To Flee youthful lusts is an imperative command. This is not an option, this is not a suggestion... it is a command for everyone of us. Now the second thing is that it is in the present, which means Timothy must always flee youthful lusts. Not just in certain times and in certain situations, but every moment of everyday he must be on the run. In fact this word flee comes into the English language as the word fugitive in the noun form and the idea is that Timothy must be a fugitive. He must be always on the run. He must always be running away from something. He must be running away from youthful lusts. ...This is not confined just to young men in their twenties and early thirties, for it carries forward into midlife, it carries forward into older age. John MacArthur rights on this point "the faithful Christian" that's what we want to be isn't it? "The faithful Christian is continually on the run from the faithful passions that started when we were young." Fleeing is not an option, it is an absolute necessity if we are to be a vessel of honour. Jesus spoke of the same... Jesus spoke of moral purity...
"but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out and throw it from you"
Now Jesus is not calling for self mutualization... Jesus is speaking metaphorically here, this is a figure of speech. To tear out ones right eye and throw it from you, our Lord is speaking graphically and dramatically that we must take whatever dramatic steps are necessary to keep away from youthful lusts. Whatever steps are necessary, take radical steps, go to the Nth degree, do whatever is necessary in repentance and to remove yourself.And then Jesus said "for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell". That's very straight talk from our Lord. And then the next verse "If your right hand makes you stumble", and the idea is, first the eye and the stirring up of fleshly appetites for that which is unlawful, and then the hand becomes involved, and He goes yet further from the eye to the hand. "If your right hand makes you stumble cut it off" chop it off! "and throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to go into hell" that's pretty strong language. What Jesus is saying is: run from youthful lusts, flee from it, escape it, get rid of it, cut it off, blow it up, bury it, tie a rock around it, throw it into the depths of the ocean, submerge it, lose it, get rid of it. Take whatever steps are necessary that you would flee from youthful lusts. Now along this line I want to be pointed: I do not understand men who are struggling with pornography who keep carrying their laptops around with them, who keep paying their cable television bills, who keep paying their magazine subscription bills. That does not sound like fleeing from lusts. That sounds like courting lusts not fleeing from it. It is like the man who pledges to give up smoking, but all he does is hide his cigarettes in the closet. He's not giving up smoking he's kidding himself. He hasn't given up smoking until he throws them away. As long as they are in the draw, as long as they are in the closet, he hasn't given them up. In fact all this is is a temporary time out. All this is is a momentary truce. He has not fled from this. And the point of this is not smoking, that's only an illustration for what is far more defiling and far more damaging to ones spiritual life. I wanna say again, I do not understand men who are courting pornography and wanna have a little small group fellowship and talk about our struggles, when you have not yet cut off the computer and cut off the television and cut off the magazines. You have not yet fled youthful lusts. Your blood is on your own hands"
~Steven Lawson
H.T. Puritan Fellowship
