Jim (3:38)

We do not.

Lisa (3:39)

But I felt like the information you have is so valuable and certainly, Joel, we're gonna turn to you because we definitely need some.

Shay Hill (3:45)

Thank you.

Lisa (3:46)

Theology around this topic as well. So Jim, I'm going to let you just take it away.

Jim (3:50)

Yeah. The lenses that I talk people to look through. This is very helpful globally about taking a look at the problem of porn, what I call the porn demic, because we're in that even at the point of recording this, we are in a global mental health pandemic coming out of a COVID pandemic, even if we're at the tail end of it or wherever. So a lot of stuff going on and the porn demic which rose so high when we were back in that original COVID pandemic, people had nothing to do. They had all this time. And it's stunning without boring. With all the stats of how high porn use went thing at that time called pornhub. Unbelievable. The way to look at this this is with these lenses. The porn problem, it's a multifaceted problem that requires a multifaceted solution. If you're a hammer, the whole world looks like a nail. Well, it's just lust. I've had pastors tell me that I understand that it is that and it's more. You just need God. You just need Jesus or behavioral modification or whatever else. Thinking in the terms, that's a multifaceted problem that requires a multifaceted treatment plan. So you never want to leave the brain out of it with neuroplasticity. That's the part of the brain that if you send it down the porn trail, it's going to have a rut in there. Back to Aristotle. We are what we repeatedly do. So that is going on and we want to, in recovery or in healing, use that. Neuroplasticity just means the brain is moldable and laying new neural pathways, let alone the word of God that we are transformed by the renewing of our mind. So the brain's involved in that. Obviously the body is involved in that. Part of why that's important is if you think if you gave someone, imagine 11 or 12 year old, you gave them cocaine, opiates or opioids or Heroin at age 12. Most people, when these 28 are not going to say go cold turkey, it's unfair. We'll say that around pornography. Just come off of it cold turkey or just stop. It didn't work with Nancy Reagan in the 80s. God bless her for trying. Just say no. I mean, there's a place to say no, but that's not going to do. This has been long term for a lot of guys. Especially chemicals involved dopamine, serotonin, catecholamines, pea, norepinephrine, adrenaline. And the one that's missing when person is acting out to pornography by him or herself, because women are involved in this too. With a rising stat is oxytocin, the bonding chemical that almighty God said, be with your spouse at the end of lovemaking and skin to skin and the two literally are becoming one again and again. With that, you're left to bond with nothing at the end of someone acting out. So the body and brain keep the score thinking of it. So I say that every pornography addict, can we use that term, is an addict. Indeed they are a chemical addict. They are a drug addict because all those neurochemicals and neurotransmitters in the brain and the drug dealer for the porn addict lives where inside him, he didn't have to go down the street, get a little dime bag or get a hit of this. It's all right there. So there's more than the brain. But that's a starting point to realize this has been going on with a lot of these guys for a long, long time.

Joel (7:04)

Yeah.

Lisa (7:04)

And I think in some home situations, I know it can go both ways. But for the purpose of focusing the conversation, I want to talk tenderly to the wife who last night just walked in to like her husband's office and saw what she saw on his computer. And it's now causing her great angst.

Jim (7:29)

It's called discovery. Right you know?

Joel (7:30)

Yes.

Jim (7:31)

Yeah.

Lisa (7:32)

And so what do you say to her? Because at that moment. Okay, yes, it has to do with the brain. Yes, it has to do with chemicals. Yes, there's a whole bunch of stuff that's at play here. But she's panicked. And so what do you say tenderly to her? Because I know many women walk into your office and they say, help me. I don't know what to do now.

