Although this is a “Bollywood” short, it is a great, sobering video for us to watch. Why don’t we try to make our world a safer place for our children? It all starts with us.
Recovery Articles
Journal Through Recovery Entry 13: Giving a First Step
My counselor just let me know that he thought my First Step was ready. There were parts I wanted to leave out. Disclosing was hard enough. Looking at my wife and telling her all of my sins, my deep rooted sexual sins…that was excruciating. Now, I get to do it again, this time with other men in recovery.
Step One: “We admitted we were powerless over our addictions and compulsive behaviors, that our lives had become unmanageable.”
I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.” (Romans 7:18)
Powerless is the appropriate word. I am powerless. I didn’t know that. I didn’t know I was powerless. I thought the opposite. I thought I was in control. I thought I could “manage” my life and had managed it quite well. I feel powerless as I read over my First Step, my description of how and why I ended up here in recovery, powerless.
Of all the options, I had to pick Castimonia for a recovery group. First steps are detailed, thorough, written and read out loud…at a group meeting. Other recovery groups make them short and private. Not Castimonia. Nice. (Sex Addicts Anonymous also practices giving a complete public First Step).
I let the leaders of Castimonia know that I was ready to do my First Step. I expected to wait a week or two before it could be scheduled. That turned out to be wishful thinking on my part. My date was the next day.
The room was full. It kept filling up. I hadn’t been in a meeting this large. Maybe it was me just thinking that …nope, its full! We opened the meeting, read through all the readings, finished up, and the leader stated that today would be a First Step, unlike any other meetings. One of my accountability partners introduced my First Step. I could breathe a little seeing my friend there, the one I had read it to already. Maybe I wouldn’t hyperventilate before I started.
So now its my turn…“Hi, I am a believer in Christ and a recovering sex addict and this is my First Step…”
I couldn’t look up. The leader told me not to get too deep in my shame, to focus on the guilt for my actions but not allow myself to be identified by them. I tried hard. I kept repeating the Serenity Prayer in my head the entire time.
Reading those words, my life story, my sexual sin, the damage I caused, how I tried to minimize them in the past and how I try not to think about all of them even now. It’s so much. I spoke out loud the unmanageable parts of my life, the insanity, the costs. And then I finished.
The feedback started…guys identifying with different aspects of my story. I told one guy that I had heard his testimony and it gave me courage to speak out loud an early part of my story that caused me the most shame. He told me that I would get to a point where I wasn’t ashamed to tell my story. I would know that God wants me to use it to show others that He can work in all areas, even the darkest.
I wrote this in my journal after I finished:
“God help me let go of my shame. Help me to not be ashamed of my story. Help me to know you can and will use my story for your glory and to impact others. Give me strength and guidance in how to share and use my story to impact my family.”
Castimonia Purity Podcast Episode 28a: Mike and Sex Addiction – Testimony and Interview (Part A)
Mike takes us through his life’s story that walks us through his addiction story. His honest approach to the dark days in his past show the power that Satan can have over us.
He talks about his youth as well as the slippery slope of his addiction. His progression into bondage of sexual sin is one that highlights the broken thinking and false beliefs that we tell ourselves.
Listen for how his story is like your story…we all have brokenness and areas that God can mend. It is about turning all of us over to Him. Listen to part B about the hope and freedom that Mike found in his spirtual program of recovery.
Our testimonies now will follow a part A and part B format to highlight the brokeness of the addiction, but we will utilize a part B to give ample time to the message of hope and freedom.
Please visit castimonia.org for more information about sex addiction recovery, or you can email us at puritypodcast@castimonia.org
Trust Your Therapist
PORN & MASTURBATION: 40 Questions Pastors Should Ask Your Husband
Originally posted at: http://prevailingwordministries.wordpress.com/2014/12/04/porn-masturbation-40-questions-pastors-should-ask-your-husband/
by prevailing word ministries
Even as information is available everywhere to discuss this taboo issue, many wives have expressed disappointment and frustration over the fact that pastors are ill-equipped to address their husband’s porn and masturbation activities.
The answer is simple.
Pastors are ill-equipped for three reasons.
1. They’ve never studied the subject thoroughly enough.
2. They are secretly involved in porn and masturbation themselves (50% of pastors in America).
3. They refer the subject to worldly counselors and Christian counselors, specializing in this area.
I thank God for Pastor Roger Jamison, senior pastor of Sword Of The Spirit Tabernacle in Brooklyn, NY for showing me where to get the information and he deserves much of the credit for this. A majority of these questions were posed to me by Pastor Roger. I’ve written down a few of my own to cover as much ground as possible.
I believe that every pastor should understand the very basics of this subject because sooner or later, a wife will come into the pastor’s study with questions. Sooner or later, a husband will come into the pastor’s study and ask questions to be delivered.
In many circles, deliverance ministry is often the way many pastors address the issue.
They anoint with oil, pray for them, lay hands on them, and then send them on their way.
