G4 Addiction

As you reach this step the momentum of change has probably already fluctuated several times. Getting started was hard. It felt like an uphill battle. Sin didn’t want to let go of you and you didn’t want to admit it had a hold on you. Honesty with self, others, and God has a great way of building momentum. You began to let go of the weights of sin that clung to you and run free from secrets (Heb. 12:1). That phase is almost always exciting and you can almost feel guilty about the amount of relief it brings (especially if you’re married and your spouse is carrying the weight of your secrets which have now come to light).

As that excitement gives way to life restructuring change begins to feel more like work again. “Implementing change” does not occur as quickly as repentance and confession. At this phase, change happens in incremental units and mundane moments. Change begins to require faithfulness in moments where change may not feel as “relevant” to your battle with sexual sin. It no longer feels like you’re running downhill towards God, but uphill.

In this chapter you will evaluate the effectiveness and needed modifications to your life restructuring plan made in Step 6. This step will require the passage of time. Implementing (Step 7) takes longer than creating a plan (Step 6). For this reason, if you are in a group program, you should give at least two months to this step. You will need to see how your plan responds to the changes of settings, relationships, and emotions that happen more over months than days.

As this time passes, there are three areas of assessment that you will be performing from this chapter. First, we will discuss the subject of relapse. Second, you will be learning how to measure lasting progress. What is the difference between “I’m having a good week” and “My life is beginning to conform to God’s design”? Third, you will be looking at key areas of your life to make sure that you have not overlooked something that was not relevant during the crisis that precipitated your seeking help but is now.

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To this point you have admitted, acknowledged, understood, repented, and confessed. Each of the previous steps are vital parts of the change process, but are incomplete to create a lifestyle where purity and honor are defining marks of your life and relationships. Each of the steps to this point have been about “putting off” sin (Eph 4:22) or changing how you think about your sin (Eph. 4:23) more than “putting on” God’s character (Eph. 4:24). Lasting change replaces what it rids and builds something new in the place of what it tears down. That will be the focal point for the rest of this journey.

As you move through the remaining steps you will be asked to address more than sexual sin. Rarely does sin restrain itself to one area of life. Therefore the notion that you will conquer sexual sin without addressing other areas of life is a naïve approach to change. It would be wasteful of the effort you have put into change this far. Failing to look at the rest of your life would be like getting braces to align your teeth and then refusing to wear the retainer to maintain those changes.

“I have found that most people who are addicted to one particular thing also fail to exercise control in other areas of their lives (p. 110)… Often this occurs because the underlying problem is not sexual addiction, but rather the lack of control, restraint, and discipline that comes from a life of self-gratification… As the person learns moderation in every area of life, he will find that the temptation to indulge in sexual sin will be weakened. Pursuing other forms of pleasure only serves to strengthen the addiction because gratifying oneself simply reinforces self-centeredness (p. 111)… A true overcomer must part with certain relationships, places, and things that were intimately associated with his sinful lifestyle. This is extremely difficult and often traumatic to the sex addict who, for many years, has looked to his sin for comfort, pleasure, and as an escape from the real world. The man invariably finds himself grieving the loss of, not just the pleasure of the sin, but also the other elements which accompanied the lifestyle of that sin (p. 124).” Steve Gallagher in At the Altar of Sexual Idolatry

You will be called on to love and rely on God more. Sexual sin is always the pursuit of something more than we can find in ourselves or a relationship with another person. Unless we address this deeper craving of the human soul we will become the slave of some other (possibly more functional) pleasure that will eventually leave. You were made for something greater than sex and nothing less than God will functionally satisfy you for long.

The changes required will take time. It is easy, at this point in your journey, to grow impatient and think, “I’ve done what I was supposed to do. Now let’s get on with it.” You have not yet done what you were supposed to do. You have only acknowledged or begun to make right what you should not have done. You have weeded your life. You are, in this step, beginning to plant seeds of honor and tend them to a lifestyle of godly character. The work ahead will take as much humility, faith, and reliance as the work you have already done.

“Faith in Jesus is not a quick fix. It’s certainly not a case of ‘just believe.’ There’s no ‘just’ about it. Yes, the message is ‘believe.’ But it’s never ‘just believe.’ We’re called to the fight of faith. So instead of ‘just believe,’ the message is ‘fight to believe.’ And it will be a fight, a daily fight. Some days you’ll be wounded; some days you’ll lose this battle. Then you’ll have to pick yourself up, fight to believe in God’s grace and reenter the fray… This is why so many people speak of turning to porn when they’re tired. It’s not because they think porn will be a pick-me-up—otherwise they’d make themselves coffee instead. It’s because they don’t feel they have the energy for the fight of faith (p. 60).” Tim Chester in Closing the Window

In this chapter we examine how life needs to be restructured under three headings: (1) Commitment to Live in God’s Reality; (2) Self-Control in All Areas of Life; and (3) Applying Wisdom to Relationships

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When we looked at the development of sexual sin in Step 1, we said a major threshold was crossed when sexual sin goes public (moving from images or conversations with anonymous people to arousing interaction with a real, known person). The same is true in the destruction of sexual sin; a major threshold is crossed as sexual integrity goes public (moving from private dialogue with God to public confession with real, known people).