Jim (7:55)

One's going to be a little FBI tactical. But I work in the tactical. Right. That is, take a breath, try to calm yourself down as best you can for a moment. Because they'll be often in that lower limbic brain because they just discovered it and they're into fight, flight or freeze, whatever. The tactical part is when you see that because of a previous episode about gaslighting, not love bombing on this, but gaslighting is I want you to get your phone and I want you to go and take a screenshot or take a shot, a camera shot of what you see. Because people could come back. That's a bad gaslighting. Erase the history trail, say it's not there. And I don't want you to become obsessive. We've talked before about shopping for pain. I'm going to literally be in the FBI. But I want you to be able to say, this is what I've seen. Because people will come back. And that's a hard gaslighting. You didn't see that. Or even to blame kids. That must have been one of our kids. I didn't do it. So I think get that get regulated. And at that moment to I'm not big on, although I understand this in trauma. For her to immediately confront her husband, if it's in a marital thing, is reach out to a friend or two, risk saying, well, then I'll blow his life up, because they'll know I've pulled the curtain back. But to say, I need to talk and you're helping a good friend will help you get emotionally regulated. I do that as a partner trauma therapist with a lot of women who've gone through this and say again, I hear you. I understand you. I believe you. Because their world, in some cases, has literally just been blown up.

Lisa (9:22)

And I think it's really important, too, to emphasize it's not that you're trying to blow their world up. Right.

Jim (9:28)

That is, for some women, it's scorched earth. And I can understand it at that moment. You're trying to not blow his world up. You're trying to get your world regulated. Because it's been like, whoa.

Lisa (9:38)

I remember the first time that I met you, and I didn't even remember this until you reminded me years later. But we were speaking at the AACC conference. I was backstage about to give a keynote message, and Julie Clinton, a mutual friend of ours, brought you up to me and said, hey, Lisa, you live in Charlotte. Jim lives in Charlotte. He's a therapist there. And I was interested. Right. And you had me until you handed me your card. And on his card he said, sex addiction.

Jim (10:14)

Certified sex addiction therapist. Yes, because I remember you went green as that sweater.

Lisa (10:19)

And I was just like.

Jim (10:20)

And I literally. I'm going, what just happened? Sorry, Julie. I just wanted to say hi.

Lisa (10:25)

I know, but it just kind of so caught me off guard. And I thought, well, I don't need a sex addiction therapist. Like, I've got issues, but maybe not that one. Right. And so I just remember there was so much fear around even the thought of, like, sex addiction and all of that. And so I didn't even have the memory of meeting you until years later when Jim was recommended to me by another therapist for me to go see. See him in Betrayal, Trauma. And Jim reminded me, like, you know, I waited.

Jim (11:01)

I didn't remind you. Yeah, I didn't do it first day because I thought, oh, no, I wonder if she remembers. I had to build a little trust. And it was like, guess what? That was me.

Lisa (11:10)

Yes. But the thing that I appreciated that you explained to me right away is that you're not just talking clinically about this, that you have personal experience of understanding this. And that gave me a lot of comfort because I thought if you personally have struggled with this, if you personally overcome this addiction. So you're not just speaking it from a clinical therapist standpoint. It's in my story, but it's in your story. It's part of your testimony. I've heard you say it many, many times. That's what gave me the comfort to learn from you. And I want you to have that comfort today too, as you're listening or watching on YouTube, that Jim knows about this and has overco this personally in his own life. And so tell us just a little bit about your story.

Jim (12:02)

So, you know, sexually abused at age 4. That's a real life story. And maybe some of you have that. And then my fifth of six kids, mom said she wanted two. I always, with all my intensives I do with people. Let's explore. What were the milieu you were born into? Naming, not blaming. What were you born into? I mean, please Please go do your story work. A safe place. So you've got abandonment. I have, studying much later, an anxious attachment style. I'm just looking for a place to feel safe and to have an external solution to my internal problem. Right in that. And then. So that's there. Loneliness in the house with a. What we call in our field, a high level of rigid religiosity. External, which I don't. That's my story, Joel. Memorizing the Bible and church activities. Very conservative and I would say legalistic. And yet there was some safety in that. So you've got that going on. So two worlds. I was, you know, Jimmy on fire for God, going to be a preacher boy and all that. And then behind the scenes, praying and agonizing to come off of what I call poor man's pornography. Because all I could get would be a Sears catalog. These catalogs are out there. And a boy coached me at about 12, and he said, you can do this. Talked about the word masturbation, then said, you need to look at pornography. And I'm like, I don't know what all this means. I mean, what is this? And I said, with Christian home. He said, well, your mom. Notice the coaching, notice the grooming. Your mom has these catalogs. Go to this section. And then I was hooked. Like, absolutely hooked, like cocaine. And then for years I was on fire for God. And I was never the guy going.

