Once addicted, always addicted!
There are many people who will try and tell you this. And when you are constantly finding yourself giving into temptation over and over again it can become really easy to believe it. You know that voice inside your head that says you will never be free, you will never know what it is like to have a healthy relationship, you will never know what it’s like to look into your wife/ husband/boyfriend/girlfriends eyes and not be afraid that your face will give you up?
That voice can become ‘truth’. It can become your reality.
I am sure many of you know that feeling. A feeling of helplessness and frustration. You just feel like giving up and getting used to the idea that porn is in your life to stay and all you can do is to just deal with it the best you can. It’s pretty horrible. What makes it worse almost is when you feel good again and you are ready to fight it again. You vow to read your bible more and pray everyday. To be totally and completely open with your wife or accountability partner.
“This time will be different”.
But then it isn’t. You end up back where you started and the porn cycle starts again.
Porn-Shame-Forgiveness- Hope….Porn-Shame-Forgiveness-Hope…..
But …that isn’t the only way it can go.
I think sometimes that when dealing with sin issues we assume that suddenly one day it will be different and we will never be tempted again. But that’s rarely how it goes. Maybe you will have a few days that go really well. Then you will experience old feelings inside you again.
The truth is we have to always be alert. It’s just as dangerous sometimes to think we have gotten over our addiction as it is to believe that we will never be free.
Does that mean we will never be free? Absolutely not!
There are many people who have beaten porn. They aren’t better than you. They haven’t discovered a magic formula that means they are immune to temptation. They are examples of what is possible. They are just like you and I. If they can beat it so can everyone. So can you.
They are people of hope who show us that what happens today doesn’t have to define us tomorrow.
One of my favourite parts in the bible is Romans 7. In it Paul, (yep that’s the same Paul who wrote most of the New Testament, had God break him out of jail and became one of the most well know Christians in the World) talks about his constant struggle with sin.
Romans 7v 14 So the trouble is not with the law, for it is spiritual and good. The trouble is with me, for I am all too human, a slave to sin. 15 I don’t really understand myself, for I want to do what is right, but I don’t do it. Instead, I do what I hate.
Wow. This can’t be the same Paul I’m thinking of can it? It must have been his twin evil brother. Nope it’s Paul.
God used this guy who can’t seem to help himself, to do amazing things. God used him despite his sin. Paul obviously had huge issues but they weren’t bigger than God. If Paul’s not enough proof for you how about David, or Abraham or Zaccheaus. Take some time to read their stories. The whole Bible is full of people who couldn’t help themselves, who had massive lists of sin beside their name.
But that was never the end of their story.
It wasn’t their reality.
They all came to believe that this was not how it had to be.
So can you.
Be encouraged.
Be hopeful.
Be open.
Be honest.
Be free.