8 Strategies to Defeat Pornography for High School Boys
While I can’t give you everything you’ll need in this short article, I’d like to outline pieces of a plan that can lead to success over any addiction.
This post was written by Deepak Reju, the author of one of the newest volumes in our ‘Track’ series, A (Male) Student’s Guide to Purity in a Porn-Saturated Culture.
“I don’t know how to stop.”
Jonathan sits across from me. He’s a junior in high school. He’s a good student, a fantastic soccer player, popular among his peers, and well-liked at church. He’s charming and his smile could be on a television commercial.
Yet, worry is written all over his face. Jonathan has been wrestling with an addiction to pornography, and he can’t figure out how to defeat it. He’s been able to conquer everything else in his life, but not porn. Ever since he got hooked two years ago, he’s continued to consume porn’s poison.
Jonathan comes to me because he feels defeated—which is new for him. But, God brings us low and humbles us when we need it the most.
Like Jonathan, do you struggle with porn? If so, what’s an adequate battle plan to fight your addiction? How can we help you climb out of the pit?
While I can’t give you everything you’ll need in this short article, I’d like to outline pieces of a plan that can lead to success over any addiction. Think of this as a ten-thousand-foot flyover of the landscape—a quick overview. If this piques your interest, you can dive deeper with my book: A (Male) Student’s Guide to Purity in a Porn-Saturated Culture.
Strategy #1: Genuine Repentance
Repentance is a self-conscious turning from sin. It’s a Holy-Spirit driven conviction that what you’re doing is wrong. It serves as motivation to make a change. If you have guilty feelings that what you’re doing is bad and no genuine conviction that this sin is an offense against God (2 Cor. 7:10b), then you’re not going to get very far.
You need a “prodigal son” moment (Luke 15:17-19), when you wake up to your sin and grieve over it. If you don’t have this, plead with God to give you conviction. When your sin is disgusting to you, and God’s grace is sweeter, you’re heading down the right path.
Strategy #2: Rule Your Carnal Desires (Don’t Let Them Rule You)
You crave things: delicious food, cool water on a hot day, and time with good friends. These are good things, and they’re a gift from God (James 1:17)!
You also wrestle with desires for pleasure and intimacy. God put in you a hunger for intimacy with the opposite sex. Your sexual desires are a good thing. But, according to God’s good design, sex belongs within marriage (Heb. 13:4). Partaking in sexual desires before God intends is where you get in trouble. Maybe you’ve been looking online at illicit material or partaking in premarital sex. A good thing (sexual desires) turns into a bad thing (sex before marriage) when you ignore God’s boundaries.
At the heart of every porn addiction are sexual desires that have taken over. If you feed a 300lb dragon juicy steak, he won’t be satisfied when he’s done eating; he’ll want more. In fact, he’ll demand more, and wrap his tail around you until he gets what he wants. It’s the same thing with your sinful nature. If you feed it porn, it’s never satisfied. It grows bigger and stronger and takes over your life. The key to defeating the out-of-control desires is to starve them. The apostle Paul tells us to make no provisions for your sinful nature (Rom. 13:14).
Strategy #3: Reorient Your Life Around Christ
When your sexual desires overrun your life, you become a slave to your desires. They rule you. As you starve these desires, you want healthy, God-honoring desires to take over. You want your desire for Christ grow. This should be your goal—that Christ would be supreme. That might seem like a far-fetched reality when porn has taken over, but nothing is impossible with God (Luke 1:39). In fact, a greater affection for Christ will have an expulsive force on your carnal desires.
Do you want to defeat the porn struggle? You can with Christ. But you’ve got to repent and put your trust in Christ. That’s always a good foundation for your life.
Strategy #4: Be Brutal at Cutting off Access Points
When Jesus speaks of fighting sexual sin, he tells us to gouge out our eye or cut off our arm (Matt. 5:27-30). He’s not passive and neither should you be. Jesus’ aggressive approach to fighting sexual sin is brutal and radical.