Lisa (13:38)

Ha, ha, ha, ha.

Jim (13:38)

I'll be fake God, please remove this from what I didn't have there. I was not doing any therapy work as a teenager. Then I go to a Christian college and thought, if I can marry who I've been married to 40 years, a beautiful Christian woman, and do all that, that will be my external solution to an internal problem. Literally thought because biblically, in Jesus name, I can have all the sex I want. That's why in pornography we always assess with a couple with the partner, the wife. Watch out for addicted sex in marriage. What is that? That's just saying, okay, I'll stop doing porn, but you're going to have sex, you know, 12 times a week or something like that. And so they just swap and begin to try to use their body, the body of their wife. So what happened is my wife and I did eight years of therapy. That's a long time with a biblical and Christian counselor. And then years later, I've been sober 20 years from this. My great mentor and friend, Dr. Larry Crabb, said, part of you wants to look at porn, but part of you doesn't. Because I'D been in ministry too, and on national Christian radio. And he said, we're going to have to talk about pornography. What's different, which is Colossians 3. Kill the deeds of the flesh. Stop that porn. Stop means stop. It does. But give life to what's most alive in you. Larry said, what do you want more than that? And I said, I said it. I said, I don't want my boys to come in and catch me looking at porn. I want to be a man of integrity. That alone wasn't going to do it. But as I got into my rather serious horrific trauma story from childhood and did my work, I began to realize the porn was not just a choice, a problem. I was using it to medicate my trauma, my lack of attachment. When I know better and knew better, I began to do better. And that's not even talking about your original question. How my wife, who was a partner and she had to go do her work to the partner question the wife discovery, all like that needs or disclosure if he discloses it. She needs to find a good safe person that is a therapist, I think to really go explore the damage that was done to her too. Not just couples counseling.

Lisa (15:40)

How much did it affect your marriage?

Jim (15:43)

Tremendously. I mean in our marriage we had a five year period of time. This is our testimony, we've taught in marriage workshops together that we both. She realized in therapy she'd been sexually abused as a child. I knew mine, I knew the story, we both did. But the therapist said what we do here a lot is, you know, that's called sex abuse. I just want happen. I mean, so we had to get the right naming, the nomenclature. We had five years in our marriage. No sex, no sexual touching. That's not good. We didn't. Even though we were in therapy, we kind of weren't bringing that in. So what we call there is a cycle of disaffection. And we began still having kids. There's a six year gap between my youngest son and my only daughter. You can see it. So that's in our story. And we were just moving away, kind of omitting that, omitting that. With our therapist, we really wrestled with quite frankly hating each other, not liking. I'm in ministry, doing that and agonizing with God. Please remove this. So inside also there was a moment where my wife, the therapist said, you think Jim's the problem? Completely and he thinks he's the problem. I was always quick to go, I'm the biggest screw up you've ever seen. I mean, I'LL own it. I mean, just that's me. And she began then so beautifully go do her own work. She's a board certified coach now, brilliant around partner trauma. And she would say, as our sweet friend Leslie Vernick, who knows my wife well, says, what is your problem with his problem? Not in an arrogant way or an angry way. So she began to go do her own work, clear going back into her own story, her views of sex, her historical thoughts and things of her own abuse as she did that and we became together. And yes, as over 20 years ago, I got sober from it. And I always tell people, sorry, but not because I got old. Well, you're old has nothing to do with it, trust me. So that piece, as I began to do my work and I had to sit and hear her story, the impact, like many men I work with, sit. You've t boned her in an intersection. She's on a bicycle. And that is, you need to sit and have that empathy with her because when you were acting out in porn, you did not have empathy towards yourself and you did not have empathy toward her. So that's the shift. And she knew that I really began to take it seriously.

