Brave Men

I wish to applaud a group of men who begin a new journey tomorrow night.  They will join together in a fifteen week experience called the Men’s Purity Group associated with my church, Community Christian Fellowship.  Together they will explore their compulsion for pornography with the goal of experiencing Christ as He gives true delivery.

The internet is the leading vehicle to feed this growing addiction.  It is no surprise that pornography is a multi-billion dollar industry in the US.  Some estimate that as much as 25% of all internet traffic is related to explicit sites and images.  The average exposure for first-time pornograpy viewing on the internet is now 11 years old.  All of this is documented by Jerry Ropelato at Internet Pornography Statistics, toptenreviews.com.  Is it any wonder that men find it relatively easy to become tangled here?

The church in my opinion has been silent about this for too long.  Through counseling sessions with men who want and long for change, I have been mentored not just about the problem, but also some good classes that are offering lasting change.  Victory takes more than just putting “blocking software” on your computer.  Although this is a good step, it does not address the root of the problem.  Men also report that merely feeling ashamed and vowing not to do it again usually does not work.  And that’s where a class like Men’s Purity, and often times ongoing personal therapy, come in.  Men must engage and uncover not just the actions of their addictions, but the issues which are injuries in the soul that lead them to this as a numbing agent.  I know it sounds strange that I would call pornography “numbing” because men usually associate it with an extreme rush and even exhilaration.  But at the root, addiction is about escape and numbing pain that we don’t know how to deal with.

And so I am in prayer for a group of men who meet tomorrow night.  They are men who are taking the bold step of saying, We know we have a problem and we long for God to help us into lasting recovery.  We know this is no quick fix, and that we need each other for the ongoing battle.  These are BRAVE MEN.  I tip my hat to them as they embark on a new journey of discovering God and themselves for the next few months.