Matthew 5: Escaping the Trap of Lust

Introduction

"The best way to deal with temptation is to eliminate it." Loïc Richard quotes this line from Craig Groeschel in the heart of a frank and illuminating message preached at la Chapelle in the series "The Greatest Speech in the World," devoted all autumn to the Sermon on the Mount. After the Beatitudes, the identity of the disciple, righteousness according to Jesus and anger, the series arrives at Matthew 5:27-30.

The text is direct: "But I tell you that everyone who gazes at a woman to lust after her has committed adultery with her already in his heart." The preacher admits it with humor, before the congregation has even sat back down: "Next week will be a little more relaxed." The advantage of preaching through a text like the Sermon on the Mount in full, he explains, is that you cannot avoid the passages you would not have chosen naturally.

The title of the message is "The Trap of Lust." Loïc Richard shows that all of us are affected and that the problem comes from the heart, then gives four concrete ways to overcome lust. He closes with his own testimony: Jesus still delivers, heals and restores today.

Outline of the message

1. God invented sexuality

Before anyone says this passage confirms every prejudice (Jesus would be against sexuality, the Bible would be uncomfortable with sex, Christianity would be a religion of uptight people), the preacher says: "It is exactly the opposite."
The story begins in Genesis 2 with a naked man making a poetic declaration of love to a naked woman. "It starts well."
He reads a passage from the Song of Solomon (7:7-10), a work of art that speaks of sexuality and sensuality in a way that is confident, deep, beautiful and pure.
The truth is that God invented sexuality and made something magnificent. We have twisted it in both directions: society says "do what you want, with whom you want, when you want," and the Church has said "it's shocking, we don't talk about it."
So the subject of the passage is not sexuality, but lust.

2. We are all affected, but temptation is not a sin

One day, a young preacher asked an older preacher at what age his struggle with lust had finally been settled. The answer: "When it's settled, I'll tell you." The young preacher was Loïc Richard. The older one was David Pothier.
We live in a hypersexualized society. You cannot go out to buy a liter of milk at the corner store without being confronted with lust in one way or another.
An essential distinction: temptation is not a sin. Jesus was tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin (Hebrews 4:15). Every way includes lust.
Martin Luther already said it: as long as we live in flesh and blood, we cannot be entirely free of these inclinations. As the saying goes, you cannot stop the birds from flying over your head, but you can stop them from building a nest in your hair.
The first glance is not the sin. The question is: is there a second glance, a third? A whole scenario playing in your head? Are you feeding that thought, are you letting it nest?

3. Do not confuse love with lust

Social media, series and movies spread ideas that confuse love with lust.
"I love her so much I can't wait." But the most beautiful poem about love, in 1 Corinthians 13, begins like this: love is patient. Lust has no time, it wants everything now.
"Love lasts two or three years." At 19 or 20, still single, Loïc Richard was the youngest in his class. His older classmates found marriage absurd. He said he believed in marriage, and they found him naive. A relationship built only on feelings or sexuality may last two or three years. But love is faithful.
"This relationship doesn't bring me anything anymore." Lust is selfish and transactional: what am I giving, what am I getting, is it a good deal? Love is selfless, it seeks the good of the other first.
Love is a covenant. His father stayed faithful to his mother for 34 years, until her death, and for 20 of those years he pushed her in a wheelchair. "That is love."
Lust takes many forms: a glance, a thought, an emotional connection, a series you watch. "Is it good for your soul to watch Occupation Double (a Quebec reality dating show)?"
Pornography is wreaking havoc. The preacher cites a 2024 Barna study: 61% of American adults consume it, including 44% of women and 54% of practicing Christians. It is a drug that, according to several studies, can change the structure of the brain. "It steals your identity, it steals your joy, it steals your relationships."
Looking at pictures of girls in swimsuits on social media, reading a novel that feeds the imagination, picturing yourself with someone else, a stronger emotional connection with a person who is not your spouse: yes, that is lust. Sometimes you need to "retrain your algorithm" by clicking "not interested" several times.

