If you have the Ask Pastor John book handy, and you open to page 177 and look down at the very bottom of the page, in the footnote, you’ll see that I quote Pastor John making this very important claim: “My favorite verse in the Psalms is Psalm 16:11.” Underline or highlight that. John Piper’s favorite verses are not for mugs and T-shirts; they are well-worn texts for life. The Bible works. It is living and active and does things. We believe with our whole hearts that a powerful text like Psalm 16:11 has been given to us so that our lives will be transformed by divine glory.

Psalm 16, which we read together today, is an essential text for every Christian Hedonist. And it’s on Derek’s mind right now too, who writes us with this question and this life challenge he’s facing right now: “Hello, Pastor John, and thank you for this podcast,” Derek writes. “I know that I once read from you, or heard you preach, that Psalm 16:11 is relevant for the struggle against lust and pornography. That is my ongoing struggle. But I cannot find where you made this point. The connection from this future-oriented text to my present struggle with temptations is not especially clear to me. Can you explain how a glorious promise like Psalm 16:11 functions in my daily battle against lust today?”

Here’s the key verse so everybody knows what we are talking about. David, the king in the Old Testament, speaking by the guidance of the Spirit of God (as Jesus said about the Psalms), says, “You make known to me the path of life; in your presence” — in God’s presence — “there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” That’s Psalm 16:11.

The Bible promises on God’s authority that when we are in the gracious presence of God — in part now and fully in the age to come — our joy, our happiness will be as full as it can possibly be (“fullness of joy”), and it will last as long as it can possibly last — namely, forever. In other words, there is nothing, absolutely nothing in the universe better than the gracious presence of God, because in the presence of God, he proves to be the greatest possible happiness and the longest possible happiness. That’s what Psalm 16:11 holds out to us. No greater pleasure, no longer pleasure can be conceived.

So, let me describe a biblical principle of motivation in regard to sexual temptation. What I mean by “sexual temptation” is the temptation to pursue or indulge in sexual pleasure where it ought not to be found. God designed sexual pleasure for marriage — the marriage bed — not for pornography, not for immodesty. Then, after I try to state the principle of biblical motivation, I want to raise an objection to it, and then answer that objection with the gospel, and then connect that to Psalm 16:11. So, that’s where we’re going.

Fear and Hope, Threat and Promise

The biblical principle of motivation for purity, for not pursuing or indulging in sexual pleasure where it ought not to be found, is that the Bible uses fear and hope to draw us away from impurity.

You hear both of these, for example, in Romans 8:13: “If you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.” So, if you spend your life giving in to lust — the lust of the flesh — you perish. Now, that’s meant to make us afraid. It’s meant to strike fear into our heart so that we turn away and flee from temptations of the flesh. But then he says, “If by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.” And that’s meant to awaken hope. In the power of the hope, pursue this purity and not sin.

So, the Bible uses both fear and hope, threat and promise. Consider a couple more examples to help us feel the force of the way the Bible does this. Matthew 5:29: “If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell.” Now, that’s in the context of lust. That threat, “be thrown into hell,” is meant to awaken fear in us so that we take drastic measures to cut off the power of temptation in our life and escape the path of destruction.

“The death of Jesus not only paid for our sin; it also purchased the power not to sin.”

Or on the other side, here’s 1 John 2:16–17: “All that is in the world — the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life — is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.” So, there’s the promise, the hope. You’re going to live forever with God in those supreme pleasures. So, flee sinful desires of the flesh and do the will of God, and you’ll live forever with him in happiness.

There’s this double motive all through the Bible — threat and promise, fear and hope. It’s all over the Bible. Hell is real; heaven is better. Flee hell; pursue heaven.

Is This Christian Motivation?

Now, here’s the objection to that set of motivations: There’s nothing peculiarly Christian about that. Everybody does that. That’s the way we motivate people in the world. That’s the way everybody motivates other people. You can scare people away from doing some wrongs by threatening bad consequences, and you can lure people into doing some good by promising sufficient rewards. There’s nothing uniquely Christian about that. So, what shall we say to that objection? It’s a good one.

Enter the gospel of Jesus Christ. Now something radically new comes into the equation of motivation. Here’s 1 Peter 2:24: “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree.” Now, just stop. That’s half the verse. Stop there. This is new. No other religion reveals a God who sent his own Son to endure the punishment for the sins of his enemies. That is, the times we have looked at pornography (or worse) — he died for that. Without this death, this substitution, this punishment, his bearing our sins in his body, there is no hope of any future happiness anywhere in the world (beyond the grave especially). This is a new factor of motivation.

Now, the sentence in 1 Peter 2:24 continues like this: “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.” The death of Jesus not only paid for our sin; it also purchased the power not to sin. That’s what he bought. “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.” He paid for that.

Now, what this means is that the forgiven Christian, on the basis of Christ’s death, trusting in blood-bought power, hears the biblical threat in a Christ-exalting way; he hears a Christ-exalting threat. And he hears biblical promise and hope in a Christ-exalting way, a Christ-exalting promise. The forgiven Christian warrior has been given new ears, new values, new preferences, new desires, new capacities for happiness. He hears promises and threats differently than the way the world hears them.

Beauty and Blood

Now Psalm 16:11 enters back in. Psalm 16:11 now becomes the centerpiece of those new preferences. “You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy.” “In your presence,” God’s presence — that’s a new affection; that’s a new preference. “At your right hand are pleasures.” “Your right hand” — that’s new. That’s a new love, a new desire, a new passion. “At your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” This is now a blood-bought fullness of joy. These are now blood-bought pleasures forevermore. These pleasures are now not only the presence of God in Christ; they are the purchase of God in Christ. God in Christ is the promise. God in Christ is the price that purchased the promise.

Here’s the implication for fighting lust. Because of the gospel of Christ crucified, when I am tempted to use my right hand — Jesus actually used the phrase, “If your right hand causes you to sin” (Matthew 5:30) — if I’m tempted to use my right hand or my left hand to click toward pornography or immodesty, I now consider not only the greatness of the pleasure promised to me if I walk in purity — “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8) — but now I also consider the greatness of the price paid for me to walk in purity.

My mind turns to beauty, and my mind turns to blood. My ears hear Jesus say, “I have fullness of joy for you. I have pleasures forevermore for you.” And my ears hear Jesus say, “I suffered crucifixion to turn you away from the fleeting pleasures of sin and lust to embrace the fullness of joy and pleasures forevermore.” And in that way, Psalm 16:11 is the greatest promise purchased at the greatest price — and therefore I pray it will become the greatest power for purity.