I need victory over an addiction to lust

[Belonging to Abba]

I want to ask for some advice on this forum about getting victory over an addiction to masturbation and lust. I am thinking of getting back to a place of victory and purity by either taking a discipleship course on purity online or by asking for prayer from prayer ministries (or both).

There is an online discipleship course that I have tried taking that lasts for 30 days and there is a longer follow up course. They assign you to a mentor and you get to answer questions involving Biblical teaching and discipleship. Several years in the past I took this course and the accountability really helped me abstain from sinful desires. However in recent times there have been changes to the purity course where the accountability questions have been removed from the course under the guise of wanting people to focus less on sin and more on Christ. I have found that taking the course has been less reliable of a way to hold me accountable in a way that I will abstain from masturbation. What I am referring to is there used to be a question at the end of each lesson that would ask, "Have you been free from masturbation since the last lesson you took?" I think this course has also been less reliable for me at the present time because of my own problem with not taking it often enough recently, where it would have been better if I had made it a goal to take every day.

Well, one of the mentors that used to disciple people through the course apparently disagreed with some of the changes made in the course and he broke away from the organization and wrote his own 60 day course. His course is a correspondence course taken by email where you fill out answers to the questions in each lesson by email. There are accountability questions at the end of each lesson and so I think this course might be more reliable than the other course. However when I tried to start taking this course I went in circles in some of my discussions by email with the mentor too much and he got in some disagreements with me and he kicked me out of his course in a way that I felt was really unfair and he said I was not allowed to take his course.

However if I am desperate enough for purity, I am wondering about the idea of trying to sneak back into this guy's course by using a different name and email and filling out a fake city and state when I sign up for his course again. I think that might be considered dishonest but I think the sin of impurity is a worse sin and so I might be desperate enough to sneak back into his course with a different name.

There is a third way I may pursue purity and that is by submitting prayer requests to prayer ministries online asking for God to break the power of an addiction to lust. In the past when I asked for prayer from a certain prayer ministry, God intervened in my life in a miraculous way and I was able to walk in complete victory for seven months. However after having a relapse I was stuck in addiction again, so I asked for prayer a few times again and this time I was desperate and so I asked for prayer to receive the chastening of the Lord and also an encounter with the fear of the Lord. The way I saw this prayer answered is tribulation that happened in the workplace for a short time and also a mental health hospitalization where I had an unusual dream where in some way I was before the presence of the Lord and really undone before His presence and terrified before His presence. Through this chastening I was able to walk in victory again for a couple months but after having another relapse I have been trapped in an addiction to masturbation and lust again.

So now I am thinking of asking for prayer from this ministry again, and I may ask for prayer every week until I am walking in freedom again. However I am afraid to ask for prayer for the chastening of the Lord to happen because I'm not sure I want to bring tribulation into my life. In the Bible the chastening of the Lord has sometimes brought people close to death, and Psalm 107 describes people being subjected to bitter labor. However I may ask for prayer for God's chastening but that He would have mercy in how He brings it, and I may ask that it would be only what I need. I would rather get freedom through taking a 60 day course than have to go through chastening again but if I find freedom through going through some tribulation I think it will be worth it. What do you think?

 

[Barnabas2]

Dear Christian. You wrote (However I am afraid to ask for prayer for the chastening of the Lord to happen because I'm not sure I want to bring tribulation into my life.)
God only chastens those who stubbornly continue in sin. He helps and encourages those who seeks to walk in His ways of love and purity. He's standing by to help you.

I want to encourage you.

There is victory in Jesus! Hear what the Word of God says:-

1. 1 Corinthians 10:13. No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, He will also provide an escape, so that you can stand up under it.

Please note, everyone of us are and will be until we arrive in heaven, subject to temptation. Yours is no different to anyone else's. However, please remember, temptation is not sin. It only becomes sin when we yield to it and give in to it. Don't let the devil make life miserable for you because you are tempted. Every believer is tempted. Our Saviour was tempted but didn't sin.

God will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you can bear. That is, the temptation will never be too strong for you to overcome.

The way of escape is not from temptation but through temptation. He will give you grace to stand firm under it and through it victoriously.

1) James 4:7. Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Victory over temptation and sin is dependant on three things.

A) You are born again. You have been converted to Christ. (To anyone reading this who is not a believer) If you are not, then you are and will be a slave to sin and Satan. If you are not born again (John 3 then it is imperative you seek the Lord while He may be found and call on Him while He is near. You must be born again.