If you have made it through the first four steps with integrity then change has happened, but it is starting in Step 5 that you lay the foundation for change to last. Privacy kills change and fuels sin. Transparency kills sin and fuels change. Chances are this step may scare you as much as any step you have taken since the first one. But remember it is not nearly as scary to move forward as it is dangerous to go backward. Don’t allow fear to make you forgetful.

This is a stage in the change process when many people want to only deal with their sin privately. But to deal with a private sin privately is like trying to wrestle an alligator in a swamp. You would be in its home turf. Every situational advantage would go to your sexual sin. If, however, you chose to wrestle the same alligator in a tree every situational advantage would go to you. Confession is when you cease fighting sexual sin on its home turf.

“If you want to stay stuck in your sin, confess it only to God. If you want to overcome it, confess it to someone else (p. 37).” Steve Gallagher in At the Altar of Sexual Idolatry

Remember, sin is not tamed. It is either killed or it kills. There are no “pet sins.” It is usually at this stage in the process when we begin to doubt this truth. Sin has been weakened. Life is probably getting better. A sense of hope should be emerging. These are good things, unless they cause us to relax and cut our journey towards God’s freedom short. Do not be deceived; unless your sin is exposed not only to the light of God’s truth but also Christian community, it will regain its strength.

“It is possible that Christians may remain lonely in spite of daily worship together, prayer together, and all their community through service—that the final breakthrough to community does not occur precisely because they enjoy community with one another as pious believers, but not with one another as those lacking piety, as sinners. For the pious community permits no one to be a sinner. Hence all have to conceal their sins from themselves and from the community. We are not allowed to be sinners (p. 108).” Dietrich Bonhoeffer in Life Together

As we examine what confession should look like and what it requires of us, we will do so in three sections: (1) to whom to confess; (2) how to confess (more than disclosure); and (3) preparing for confession.

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You probably feel like your soul has been laid bare in the first three steps. You have looked at yourself, your behaviors, and your life as a whole in ways that you have likely resisted doing for a long time. In this chapter you are going to bring that honest self-awareness before God. You are not bringing Him something (by way of information) that He needs in order to act. You are placing yourself in a position to receive what He has already done on your behalf.

If you presume upon God’s forgiveness (i.e., “God has to forgive me. He’s already sent Jesus to die. It would be a waste if He didn’t follow through. Besides, God would be a liar if He promised to forgive and didn’t honor His Word. I’ll go through the ritual to get what’s coming to me if that is what He wants.”), then you are not repenting. You are making a legal transaction with someone you believe to be too stupid to know better. Additionally, you are prone to use God in a manipulative fashion with anyone you offended in your sin (i.e., “If God has forgiven me, why can’t you?”). If this fits you, receive the strong warning of Galatians 6:7, “God is not mocked.”

If you neglect seeking God’s forgiveness (i.e., “I don’t deserve to be forgiven. I should have to pay for what I’ve done wrong. I’ve made enough people suffer because of my selfishness, so I shouldn’t add Jesus to the list.”), then you are wallowing in self-pity and will remain in the same shame-cycle that has likely fueled your sin for a long time. Relationally, you are remaining an “unsafe” person who will either betray again (sexually or through deceit) or by virtue of your self-pity become manipulative of others with your use of guilt.

The only way out of sin is through genuine repentance. All lasting change is built upon repentance. Repentance is when we change our primary allegiance from self to God. Repentance is when we turn from trusting our ways to trusting God’s ways. Repentance is when our primary goal changes from self-satisfaction and self-protection to glorifying God and loving others.

“If the problem were simply with our eyes, then the solution would be to avert our eyes. But if the problem begins in the heart, then the solution must be much more fundamental (p. 41).” Tim Chester in Closing the Window

“A common flaw in dealing with the sinful patterns of viewing sexually explicit material is to focus solely on employing methods to stop the behavior (behavior modification) to the exclusion of addressing the root issues of the heart (p. 9).” Brian Croft in Help! He’s Struggling with Pornography

This chapter solidifies all the work you have done so far and serves as the foundation for each step remaining in the process. You have learned a great deal about yourself and your sin in the first three chapters. Repentance is when you commit to quit trying to make your broken ways work. You are about to make some significant changes to restructure your life (Step 6). Repentance is what allows these changes to be life giving rather than exercises in self-punishment or to reinforce shame.

