G4 Addiction

As you reach this step the momentum of change has probably already fluctuated several times. Getting started was hard. It felt like an uphill battle. Sin didn’t want to let go of you and you didn’t want to admit it had a hold on you. Honesty with self, others, and God has a great way of building momentum. You began to let go of the weights of sin that clung to you and run free from secrets (Heb. 12:1). That phase is almost always exciting and you can almost feel guilty about the amount of relief it brings (especially if you’re married and your spouse is carrying the weight of your secrets which have now come to light).As that excitement gives way to life restructuring change begins to feel more like work again. “Implementing change” does not occur as quickly as repentance and confession. At this phase, change happens in incremental units and mundane moments. Change begins to require faithfulness in moments where change may not feel as “relevant” to your battle with sexual sin. It no longer feels like you’re r

To this point you have admitted, acknowledged, understood, repented, and confessed. Each of the previous steps are vital parts of the change process, but are incomplete to create a lifestyle where purity and honor are defining marks of your life and relationships. Each of the steps to this point have been about “putting off” sin (Eph 4:22) or changing how you think about your sin (Eph. 4:23) more than “putting on” God’s character (Eph. 4:24). Lasting change replaces what it rids and builds something new in the place of what it tears down. That will be the focal point for the rest of this journey.As you move through the remaining steps you will be asked to address more than sexual sin. Rarely does sin restrain itself to one area of life. Therefore the notion that you will conquer sexual sin without addressing other areas of life is a naïve approach to change. It would be wasteful of the effort you have put into change this far. Failing to look at the rest of your life would be like getting braces to align your

When we looked at the development of sexual sin in Step 1, we said a major threshold was crossed when sexual sin goes public (moving from images or conversations with anonymous people to arousing interaction with a real, known person). The same is true in the destruction of sexual sin; a major threshold is crossed as sexual integrity goes public (moving from private dialogue with God to public confession with real, known people).If you have made it through the first four steps with integrity then change has happened, but it is starting in Step 5 that you lay the foundation for change to last. Privacy kills change and fuels sin. Transparency kills sin and fuels change. Chances are this step may scare you as much as any step you have taken since the first one. But remember it is not nearly as scary to move forward as it is dangerous to go backward. Don’t allow fear to make you forgetful.This is a stage in the change process when many people want to only deal with their sin privately. But to deal with a private

You probably feel like your soul has been laid bare in the first three steps. You have looked at yourself, your behaviors, and your life as a whole in ways that you have likely resisted doing for a long time. In this chapter you are going to bring that honest self-awareness before God. You are not bringing Him something (by way of information) that He needs in order to act. You are placing yourself in a position to receive what He has already done on your behalf. If you presume upon God’s forgiveness (i.e., “God has to forgive me. He’s already sent Jesus to die. It would be a waste if He didn’t follow through. Besides, God would be a liar if He promised to forgive and didn’t honor His Word. I’ll go through the ritual to get what’s coming to me if that is what He wants.”), then you are not repenting. You are making a legal transaction with someone you believe to be too stupid to know better. Additionally, you are prone to use God in a manipulative fashion with anyone you offended in your sin (i.e., “If God has

Why? Why? Why?! This is a vexing question. As soon as you say “because…” you run the risk of blame-shifting and we’ve already spoken to the dangers of this. But in the absence of a “because…” it sounds like you should just be able to “Stop it!” and if that were the case you wouldn’t be reading these materials.Part of this confusion begins with how we commonly view people. It is popular to think of ourselves as basically good people who apart from outside interference would not do bad things; act selfishly, betray, sacrifice more important things for less important things, or otherwise be foolish. “The power of all temptation is the prospect that it will make me happier. No one sins out of a sense of duty (p. 334).” John Piper in Future GraceWe are born twisted, broken, and out of order. We are born with a bent towards self and we experience life self-centeredly (trapped within our bodies; literally only seeing the world through our own eyes and interpreting it through our own experiences and desires). Th