B) As a believer you must be in submission to the Lord. Jesus must be Lord of all or He is not Lord at all. Have you handed they keys of every department in your life over to Him? This is so Important if you are seeking victory in you life. In Ps 66:18 it says, If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened. Sin, any sin cherished, will cause God to refuse to listen to your requests. If you sincerely have confessed, repented and genuinely sought to turn away from sin you are in a good place, even if you at present are struggling and maybe experiencing failure from time to time. God's ear is still open to your hearts cry.

C) Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Read that slowly and let it sink deep into your sub consciousness. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. You will not buckle under his lying temptations. He will run away from you. As you trust the Lord and seek His face Satan is terrified and knows he is defeated. His temptations are lies. He cannot give what he promises. Only God can do that. Satan cannot make you do anything you don't want to do. Satan tempts us to bring out the worst in us. God tests us to bring out the best in us.

Do what Jesus did. Find a Bible promise suitable to your particular type of temptation. Believe it. Quote it to Satan. Steadfastly resist his lying attempts to drag you down into sin. God will come to your aid and Satan will - must - flee from you. If on occasions you may slip or fall run to 1 John 1:9 immediately. That is the infallible remedy.

This is the promise of God. Believe and now go and prove it. Be careful to give God all the glory.

 

[joshua 1 9]

I want to ask for some advice on this forum about getting victory over an addiction to masturbation and lust.

We need to be washed and cleansed in the Blood of Jesus and we need to watch over our eyes not to look at what we should not be looking at. We need to pray it though. We need to keep praying about our request until God give us Peace. Usually He gives us wisdom and knowledge on how we are to proceed.

5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; 6 in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight. (Proverbs 6)

 

[Barnabas2]

I want to ask for some advice on this forum about getting victory over an addiction to masturbation and lust. I am thinking of getting back to a place of victory and purity by either taking a discipleship course on purity online or by asking for prayer from prayer ministries (or both).

There is an online discipleship course that I have tried taking that lasts for 30 days and there is a longer follow up course. They assign you to a mentor and you get to answer questions involving Biblical teaching and discipleship. Several years in the past I took this course and the accountability really helped me abstain from sinful desires. However in recent times there have been changes to the purity course where the accountability questions have been removed from the course under the guise of wanting people to focus less on sin and more on Christ. I have found that taking the course has been less reliable of a way to hold me accountable in a way that I will abstain from masturbation. What I am referring to is there used to be a question at the end of each lesson that would ask, "Have you been free from masturbation since the last lesson you took?" I think this course has also been less reliable for me at the present time because of my own problem with not taking it often enough recently, where it would have been better if I had made it a goal to take every day.

Well, one of the mentors that used to disciple people through the course apparently disagreed with some of the changes made in the course and he broke away from the organization and wrote his own 60 day course. His course is a correspondence course taken by email where you fill out answers to the questions in each lesson by email. There are accountability questions at the end of each lesson and so I think this course might be more reliable than the other course. However when I tried to start taking this course I went in circles in some of my discussions by email with the mentor too much and he got in some disagreements with me and he kicked me out of his course in a way that I felt was really unfair and he said I was not allowed to take his course.

However if I am desperate enough for purity, I am wondering about the idea of trying to sneak back into this guy's course by using a different name and email and filling out a fake city and state when I sign up for his course again. I think that might be considered dishonest but I think the sin of impurity is a worse sin and so I might be desperate enough to sneak back into his course with a different name.

There is a third way I may pursue purity and that is by submitting prayer requests to prayer ministries online asking for God to break the power of an addiction to lust. In the past when I asked for prayer from a certain prayer ministry, God intervened in my life in a miraculous way and I was able to walk in complete victory for seven months. However after having a relapse I was stuck in addiction again, so I asked for prayer a few times again and this time I was desperate and so I asked for prayer to receive the chastening of the Lord and also an encounter with the fear of the Lord. The way I saw this prayer answered is tribulation that happened in the workplace for a short time and also a mental health hospitalization where I had an unusual dream where in some way I was before the presence of the Lord and really undone before His presence and terrified before His presence. Through this chastening I was able to walk in victory again for a couple months but after having another relapse I have been trapped in an addiction to masturbation and lust again.

So now I am thinking of asking for prayer from this ministry again, and I may ask for prayer every week until I am walking in freedom again. However I am afraid to ask for prayer for the chastening of the Lord to happen because I'm not sure I want to bring tribulation into my life. In the Bible the chastening of the Lord has sometimes brought people close to death, and Psalm 107 describes people being subjected to bitter labor. However I may ask for prayer for God's chastening but that He would have mercy in how He brings it, and I may ask that it would be only what I need. I would rather get freedom through taking a 60 day course than have to go through chastening again but if I find freedom through going through some tribulation I think it will be worth it. What do you think?

