Church is often an important factor in overcoming addiction. The right Pastor or Priest is even more important. We need to attend a Church that will consistently help us to fight addiction. A Church that will help us to never look back at the addiction that has caused us much pain and destruction. A Church that has a leader who will help us to increase our learning about how to conquer addiction until we are expert at it. A Church that has wise counsel so that we can learn rapidly. Many of you have attended Church for years but you will be shocked to hear me say that the Bible says over 100 times that we are to fear the Lord. A great Church teaches what the Bible teaches. They will teach you to obey the commandments because of a fear of the Lord.
Is sex outside of marriage or porn a Biblical sin? We must refer to first Corinthians 6 to get more information. Read this chapter to get the answer.
A person is made up of Spirit, Soul and Body. Certain sins fully divide us from God . A person who idolizes lust is worshiping the wrong thing. The Bible says we cannot serve God and sinful pleasure. Lust makes the body comes first instead of the Spirit. Run from sins that quench the Spirit.
Study the Bible books of Matthew and 1 Corinthians. Then make it a priority to find a great Church. A Church that teaches obedience. Make a list of Churches you want to try. After you visit each one make an appointment with the Pastor or Priest to meet with them to see how much help they can give you with your addiction.
Find a church that will tell you to stop committing the same deadly sins over and over again. Hebrews 10:26 says we can and will run out of chances. Find a church that teaches obedience.
Some of you are currently attending a Church that says; our Church is the only way to Heaven. If they are not helping you with your addiction switch Churches right away. If what they are teaching is not helping you, that is 100% proof that they are not the only way.
So what Churches are good? Sometimes the Assembly of God or the Nazarine Churches are good, sometimes they are not. Ask people that you know; what Churches around here really help people change for the better? Then try them and see if they are good for you. The only Christ following Churches that I would avoid are the Jehovah’s Witness (who subtract multiple verses from the Bible saying they are not true) and the Mormons (Who add multiple verses to the Bible from the writings of a very mixed up man).
Believing the Bible allows you to live in the light. It allows you to fight your way to joy through a relationship with Jesus. Find a Church that believes every verse in the Bible because it will be led by a Pastor who has real answers for you.
This week make it your written goal to find a great Church that can help you. Lastly keep working on your own to seek out help about addiction from experts, groups, books, web sites and everything else we can get help from.
What if we were given a brand new start to life? Put into paradise in the Garden of Eden. Everything brand new except that we still have our same old thoughts and ways of thinking. What advice would we tell our-self?
I would say: “Dear Self, you are getting some of the destruction out of your life by reading several chapters of the Bible which has increased your faith. You are spending time in prayer every day which has helped you learn why and how to overcome sin and addiction. You are focusing on treating others with love and praying about being filled with love. This has caused you to realize that people are more important than any addiction. You are focused on finding and fulfilling your purpose which is filling you with joy.
But remember, satan will come into the garden. He will bring new updated tricks and temptations. But they will be the same old tricks and temptations disguised as something new and great. So today and every day focus on the fact that _____ steals your joy. Focus on the fact that sin steals your joy. Focus on the fact that being a slug and not fighting to fulfill your purpose steals your joy. Instead choose Christ who fills you with joy.”
Some of you have not experienced this great joy. But you have experienced great darkness and depression. You only continue to read because you know what you don’t want. But please understand – you can’t be doing everything we talk about without finding joy. Some of you are doing 25%, others 50%, others 75%. Sell out and give 100%. Sell out and do everything. You will never regret it if you do.
If you know that addiction steals your joy than you can use that information as a weapon. You can say during your high temptation times: _____ steals my joy.
Idea to memorize: If I resist “it” persists. When I “refocus” on something new I can gain control. Example: Mike is fighting temptation with all his strength. Now he has to fight all evening. Monica gets tempted and she spends 3 minutes planning out her night and then immediately gets busy with her plan. Monica will be too busy to be tempted a lot and she will likely keep control all night.
Read John 18, 2nd Corinthians 2 and Proverbs 16
Continue to read the Purpose Driven Life
If you are on track great; if not review the red letters from day 5.
Pray: “Father give me the wisdom to write a prayer that will help me to start overcoming my addiction.” For example – you feel like your porn use has hurt your ability to be a great parent. You might pray “Father help me to care more about my kids future than I care about lust.” Once you have that prayer that really speaks to what will motivate you – start praying it in earnest. You can pray it as many times each day as you want as long as you are sincere in increasing your desire to change with each prayer. God is not counting how many times I pray my prayer. He is looking at how my heart changes as I sincerely pray it each time and how I allow him to lead me to better choices because now (because of prayer and extra effort) I am starting to see reality clearer.
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Thank you for reading day 21 of this program on how to stop a sex addiction and porn addiction.
Index
Day 1: Overcoming cravings
Day2 : Is God real?
Day 3: Quitting addiction exercises
Day 4: Getting negative emotions out
Day 5: You can never increase the amount of pleasure that you can have for the month by going back to an addiction
Day 6: Sin leads back to addiction
Day 7: Worshiping God helps us overcome addiction
Day 8: What causes you to stay addicted
Day 9: Develop positive addicitons
Day 10: Overcoming negative emotions
Day 11: You have some self control
Day 12: Always have a list of alternate activities to do when temptation hits
Day 13: Only living water can satisfy you for good
Day 14: Learning form the story of Adam and Eve
Day 15: Blessings and curses
Day 16: Self Control
Day 17: Self Control continued
Day 18: Learning to pray
Day 19: What kind of prayers does God answer
Day 20: Don’t let relationship problems lead you back to addiction
How to stop a sex addiction