Question:
I never have a problem talking about my problems on this message board. So I will spill my problem easily.
I've been addicted to porn since I was about 13 ( I've been watching it longer without knowing what it was what it is) basically as long as I could remeber I've been sexually immoral. Even before thirteen
Lately however I feel as though I can live without it but just choose to SIN. I still look at porn and committe immoral acts but I feel I can stop anytime but I dont stop........
Too life has just been becoming more mundane with work and school being the only things I do in life so I guess it's a lot of problems..... anyway leave advice or ask questions. thankyou... and by the way the sexual immorality is why I gave myself this user name.
Answer:
First, renew your mind. Conform your thoughts about it to God's thoughts about it. God hates sin, so you should too. (Aaron Adams can talk a LOT more about this, PM him if you're curious) You need to learn to hate your sin.
After your mind has been renewed, you need to change your actions (this should naturally follow from the renewing of your mind). Discipline yourself and bring yourself into subjection, so to speak, so that you do not continue to fall into sin. What I mean by that is, let your renewed mind and your relationship with God control your actions instead of letting your sinful nature control your actions.
Answer:
Like you said, you've been addicted to your sin. It's habitual, and in this case, I don't care how many books you read on it or how much you think about wanting to stop; it's not going to happen until you put your foot down and decide to stop. Daniel's advice is good. When you decide to your sin and decide not to be controlled by your sin nature is when you will stop. Get a streak going, and when you fail, don't take the easy path and say "Here we go again, it's all going to end up the same way it used to be." If you're going to really fix your habit, you're going to have to rebound from that and continue to your sin and abstain from it. I respect your boldness and honesty on these advice forums, though, and I'm glad that you want help with your problem badly enough to post about it.
Answer:
alright well i guess I'll post like a log here maybe. today i screwed up but i dont feel the need to i just do it. so as of right now i've been good for over 2 hours
Answer:
Originally Posted by bobthecockroach First, renew your mind. Conform your thoughts about it to God's thoughts about it. God hates sin, so you should too....After your mind has been renewed, you need to change your actions (this should naturally follow from the renewing of your mind). Discipline yourself and bring yourself into subjection, so to speak, so that you do not continue to fall into sin.
Actually, this is not very good advice; this approach might allow you to see immediate results, but it will have no lasting power in enabling you to resist temptation.
First of all, it is God who renews our minds, not us. You can't "renew your mind." All you can do is ask the Holy Spirit to renew it.
Secondly, hating sin more without loving God more will not make you a better Christian. I can say from experience that the _only_ way to find the strength to resist lust is not just to hate sin more, but to love God more, to take such delight and pleasure in Him that sin begins to lose its appeal.
Discipline is not the answer. If you try to sanctify yourself or make yourself holy, 1) you will fail and 2) you are trying to do what Jesus has already done; you are attempting to become your own Savior. What use is it to get free of lust if the cost is an increased level of spiritual pride?
Our sin forces us to see that we are imperfect. What should happen when we see our imperfection is that we turn to God to seek forgiveness and strength. But instead, the moment we realize that we are living in sin we begin attempting to fix ourselves - instead of responding in humility we respond with pride. If your failures lead you to try harder to be a good person, instead of driving you to go to God in weakness and neediness, seeking His help, then you are not living a Christian life - you are doubting the power of Christ and trying to usurp His role in your life.
Answer:
Originally Posted by Blindman Discipline is not the answer. 1 Corinthians 9:27
But I discipline my body and bring it into subjection, lest, when I have preached to others, I myself should become disqualified.
Paul must've been terribly confused.
Answer:
Originally Posted by bobthecockroach Paul must've been terribly confused.
You're taking that verse out of context. Paul is talking about enduring physical hardship for the sake of the Gospel, not about resisting sin.
Concerning the way we treat our bodies with regard to immorality, what Paul says is, "Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their selfimposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence." (Col 2:23).
I don't disagree that we should resist sin, that we should turn from evil and do good. What I disagree with is any approach to resisting sin that is grounded in our own human strength and ability and will-power, instead of the power of Jesus Christ. What I disagree with is any sin-management plan that is not powered by the death and resurrection of Christ.
Our pride is the worst sin of all, and the sin that we have the hardest time letting go of. Our pride is so precious to us that we will do anything - even try our hardest to live a godly life - if only we can hold on to that pride instead of relinquishing it. The Pharisees were quite righteous people - you can bet that they had developed all sorts of very effective methods to resist lust and other temptations - but Jesus wasn't too fond of them.
