the Spirit.

Don’t quench the Spirit.

Continually say: “Spirit, is there any area — any desire you want to speak to me about?”

So, first step to start walking down the wrong road — Quench the Spirit.

The next step down the wrong road of desire is…

Hiddenness

Some of you know what that moment was like when you came into the light — when you acknowledged before God and before others:

Here’s my junk.
Here’s my sin.
Here’s what I wrestle with.

And you experienced the freedom and the delight of openness and truth and being known.

But to walk down the wrong road… you’ve got to hide.

And the writers of Scripture have a lot to say about this one.

This is what Jesus said in John 3:

Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. (John 3:20)

Everyone who does evil hates the light, — hates to be known — and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed.

This is an instinctive and inevitable response to anyone who knows they’re doing something wrong — they will avoid the light.

Some people deal with speed anxiety in a real interesting way.

They don’t slow down. They just stop looking at the speedometer.

I’ve actually known people who put tape over it. Not because the car isn’t going fast — but because if they don’t see how fast they’re going, it doesn’t feel as real.

The problem, of course, is that the speed doesn’t change. The risk doesn’t change. The consequences don’t change.

You just lose awareness.

And that’s how desire works.

Desire says, “If you don’t look too closely… if you don’t name it… if you don’t think about where this is headed… you’ll be fine.”

That’s not freedom. That’s desire quietly taking the wheel while you stop paying attention.

When you’re walking down the wrong road, when you’re at this stage, you will start to do little things that you don’t let other people — like your spouse, if you’re married — know about.

You’ll start to leave notes for another person that mean something more than just friendship… and hope you get something back.

You’ll start arranging your schedule so you can be with this person… because you’re getting a little emotional charge out of what you know isn’t fully healthy.

You’ll start offering certain kinds of compliments in the hopes of getting reciprocation — getting compliments back that indicate taking a few more steps down the wrong road.

And you’ll start getting a little more energy out of those compliments than is really healthy.

And you know it… but you don’t talk about it with anyone.

You don’t pray about it… because to keep walking down this road, one of the things needed at this point is hiddenness.

The third step down this wrong road of desire is… you begin to make

Ethical violations

At this point, you start to cross lines that you know you shouldn’t cross.

The passage I want to mention on this… is from when Cain is getting real close to sinning… and God intervenes.

Genesis 4:7

God knows — when you don’t do what is right… you start crossing lines.

If you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it. (Genesis 4:7)

And you begin to do things with the other person…

Like use sexually-loaded language in ways that are coarse or inappropriate, but that elicit a little thrill…

And then see if they do the same thing back to you.

You leave messages that use language that you know you shouldn’t be using.

And it starts to create a bond.

You begin to touch or embrace in ways that would have been embarrassing or unthinkable before… but now they’re not anymore.

You’ve started crossing lines.

We’ve talked about how much our living in the presence and power of God rests on what happens in the inner person — in the mind.

And that in our minds we’re having a series of thoughts all the time… that all have a little emotional charge.

At this point, because you’ve hidden away so much of the rest of your life… and centered so much of it on this —

The thoughts that are about this relationship become charged with a kind of emotional intensity that nothing else in the rest of your life has — so emotionally now, you’re becoming dependent on this desire.

Again, this could relate to other forms of desire.

We’re talking right now about sexual desire.

But when you think about this relationship or this person, it’s like you’re having these thoughts in real vivid Ultra HD color…

And all your other thoughts are just real flat, small, black-and-white thoughts without much emotion attached to them.

And it’s because this is what’s going on inside you now.

It’s almost like your body has been wired up for you to be emotionally and almost physically dependent on this relationship — on these thrills.

And you have to keep taking the ethical violations a little farther than you did before.

Again, there’s so much effort involved in going down this road that you have to calculate it exactly right.

You have to make it real gradual… because if you make a violation that’s too sudden, too severe, that could wake up your conscience and lead you into authentic repentance.

