“I can’t shake this, and I have no idea what in the world to do about it.”
For Luke, becoming an overseas missionary was the fulfillment of a lifelong dream. He wanted to share the gospel with the nations, but he found himself forced to leave the mission field along with his wife and three kids. His addiction to pornography had spiraled out of control, and he was wrestling with doubt.
“I’m reading my Bible about power over sin,” he said. “Meanwhile, I don’t see any victory over porn. I mean, is my faith real?”
Luke isn’t the only one asking this question. Compulsive pornography use is a growing trend affecting our mission agencies, churches, and ministries. It’s bringing our workers home from overseas, and it’s keeping many who are called to service from ever volunteering in the first place.
The fields are ripe for harvest, but the workers are addicted to porn. Christians who want to make an impact find themselves silenced by fear, shame, and doubt. The result is a widening gap between those desperate to hear the gospel and Christians who feel qualified to serve.
How Porn Is Crippling Our Workers
Dr. Samuel Perry conducted a six-year study of 3,000 people that looked at the impact of porn on their lives. One of the areas he examined was how porn use impacts a person’s ability to serve in their congregation. His findings make it clear — when porn use goes up, Christian service goes down (learn more here).
According to the study, the odds that someone who doesn’t watch porn will end up serving in the church are one in three. Among those who watch porn monthly, those odds drop to one in ten. People who watch porn weekly have only a one in twenty chance of serving. If they watch porn daily, they have almost no chance of ever stepping up to volunteer.
One former leader in the study described why he backed out of service:
A few years ago, I stopped taking opportunities to lead groups at church or disciple younger men because of where I was personally with porn. I felt like a worthless hypocrite for teaching young men how to study the Bible and share their faith when I was regularly looking at pornography.
The next generation of leaders is under attack like never before. In 2019 the Freedom Fight surveyed 1,350 growing Christian college students from over 30 different universities across the country. All of the students were plugged into campus ministries, and half of them were leaders in those ministries. All of them said their faith in Christ is very important to them. These are our future Christian leaders.
Of the men surveyed, 61 percent said they watch porn at least weekly and more than half of them said they were addicted to porn, and 24 percent of the women said they watch porn at least monthly.
How many of these future leaders will be sidelined because their struggle with pornography continues? How many of their marriages will end in divorce? How many souls, ripe for harvest, will have to wait to hear the gospel because the workers are weighed down with sin and shame?
How can we turn things around?
A Story of Hope
Meet Linden.
Linden assumed marriage would fix his addiction to pornography, but instead, he continued to struggle for 13 years. He was trapped in cycles of relapse until his wife caught him watching porn. He was broken by conviction, and he knew he needed to change his approach.
“Reading my Bible more, praying more, telling someone, locking up my phone — they were all good things, but they never enabled me to kill this sin for good,” he explained.
When Linden found the Freedom Fight program, he realized it was the resource God would use to set him free.
“The Freedom Fight helped me understand my own porn use and the things that drove me there,” he said. “It helped me develop more authentic, open and vulnerable relationships with others, including my wife, and it helped me build better spiritual disciplines that have grounded me in God’s promises.”
Now Linden has walked in freedom for 18 months and has developed a passion for service. He started a small group in his church focused on working through the program. The joy he found in helping others encouraged him to take the program to other churches. Today, Linden leads seminars for congregations in his area. He is working to destigmatize pornography addiction in the church by offering a proven pathway to freedom for those struggling with sin.
Linden’s story isn’t just about escaping addiction. It’s a story about the pursuit of truth. Our program worked for Linden because it helped him understand how to apply biblical truth in a way that empowered good discipline.
Instead of retreating from service and running from his past, he was able to run towards service in spite of his past. He learned how to be bold and honest about his journey, and God is working through his boldness to bring healing to the churches in his area.
An Opportunity for Deep Discipleship
Hebrews 12:1 commands us to “lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.”
It’s hard to find a more entangling sin than pornography, and there are few weights heavier than the shame it causes. In the survey mentioned earlier, 9 out of 10 Christian college students said they experience self-hatred after watching porn.
If we want future generations of leaders to be successful, we have to help them break free from condemnation. When the Apostle Paul addressed sexual immorality in the church at Ephesus, he did more than treat it as a problem to solve. He saw it as an opportunity for deep discipleship. He knew that if the Ephesians could embrace the truth of new life in Christ, the past would no longer hold them back.
Testimonies of Freedom
Jesus told us to pray for the Lord to send more workers into the field (Matthew 9:37-38). If we are willing to address this issue with real solutions that lead to freedom, we can help our workers and future leaders engage in service with renewed passion, purpose, and effectiveness. When people experience the freedom the gospel promises, their excitement for the King and His Kingdom soars to new heights.
Instead of running from the stigma of pornography addiction, we must engage with our staff and people alike who struggle. We can help them experience the grace of God that transforms histories of shame into testimonies of freedom. We can work with the Lord of the Harvest to set His laborers free and send them back into the fields, strong, confident in Christ, and assured of this truth — that if the Son sets you free, you are free indeed.
