confronting lust with watercolors: a response to "when women lust."

This morning I read a very well written article on the Gospel Coalition, entitled, "When Women Lust" by Eowyn Stoddard (you can read it here). I was immediately intrigued upon seeing the title, as it's not often that someone's willing to shine the lust spotlight on women, rather than men. Turns out, Stoddard's focus was not so much on the sexual side of lust that we normally associate the word with, but on an alternative definition, "a strong desire for something." That being said, she's not trying to say that women never have issues with sexual sin, and I commend her for clearing up in the comments section that an article still needs to be written about women who struggle with lust's sexual component.

Great. Glad to hear it. But I'm also getting tired of packaging men and women up in little lust boxes based solely on their gender. The article actually starts off with this: 

"We all know that men struggle with lust. But what about women?"

So, right off the bat, we are pushing men and women apart, almost like men's lust is old news, something we all know about and something that can be applied equally to every male across the board, so there's no use dwelling on the fact. I understand that the article is about women's lust. But I think there is a way to talk about women's lust without feeling the need to press it up against men's lust for a round of compare and contrast. Literally the moment I started reading it, I felt like nothing more than a number, a worn down sermon topic or a deadpan accountability group that is somehow supposed to sum up this idea that "all men struggle with lust." 

I think there is a more healthy way forward. She goes on:

"When a beautiful woman walks in the room or flashes on a screen or billboard, all eyes are transfixed. While men might be thinking about sex, a woman might be thinking, I wonder what it would be like to have such a body? Men want the body, women want the body. They want the body that attracts everyone. Lust can be either a strong feeling of sexual desire, or a strong desire for something."

After this quote, Stoddard begins to dive into the often times hidden signs of lust for women: self-pity, insecurity, criticism, and activism, all extremely valid points.

But here's where I'm going with all of this: I think that a lot of the time, our attempts to analyze lust more fully end up in neat little boxes, most of the time based on gender. But for a sin as broad and sweeping as lust, one that is both cymbals-and-gongs-loud and under-the-table-subtle, we can't shove it down into a box. We've got to start seeing it differently in the eyes of everyone.

For I know that an estimated 15% of people struggling with eating disorders are men, a statistic that is quickly rising (men are also less likely to open up about the eating disorder, so the statistic is definitely higher). I know that 1 in 3 users of pornography are women, something that even Stoddard acknowledges in her article. But there it is again - by separating "when men lust" and "when women lust," it can make that woman who's addicted to pornography, but perfectly content with her body image, feel like an outcast. It can make the man with anorexia, completely insecure about his body image, but having never struggled with pornography, also feel like an outcast.

An outlier.

A reject.

The weirdo that's not like most men, or most women.

It can make the gay man feel even more rejected by the church for not being attracted to that beautiful woman walking into the room, but actually to the man entering with her. It can make an incredibly visual woman feel like a freak, for her greatest struggles come through what she sees, and not through how she relates (a tragic stereotype that men are more visual and women are more relational).

If I'm being honest, I related to so much of what Stoddard said in her article about coming to grips with body image and insecurities, even though it was directed at females. For me, it's not just "when women lust" or "when men lust," but "when someone struggling with body image lusts" or "when someone struggling with sexual sin lusts." Now, granted, we can break these down into even more specific categories, including (but not limited to) men and women, gay and straight, etc. And there is beauty in that, there is a richness and a closeness that can come through relating to those most similar to us.

But I long for the day when the entire church can move beyond accountability groups for men and relational small groups for women (I say 'entire church' because I recognize that some churches have already moved past this and it would be ignorant of me to generalize.) When we don't have to choose between a group for people who lust and a group for people who do life together. Doing life together also means confronting lust together. My heart cries out for all of the church to embrace a deeper understanding of lust, one where it spreads out differently in the lives of the Body's myriad of individuals. One where people are seen as three-dimensional, image-of-God human beings, beyond just their status as a man or as a woman, normal or abnormal, but as Heather and Carl and Tracy and Jim.

A rich watercolor of different hues over the stark black and white.

So, I both respect and commend Stoddard for bringing up such an important issue like body image. The words she speaks toward the end about surrendering our desires and our imperfections to Christ are absolutely spot-on and stunning,

"My dissatisfaction with my body was shouting out to God, 'You made me wrong!' But as my maker, did he not have the right to make me as he pleased? Does not God look over his creation and pronounce it good? Who was I to contradict him?"

That being said, I also would like to start seeing lust beyond the cardboard boxes, beyond what it's assumed to look like in typical men and typical women, and start seeing it fleshed out fully in the lives of my brothers and sisters. I want to understand it as a sin that doesn't just pick one side or the other, doesn't just map out the same trail through everyone's life, but that it's fluid and rushing-rapids-dangerous, moving out beyond stereotypes and assumptions, and nestling down past the surface, in between the cracks and underneath the obvious.

Take small steps with me toward this Living Water reality. This is my prayer, that you and I, small individuals in the grand scheme of things, would start to rise up with a vision, organic seeds that spread healing truth, taking in the outcasts and the 'incasts', the outliers and the means, the rejected and the accepted, letting them know that they are now one in Christ. There is no room for fear here, there is no room for lies.

We are his beloved and lust will lose its grip on us.

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Click here to check out the first chapter of my work-in-progress novel, Yellowtree!