How to Overcome a Defeatist Attitude and Find Victory Over a Porn Addiction
Editor’s Note: This week’s mini-series on the Grace and Truth Blog addresses the issue of pornography. In our first article, Deepak Reju encourages believers in how to overcome a defeatist attitude and find victory over pornography addiction. In other contributions to the series, Jenny Solomon advises the person dating or engaged to someone who views pornography, and Curtis Solomon offers insight into whether pornography use disqualifies from ministry.
Tony tells me, “I’ve given up. I can’t keep fighting.” He’s discouraged and worn out from his decade-long porn addiction.
A few days later, Lisa walks into my office. “I’m addicted to pornography, and I’ve lost all hope. God doesn’t seem to care.” She doesn’t know what to do anymore.
Tony and Lisa are weary soldiers who have spent years in a hard-fought battle against porn addiction. They’re infected with a defeatist attitude that results in a passive approach to their sin. “What’s the use?” they think. “I’ll just give in again. I won’t ever defeat this problem.” They assume that they’ll always struggle. Change is no longer possible. Their lack of success proves (in their minds) that they’re in a losing battle.
What do believers do if they’ve given up? How do they overcome the defeatist attitude that’s so characteristic of this problem?
Be Aggressive About Cutting Off Access Points
Hope often begins when the addict finds success in slowing down the addiction.
The first step is to be brutal about cutting off access points. Jesus tells us not to be passive about sexual sin. Our Lord uses graphic language to communicate the seriousness of getting rid of sexual sin: “If your right eyes causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away…If your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away” (Matt. 5:29-30).
Strugglers do a poor job getting rid of access points. They cut out most access points, but they leave one or two lingering. Why is that? They’ve grown far too cozy with their sin and let it stick around. What happens in a weak moment when Tony is ruled by his lustful desires? Because he’s given up, he’ll give in to his desires, and he’ll act out yet again.
Jesus says to Tony, “Be radical. By my power and my strength, get rid of every access point. Don’t leave any behind.”
A defeatist attitude grows comfortable with sin. A gospel mindset is aggressive about cutting sin out.
Deal With the Shame
Shame causes a struggler to hide. Shame whispers in an addict’s ear: Run. Don’t let people see you. You’re worthless. Who would want someone like you? Sexual sin prospers in the darkness, not in the light. Mold grows in darkness, but it dies under the bright, hot sunlight. So also, sexual sin prospers and grows as a believer isolates himself and turns away (Prov. 18:1) from the provision of God’s people (Eph. 4:15-16) and God’s Word (Isa. 55:10-11).
If you struggle with porn, do you feel dirty and unclean? Have you been exposed? Do you act like an outcast? Do you feel rejected? Do you wallow in a sense of failure?
Hope comes when you turn away from the whispers of shame and run headlong to Christ. Jesus covers the naked and exposed (Zech. 3:3-5). He makes the unworthy and unclean clean (Matt. 8:1-3). He welcomes the outcast with open arms (John 4). He gives you a righteousness that’s not your own (2 Cor. 5:21), so you don’t have to live under your own unreasonable standards.
A defeatist attitude wallows in shame. A gospel mindset begs Christ for mercy.
Find Accountability That Works
There’s a lot of bad accountability out there. Granted, Tony and Lisa must take responsibility for their sin, but their problems are compounded by unbiblical, sometimes harsh, graceless, Christless, distant, and hopeless accountability.
If your accountability is mediocre, you’ve got two choices: either rework your accountability so it becomes more edifying or find a mature believer who can do a better job at coming alongside you.
A few questions to consider:
- Is your accountability tough? Is your friend willing to ask hard and awkward questions? For example: Did you lie? Have you masturbated? Where are you angry at God? Are you hiding from your spouse?
- Is your accountability consistent and reliable, or is it infrequent?
- Is your accountability communal? Are you relying on just one person, or are you leaning into an entire gospel community? Scripture tells us there is success with many counselors rather than just one (Prov. 11:14; 24:6).
- Is your accountability local? Proximity matters. Are you open to people in your own local church? Or is your main help someone who lives far away? Why not let the people in your church know about your struggles?
- Is your accountability mature? Is the person you’re meeting with loving, wise, faithful, a season or two ahead of you, and doesn’t wrestle with porn themselves?
- Is your accountability gracious and encouraging? Or is it harsh and discouraging?
- Is your accountability Word-based and faith-focused? Does it regularly point you back to what God values and remind you of the hope you have in Christ?
A defeatist attitude is satisfied with mediocre help. A gospel mindset knows God’s help is offered through God’s people and deliberately goes out and finds it.
Take Aim at the Heart
The deepest and most long-lasting change comes through the pathway of the heart. We have physical hearts that pump blood. We also have spiritual hearts—the inner and most core part of who we are. Our hearts are the command centers of our lives and from our hearts flow our thoughts, words, feelings, and deeds. As Jesus taught us, our lives are an overflow of our hearts (Matt. 12:35-37; Luke 6:43-45).
When you fight porn problems, you should never be satisfied with behavior change. I teach addicts what to do—add filters and software programs to devices, avoid certain routes home from work that pass by provocative billboards, and turn away your eyes when a scantily dressed person walks by. But ultimately, behavior change won’t solve an addiction. We’ve got to go beyond behavior and get addicts to deal with the deeper motivations and desires of their hearts.
What are the deeper motivations with porn struggles? Here’s a small sampling: Is Tony trying to escape his stress and disappointment in life? Does Lisa feel bitter at God, so she creates her own fantasy world where her “dreams” are fulfilled? Is Tony bored with a pietistic lifestyle? Is he looking for affirmation? Is he selfish and feeling entitled to treat himself with pleasure? Does Lisa feel so overrun by men that she looks at porn to gain some sense of control?
A defeatist attitude is satisfied with managing sinful behavior. Yet, the gospel can re-arrange our carnal and ungodly motivations. A gospel mindset unearths these deeper motivations that drive an addiction and submits them to Christ.
Repent of Atheism
Behind all these foolish motivations stands a doubting of God—a questioning of His character and His goodness. God can’t change me. God doesn’t care about me. God must not love me. If you dig down into the deepest recesses of Tony or Lisa’s heart, you find they’ve lost hope in God.
Christians struggle with momentary atheism—times when our doubts get the best of us. We believe our doubts more than we trust in God’s character. Porn struggles are teeming with this kind of thinking.
What can be done? We come alongside Tony and Lisa, patiently showing them that God really does care. Along the way, we draw out their false functional theology of God. We gently and lovingly call on them to reject their wrong thinking. Through the conviction of the Spirit, they can reject their doubts and embrace more redemptive thoughts about God.
A defeatist attitude gives up on God. A gospel mindset repents and fights for hope in God.
Victory in Christ
The gospel disrupts a defeatist attitude. It won’t tolerate the mindset of a weary soldier who doesn’t want to fight anymore. Rather it says: In Christ, nothing is impossible (Luke 1:37). Your life, no matter how bad it is, is not beyond the scope of God’s life-giving, sin-defeating grace.
So, if you struggle, don’t give up. Christ hasn’t given up on you, so you shouldn’t either.
Questions for Reflection
- Have you given up on God? If so, who can you turn to for gospel-minded help?
- How does your accountability need to change to yield more success?