Is My Desire Sin?
It’s helpful to recognize that desire in itself is not positive or negative. It’s part of being human, part of how God made us. What matters is the object of our desires and what we do with them. Sometimes we desire things that are of God—in line with his commands and the story he’s writing. Other times we desire things that are against God’s ways. God created us to be people with desires, but in this fallen world where things are broken, not all our desires are good ones.
That’s why, when I hear students say things like “It’s just the way God made me” when they share about their sexual attractions or gender identity struggles, I have to disagree. God made you in his image, yes. But you’re also broken and sinful, just like everyone else. Some of your desires—like the desire for sex outside marriage, or for a romantic relationship with a person of the same sex—are not of God, and they need to be resisted.
We need to start by recognizing that because we live in a fallen world, all of us face temptation. That means all of us experience being enticed by things that are not of God. These temptations may be fleeting or persistent; they may involve so-called “acceptable sins” or ones we feel we could never confess; they may be easy to resist or feel impossible to fight. But all of them are temptations toward sin. Yet we don’t need to feel guilty for temptations we didn’t choose. We need to, instead, ask Jesus to deliver us from them and help us to live godly lives.
Same-sex-attracted pastor Sam Allberry explains:
Same-sex temptations (along with any other kind of temptation to sin) reflect our own fallenness. But this is not the same as saying the presence of temptation itself is a sin to be repented of. Scripture makes a distinction between temptation and sin . . . we are to seek forgiveness for sin but deliverance from temptation. (Is God Anti-Gay?, 60)
So, we don’t need to beat ourselves up for the temptations that arise unbidden in our minds. But we do need to take ownership of what we do with them. If you experience same-sex attraction or gender dysphoria, or you wrestle with lust or any other temptation to sin, those struggles don’t need to define you. They’re not a reason for shame and hiding. They don’t put you in a unique category of people who are hopelessly sinful. (News flash: that’s all of us—or it would be, without the transforming work of Christ.)
What we do with these temptations, though, matters deeply. And I’m not just talking about what you do physically. Like I said, it’s not just our sexual activity but also our desires themselves that need to be submitted to the rule of Christ.
As the apostle James puts it, we can get “lured and enticed” by our own desires (James 1:14). You keep on letting your attention drift to that girl’s chest, or you let your sexual fantasies run and run inside your brain, or you tell yourself that since you experience same-sex attraction, God must have wanted it that way. This is sin. James 1:15 warns: “Desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.”
When we allow ungodly desires to “conceive” or take root—when we encourage and enjoy them, even if we’re not acting on them physically yet—that’s where sin comes in (see Matthew 5:28). And sin (but for the grace of God) will always have its end in death.
So, no, you don’t need to be ashamed if you’re being tempted to do something that you know is against God’s word. But you do need to think seriously about how you’re responding to that temptation. And that includes what happens in your mind and your heart as well as your body. God knows that too often what we think will bring happiness will really bring death. And he wants something much better for us—abundant life.
This article is an adapted excerpt from More to the Story by Jennifer M. Kvamme (The Good Book Company, 2023). In this book intended for a teenage audience, Jennifer explores biblical answers to questions about identity, attraction, and relationships.