The last chapter was painful. Looking at “what” types of sexual win you struggle with is hard. This chapter will likely be equally uncomfortable as you examine the “extent” of those sins. Unless you acknowledge the breadth and impact of your sexual sin, your efforts at change will be limited to the most overt and recent sins. Omitting this step also results in rooting your efforts at change in the powerful emotions you feel (shame in a “bad” moment; relief or pride in a “good” moment) rather than the reality of your history. Neither sincerity nor shame will sustain lasting change. You’ve probably already experienced that many times, if you slowed down enough to acknowledge it.“Every Christian guy who looks at porn wants to stop, but many of us want to stop just a little bit less than we want to keep going… Here’s a promise. You will never stop until you begin to see the monstrous nature of the sin you are committing. You will never stop until the sin is more horrifying to you than the commission of the sin is

This is miserable. Whether you are picking up this material for yourself or to help a friend, you’ve probably tried to avoid this subject for a while. Although unpleasant, this material is vital. It is vital for you personally if you are caught in sexual sin, because you will never know lasting peace and joy while the leach of lust drains your life. It is vital for you as a friend, because sexual sin is reaching epidemic proportions in our culture and must be addressed if we are going to do “relevant” ministry."If you preach the gospel in all aspects with the exception of the issues that deal specifically with your time, you are not preaching the gospel at all." Martin Luther as quoted by Tim Chester in Closing the Window (p. 10).Sex is awkward to talk about, especially when guilt is involved. Even reading about sex when it has to do with sin. Thinking about confession is as painful as sex is fun; as repulsive as sex is attractive. The equal and opposite force of what drew you to sexual sin will try to drive

It would be easy to want this study, like this season of your life, to just be over. But this study, like your life, has at least one more chapter (and several appendices) left. When you put a great deal of effort, as you undoubtedly have, into getting past something, it can be easy to forget that there is something next. The fact that God has brought you to this point should be evidence enough that He has more in store for you and more to do through you.  In this chapter you will be doing most of the writing, because it is your life that is being stewarded for the glory of God. No one else could write this chapter but you. What you will be given is nine questions that walk you through a life assessment to determine where God wants you to serve now and where He may want to prepare you to serve in the future. As you read through and answer the next nine questions, remember God’s patience and timing. There will be some aspects of God’s design that you can engage in immediately. But there may also be w

New and normal are words that do not belong together. But that is precisely what step eight is all about, establishing a new normal. In steps 2-4, you looked at the things that created an unhealthy normal. In step 5, you grieved that these things were ever “normal” for you. In steps 6-7, you began to piece together a new, healthy normal. Now, in step 8, you will begin to rest in that new normal and allow it to solidify.Unfortunately, prolonged relational dysfunction created a way of life that made it easy for us to wonder if “normal” could ever be good again. Hopefully that skepticism is beginning to fade by the time you’ve reached this point in your journey.Realize, the phrase “new normal” seems to imply more intentionality than it actually requires. You do not need a spreadsheet with seven columns and twenty-four rows to itemize and color-code. As you live wisely, a new-healthy normal will happen. This chapter will be devoted to identifying the defining marks of this new normal so you can be comforted as th

One of the biggest challenges in identifying goals for combatting the effects of codependency is to be active without accepting false guilt or distorting how you allocate responsibility for change again. It is easy to think if there is something I can do that would be more effective than what I have been doing, then if I had been doing it all along everything would be fine. In order to help you avoid this mindset, we will order the strategies for relating more healthily in a progression that builds from intrapersonal strategies (inside of you) to interpersonal strategies (between you and the other person). The intent is to reinforce the idea that you can get healthier even if the other person does not and that their possible resistance to change does not have to be interpreted as your personal failure. Gaining PerspectiveBuilding Resilience Alleviating Emotional TriggersGrowing Positive Influence As you learn from and practice each strategy, pray that God will use it for restorative purposes in the life of y