4. The problem comes from the heart

Verse 28: the adultery has already been committed "in his heart." Throughout this section of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus repeats that the problem is in the heart.
When we hear about a scandal, for example a pastor having an affair, we think it happened all at once. "That is not true." It was months of feeding glances, images and thoughts, of letting the heart fill with things that have no business being there. Let him who thinks he stands be careful that he doesn't fall (1 Corinthians 10:12).
In Quebec, people say: "You're allowed to look, but not to touch." Jesus answers no: it takes root in the heart. He wants to reign over your thoughts, not only over your actions.
"Your actions are like fruit growing on the tree of your heart." Cutting off the rotten part of the fruit is not enough: the tree itself has a problem.
Imagine a man who cuts off his hand, then tears out his eyes, then his tongue, then his ears, so as to stop sinning. In the end, he would have to cut out his heart. And Jesus says: "I came to replace it." I will give you a new heart, and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 36:26).
Jesus does not only want to change your behavior, he wants to change your heart. But you have a responsibility in the process.

5. Unmask the enemy's lies and confess

Good news: with Jesus, there is always a way out. Rest assured, you will walk away with both hands. Jesus uses hyperbole to say that sin must be dealt with radically, with no compromise at all.
First strategy: unmask the enemy's lies. Satan is the father of lies (John 8:44). Lying is his number one strategy and his identity.
First lie: "It's no big deal, everyone does it, it's 2026." Or: "It's your private life." But you know exactly what it does to you: you feel empty, your self-esteem changes, your view of women and of sexuality changes, your relationships suffer. The world, which used to be in color, becomes more and more gray.
Second lie: "You deserve a reward." After an exhausting day, or when you feel an emptiness, the enemy tells you this will fill it. But the more you go to this drug, the more the emptiness grows.
Then the enemy comes at you from the other side: "You are dirty, you disgust me, you are not worthy to pray or to come to church. You are the only one." Often he mixes it all together: before the fall, "it's no big deal," after the fall, "you are disgusting, don't tell anyone." Do not let him keep you in the dark.
Second strategy: confess. "If the enemy manages to keep you in secrecy, he has won." There is no place where sin grows more than in secret. Confess your offenses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed (James 5:16).
Confession is not an "emotional striptease." Find someone safe, who will not use what you confess against you, and someone mature in the faith, so you do not reinforce each other in the same struggle.
Loïc Richard meets every week with a group of men with whom he confesses all his sins, not only lust. It sets you free, and it protects you: knowing you will have to confess it on Tuesday helps you not to go there.
Confessing to God is essential, but God works through his body. If you are married, confess to your spouse. "It would affect them too much? Guess what: it already affects them." Secrecy creates distance.
To the one who receives the confession: anger, disgust, the feeling of betrayal and the question "is it because of me?" are legitimate. Take the time you need. But his prayer is that you may see your spouse as a warrior fighting for your relationship, loving enough to be vulnerable.

6. Cut radically and fix your eyes on Jesus

Third strategy: cut. The parallel passage in Mark (9:43-47) speaks of the eye, the hand and the foot: what you look at, what you do, the places you go. In the Bible, the right side is the side of authority. What you look at, what you do and where you go have authority over you.
Sometimes, instead of fighting temptation, you have to flee it. Paul tells the Corinthians: "Flee sexual immorality" (1 Corinthians 6:18).
Concretely: do not stay alone in an apartment with your boyfriend or girlfriend, delete apps, do not let five minutes of scrolling turn into an hour. Some have chosen a flip phone, "and I have so much respect for those guys."
On vulnerable evenings, the right thing does not always look spiritual, but it is: go for a run, do something else.
A friend drawn to a vacation in the South knew that the beaches would be a great temptation for him. He and his wife chose the mountains instead, a place that restores the body, but above all the soul.
The preacher trains at home and never goes out to eat or have coffee alone with a woman. "Not because I'm an uncontrollable predator," he clarifies, and it is not a law for everyone, but because the best way to deal with temptation is to eliminate it.
He tells the story of a nurse who worked with a doctor. Nothing had happened, but she sensed something growing in her heart. She asked for a transfer to another department. She put her integrity above everything.
Maybe you should not finish that series or that book. Maybe you should go to bed at the same time as your spouse. "You say the devil made you look at pornography, but it was you who went to bed at 2 a.m. after spending the evening on TikTok."
Fourth strategy: fix your eyes on Jesus. Cutting leaves a void, and a void will always be filled with something. To follow Jesus like the disciples, you have to watch him to know whether he is going left or right.
The marshmallow experiment run by psychologist Walter Mischel in 1972 illustrates this: the children who kept repeating "I don't want to eat the marshmallow" ended up eating it. The ones who succeeded looked elsewhere, sang, invented games. When driving, do not stare at the tree you want to avoid: look at the road. Fill the void with Jesus and let the Holy Spirit fill you.