A SUGGESTION:
If it would help you, you can ask one of the moderators for my email address and we can be accountable to each other if you think this will be of any help and encouragement to you. Believe me, there is genuine and lasting victory over sin through Christ Jesus our Lord and Saviour. Brother, you must believe it.

 

[FreeinChrist]

You can pm each other. The mods will not be giving out emails.

 

[Barnabas2]

You can pm each other. The mods will not be giving out emails.

How can we do that please?

 

[FreeinChrist]

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[Belonging to Abba]

I wanted to write to share that God has given me victory over the addiction to lust. Through my experience with going on a vacation last month to a place of worship that is open 24 hours a day seven days a week, and spending several days in worship, I broke free from the addiction. I heard a strong challenge that was being sung in this place of worship: "Don't go back to the old ways. Don't go back to the old grave. It is for freedom that Christ has set me free." I have been faithful to this challenge since than, but I have had some slip ups, where during my sleep the enemy has attacked me. What will happen during these attacks during my sleep is I will partially wake up but not become fully conscious, and I will start slipping into self gratification and find it difficult to stop when I am fully awake. But I have not relapsed severely into a place where I am trying to look at women in the media or am habitually giving in to self gratification.

I often do not have access to the computer to be able to write a reply because I have given my mom the password so that I cannot get online alone. I am also not using a smartphone since I had trouble with that before.

 

[Barnabas2]

I wanted to write to share that God has given me victory over the addiction to lust. Through my experience with going on a vacation last month to a place of worship that is open 24 hours a day seven days a week, and spending several days in worship, I broke free from the addiction. I heard a strong challenge that was being sung in this place of worship: "Don't go back to the old ways. Don't go back to the old grave. It is for freedom that Christ has set me free." I have been faithful to this challenge since than, but I have had some slip ups, where during my sleep the enemy has attacked me. What will happen during these attacks during my sleep is I will partially wake up but not become fully conscious, and I will start slipping into self gratification and find it difficult to stop when I am fully awake. But I have not relapsed severely into a place where I am trying to look at women in the media or am habitually giving in to self gratification.

I often do not have access to the computer to be able to write a reply because I have given my mom the password so that I cannot get online alone. I am also not using a smartphone since I had trouble with that before.

There are two scriptures which spring to mind having read what you posted.
1) Jude 1:24. "Now unto Him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy" etc. Here is a glorious promise for you to claim. He is able! Jesus is able. Claim this promise and believe it and expect God to do what He promised - to keep you from falling. Remember, "There is nothing too hard for the Lord". Jeremiah 32:17. " Ah Lord GOD! behold, you have made the heaven and the earth by your great power and outstretched arm, and there is nothing too hard for you". and verse 27 "I am the LORD, the God of all humankind. There is, indeed, nothing too difficult for me. ... "I am the LORD God of all humanity. Nothing is too hard for me".
2) Psalm 127:2. "It is vain for you to rise up early, To sit up late, To eat the bread of sorrows; For so He gives His beloved sleep". He gives His beloved sleep. Here is another promise for you to claim. Believe them all! He will keep you from falling. He will give you sleep. Trust in the Lord to do it! Trust Him to give you what He promised. He's not counting on you to do it.

God bless you.

 

[Bob dees]

I want to ask for some advice on this forum about getting victory over an addiction to masturbation and lust. I am thinking of getting back to a place of victory and purity by either taking a discipleship course on purity online or by asking for prayer from prayer ministries (or both).

There is an online discipleship course that I have tried taking that lasts for 30 days and there is a longer follow up course. They assign you to a mentor and you get to answer questions involving Biblical teaching and discipleship. Several years in the past I took this course and the accountability really helped me abstain from sinful desires. However in recent times there have been changes to the purity course where the accountability questions have been removed from the course under the guise of wanting people to focus less on sin and more on Christ. I have found that taking the course has been less reliable of a way to hold me accountable in a way that I will abstain from masturbation. What I am referring to is there used to be a question at the end of each lesson that would ask, "Have you been free from masturbation since the last lesson you took?" I think this course has also been less reliable for me at the present time because of my own problem with not taking it often enough recently, where it would have been better if I had made it a goal to take every day.