Take a moment to compare what you’re doing to what Jesus tells you to do. How do you measure up? Have you been passive in fighting sin? What’s your attitude—aggressive in fighting sin or apathetic?
You might not be sure what radical steps might mean. Let me offer a few practical suggestions:
· Are you willing to completely shut down access to illicit material on your phone?
· Can you cut out all streaming services which give you R-rated movies with sex scenes?
· Are you willing to give your phone’s password to a friend so you can’t look at anything inappropriate in a hard moment?
· Can you be honest about workarounds on your phone?
· Will you look away when a scantily clad woman walks by?
· Can you be honest about temptations, fantasies, masturbation or any other problems?
Are you willing to take practical and radical steps to fight off sexual sin? Does your sin have a hold on you more than you have on it?
Strategy #5: Aim for Your Heart, Not Your Head
Jesus also tells us that what you do flows from your heart (Luke 6:43-45). The heart is the central part of who you are. It’s the command center of your life—what you say, do and think comes from your heart.
Your desire for porn is not just about pleasure. Dig into your heart, and you’ll find there’s more. When Johnny is bored on Saturdays, he wanders online to websites with illicit material. But it’s more than just boredom: Johnny is discontent with his life.
Or, consider Peter—after a few intense months of academics and pressure from his sports coaches, when the summer starts, he plunges into porn. Because of the intense pressure Peter faced, he feels entitled to a little pleasure.
Johnny’s discontentment and Peter’s sense of entitlement are their motivations to pursue porn. They take practical steps to block access points (strategy #4), but unless they confront and repent of their heart issues, they’ll continue to battle their carnal desires.
Heart change starts with genuine repentance (strategy #1). It then adds in many of the strategies I’m describing. By God’s grace, Johnny and Peter don’t have to stay stuck in their sin. True heart change can bring real, substantial change to their life.
Strategy #6: Fight Your Shame and Satan’s Bold Lies
Shame whispers in your ear, “You’re worth nothing.” And sadly, you believe it. You hide and don’t tell friends or family about your struggles. The devil’s got you trapped exactly where he wants you—alone. Christians don’t do well in isolation (Prov. 18:1).
But you can’t let shame have the final say or let it define you. Christ draws you out of your isolation, especially when he declares: “You are mine!” He covers your shame with His love. In fact, he bore shame for you, so that you don’t have to stay ashamed.
Strategy #7: Wisely and Carefully Handle Temptations
You see a pretty girl with a shapely figure walking toward you, and you look. You probably stare a few second too long. You get the thought imbedded in your mind – “I should look at something online when I get home.” After dinner with your family, you go to your room, shut the door, and plunge into porn. You might think: “It’s inevitable” and “I can’t help myself.” Not true! You can learn to handle temptations, early and often.
There are lots of external temptations you fight off every day, as you try to survive an over-sexualized culture around you. But there are also temptations that swell up within you. You have dozens of images stored up in your brain, and unfortunately, in down moments, your mind can go places that it shouldn’t. Nonetheless, with the Holy Spirit’s power, you can grow in self-control of what you look at with your eyes, and what you think about in your mind.
Strategy #8: Rebuild Your Terrible Accountability
Honestly, most accountability stinks. Friends promise to hold you accountable, but they don’t follow through or check on you. They can be unreliable and inconsistent.
You need help that will make a difference. You want honest, frequent, local, tough, hopeful, and Word-driven partners. You need men who will be an encouragement but also not shy away from saying hard things when needed.
The End of the Matter
An addiction to pornography can be defeated, but you can’t do it on your own. You need competent, godly people to come alongside of you. You need genuine repentance and faith in Christ. You must starve the out-of-control desires. You should be brutal about access points and honestly confront your heart issues. You can fight your shame and Satan’s lies. You should also wisely handle temptations both around you and in you.
That’s a lot to take on. But with Christ’s help, you can win this battle. When a true desire for purity is the goal, dependance on Jesus can help you get there.