7. Jesus still delivers today

The preacher tells the story of a boy of 8 or 9 who comes across erotic images in the local newspaper. A rush of dopamine, then shame like a big black cloud, and voices: "You are the only one, you are disgusting, keep it secret."
He eventually half confides in his parents, too ashamed to name things. As a teenager, in the early days of the Internet, he falls into a spiral of pornography. At church, he thinks his pastor committed his last sin in 1965 by stealing an apple. He shuts himself up in silence, and the sin grows.
A Christian friend admits to the same struggle. It is a breath of fresh air, but as both of them often relapse, a new lie sets in: "everyone does it." His emotions go numb, everything turns gray, and his view of women and of himself deteriorates.
He meets a young woman who brings color back into his life. He confesses, then relapses. He believes marriage will fix everything, but he relapses after the wedding, and again after the birth of a child. Shame keeps him from confiding in anyone other than his wife. She begins to doubt herself, trust and intimacy erode. The thief only comes to steal, kill, and destroy (John 10:10).
"This story is mine." Loïc Richard testifies that he has been free from pornography for several years, that Jesus restored his identity, his wife's, their sexuality, his emotions and his view of women, and that he took away his shame.
He adds that he will have to cut throughout his whole life: his wife has access to his phone, there are places he does not go and people he does not spend time with. Deliverance was not instantaneous: it took months to unmask the lies, confess each relapse, cut radically and fix his eyes on Jesus. "It is the grace of Jesus that set me free. If it was possible for me, it is possible for you."
The message ends with communion. To repent is to confess your sin and choose to let go of it, with concrete decisions for the week. The bread reminds us that Jesus took a blow for every sexual sin and nailed shame to the cross once and for all. The juice reminds us that his blood has reconciled us with God: "Jesus did not only come to take away your shame, he came to give you a new dignity."
Just as the father of the prodigal son covered his son with a robe (Luke 15:22), the preacher prays that the Church will accept the mantle of dignity that God gives.

Key takeaways

God invented sexuality and made it beautiful. The problem is not sexuality, but lust.
Temptation is not a sin. What matters is what you do with the first glance and with the thoughts that cross your mind.
Love is patient, faithful and selfless. Lust is hurried, selfish and transactional.
Sin takes root in the heart. Jesus does not only want to correct your actions, he wants to give you a new heart.
To overcome lust: unmask the enemy's lies, confess, cut radically and fix your eyes on Jesus. Grace still sets people free today.

Personal application

Which thought or which glance are you letting "nest" in your life right now?
Which of the enemy's lies do you hear most often: "it's no big deal," "you deserve a reward," "you are dirty" or "you are the only one"?
Who is the safe person, mature in the faith, you could confide in this week?
What do you need to cut concretely: an app, a series, an evening habit, an ambiguous relationship?
What will you fill the void left by what you cut with, so you can keep your eyes fixed on Jesus?

Verses cited

Frequently asked questions

Is temptation already a sin?

No. Loïc Richard relies on Hebrews 4:15: Jesus was tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin. A thought that crosses your mind or a first glance is not a sin. The question is what you do with it: the second glance, the thought you feed, the scenario you let develop.

What does Jesus mean when he says to tear out your eye and cut off your hand?

Jesus is not asking anyone to mutilate themselves. He uses hyperbole to say that sin must be dealt with radically, without compromise. The right side represents authority: what you look at, what you do and the places you go have authority over you. So you need to cut off whatever feeds lust.

Who should you confess a struggle with lust to?

According to James 5:16, confession opens a path to healing. The preacher advises choosing a safe person, who will not use your confession against you, and who is mature in the faith, so you do not feed the same struggle together. Confessing to God is essential, but God also works through his body. If you are married, confess to your spouse as well.