The Addiction

a true story

by David Chipp-Smith

'Dave, we really need to talk man. It is getting worse and I don't know how much farther this can go. Please call me as soon as you get this. I need to speak to you in person.'

This was the message left on my voice-mail by John. John has been struggling for years with an addiction. He has been off and on the wagon so many times that a couple of guys that were accountability partners with him gave up and let John drift in and out of his addiction. The addiction has threatened to pull his family apart and as soon as John started making progress to beat it, some personal struggle came to the fore-front and John drifted back into his addiction. Now it had hit a crucial period in his life. John noticed (finally) that it was affecting his walk with God, to the point that he felt 'dry' spiritually. John never noticed it before, or refused to notice it, and he finally began to realize that his addiction cannot keep controlling him as it has been for all these years.

By now you have probably been asking yourself what is this addiction that has taken control of John? The addiction that has had a hold on John, whose name has been changed to protect his privacy, and has a hold in various ways of over 90% of men is the addiction of pornography.

Now if you are like me, you are probably challenging the 90% figure. Really? 90%?? According to research in the book Every Man's Battle, 80% of men struggle in some way with lust or 'soft porn' during any given time. Another 10% of men are hooked to pornography so bad, that it takes over every aspect of their life, like my friend John.

John is like any other guy out there. He attends church on a regular basis, in fact he held a board position at a church at one time and he loves his family and looks like he has it all together. But there is a dark side to John. You see, he cannot look at a Sears catalog without having an uncontrollable urge of lust. He gets tempted on the internet and according to his own words, 'I have seen a lot of stuff on there that no one should see. It is really scary.'

He has tried several ways of keeping clean from this addiction. One being internet filtering devices. He let his wife install several filtering devices on the computer and has her set the password. Each time, he has either broken the password, or has found a way around the filter. One time using the program's own search engine to get around the protocols. John is a very ingenious person and when he gets bored he likes to find ways around things. That being said, John has been up front with his wife about his urges and the hold that pornography has had on him. That admission put their marriage ever so close to the edge. His wife Sandra has been the ever loving and faithful wife even though John has not been completely faithful to Sandra. No, he hasn't cheated on her physically, but he has emotionally and mentally. You see, when we as men fantasize about any woman, Jesus Himself stated that we have already committed adultery (Matt. 5:28). When we lust after a woman other than our wife, we rob our wife of the sexual intimacy that God intended for us to have.

What John is also realizing through this journey is that his addiction is robbing God and is robbing those around him as well of the gifts that God has given him to be a source of light in this world. You see, John and Sandra have gone through a major tragedy in their life. Through this tragedy, they have been able to touch the lives of many people throughout the journey and sorrow that they have had to endure. John's addiction to lust and pornography has robbed him of the opportunities to help others facing what he and Sandra have already faced. God has prepared John to be an incredible force for His good, but John, through his continued surrender to the urges and lust of his earthly body, continues to deny God the opportunity to use him in ways that he cannot comprehend.

John also uses his addiction as a way to escape the pain that he has been feeling in his life. Psychologically, there are two things that drive us as humans: pain and pleasure. The default mechanism in our subconscious is to avoid pain as much as possible and to gravitate towards pleasure. Through the tragedy that he has faced in his life, John has had to burden an immense amount of pain. Pain that I wish (and he wishes) that no one will ever have to endure. Sexual gratification brings a moment of pleasure to him. So much so that it is addicting to him. It is a time to get away from all the struggles and pain that John has had to endure and to experience pleasure, if only for a few minutes. The problem is that fleeting moment of pleasure comes with a price. The price is the pain of realizing what he has done and the pain in Sandra's face once she realizes what he has done. But the real problem is that the pain that is a result of his actions has not been painful enough to stop. And because of the years of addiction to pornography, John has had to break a habit that has become part of his daily life. One that has actually become part of him.

So, that night that I received that message on my voicemail is a night that John decided that something has to change and that he cannot continue to allow pornography to control him. That he needs to take control of this addiction and beat it for the greater good of his family and to become the man that God wants him to be...

Continued in November Issue

Do you battle with pornography? Do you have some feedback on this subject? Feel free to contact David.