Failures of Biblical Proportion
What We as Creative Men Can Learn From the Moral Failures of Our Spiritual Heroes
I used to listen to Ravi Zacharrias everyday after work.
I was 19 and had just started walking with Jesus. I had a job at a business card factory, one of the places where my love for design began to spring to life.
I worked from 6am to noon every day. At the end of my shift I would get in my car and then on Christian radio to hear Ravi Teach the Bible. My ride home was just long enough for an entire sermon.
I spent a whole summer listening to Ravi and growing in my understanding of the gospel. It was awesome.
That’s why this blog is so difficult for me to write.
What this post is not: This is not an indictment on Ravi. Many still say he never did the things that he was accused of.
What this post is: A call to all men to learn from the failures of others, not just Ravi.
This is a call to my fellow kingdom creative men out there: (and really, all men) what will we learn from Ravi Zacharias, or others like him who have fallen into sexual sin?
Here’s a few things to start with:
Your secret, sexual sins will find you out. Yes, even porn.
The legacy you leave behind can be tarnished by one bad decision. Those decisions, such as sexual sin (yes even porn) will eventually damage not just you, but your family, wife, kids, and other relationships as well. How? There are many ways, but one way is that porn spiritually and chemically changes the way your brain works, thinks, views women, and relates sexually to the world.
The size of your platform and following are no indication of the quality of your integrity, and they are no indicator of whether or not you’re really walking in the light.
(But Brandon, I’m not famous. I don’t have a huge platform. Im just a creative guy trying to follow the Lord! A little porn is fine!)
False. Pornography is a demonic gateway to oppression. It is in fact FULL BLOWN adultery.
It’s an open door to things worse than “naughty pictures on the internet.” It will damage your marriage, and the relationship you have with your children (especially if you're a dad with daughters). It will gently take your hand, and lead you down a road that looks innocent as long as no one finds out. That road leads straight to hell, pain, broken hearts, damaged consciences, and a twisted and warped view of the holiness and beauty that sex is supposed to be.
Sexual sin is a snare, and those who fall into it should have asked for help years, probably decades before it became a full blown problem.
There’s a crazy thing about snares: The longer you try to fight free from a snare on your own, the stronger its hold becomes. A snare can only be removed by someone else.
My heart breaks for the victims, and for the families of the accused as well...those whose husbands and fathers will now be known as a rapists, manipulators, and liars.
My charge to my fellow men of God and kingdom creators:
Take inventory of your lives. Take inventory of your thoughts—the things you do behind closed doors. Bring the dark things into the light, and if you find yourself caught in the snare of sexual sin, don’t move.
Don’t try to shake loose alone. Lift up your hand and cry for help...find someone who can free you from the same snare that Ravi should have cried for help with long ago.
Start with Jesus. He’s really good with snares!
Remember your calling! As kingdom creatives we are called to fill the earth with glory and beauty—glory that reflects back onto God Himself.
To remember what you’ve been called to, I leave you with this verse:
“Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things.”
-Philippians 4:8
For glory and beauty,
Brandon
