To be discerning about what is legitimate when it come to pleasure is essential. Not all things are as they seem and although there may be a good argument for why it is acceptable, in the eye of God it may delay or derail His plan for your life.

We start r828 considering the question of PLEASURE:

Here is how the discussion took place:

 

Pleasure: Legitimate or Illegitimate

Judges 7:4-7 English Standard Version (ESV)

4 And the Lord said to Gideon, “The people are still too many. Take them down to the water, and I will test them for you there, and anyone of whom I say to you, ‘This one shall go with you,’ shall go with you, and anyone of whom I say to you, ‘This one shall not go with you,’ shall not go.” 5 So he brought the people down to the water. And the Lord said to Gideon, “Everyone who laps the water with his tongue, as a dog laps, you shall set by himself. Likewise, everyone who kneels down to drink.” 6 And the number of those who lapped, putting their hands to their mouths, was 300 men, but all the rest of the people knelt down to drink water. 7 And the Lord said to Gideon, “With the 300 men who lapped I will save you and give the Midianites into your hand, and let all the others go every man to his home.”

 

Ravi Zacharias shares how to identify legitimate pleasures.

1. Legitimate Pleasure

“Anything that refreshes you without distracting you from, diminishing or destroying your final goal in life is a legitimate pleasure. “

But how do you determine what is legitimate and will not destroy, unless you know what life’s purpose is first? 

 

Example: Living Life Without Purpose

Attempted Suicide

No interest in the things of God. All that I rejected in my life took to suicide at the age of 17. I did not know how to live -or- die properly.

 

Find out what life is all about, and only then can you define what legitimate and illegitimate pleasure is all about.

 

 2. Illegitimate Pleasure

“Any pleasure that jeopardizes the sacred right of another person is an illegitimate pleasure. “

Ravi Zacharias shares a regret from his own life due to an illegitimate pleasure.