Disintegration

Really hit a rough patch this week. So my struggle isn't my only issue and I have found that when I am having a rough time in other areas of life the pornography and acting out is worse. So looking at my life honestly I have to admit that I am a wreck. Personally, spiritually, and financially. My lack of discipline in all of these areas is the chaos that feeds/justifies my addiction and contributes to the feelings of hopelessness. But I am not hopeless, nor am I helpless, I am also not alone. My choices are what got me here. Every dirty dish, I own. I made that...and when I decided it was easier to toss it in the sink instead of deal with it...that small mess grows.I have a good job, I just spend more than I make...apparently. I am always tired when i get home because I dont' exercise enough. But finding the energy to exercise when you come home to the same chaos everyday....it's not easy. All of us here face similar struggles I am sure. Mine are not the worst. I just have to work on it. one dish, one bill, one load of laundry at a time. I can't recover in only one area of my life....I have to recover my life in whole. God came to make us whole, to integrate what was dis-integrated.

Reboot

I work in IT.

When your computer bogs down, starts throwing errors, or gets all mucked up from too much porn.

Reboot.

Rebooting resets the computer to it's normal state, clears out the current memory, and can give you a chance to fix whatever the initial issue was.

What it won't do is fix hardware problems, or bad programming.  That takes skilled help, it takes effort, it means that you have to go in a clean out whats causing the problem.

Sometimes your computer has to crash before you admit you need to reboot.

I crashed.  And am in desperate need of a reboot.

Hope for the journey

I think we mistakenly assume that Christ in us means we will feel these wonderful urges to only do good and bad things will suddenly be unappealing. Or that somehow our actions have bearing on our eternal position in Christ. We either have asked Jesus to be our Savior or we havent. If so, the rest of life is "working out our salvation with fear and trembling" which, to me, means...trying to figure out the ramifications of being saved while still living in my sinful body here on earth. Our eternal destination is set with God in Heaven, but we have a few miles to walk here before we get Home. We are imperfect creatures, saved, and destined for future perfection in Christ. 

12 Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 13 Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. Philippians 3:12

 
Be encouraged, God has not abandoned us.

Unregenerate Bastard?

There's been some discussion of late about 'unregenerate christians'

those with no fruit, or those living in habitual sin.

 

So even tho I am in Christ and saved by Grace, there's an expectation of growth, or some development, maturity. Trying to wrap my head around the idea of grace without using it as a license to keep sinning and simply claim that I just "unable" to get victory in this area

 

....maybe its just that I am 'unwilling' to submit to the amount of pain necesary to see that battle won.

 

There is still the reality that I am living in a sinful body, I am not yet perfected, I will always have a sin nature.  But will i always give in to it so easily?

 

Porn has been my struggle since college, lust was even years before that.

More than half of my life i have been hamstrung in one way or another with this...even if only for its power to contribute to my insecurity in my relationship with my Heavenly Father.

 

I am grateful for Gods faithfullness in the midst of my faithlessness :)

All is not lost, and God is not finished with me yet...but yikes its hard not to get a lil' down about it once in a while!

What's in a Touch?

Sitting close to someone. A brush of the leg or the arm. Cuddling.

What could possibly be wrong with that? We didn't kiss, there was nothing "sexual" about it.

I beg to differ.

This is an area in my life in which I have struggled...ok, still struggle to set boundaries and stick to them. As someone with SSA, I find myself pulled, as if by gravity, to guys around me. Their looks, their humor, their sense of self-confidence....any one of those is enough to set off the radar and make me turn my head. Could be a stranger, but more often it is a friend. Someone I have known or met thru other circles in my life. But ever since I was a teenager I can remember actively pursuing "touch" with or without permission. To clarify, this is about intentional touch, touch that I initiated, or prolonged.

Sounds awful, doesn't it. But it's okay, right? Because I wasn't touching them sexually...

So what do I mean when I say "actively pursuing touch"? Let me give you some examples; In highschool I remember sliding down in my desk so my knee would just touch the guy in front of me, if he didn't move...well, he must be saying its okay, right? Another time, I sat next to a foreign exchange student in some boring school play and let my hand rest against the outside of his thigh...for the entire play! I even had experiences while I was camping of people rolling close to me in their sleep, and I made sure to not move, and not wake them...just so it would last.

It gets worse.

I have had a habit of sexual jokes, but some of it involved physical antics. Butt-slapping, pretend caresses, passionate embraces, rubbing up against people...all in the name of humor. But was it all just a joke?

What about giving a backrub? Come on, everyone likes a backrub! Nothing wrong with that!

Not so fast.

I have given alot of backrubs. I'm trained in First Aid, and am almost always the "go to" guy on trips (camping, canoeing, climbing) for ailments and aches. I simply want to help. Or do I?

Here's the ugly part.