When you experience major relational upheaval, it feels like the rest of life should be put on hold. Yet, so often, when we face addictive or abusive challenges in our relationships, life continues “as normal” because no one else knows what’s going on. This can be both disorienting and offensive. Doesn’t anyone care? Can’t anyone see? We feel hurt, angry, and alone.However, so far this study has primarily been a major deconstruction project; we have broken down your experience and its fallout in many ways (hopefully insightful and helpful). The result is, while you may feel like there is hope for things to be better, you likely also feel like a person without a story.That is what this chapter begins to address. In this chapter you will begin to put the pieces you deconstructed into a new narrative; not a narrative that makes the “sad things untrue” but a narrative that allows you to understand yourself, God, your life, relationships, and the future in ways that are healthy and hopeful.This new narrative will

It is likely that we have related codependently, not just with other people, but also with God. This is not meant to call into question our assurance of salvation, but to recognize the likelihood that we have:Served God in order to get leverage over him to do what we think needs to be done.Thrown our emotions at God in prayer more than had a genuine conversation with him.Tried to make God feel bad because we interpret our hardships as if he were being mean or insulting towards us.This chapter is where we, if needed, change this dynamic in our relationship with God; as the foundation for changing our codependent pattern of relating to others.Step Four reveals a large amount of “bad news” – destructive narratives or scripts we place upon our unhealthy relationships which leave us feeling shame or like God is absent. What are we supposed to do with that kind of bad news?The tempting answer is “make it better… spin it positive… fast… if we can use the Bible, all the better; that way we’re more likely to believe w

At several points in the study you have probably begun to question God, doubt Him, be angry at Him, or wonder if what you think about Him really makes any difference. We’ve brought many painful experiences to mind. When we look at them, we naturally ask, “Where does ‘the buck’ stop?” It stops with God (or whoever, whatever is in control… if anything is). It has been said that animals divide between herbivores (those eating plants) and carnivores (those eating meat), but that humans are verbivores – we live off of words, or, more accurately, off of the meaning we give to life through words. This is why we’ve emphasized the themes of story, journey, and identity so much. They are how we “digest” life. “No one is more influential in your life than you are, because no one talks to you more than you do. You are in an unending conversation with yourself. You are talking all the time, interpreting, organizing, and analyzing what’s going on inside you and around you (p. 56).” Paul Tripp in A Shelter in the

After acknowledging the history and realness of our relational unhealthiness, we need to understand the impact of these experiences on our life. Unless we understand the impact, we will be forced to “just try to do better;” which is often what leads us to the dilemma of taking responsibility for things that don’t belong to us and, hence, leads us to be controlling.But the other rebuttal is, “Looking at the impact will only make me feel worse.” This is partially true, and why it is highly recommended you go through this study with a friend, pastor, or counselor. But it is also largely false. Consider the parallel example of debt. Many people in debt fail to itemize and total their debt for fear it will be overwhelming. But that leaves them powerless and with a “haunting ambiguous” sense of how big it must be.In this chapter we will seek to understand the impact of relating codependently in four sections.Qualities of CodependencyEffects of Living with AbuseEffects of Living with AddictionThinking Well about Bou

There is nothing “fun” or enjoyable about this step. However, it is a good and needed part of the process. But do not allow these first two statements to cause you to think, “Alright then, let’s get it over with as quickly as possible.” That would be a mistake that would likely result in you missing the key information that is most important to glean from this step.Your goal in this step is to identify the unhealthy patterns of relationship that have developed in your life. Often we miss the patterns for the events; a form of missing the forest for the trees. The events (i.e., controlling-abusive behaviors, repeated intoxication of a loved one, having your opinion taken for granted, etc…) are usually things that are happening to us. They are painful and we remember them. It is right to view them as suffering. But often we assume suffering means we have no choice but to be passive and that we contribute nothing to the interaction.The patterns are the ways we relate that enable the events to continue occurring.

