Written by American mental-health counsellor and ordained minister Jay Stringer. The book explores the processes of how we begin to “understand our lust”, seeing our present-day sexual fantasies and behaviours as road maps that can help us to understand our unresolved experiences from the past.

Pornography, masturbation, sexual fantasy, lustful thoughts... They’re just men’s issues, aren’t they? The ways in which women struggle may often be subtly different to our male counterparts, but the fundamental issues of our sinful hearts seeking fulfilment in the wrong places are just the same.

The word holiness can give rise to thoughts of legalism. Rightly teaching the Bible truth on ethics and godly behaviour can so easily cause others to consider us dour or legalistic. Keeping in mind all this confusion around the command “be holy”, we must remind ourselves of some fundamental motivations for holy living.

Some people who are single and/or attracted to the same sex find that physical touch is something they feel they lack. Therefore, feelings I began to have a few years ago took me somewhat by surprise. I became aware that I felt acutely untouched. I felt like I had a craving for physical intimacy.

Celibate same-sex attracted Christians, while accepting that they need to say “no” to their desires for sexual intimacy with another person of the same sex. They often long for healthy and godly ways of meeting their God-given hunger for connection and intimacy with others that will ease loneliness and physical isolation.

When we start to think about our spiritual brothers and sisters, it soon becomes apparent that we have a responsibility to all of our fellow members in how we behave. Because we know and experience a level of freedom in Christ, it is easy to ignore the effect our actions can have on others.