Page 18 - Overcoming Addiction

There have been a few occasions when men at the rescue mission have
suggested that I was not qualified to address their problems with alcohol and
drugs, since these things have never been an issue in my life. I have never been
drunk, nor have I ever taken illegal drugs. I have, however, struggled with
addictive desires in many areas. Sexual lust, covetousness, and an appetite for
foods that are unhealthy have all been areas in which I have found myself
tempted and failing time and again. Yet God has shown me that victory is
possible in every area, and I am now walking as an overcomer in these things.
Sexual lust was perhaps one of the strongest and most shameful of the
addictive desires that plagued me. From the time of my first exposure to
pornography, I found the desire would not go away, and instead grew to become
an obsessive thing. When I was sixteen years old I took my first job, working at a
small, family owned grocery store. At the store there was a magazine rack where
several different pornographic magazines were sold.
At the age of sixteen I could not purchase pornography, nor would I have
openly done so. I had been raised in the church, and I knew that this constituted
a great sin. I therefore began taking magazines off of the rack and sneaking them
out behind the store to view them. Later I began stashing the magazines out back,
and I would return after work and retrieve them and take them home where I
would hide them in my room.
Such behavior is identical to that of many men and women who become
addicted to illegal drugs. They are ashamed of their habit when in the presence of
family, or others who do not participate in such things. They will also resort to
stealing to provide that which their flesh desires. Their life becomes one of
subterfuge and deception, and worries of being found out, and brought to open
shame often trouble their minds, even as it did my own.
Viewing pornography was a love/hate experience for me. My flesh craved it,
yet the immediate aftereffect was a feeling of guilt and shame, and a knowledge
that my sin had brought a separation between myself and God. This separation
from God is what troubled me the most. I felt like I could not pray to God after
having viewed pornography, and usually I waited until the next morning to
confess my sin and ask God to forgive me.
This experience of separation from God is normal for those who engage in
sin. The first occasion of sin, that of Adam and Eve in the Garden, reveals the
effect it has upon mankind. Immediately after Adam and Eve sinned we read the
following.

Genesis 3:8-10
They heard the sound of Yahweh God walking in the garden in the cool of
the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of
Yahweh God among the trees of the garden. Then Yahweh God called to
the man, and said to him, "Where are you?" He said, "I heard the sound of
You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid myself."

Our sin causes us to feel exposed and naked before God. We know that He
sees all things, and He is aware of what we have been doing. Our natural reaction