The subject of repentance will be discussed in four sections.

1. The Barrier to Repentance: Pride
2. The Key Elements of Repentance
3. To Whom Are You Repenting?
4. A Sample Prayer of Repentance

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Why? Why? Why?! This is a vexing question. As soon as you say “because…” you run the risk of blame-shifting and we’ve already spoken to the dangers of this. But in the absence of a “because…” it sounds like you should just be able to “Stop it!” and if that were the case you wouldn’t be reading these materials.

Part of this confusion begins with how we commonly view people. It is popular to think of ourselves as basically good people who apart from outside interference would not do bad things; act selfishly, betray, sacrifice more important things for less important things, or otherwise be foolish.

“The power of all temptation is the prospect that it will make me happier. No one sins out of a sense of duty (p. 334).” John Piper in Future Grace

We are born twisted, broken, and out of order. We are born with a bent towards self and we experience life self-centeredly (trapped within our bodies; literally only seeing the world through our own eyes and interpreting it through our own experiences and desires). This does not mean that we cannot love. It does mean we must be both commanded and enabled to love God and love others because of our sin-nature causes us to innately center on self.

Some would take this to mean that personal history (i.e., experiences of abuse, rejection, failure, or neglect) is inconsequential to sexual sin. But this draws an unnecessary distinction between our sin nature and personal history. While we sin because we are sinners, our appetite for and bondage to particular sins have histories. Understanding these histories can enhance our ability to cooperate with or apply God’s power to change.

There are two truths you must keep in balance as you work through this chapter or you will fall into shame/despair or blame-shifting. First, sin reveals our heart so we are responsible for our sin and change will require dying to self. Second, our heart has a history and God wants to do more than eliminate a sin; God wants to redeem your history by replacing lies with truth, despair with hope, and self with Him.

This chapter is divided into three major sections:

1. Learning the History of My Sin
2. Identifying the Motive(s) of My Sin
3. Capturing the Present Struggle

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The last chapter was painful. Looking at “what” types of sexual win you struggle with is hard. This chapter will likely be equally uncomfortable as you examine the “extent” of those sins.

Unless you acknowledge the breadth and impact of your sexual sin, your efforts at change will be limited to the most overt and recent sins. Omitting this step also results in rooting your efforts at change in the powerful emotions you feel (shame in a “bad” moment; relief or pride in a “good” moment) rather than the reality of your history. Neither sincerity nor shame will sustain lasting change. You’ve probably already experienced that many times, if you slowed down enough to acknowledge it.

“Every Christian guy who looks at porn wants to stop, but many of us want to stop just a little bit less than we want to keep going… Here’s a promise. You will never stop until you begin to see the monstrous nature of the sin you are committing. You will never stop until the sin is more horrifying to you than the commission of the sin is enjoyable. You will need to hate that sin before you can find freedom from it (p. 17).” Tim Challies in Sexual Detox

In this chapter, you will be asked to examine three areas of your life.

1. The history and growth of my sin
2. The impact my sin has had on me
3. The impact my sin has had on others

The examination that you do in this chapter will be foundational for the effectiveness of the coming chapters. You will come to know yourself in a way that you have probably avoided. You will come to know your history in a way that will allow you to let others know you (especially your spouse, if married) in ways you have hidden. You will come to know other people in your life as real people as opposed to objects of pleasure to be exploited or sources of rejection to be avoided.

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This is miserable. Whether you are picking up this material for yourself or to help a friend, you’ve probably tried to avoid this subject for a while. Although unpleasant, this material is vital. It is vital for you personally if you are caught in sexual sin, because you will never know lasting peace and joy while the leach of lust drains your life. It is vital for you as a friend, because sexual sin is reaching epidemic proportions in our culture and must be addressed if we are going to do “relevant” ministry.

"If you preach the gospel in all aspects with the exception of the issues that deal specifically with your time, you are not preaching the gospel at all." Martin Luther as quoted by Tim Chester in Closing the Window (p. 10).

Sex is awkward to talk about, especially when guilt is involved. Even reading about sex when it has to do with sin. Thinking about confession is as painful as sex is fun; as repulsive as sex is attractive. The equal and opposite force of what drew you to sexual sin will try to drive you away from this study. Satan, the one seeking to destroy your life and relationships (I Pet. 5:8) wants to keep you from this study, especially in the openness of a G4 group or counseling relationship, as much as he wanted you to sin.