So this slide has to be consistent enough to keep going downhill…

but subtle enough
gradual enough
one step at a time
one look at a time
one touch at a time
one word further at a time… so you don’t wake yourself up.

And you keep walking down this road, and eventually, you come to a door.

And if you go through that door — if you violate the promise that you made to be faithful to your spouse… as far as you’ve come to this point, nothing will ever be the same.

You will violate the values you committed yourself to… and held all your life.
You will inflict massive pain on people you love.
You will do damage to, or maybe destroy, the most important relationship of your life.
You may trash your future.
You will launch yourself and other people into an era of unimaginable destructiveness if you go through that door.

And people go through that door.

And when they do… and when they get to the other side — when they’ve betrayed with their body… and mind… and heart… the most important vow they can make to another person —

What they find at the end of this road, consistently, is catastrophe.

It’s just heartache and pain.

It’s never what it looked like at the beginning of this road.

And what it ultimately leads to, in a single word, is

Slavery

That’s what happens when desire drives long enough — it promises freedom and delivers chains.”

The writers of Scripture are real consistent about this.

Jesus says in John 8:

I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. (John 8:34)

And this is just true. This is what happens inside our minds — we become slaves to these red-hot thoughts and red-hot feelings.

The writer of Proverbs said:

The unfaithful are trapped by evil desires. (Proverbs 11:6)

I want to pause at this point for just a moment to say to anyone in the room who has walked through that door… that even that door does not put you beyond the reach of God’s grace.

God’s grace can reach through that door.

God’s grace means that every moment of your life, God sends another opportunity, and you are not out of the game.

You are not beyond God’s love or God’s mercy or God’s forgiveness… so don’t you dare despair.

If you’re walking down this road right now… I don’t know how else to say it — you need to turn around. Start going back the other way.

If you’ve walked it through to the end and you’ve tasted the bitterness, don’t despair. God’s grace will reach you there.

But you do have to turn around.

For the ethical violations — pray God will forgive you.

Very possibly, there are amends that you need to make with other people that you hurt.

Make them.

If you’ve cultivated the habit of living in hiddenness… you’ve got to come into the light.

Come into the light — let other people know what’s going on.

You may have been in the habit for a while of quenching the Spirit.

Stop quenching the Spirit and just say, “Okay, Holy Spirit, I want to open myself up to you again.”

You can come back from going down the wrong road.

Again, this deal of desire is so central to our spiritual lives… and it’s not by any means just sexual desire.

That’s the one we’ve talked about, but it could be any number of other things.

For some of you, it’s work.

This is the desire that’s leading you down the wrong road.

And you’re trashing your family… or your health… because you’re spending way too many hours there.

For some of you, it’s approval addiction.

You’re living for that.

If people don’t give it to you, you’ll do anything to make people happy with you.

And the reality is, that’s what’s governing your life.

And that’s going to be a hard thing for you to let go of.

For some, it may be money.

For some, it might be vanity.

For some of you, it may be just something as simple as — What do I look like? Are people impressed by the way I look, by my appearance?

If I think they are, I feel pretty good. And if I think they’re not, my world starts to get a little shaky.

For some — and this is pretty trivial — it may be something as simple as staring at screens.

People start to get addicted to that.

And they’ll throw away their whole life hour by hour, year by year, sitting in a chair and consuming.

For some, it might be food.

And I know we don’t make it easy for you with all the donuts in the courtyard.

I want to ask that you assess, as honestly as you can — where are you tempted to go down the wrong road of desire?

And then — let the Spirit speak to you.

Don’t quench the Spirit… because he really will speak.

And if you need to repent, start now.

If you need to ask forgiveness, ask.

So you don’t end up slaves to these addictions.

There is another way, another road to go down.

And I want to talk about how to go down the right road when you’re managing desire.

It starts with the opposite of quenching the Spirit, which is

Embarrassingly honest prayer

So it’s prayer.
And it’s not just prayer; it’s honest prayer.
And it’s not just honest prayer; it’s embarrassingly honest prayer.

Which means this — I tell God everything. I bring all my desires before him.

