In 1656, Puritan minister John Owen (1616–1683) wrote The Mortification of Sin, calling Christians to put sin to death by the power of the Holy Spirit. Although Owen is infamous for his challenging prose, Sinclair Ferguson points out that Owen originally addressed the book to teenagers as “a series of sermons [he] preached to students at the University of Oxford.” Here we find not “strong meat for the well-tried Christians” but “basic milk, foundational principles for every Christian believer” (John Owen: The Man and His Theology, 73).
Of all the sins plaguing not only adolescents but also Christians at large and our society today, arguably none has ensnared more men and women than addiction to pornography. For those longing to find freedom from sexual sin, Owen offers liberating biblical wisdom.
I experienced this liberation firsthand when I stumbled upon Owen’s blueprint for waging spiritual warfare while in a sexual addiction recovery group. So, I write not as a Puritan scholar but as one who has been helped tremendously by Owen in my own journey of sanctification. I desire to extend to others the wisdom that has been so helpful for me.
To do so, I will sketch what Owen saw as three key weapons of warfare against sin — mortification, vivification, and union with Christ — and explain how to wield these in the battle against pornography and sexual sin.
Mortification: Resist, Root Out, Repent
Owen based The Mortification of Sin on Romans 8:13: “If by the Spirit you put to death [mortify] the deeds of the body, you will live.” This verse calls Christians to engage in what Owen and the Puritans described as the twofold work of mortification and vivification. Though these are intimidating theological terms, the concept behind them is simple. As J.I. Packer explains, mortification and vivification are the “double aspect” of sanctification (A Quest for Godliness, 199). On the negative side, mortification is “the weakening and killing of the old man” (our sinful nature); on the positive side, vivification is “the growing and maturing of the new man” (our new nature by virtue of our union with Christ, regeneration, and the Holy Spirit’s renewing work in our lives). These two aspects of sanctification come by grace alone and advance progressively throughout the life of a believer.
For Owen, mortification is marked by several features.
RESIST
First, since sin aggressively seeks to draw us away from Christ, mortification should likewise be vigorous and active (Works of John Owen, 6:11). Imagine anchoring your umbrella in the sand at the beach before going out to wade in the ocean, only to find that after half an hour you have drifted fifty yards down shore without even noticing. This is how Owen pictures our battle against sexual sin: We actively swim against the constant, fierce sin-tide pushing us away from Christ.
Swimming against the sin-tide of sexual addiction begins with identifying the specific, often small ways you begin to drift toward sexual sin. Long before you are fifty yards down the beach, you begin drifting, making little compromises. But identifying is not enough. Once you identify the specifics of what your drifting looks like, share them with a trusted mentor — someone who has found victory over sexual sin. Finally, and perhaps most crucially, regularly reach out at the earliest signs of drifting into temptation. God has not designed us to pursue sanctification in isolation. It is folly to walk the Christian life alone.
ROOT OUT
Second, according to Owen, true mortification is motive-focused not just behavior-focused. There is a massive difference between running a lawn mower over a weed and uprooting it. While the lawn mower may temporarily remove the appearance of weeds, only uprooting the weeds will rid the yard of them. Owen contended that much “mortification” does not go deep enough to the affections. In another classic work, The Grace and Duty of Being Spiritually Minded (1681), he argues that since the affections aim at what we truly love, sanctification must transform our affections (Works, 7:395). He beautifully illustrates this when he says, “The affections are in the soul as the helm in the ship. . . . If God hath the powerful hand of grace upon affections, he turns our soul unto a compliance with [him]” (7:397).
So, progressive victory over sexual sin comes by having our affections renewed for Christ. We don’t want to just modify behavior; we want the Spirit to transform our hearts. God shifts a believer’s affections from loving the world and sin to loving God through transparent and honest self-examination that not only considers the fruits of sinful behavior but increasingly uncovers the sinful roots — what Ferguson calls “the reality which lies behind, and comes to expression in, any and every pattern of sinful behavior” (Devoted to God, 154). We ask the Holy Spirit to open our eyes and reveal the roots beneath our behavior.
REPENT
Third, once those roots are exposed, we confess to God and a trusted mentor those sinful patterns as an expression of true repentance.
