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Is Masturbation sin?

[Warning: If my title grosses you out, then please don't continue reading cause you're too young. If you're however interested, then you're old enough to dialogue although I'd HIGHLY recommend involving your parents/trusted adults in processing this with you. Parents, if your kids are older than 11 [especially male], chances are they already know about the 'M' word so please talk to them about it. They have questions. Don't let their college pastor be the first person they talk to about this 10 years down the road when they are sex addicts.]

A while ago I did a series on sex called 'four, five, sex' and during the dialogue I encouraged people to send in any questions they had about sex.

My hope was to put together a panel of sexperts to answer these questions.

While I was able to get one sexpert to write a guest post, putting together a panel to answer questions about sex proved harder than I imagined [actually virtually impossible] so I chucked the whole idea.

But after getting this question again and again and again and again and again, I decided to take a stab at it...

"I have always wondered what God thinks of masturbation. Is it a sin to masturbate? To me I think it would still fall into the category of "sex" but on a different spectrum? I wouldn't know how to answer this question".

Is masturbation sin?

No and Yes.

No I don't believe the act in itself is a sin because I think there's freedom for a married couple who mutually agrees to engage each other in the act of masturbation.

Yes its sin if the act is a shortcut for you to experience sexuality and lust as a single guy or girl [or even married] outside of the covenant of marriage. Keyword is lust.

I suppose some would ask what if I can masturbate without lusting?

I think that’s a fair question.

My response is if you can masturbate without being lustful or looking at porn or picturing a naked girl/guy or taking anything away from your future spouse AND you can do all that to the glory of God without being shameful [you’ve got nothing to hide] then definitely go for it.

P:S- If you can accomplish that PLEASE email me because you are the man. Or the woman. Cause I think its impossible and have never met anyone who can pull that off.

[By the way, for those who are wondering, marriage will NOT solve your lust, masturbation or porn addiction]

Although there’s no explicit command about masturbation in the bible, I don’t think my thoughts/conclusions are far-fetched in light of the commands we do have about lust. 

I know some people believe that masturbation is Gods way of giving us an escape so we can deal with our sexuality till we can have sex in marriage and I just don’t see it. What do you think?

Is masturbation sin? Why or why not?
How would you feel if you found out your current or future boyfriend/spouse masturbates?

P:S- I know a lot of people struggle with sexual addiction in a real way so I don’t want to make this just a ‘debate’. I’d love for this to be a space for some of you to come out and share your experiences/frustrations/addictions/victories/redemption with this issue. I’d also love for us to pray and encourage each other. As always with posts like this, feel free to leave comments as anonymous.