While the above listed actions could be rationalized away as not crossing any major legal or moral boundaries. Is that the truest telling of the story? What is it about me that is compelled, like a moth to the flame, to touch those around me? And no, all touch is not bad. But if I am honest in me there is almost this vampire-like habit of getting what I "need" from unsuspecting people around me. It's about the condition of my heart. Am I seeking touch from a place of health and balance? Or am I vampire seeking the warmth that only others seem to possess?

Harsh. I know.

If I am ever to get better at relating to the people around me (attractive or not) then I had best be brutally honest about my motivations. I believe that God made me a caring, empathetic person. And healthy 'care-taking' is gift and blessing to those around you. But if I am focusing on how what I do for them will improve our friendship, or I have thoughts of how "our friendship is more special" because of what they allow me to do for them. Or even the simple fact that they do not experience touch in the same way or view it with the same significance as I do, am I being honest by keeping them in the dark? Would they allow the touch if they could see how it affects me? (And I not talking just erections here, the most serious of connections we make outside of physical{sexual} intimacy is emotional.) So for me to pretend that it has no effect on me puts me in a precarious position, lust is crouching at the door, ready to pounce.

Matt 5:27 "You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery’; 28 but I say to you, that everyone who looks on a woman to lust for her has committed adultery with her already in his heart.

Jesus said it's not about how far I go with him/her...it's about the motivation of my heart.

So these are the questions I need to ask myself:

Why am I going there?
What needs am I attempting to get filled?
Would an emotionally healthy person (who knows my struggles) be okay with this?*
Would I do this in front of other Christians (that I look up to?)

*(just because someone might be okay with it does not automatically make it right)

Do I crave touch? You bet. Is it ok for me to take it whenever, wherever, and however I want?

No. I need to trust that God has a plan to meet those perceived needs I have in ways that don't compromise healthy boundaries.

Can I look at healthy males and simply mimic what they do? Maybe, maybe not. Why? Because a healthy, straight guy isn't attracted to the guy he's touching...I am, and that makes all the difference. It isn't about them, it's about how this affects me.

Disease or Choice?

The power of addiction cannot be adequately appraised until addiction is understood as a misguided enactment of our quest for right relationship with God.

Kent Dunnington. Addiction and Virtue: Beyond the Models of Disease and Choice (Strategic Initiatives in Evangelical Theology) (Kindle Locations 81-82). Kindle Edition.

This brick house of a statement is found in the preface of this book that I have only just started reading. Obviously the topic is of personal interest for me, being both Christian and Addict. If my addictive behaviors are simply sinful choices....then I am just a bad person who chooses to sin continuously. But if they are an 'addiction', something that I am afflicted with, then perhaps I have no choice in the matter - or if I do have a choice it is so unfair a fight as to make Don Quixote seem sane in believing he can joust a windmill.

As Dunnigton suggests, the truth lies closer to the middle. It looks like a pretty technical read, but its high time I pursued more than just sugar-coated recovery and begun to expose the insides to the light of truth.

Sexual sin is a heart that doesn’t trust God.

"Sexual sin basically says, “I can’t trust God to meet these needs. I can’t trust God to provide these needs in the way that he chooses, therefore, I need to go outside of his provision” —whether that’s through the internet and looking at women in ways you should never look at them, masturbation, sleeping around—it’s really saying, “You’re not true, God. I can’t trust you to be good. I have these desires and urges in the moment, and I need to go take care of them because I can’t trust you to.” So I think that’s really the heart of sexual sin. It’s a heart that doesn’t trust God. It’s a heart that, instead of worshipping the God who is trustworthy, who knows our every need, and who’s good to provide what we really need, we commit idolatry and say, “I need to worship sex instead of you, God."  (from Dave Bruska)

Ran across this today.  And it hit me like a ton of brinks.  Not that I haven't come to the same conclusion before, but simply because it re-reminds me that I have issues...specifically a trust issue.


I don't trust God.

Holy crap.

The God who made the Universe, the God who designed DNA, laminin, quarks, black holes,  the God who knew me in my mothers womb, the God who sent his ONLY Son to die for my sins, the God who has relentlessly pursued me with his grace....THAT's the guy I don't trust?


Well, I usually say that I trust God...but what I say and what I do don't always line up.  So I have to see again that my repeated return to lust as a coping mechanism robs God of his rightful place in my life.  His place is as Provider, Sustainer, Healer, Counselor, Friend, and Savior.  I have let lust come in and occupy most/all of those roles in some fashion or another.

What’s difficult about sexual sin is it has a unique shame factor to it. It’s just a downward spiral. And what happens when you commit sexual sin is you typically withdraw from the things you need the most, whether that’s first and foremost Jesus, and his people, and so, it’s just a downward spiral, it’s a really downward spiral. But it’s an issue of the heart. And the good news is Jesus changes hearts. (also from Dave Bruska)

Thank God for Good News.