Well, one of the mentors that used to disciple people through the course apparently disagreed with some of the changes made in the course and he broke away from the organization and wrote his own 60 day course. His course is a correspondence course taken by email where you fill out answers to the questions in each lesson by email. There are accountability questions at the end of each lesson and so I think this course might be more reliable than the other course. However when I tried to start taking this course I went in circles in some of my discussions by email with the mentor too much and he got in some disagreements with me and he kicked me out of his course in a way that I felt was really unfair and he said I was not allowed to take his course.

However if I am desperate enough for purity, I am wondering about the idea of trying to sneak back into this guy's course by using a different name and email and filling out a fake city and state when I sign up for his course again. I think that might be considered dishonest but I think the sin of impurity is a worse sin and so I might be desperate enough to sneak back into his course with a different name.

There is a third way I may pursue purity and that is by submitting prayer requests to prayer ministries online asking for God to break the power of an addiction to lust. In the past when I asked for prayer from a certain prayer ministry, God intervened in my life in a miraculous way and I was able to walk in complete victory for seven months. However after having a relapse I was stuck in addiction again, so I asked for prayer a few times again and this time I was desperate and so I asked for prayer to receive the chastening of the Lord and also an encounter with the fear of the Lord. The way I saw this prayer answered is tribulation that happened in the workplace for a short time and also a mental health hospitalization where I had an unusual dream where in some way I was before the presence of the Lord and really undone before His presence and terrified before His presence. Through this chastening I was able to walk in victory again for a couple months but after having another relapse I have been trapped in an addiction to masturbation and lust again.

So now I am thinking of asking for prayer from this ministry again, and I may ask for prayer every week until I am walking in freedom again. However I am afraid to ask for prayer for the chastening of the Lord to happen because I'm not sure I want to bring tribulation into my life. In the Bible the chastening of the Lord has sometimes brought people close to death, and Psalm 107 describes people being subjected to bitter labor. However I may ask for prayer for God's chastening but that He would have mercy in how He brings it, and I may ask that it would be only what I need. I would rather get freedom through taking a 60 day course than have to go through chastening again but if I find freedom through going through some tribulation I think it will be worth it. What do you think?

There are two scriptures which spring to mind having read what you posted.
1) Jude 1:24. "Now unto Him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy" etc. Here is a glorious promise for you to claim. He is able! Jesus is able. Claim this promise and believe it and expect God to do what He promised - to keep you from falling. Remember, "There is nothing too hard for the Lord". Jeremiah 32:17. " Ah Lord GOD! behold, you have made the heaven and the earth by your great power and outstretched arm, and there is nothing too hard for you". and verse 27 "I am the LORD, the God of all humankind. There is, indeed, nothing too difficult for me. ... "I am the LORD God of all humanity. Nothing is too hard for me".
2) Psalm 127:2. "It is vain for you to rise up early, To sit up late, To eat the bread of sorrows; For so He gives His beloved sleep". He gives His beloved sleep. Here is another promise for you to claim. Believe them all! He will keep you from falling. He will give you sleep. Trust in the Lord to do it! Trust Him to give you what He promised. He's not counting on you to do it.

God bless you.

I am not saying I know everything, but I can tell you how the lord helped me to overcome the inappropriate content addiction. I started with very low Christian worship music at night all throughout the night and of course reading the Bible and praying before bed. I am not exaggerating but I have been a born again believer in Christ Jesus , but I have always taught against experiences. But the lord really showed me some unique things, I used to have wet dreams even being married, I always assumed it was a high sex drive. The lord showed me the strangest thing, as the Spirit pulled me away from my addiction. I started not to have little dreams but to have vivid full movie experiences . Finally after a few weeks the addiction was gone/ broken ( I honestly don’t have the correct words)

 

[AlexB23]

Luckily for me, I have always stayed away from inappropriate content (though accidentally got a surprise dirty pop-up almost a decade ago before installing an adblocker when downloading a harmless Wolfram|Alpha science applet about color wheels from a software distribution website in 2014), but I have had attractions for someone with a good looking face before.

For me, I sometimes lust over Asian guys, or a beautiful woman. In November 2022, my Asian acquaintance tried on my '90s thrifted leather jacket at the local bowling alley, cos I wanted to see an Asian man wearing it. That definitely got me going. To this day, it is difficult not to think of him, as Koreans are attractive to me. Both he and myself were adopted (him from Asia, myself from Europe), which is something the two of us have in common. He is into science, is probably straight and builds 3D printed Nerf blasters.

Prayer is the best way to end the addiction. After you sin, or jerk-off, pray about it. The more you pray to ask God to help you, the less you will jerk-off. These thoughts are still a problem for me to this day, but it happens a bit less. Man, this is a weighty topic, and the original post is from July 2019. I will pray for you @Belonging to Abba .