This is how you take the wheel back — not by denying desire, but by bringing it into the light with God.

Paul puts it this way when he writes to the church at Ephesus:

And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. (Ephesians 6:18)

I think Paul is quite deliberate in how universal he makes this command.

Talk to God about what you really want… even though that’s quite embarrassing to you.

I think one of the biggest things we often do in prayer is — we tend to talk to God only about what we think we should want or what we think God wants to hear.

We end up praying, “God, bless the missionaries and bring world peace.” — and then we start falling asleep.

Instead, you’ve got to tell God the truth about what you really want… or you’ll never be able to pray for long.

People in Scripture do this all the time — they pray for

wonderful things
noble things
good things
selfish things
foolish things
confusing things

When you pray, then God can start helping you sort out what it is you really want.

But you’ve got to start by telling God the truth about what you really desire.

And by the way, you might as well do this… because it’s not like he’s going to be surprised.

It’s not like God’s going to say, “Wow, I had no idea you’re so selfish.”

When I pray embarrassingly honest prayer, God can help me come to understand what I desire… not just with my appetite, but also with

my values
and my conscience
and my mind
and my soul

So I start with embarrassingly honest prayer.

Then the next thing I do as I’m walking down the right road, the road of rightly managing desire, is I make a

Resolution

This is an act of the will.

Desires are businesses of the emotions.
Resolution is an act of the will.

I make a decision of the will that I will not express this desire in a way that dishonors God.

That’s exactly what Paul tells us to do in Romans 6.

In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. (Romans 6:11)

Count yourself… commit yourself — I’ll be dead to expressing this desire in sinful ways.

And I’ll begin to learn that it’s possible to have an unfulfilled desire and still survive… even though, at first, it feels like it takes heroic effort.

Let’s say my desire gravitates towards power and having other people serve me.

The first time I serve, it will feel like someone should hire a brass band:

“Hey kids, I’m about to empty the dishwasher without being asked. Get the video camera ready. Heaven is rejoicing today.”

The first day an alcoholic goes without drinking, or the first day a sexual addict stays away from porn, it can feel like a huge battle.

These thoughts and feelings and desires are running through their minds all the time, and they’re so vivid and they’re so intense that it really is quite a battle.

It’s a battle to engage in certain practices that support my resolution…

Like accountability with other people that I disclose my struggles to so I can’t hide.
Like the study of Scripture so God leads me to the truth.
Like meditation so I’m reflecting on what is good and pure and right.
Like worship so that my mind begins to get filled with other thoughts.
Like writing down what the cost would be if I give in to wrong desires.
Like writing down what would happen if I ended up down that road.

And just parenthetically, I recommend to anyone here who wrestles with wrong desires — which is all of us — whether or not you find writing helpful, periodically write down what would happen if you gave in to that desire.

If it’s the sexual area, I would write down:

Betray and cause unbelievable pain in the heart of my spouse.

Devastate the children who I want so much to lift up and make strong and healthy and good.

Bring dishonor to a community that I love.

Carry a burden of guilt that would be unbelievably crushing.

Do damage to someone else… maybe to a whole family…

Just list those kinds of things. Because when you read through them, it will strengthen your resolution… and it will cause you to say, “Why would I want that?”

So I engage in certain practices that will help me revisit and reaffirm this resolution.

In my experience, this business of resolving and deciding and committing is something that needs to get revisited on a regular basis. It’s not a once-and-for-all deal.

But I make a resolution.

The third thing that happens as I keep walking down this road is something I begin to experience that could be called

Emotional realignment

As I keep going down this road…

As I’m praying openly with God
As I’m consistently reaffirming this decision and supporting it with certain practices

My mind begins to be occupied by other thoughts and, therefore, my body and emotions begin to get moved by healthier, saner spiritual feelings.

Paul talks about this as well.

He says in Romans 8:

The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. (Romans 8:6)

Over time… it’s not all about struggle.

It’s a reflection of the spiritual sanity and aliveness and peace that’s now going through my mind.

