Redirect

I want to be a simple guy as it relates to following Jesus. My pursuit is to do the things that He says are important and not get distracted by too many opinions and thoughts of man. Jesus was overtly clear that if there was only one command it would be to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30 NKJV). This profound statement Jesus made to the religious scholars of His day is just as profound and thoroughly directive to us today. He wants all of us. Trying to do it any other way, less than being all in, is setting yourself up for disappointment. He has a plan for your life, and it requires all of you to make it happen.

One of the biggest challenges for men leaving pornography behind is that they really aren’t willing to leave pornography behind. They still want to dabble.

What do I mean by dabble? Dictionaries give a lot of great definitions, but I don’t think they hit the mark completely on this one. I see dabbling as not being all in on something or being wishy-washy or apathetic about your pursuit of something. If you’re dabbling about being on a diet, then chances are you’re not going to lose a lot of weight. If you dabble with exercising, you shouldn’t really expect to get cut or chiseled any day soon. You won’t survive dabbling with pornography—it’s like stepping into a small child’s sandbox with ten twelve-foot adult king cobras and thinking it’s playtime. So, if there’s no such thing as dabbling with pornography, then why do I find this so often to be the case for someone who wants to step away from pornography? It’s because we don’t fully know what we’re dealing with! The evil of pornography will not leave you alone. You must desert it completely and fill that space it occupied in your life with something much more valuable.

If I’ve had this conversation with one man, I’ve had it with hundreds. I ask them something like, “On a scale of 0 to 100 percent, how willing are you to leave your hidden world of pornography?” You know the answer I get, right? It’s always “One hundred percent.” Then why does almost every man end up in their willingness scale at something around 70 percent? It’s simply that their desire for 100 percent doesn’t consider how truly difficult it is to leave any hidden world, especially that of pornography.

It has been my experience, both personally and from working with hundreds of men, that there is only one way to be free from pornography, and that is to be completely given over to something greater. It says in 2 Peter 2:19 (NIV), “People are slaves to whatever has mastered them.” In most cases, the cruel taskmaster of pornography is broken only when you give yourself over to a greater Master.