One of the things that makes sexual sin hard to talk about is the stereotypes that we place on those who struggle with lust. It feels like if you admit that you struggle with sexual sin that you are confessing to being a pedophile, a social misfit, or a danger to society. Our goal in these materials is to speak to the real dangers of sexual sin without reinforcing these stereotypes.

“Sex addicts, however, do not fit the popular stereotypes. They are otherwise gentle and kind. They care deeply for others. To fellow church members they appear to be ideal Christians (p. 16).” Mark Laaser in Healing the Wounds of Sexual Addiction

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It would be easy to want this study, like this season of your life, to just be over. But this study, like your life, has at least one more chapter (and several appendices) left. When you put a great deal of effort, as you undoubtedly have, into getting past something, it can be easy to forget that there is something next. The fact that God has brought you to this point should be evidence enough that He has more in store for you and more to do through you.

In this chapter you will be doing most of the writing, because it is your life that is being stewarded for the glory of God. No one else could write this chapter but you. What you will be given is nine questions that walk you through a life assessment to determine where God wants you to serve now and where He may want to prepare you to serve in the future.

As you read through and answer the next nine questions, remember God’s patience and timing. There will be some aspects of God’s design that you can engage in immediately. But there may also be ways you want to serve God that will require you to be more mature or be equipped before you are prepared to fulfill them. The main thing is to begin to have a vision for life that involves being God’s servant and actively engaging that vision where you are currently equipped.

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New and normal are words that do not belong together. But that is precisely what step eight is all about, establishing a new normal. In steps 2-4, you looked at the things that created an unhealthy normal. In step 5, you grieved that these things were ever “normal” for you. In steps 6-7, you began to piece together a new, healthy normal. Now, in step 8, you will begin to rest in that new normal and allow it to solidify.

Unfortunately, prolonged relational dysfunction created a way of life that made it easy for us to wonder if “normal” could ever be good again. Hopefully that skepticism is beginning to fade by the time you’ve reached this point in your journey.

Realize, the phrase “new normal” seems to imply more intentionality than it actually requires. You do not need a spreadsheet with seven columns and twenty-four rows to itemize and color-code. As you live wisely, a new-healthy normal will happen. This chapter will be devoted to identifying the defining marks of this new normal so you can be comforted as this occurs.

The chapter will also include three other sections. First, we will look at how this new normal assimilates into your life story. This will be a place for you to summarize what you learned and how you have grown over the course of this study. You will seek to combine the narrative you built in steps four through six with the practices you implemented in steps seven.

Second, guidance will be provided to help you think through how to prepare to transition from your current formal helping relationship (i.e., support group, counseling relationship, or mentor relationship) into general small group ministry of your church for continued encouragement and growth. You are about to enter a new season of transition: from healing to living.

Third, consideration will be given to those who are considering divorce. “Overcoming Codependency,” as we have entitled this study, does not require ending relationships. But some participants may find themselves in marriages where the covenant has been repeatedly violated and there are no signs of willingness to honor it. This unfortunate reality requires guidance. 

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One of the biggest challenges in identifying goals for combatting the effects of codependency is to be active without accepting false guilt or distorting how you allocate responsibility for change again. It is easy to think if there is something I can do that would be more effective than what I have been doing, then if I had been doing it all along everything would be fine.

In order to help you avoid this mindset, we will order the strategies for relating more healthily in a progression that builds from intrapersonal strategies (inside of you) to interpersonal strategies (between you and the other person). The intent is to reinforce the idea that you can get healthier even if the other person does not and that their possible resistance to change does not have to be interpreted as your personal failure.

1. Gaining Perspective
2. Building Resilience
3. Alleviating Emotional Triggers
4. Growing Positive Influence

As you learn from and practice each strategy, pray that God will use it for restorative purposes in the life of your loved one. Ask God to soften their heart towards their need to change and provide them the courage to vocalize their need to change.

But, just as fervently, pray that God will give you the strength to continue on your journey towards healthier relational patterns whether your loved one is cooperative or not. If distance is created by your healthier choices, that is not “turning your back” or “leaving them behind.” Instead, it is you removing your cooperation with their dysfunction and pioneering a healthier life as an invitation for them to follow your example as you follow the example of Christ (I Corinthians 11:1).

Note: The relational restoration methods advised in this step presume that safety has been restored to the relationship. Until your loved one has taken the steps to acknowledge their destructive patterns and evidence change, then you should (a) only seek to implement those components of this chapter that pertain to your personal-emotional well-being, or (b) apply the interpersonal strategies to relationships that were unduly harmed by the mistrust developed because of your abusive-addictive relationship. Until safety is honored, then restoration is not wise or possible.

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