And what once felt like heroic effort to me, now it just feels like sanity.

It just feels like — “Well, why wouldn’t I live that way?”

I think one of Dallas Willard’s great sayings is,

One of the great signs of maturity are the thoughts that no longer occur to you.

If you struggle with alcoholism and you’ve been on the road to sobriety for awhile, although you’re never free… because being in recovery becomes a lifelong deal, you find that those thoughts that tormented you, the desires that tormented you, just don’t occur to you as often.

If you’re on the road to handling feelings of anger well, then you find that feelings of rage or thoughts of, “What’s the matter with that person?” simply don’t occur to you like they did before.

One of the signs of maturity are the thoughts that no longer occur to you.

The psalmist says about a person who’s been going down this road:

But his delight is in the law of the Lord. (Psalm 1:2)

Not just he thinks about it, but he likes to think about it, and he likes to do it.

His feelings are lined up with his thoughts.

This is emotional alignment.

And this leads to the final place down this road… which is the opposite of the outcome of the other road.

And it ends up being a place called

Freedom

Jesus said in one of his most famous and wonderful statements:

Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. (John 8:32)

I want to ask you to imagine yourself for a moment living in this place.

Whatever the desires are that you’ve identified that can sometimes torment you — imagine what it would be like if you were free of those.

You see, what happens for a lot of us is we think, “Well, if I follow Jesus, then I can’t gratify these desires.”

But the truth is — life sounds kind of scary because I think I’m condemned to live a life where I always want this stuff.

I’m always tormented by it.
I think it would be really, really good, but I know I can’t have it.
And so I feel trapped.

So you need a vision of your life that is stronger and more compelling.

You need to envision what you would be like if you were free.

Free from the tyranny of vanity.
Free from the pull of lust — it just doesn’t have a grip on you anymore.
Free from being enslaved to the need to keep climbing the ladder higher and higher and higher, being more and more and more successful.
Free of the demand for more power
Or more money
Or more physical gratification of any kind

What if you were free of that and you were strong and powerful for that which is good… and you most genuinely and authentically wanted what God most wants you to have?

It becomes very important in spiritual growth for you to get an increasingly clear vision of what life in the presence and power of God would look like for you… because the clearer you get about that, the more you want it.

And if you really want it, then you’ll increasingly open yourself up to the Spirit saying, “Spirit, lead me there.”

A whole lot of Christians get into trouble in terms of spiritual growth because all they think is — they’re not supposed to do this or they’re not supposed to do that.

But there is not much desire in not doing this and not doing that… and feeling like you’re going to go through your life just frustrated.

We’re going to spend next week talking about what it looks like when you’re walking down this road — What does a life of rightly-ordered desire look like?

And I think it may surprise some of you… so I hope you come back for that next Sunday.

Alright, now would you pray with me as the worship team comes to lead us in a closing song.

Prayer

Now, as we move toward communion, I want to say something important.

Communion is not a moment for people who have managed their desires perfectly this week. It’s a moment for people who are honest about how powerful desire can be —
and how much we need help.

In communion we’re reminded that Jesus doesn’t just forgive our failures — he reshapes our longings. That the deepest desire of God’s heart was to move toward us even when our desires were disordered, misdirected, or destructive.

So when we take the bread and the cup, we’re not saying, “I’ve done this right.” We’re saying, “Jesus, I want you to lead my life.” “I don’t want desire to take the wheel.” “I want my longings reordered around you.”

The bread reminds us of a body broken for us — not because we were strong, but because we were loved.

The cup reminds us of grace poured out — not after we got our desires under control, but while we were still learning how to follow.

So if you’re aware today of a desire that’s been pulling you down the wrong road, communion is for you.

If you’re tired of fighting alone, communion is for you.

If you want to say again, even quietly, “Jesus, I want you in the driver’s seat,” communion is for you.

You don’t have to take communion, and you don’t have to rush. But if you choose to come, come honestly.

Let this be a moment where you place your life — and your desires — back in the hands of Jesus where you will receive grace.

Come forward when you’re ready.