Brother “John’s” Testimony, Married

One year ago, I was at a near breaking point. My marriage was suffering. My personal devotional life was almost non-existent. I was leading the church from a place of timidity and shame. I didn’t want to challenge people too boldly because I knew I wasn’t able to see the change in my own life. The worst thing of all was preaching and seeing my wife sitting on the front row. She was in so much pain, and I knew she knew what was going on inside of me. I felt like a fake but I couldn’t help it.

Porn and masturbation had been a constant part of my life since my teen years when I was exposed to it in middle school. Things escalated from there, especially when we got internet access in my bedroom in high school. I always thought I would ‘grow out of it’ like when I went to a Christian college, met my fiancé and started in ministry. I was wrong, wrong and wrong again. The patterns of addiction were too deep, and there were a number of practical avenues that I was not closing which left the ‘drug’ available to me. I had personal counseling, marital counseling, and even joined a Christian recovery group for 3 years. In all of that, I had never made it past three months without masturbating or looking at sexually explicit material.

I found Pureheart Ministries online one day and decided to give the free assessment a try out of desperation. I really wasn’t expecting too much since I felt I had already done ‘all I could’ to get free to no avail. Tim shared with me that he had a nearly 100% success rate with guys who followed his advice step by step. That got my attention. The first step was to ‘get rid of the drug’ by white listing my computer. While I had a filter for many years, I always found a way around it by doing searches, trying to ‘poke holes’ in the system- and there were plenty of loopholes. I didn’t think white listing would work because I often have to use the internet for work-related purposes- and because so many things happen online these days (registration, conferences, purchasing etc). After setting it up, the white listing has been a lifesaver. Because I’m restricted to only a few sites (email, bills, bible programs, etc), I don’t spend any idle time surfing the net. That is something I am done with the rest of my life. If I ever need a site that I can’t access, I can ask my wife at home with her present there.
The second biggest help for me was establishing financial consequences for an integrity break. My wife was very skeptical of this at first, and thought we’d lose our whole savings because nothing had ever worked for me in the past! However, combining consequences with the white listing proved to be a very powerful combination for me. In the one year since working with Tim, I had one incident where I did a search for inappropriate ‘soft porn’ images while logged into my wife’s user. Paying the consequence reaffirmed for me the ‘sting’ of getting wrapped up in this sin again.

I appreciate Tim’s bluntness. The Pureheart workbook follows the theme of WWII and at times, I really did feel like a recruit in Basic Training taking orders from a drill sergeant! I took it, however, because I know he really has my best in mind, and because we truly ARE in a war. Falling into the enemy’s trap has HUGE disastrous consequences for myself, my wife, my kids, my church, community and the Kingdom of God. I truly believe that. I was losing my relationship with the Lord. My wife was becoming hurt and distant. I was not connecting well with my children. My ministry was suffering. All of those things could have been thrown away in a moment of stupidity by acting out at church and having someone else find out.

On the other hand, VICTORY also has huge consequences of blessing, life, freedom and helping others to get free. I am so excited to be crossing the one year mark. I feel like a new man. I have gotten into better shape physically than any time since college. I’m eating well, exercising regularly. My sex life with my wife has greatly improved. I am more present with my kids and don’t lose my patience with them as easily. I am preaching with more passion, conviction, and clarity. I am engaging difficult conversations with people without feeling like I have anything to hide. I am a better leader. I am setting goals and praying and working to see them reached. I am excited to see other men break free of their addictions. I have led two men’s groups on this topics, and am waiting for the Lord to reveal his next steps for me. At some point, I hope to take men through the Pureheart training- especially pastors and leaders who are stuck like I was.

Going forward, I plan to live in integrity the rest of my life. I plan to have a regular weekly check in for the rest of my life. I will never do an internet search by myself again. I will always have white listed internet. I will never have TV. These are simple ways of ‘cutting off my right hand’ that are a small price to pay for the blessings and benefits of living in freedom.