Few realize that it will take this and one on one ministry over a long period of time.
Sexual immorality is a very entrenched stronghold that requires tenacity, vigilance, persistence, and a willingness to cut certain things to the root.
It is man’s most sacred idol.
You mess with a man’s immoral sex life and you will get his wrath.
Very few men will desire to be free because they believe that this is their business.
Pastors should avail themselves with as much material on this subject because every church has a person that is into porn and masturbation. The size of the church doesn’t matter. And the reputation of the church doesn’t matter. Just because something looks holy and sound holy is not excluded.
Mega, mid-sized, and store front churches all have some measure of men involved in sexual immorality, porn and masturbation.
If the pastor knows everything and what every man is doing sexually, this statement wouldn’t be as bold. Even I, in a small storefront church with only 9 men as members in Brooklyn, NY, would never take it for granted. Men are capable of falling into Secret Sexual Sins no matter how much I preach on this subject.
Having said this, many women will express exasperation over her husband’s porn and masturbation addictions.
If her husband is willing to sit with a pastor, a pastor must be clean, holy, and pure before God. He must ask pointed questions to get at the heart of the issue. He must be prepared with as much information as possible. It will not take one night of pouring oil and laying on of hands. It will take a great deal of dealing with the mind of a man bent on keeping his perversion.
The wife must be supportive and prayerful. She must be patient because his addiction didn’t happen over night.
Finally, the pastor should ask that man to answer 40 questions. This will help the pastor to ascertain to depths of the husband’s porn and masturbation involvement. Many of you reading this will not agree with this and the questions. However, every person has a different approach to dealing with porn and masturbation.
Sexuality Questionare
1. Do you know Jesus as your Lord & Savior?
2. Do you love your wife and your children, if any?
3. How often do you attend church with your family?
4. How often do you read your Bible and pray?
5. Do you know that your wife loves you and how does she express her love for you (she says that she loves you)?
6. How often do you look at movies with sexual content?
7. Do you look forward to looking at movies with sexual content?
8. Does the magazine stand with sexually provocative pictures, TV commercials, Internet news and weather stories with sexually attractive women stimulate you to watch porn and masturbate when you get home?
9. Do you consider yourself an introvert (isolated) or are you very social?
10. Do you believe that porn and masturbation is a sin? Why or why not?
11. Do you believe that looking at another woman sexually is a sin? Why or why not?
12. Do you believe in marriage and monogamy? Why or why not?
13. How often do you and your wife experience sexual intimacy?
14. Are you still sexually attracted to your wife?
15. Does your wife satisfy you sexually?
16. Do you share your sexual preferences (reasonably mutual sex positions and sex acts), and does she share her sexual preferences with you to please each other in the bedroom?
17. What emotions and attitudes does your wife possess that turn you away from her? (loud, boisterous, combative, confrontational, overbearing, headstrong, mean spirited).
18. Does she ask questions for information or does it turn into an inquisition?
19. How often do you and your wife argue, and over what specific issue(s)?
20. Do you watch porn and masturbate? And if so, how often?
21. Are you into drugs and alcohol, or any other substance?
22. If involved, describe such involvement. Occasionally, moderate to heavy addiction?
23. When you are not sexually satisfied (orgasm), do you masturbate to achieve sexual satisfaction?
24. At what age were you exposed to watching porn?
25. At what age did you start touching yourself sexually?
26. Were you ever molested or sexually assaulted?
27. Is any thing preventing you from having sexual intimacy with your wife regularly?
28. Do you have any medical conditions (such as ED erectile dysfunction) that may prevent you from sexual performance with your wife?
29. In the morning and at night, do you touch yourself sexually when an erection occurs?
30. Have you ever committed adultery or solicited a prostitute?
31. What keeps you interested in watching porn?
32. Does sadness, depression, worry, fear, pain in the soul, anger, loneliness, hunger, fatigue, job satisfaction or job dissatisfaction, job or marriage pressures, marriage dissatisfaction, discouragement, or money issues trigger the desire to watch porn and masturbate?
33. Do you and your wife resolve the issue(s) before going to bed?
34. Have you seriously considered getting help to stop watching porn and masturbation?
35. Have you seriously considered understanding the true facts behind pornography and masturbation?
36. Have you ever considered the fact that if you have children, your son might eventually be exposed to your porn and masturbation habits?
37. Have you ever considered the possibility that if you have a daughter, she might be kidnapped for the sex trade, kidnapped for child porn or molestation, or grow up to be a porn star, or get married to a man with porn and masturbation habits like you?
38. How often have you called it quits to porn and masturbation and return to committing these acts?
39. Have you ever been so mad at yourself for watching porn and masturbating that you’ve considered doing harm to yourself?
40. Do you want to be free?
Pastors, feel free to use these questions because you will need them.
But make sure that you are free from porn and masturbation yourself. You can’t help a man out of a burning building if you are burning in the same building.
