Pornography and the Golden Calf

In his powerfully real book, Blue Like Jazz, Donald Miller confesses that he desired false gods "because Jesus wouldn't jump through my hoops..." Instead, he sought after gods that would satisfy his desire for novelty and philosophical variety. He sees parallels in the way the people of Israel committed spiritual adultery as a means to control their situation and fulfill their legitimate longings. Wandering in the wilderness, following a mysterious, frightening God, they built an idol more familiar to them, an idol they could see and touch and that would condone any pleasures they so desired. In this, we see the catastrophe of the human condition, The Fall replayed in all its horrid detail. Men seeking to harness the universe and bend life to meet their own lusts bring destruction upon their heads.

Several thousand years later, men use pornography as an idol to scratch their lustful itches. Unable to get their wives to jump through their hoops, many men have escaped to a twisted, on-demand form of sexuality they can control. Though this hateful idol is the very one worshiped by unbelievers and held up as a sign of human progress in upending "traditional" morality, Christian men return to its familiar comforts at the risk of bringing a plague upon their homes. That plague has devastated America as family upon family have blown apart in the forces of bitterness, distrust, and hurt. Oh that we could crush pornography into fine dust as Moses did to the golden cow!