This may be the most confusing seminar topic ever. Is codependency really a thing? After all, no one can agree on a definition (this is true). Besides, the problem isn’t me; it’s the people who are hurting me or are destroying their life with addiction. You’re not going to tell me this is my fault, are you? Wait a minute, no one in my life is an addict and I’m not married, can I be codependent? These are just a few of challenges we will have to navigate on our journey. We will define the concept of codependency in greater detail as we go along, but here are a few foundational premises for how we’ll use the term.Codependency is a style of relating; meaning it is an activity rather than a condition.Codependency is more about why and how you do things than what you do. There are not codependent behaviors (what you do) as much as there are codependent motives, tones, and patterns (why and how you do things).Those who relate codependently struggle to rightly assign responsibility for problematic actions by others

If the law of God can be summarized in a positive command, then we must end this study talking about how to “run to” God rather than merely how to “run from” sin. Life is not about what we avoid, but what we pursue. How we run to God’s design for our life finds a unique expression in each person’s life. For this reason, you will do most of the writing in this chapter. It is your life that is being stewarded for God’s glory.  The goal is that you would find things that you could give yourself to more passionately than you once gave yourself to your addiction. But not just temporal, slightly healthier things that would quickly become the next edition of ruling desires; and not things that you give yourself to in private so that they foster selfishness and excess. Rather, eternally significant things that you give yourself to in a community of faith to maintain endurance, temper desire-excess, and become an example to others. As you read through and answer these nine questions, remember God’s patience

Are you enjoying where you are? Even if you are not “there yet,” can you identify aspects of this part of your journey that make it significantly better than where you’ve been? Unless you can answer “yes” to this question and take delight in that answer, perseverance will be grueling.Striving without delighting is exhausting.One of the keys to persevering, especially with a struggle as recurrent as an addiction, is the ability to enjoy an imperfect, in-process life. God does not just delight in you at the culmination of your sanctification. God delights in you right now. He invites you to agree with him; where he has you in this process is good. This provides the emotional stability and security to persevere in your journey of recovery.With that as our starting point, let’s ask the question, “What does it look like to continue to follow God from here?” Chances are that you’ve put so much energy into getting “here” that it is not entirely clear how to prepare yourself for life after an intensive focus on chang

As you reach this chapter, the momentum of change has probably already fluctuated several times. Getting started was hard. It felt like an uphill battle. Old patterns of life didn’t want to let go of you and you didn’t want to admit they had a hold on you. Changing your addictive lifestyle can feel like betraying a friend; breakups are never easy even when they’re good and needed.But honesty with self, others, and God has a great way of building momentum. You began to let go of the weights of sin that clung to you so you could run free (Heb. 12:1). This second phase is almost always exciting. When there are so many ways that your life can be healthier, it can bring a great sense of hope and progress.In the third phase, the one we’re starting now, life restructuring may begin to feel more like work again. “Implementation” is not an exciting word or process. Lasting change happens in incremental units and mundane moments. Change begins to impact moments that feel “less relevant” to your battle with addiction. T

This is probably the chapter you were looking for when you started this study. Thank you for your patience and perseverance in getting to this point. The foundation you’ve laid will help to ensure that your current efforts towards sobriety do not meet the same fate as previous, well-intended efforts.You’ve probably known that living an enjoyable sober life required more than insight and remorse. But you needed to see more clearly how your AoD of choice was being asked to fulfill a bigger role than it ever could and how this dysfunctional relationship with substances developed. You also needed to allow God and others to play the vital role in change that God desires for you.Now you’ve done those things; which means the practical advisements below have the opportunity to be incorporated into a healthy lifestyle. No longer are these plans your “savior.” No longer are you merely mustering will power. No longer are you striving to make yourself acceptable to God and others by a longer streak of days “being good.”Y