Why There is No Such Thing as Porn Addiction
Am I being intentionally provocative? Yes, but the reason is to communicate an important understanding. Viewing pornography is a behavior. Researchers gather data on porn use it because allows them to gather important statistics on who is using and why. But porn use fails to get to the root cause. Porn use is the result of addiction, not its cause.
Jesus nails the actual problem. When he said in Matthew 5:27-28, ‘You have heard it said, you shall not commit adultery,’ he was referring to the Old Testament law and perhaps to the current teaching of the Pharisees about sexual behavior. This teaching can be reduced to ”avoid the behavior, (in this case adultery) and you have fulfilled the law.” Many churches still teach this, but their members are still using. To make matters worse, because what they have been told doesn’t work, shame multiplies
But Jesus, as he so often did, went to the heart of the matter. ‘But I say to you that everyone who looks on a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.’ Our problem is in the heart. What can we learn from Jesus’ teaching?
1. Behaviors like adultery, porn use, internet chat rooms and so on, are fruits, not roots. To understand and deal with these matters, a person must get to the heart first. Proverbs 23:7 tells us “As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.” So if we want to deal with an addictive behavior, we must get to the heart of the matter,. This is why internet filters and accountability partners can play a role but they cannot change the heart. And the heart is key above all.
In my 30 years in and out of recovery groups, I have met a number of people who rarely if ever look at porn. If porn were the problem, they would not need a program, would they? Of course not, because they are not using porn. And yet they clearly belong in the rooms of recovery. What gives? Behaviors differ. But the only problem everyone shares in these groups is lust. That is our common problem and addressing it as such is our common solution.
2. Remember, Jesus is not equating lust with adultery. Many Christians misunderstand this point. They say things like ‘it is just as bad to commit adultery in your heart as to act it out.’ No it’s not and Jesus does not teach that. Adultery brings another person into our sin and creates havoc in two lives or more, not just one. In the case of King David, it was many lives. Jesus point is simple, Avoiding adultery does not equate to lust-free.
In extreme cases this argument equating heart adultery with physical adultery can justify actual adultery by thinking, ‘Well, I have already blown it by playing it out in my mind, so there is no point in stopping now.’ No, you haven’t and yes, there is. The best way to stop is to bring someone into our secrets, flee the person involved and get help asap. This is four alarm fire stuff. Jesus is not equating lust with adultery, any more than he equates anger with murder. (See Matthew 5:21-22) In only one of these is there a dead person and its not anger. No, Jesus is saying adultery begins with lust and all lusters, whether they act it out or not, have a serious problem that needs addressing. In many cases, unless it is addressed with considerable effort, a wall of pain will appear the person’s path. Jesus is warning that a lustful heart is the very spirit of adultery, but short of the behavior, it is not adultery itself.
3. This should cure us once and for all of a judgmental attitude when it comes to other people’s sexual behavior. We live in an era when many church leaders and prominent Christians are falling. Rather than shaking our heads in self-righteousness or secretly feeling superior, our attitude should be “there but for the grace of God go I.” Jesus is leaving us with a very important truth. There are a lot more people struggling with heart faithfulness out there than adulterers. The spiritually mature will be compassionate in regard to this problem because they are aware of their own vulnerability in these areas. If used properly, that awareness can drive us closer to Jesus than ever before, make us more vulnerable in fellowship than ever before and help us befriend those who are very alone in their struggle or in the aftermath of disclosure. We might even find in helping others, our own wounds are healed.
in Jesus, the Lust-Bearer
Jay Haug
Executive Director, Living Without Lust
livingwithoutlust.com
jay@livingwithoutlust.com
904-635-8546