I say this as someone who has lived long enough to see great defeats in the battle for purity, and great victories too. And I can say that the only lasting victory comes, not through my mental effort to resist sin, but out of the discipline of constantly savoring and delighting in Jesus Christ as the joy and treasure of my heart. I'm not just making this up: I have experienced great victory over temptation in my life, but _only_ at the times when God has been, not just a Master to serve, but a source of delight for me. And I am quite certain that anyone who does not find _joy_ in God will have no lasting power to resist temptation.
Answer:
First off... If you have a collection or whatnot... throw it away. If you have files... delete them. Clean your book marks and history, etc.
I also recommend a porn blocker. That helps a lot. It makes you think before you try to unlock it with a password. You just have to remember that you did this for a reason.. to change your life to model Christ. If the computer is still a problem.. stay away from it.
An accountability partner is spiffy, too.
And sometimes you just have to say no. Like when you are about to go look at something, no matter how you plan to justify it, just stop right there. Don't even think about it. Just say no.
Put a Bible on your computer desk, just for that constant conscience. To remind you that God is always watching you...or desktop wallpaper... something to always 'scream' out at you while you're surfing the net and ignoring what you know is the right thing to do.
oh yeah... and pray a lot.
Answer:
that sounds good. I actually thought about video taping myself on a webcam or someting when im on the internet. ( from the waste up ) maybe if I see how I look when I do it it will scare me. Because I know how I look can't be how I want other people to see me as.
Porn blockers dont work cause i either work around them or I just turn them off.
Answer:
Originally Posted by DirtyPunk that sounds good. I actually thought about video taping myself on a webcam or someting when im on the internet. ( from the waste up ) maybe if I see how I look when I do it it will scare me. Because I know how I look can't be how I want other people to see me as.
Porn blockers dont work cause i either work around them or I just turn them off.
Blindman is correct (I'm finding this more and more lately... ) in that we can never truly defeat sin by merely applying certain standards we must follow. We must delight in our saviour Jesus Christ, who died to release us from our bondage. "Those who belong to Christ Jesus, have crucified the sinful nature with it's passions and desires." (Gal. 5:24, paraphrased). C.S. Lewis once said that it is not that our passions are to strong, it's that they are to weak. All to often we settle for the crap of this world. And that's what porn is... crap. It's nothing compared to the glory of Christ, it's a perversion of human sexuality, it will affect the way in which you view the opposite sex, and if left unchecked it will not only destroy your own life but ruin your marriage and the lives of your children (if you get married).
Now, after setting your mind on Christ, and delighting in Him, you will become more disciplined in your walk with Christ. Being disciplined is not godliness, but godliness breeds discipline. So let me tell you this, and I speak from experience. If you don't think you can control yourself, don't put yourself in a situation where you can fall. If you constantly find yourself falling while surfing the net, don't surf the net. Get rid of your computer. If you need your computer for work... find a new job. If you can't get rid of your computer because it is someone else's. Tell them about your struggle and have them hold you accountable. To continually fall in this area will desensitize you to the Lord, and rob you of your joy.
Answer:
Originally Posted by DirtyPunk that sounds good. I actually thought about video taping myself on a webcam or someting when im on the internet. ( from the waste up ) maybe if I see how I look when I do it it will scare me. Because I know how I look can't be how I want other people to see me as.
Porn blockers dont work cause i either work around them or I just turn them off. Go to www.covenanteyes.com. It cost $6.99/month, but it's not a porn blocker. It logs every single website you go to, every single P2P (Kazaa/Limewire, etc.) file you download and then emails them bi-weekly to an accountability partner. Mine is my soon to be wife in a month. It's pretty hard to even want to look at porn when you know the page is going to be emailed straight to your wife. Furthermore, the program, as far as I can tell is fool proof. It modifies your brower(s) so that if you disable the live monitoring software, it also disables your ability to access the internet. Reinstalling the browser or starting your compy in safe mode doesn't work either. If you want to uninstall it, you have to request an uninstall password from the company, who in turn asks your accountability partner if they mind you uninstalling it. If your partner agrees, then you get the password and can uninstall it. The only way I think of to bypass this program is to format your compy and start over.
As you can see, I did my homework on this program before I got it. I wanted something that I couldn't just get around at the greatest of ease. So I tested this one to make sure it was good and I can honestly say that I've not looked at porn once since installing this program...just ask my fiance, she knows precisely where I've been on the compy. Anyway, I give the program two thumbs up and recommend it to all men who struggle to be free from the clutcehs of pornography.
Answer:
Wow. I never knew anything like that existed.
Answer:
A friend of mine had showed it to me several years ago, but I was uninterested at the time, I didn't have my own computer with highspeed internet in my room...so internet porn wasn't a big deal. Things changed. I like it because it forces what is done in darkness into the light and makes you accountable.