Repentance is not merely being sorry for sin but also turning from it. William Gurnall, in A Christian in Complete Armor, explains that “to forsake sin is to leave it without any thought reserved of returning to it again.” To illustrate, he describes the difference between a daily commute and a permanent move: “Every time a man takes a journey from home about business, we do not say he has forsaken his house, because he meant when he went out to come to it again.” Rather, he has forsaken his house “when we see [him] leave his house, carry all his stuff away with him, lock up his doors, and take up his abode in another never to dwell there more” (368). God calls us to not merely go on a weekly, monthly, or seasonal commute from sexual sin but to forsake it entirely. So, in repentance, we intentionally, consistently, and very practically identify and burn down any and all bridges that lead back to our old prisons of sexual sin.
In this, we follow Paul in making a clear distinction between worldly sorrow and godly sorrow (2 Corinthians 7:10). Although initially these two often look nearly the same (both marked by tears, apologies, heartfelt resolutions, and so on), they are entirely different. Worldly sorrow merely takes a commute away from sin — often with bridges in place to make our way back in case we change our mind. Godly sorrow burns down the bridges because it has resolved to move house entirely.
Vivification: New Life and Delight
If mortification puts sin to death, vivification gives life to righteousness. Mortification remains incomplete without new life. Owen notes that vivification is Spirit-wrought, as only the Spirit can make anyone come alive to God: “The internal operation of the Spirit of God is necessary . . . unto the producing of every holy act of our minds, wills and affection, in every duty whatsoever” (Works, 3:529). Because vivification is God-dependent, it should create in believers a deep sense that we desperately need God to make us holy. How many who struggle with sexual sin believe that they are justified by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone yet live the Christian life in constant dependence on their own resources? A crucial key to sanctification is trusting in God’s grace by taking hold of his promises through faith — especially the promise that God will give what he commands.
To give life to the soul, vivification focuses on the superior loveliness of God. Building on Owen, nineteenth-century Scottish preacher Thomas Chalmers argued in his classic sermon “The Expulsive Power of a New Affection” that “the only way to dispossess the heart of an old affection is by the expulsive power of a new one.” In short, an old love can be replaced only by a new and superior love. Chalmers points out that God does not offer us something marginally better than sin. Rather, he presents to the soul the most supremely lovely object in the universe: himself.
How does this happen? Owen argues that the Spirit awakens love “by supplying believers with the experiences of the truth and reality, and excellency, of the things that are believed” (Works, 3:390). In the context of pornography, this means that over time we begin to delight in the beauty and freedom of holiness more than the fleeting pleasures of sin. Thus, the litmus test of renewed spiritual affections is both a new way of living and a new delight (Works, 7:419). When our affections change, we know and follow God’s ways, and we desire and delight in God himself.
Union with Christ: New Identity
Owen presents the final weapon of our warfare: the doctrine of our union with Christ. As believers, we are really and mystically united to Christ by his Holy Spirit. Our identity is grounded not in our sins and failures (or our performance and success) but in who we are and whose we are in Christ. Consider three implications of this union with Christ for fighting sexual sin.
First, union with Christ means that because Christ died for sin, we truly are dead to sin as well, no longer under sin’s reign and dominion. Paul exhorts believers to see themselves as they really are: dead to sin (Romans 6:11). If you are in Christ, both sexual sin and the heart dispositions that accompany the behaviors are already defeated foes. They have no authority to hold you captive any longer.
Second, because Christ rose from the dead, believers too have new life (Romans 6:11; Ephesians 2:5). As Paul asserts, “If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you” (Romans 8:11). Ponder the power at our disposal for doing battle against sin!
Third, union with Christ calls us to embrace our new God-defined identity. Sadly, even after hearing these truths for decades, many Christians have a poor understanding of who they are in Christ. Many still self-define their identities, often seeing themselves in the light of their past sins. Union with Christ breaks into this mindset and commands Christians struggling with sexual sin to have a God-defined identity — to see themselves not by the sins they have committed but by what Christ has accomplished on their behalf. Christ died, rose, and ascended into heaven so that those who believe in him could have a deep, abiding knowledge that they are defined entirely by their union with Christ. As Ferguson says, we
align our self-understanding to the apostolic norm. . . . If you are a new person in Christ, having died to the old life, been buried in Christ’s tomb, been raised with him, ascended in him, now have your true life hidden in him, and are destined to be with him in his glory — then live as though these things are true of you — because they are true. (Devoted to God, 114, 130)
Our union with Christ forms the foundation for our battle against sexual sin, essential for both mortification and vivification, because we do not attempt to generate a new identity by our own doomed efforts. Instead, we embrace our union with Christ and seek to live out that new identity. Only then will we succeed in the mortification of porn.