Lisa (17:57)

Hi friends.

Lisa Turkhurst (17:57)

I hope you're enjoying this episode of Therapy and Theology. Before we hear what's next, I want to pause and thank our partner for season eight, Compassion International. For years, Proverbs 31 Ministries has stood alongside Compassion International because we love their mission, bring real solutions to the poverty that so many children in today's world are facing in Jesus name. I've seen Compassion's impact myself through the letters and updates I've received from the child I sponsor. Several of my teammates here at Proverbs 31 sponsor children as well, and we would all tell you the same thing. The work Compassion is doing is truly amazing. When you sponsor a child, you ensure access to quality education, medical checkups, healthy food, clean water, and most importantly, the love of Jesus, all delivered through their church in their community. Compassion isn't just changing the lives of children. It's changing entire families and whole communities in need. And it's also changed me. So today I hope you'll join me in sponsoring a child through Compassion. All you have to do is pull out your phone and text Proverbs 3:1 with no spaces to 83393. That's Proverbs 3:1 with no Spaces to 83393. You'll get a text back with a picture of a child who is waiting for a sponsor and a link to sponsor that Child. You can also go to compassion.comproverbs 31 to sponsor a child. And when you become a sponsor, Compassion will send you a copy of our study guide titled the Beginning of All Wisdom as our way of saying thank you for investing in the life of a child. Thank you for joining me in sponsoring a child through Compassion today. Now back to the show.

Lisa (19:50)

Okay, I've got a few other questions, but, Joel, I do want to turn to you because I want to hear some of the theological research that you've done on this very challenging topic.

Joel (19:59)

Yeah, I mean, I can share personally, too, that, you know, I remember my first time being introduced to pornography. I was 11, 10, 11 years old and was introduced to it at a family member's house. And I remember my first response to it was like, I've shared this, I think, with you guys before. It was this righteous anger. Like, really, Like, I knew. I knew this was bad. I knew it was wrong, and I brought it down and I kind of, like, shared it with a family member. I was like, I cannot believe this. And the individual told me, put that back and let's not ever talk about this ever again. Classic, right? And so that created for me roots of secretness, hiddenness, and what was righteous anger turned into curiosity and obsession and ultimately addiction. Right? And so I remember, it's funny that kind of just generationally, I think I was in the shift generation where I had some friends who were like, hey, we can ride our bikes to the White Hen Pantry. There's this place called Whitehead Pantry in Illinois, and they had a place where the naughty magazines were, and we would try to figure out how to steal them. Well, by the time I get into high school, it's the rise of the technology world. AOL Instant Messenger. There's this thing called Napster, and that was where there's accessibility. And I think what I found, and this is going to lend into the conversation of the biblical narrative. What I found was, for me, entering into an environment that was now hypersexualized and where once I had an imagination for the beauty of what it was to be a man and what it was to be a woman, that beauty and that imagination I think God created for us originally in the Garden of Eden was perverted and it was corrupted. And often when it comes to the biblical text, when it comes to conversations that we're having, Lisa, and we worked on a chapter. I wrote a chapter in an upcoming book that me, you and Jim have co authored together, I think it's going to be really important Work. And I'm excited to share that more with you guys as the days go. But I wrote a specific chapter on pornography because one of the big questions is, well, what does the Bible say? We know therapeutically, and we've got the data and the science of it, but what about the theology of it? And often I'll get, like, from guys, you know, well, the Bible doesn't say pornography anywhere. It's not talking about it. So, you know, how do we know that it's bad? And to that I would say, okay, take a look at Matthew 19:9. Jesus refers to sexual immorality, and he uses a Greek word about sexual immorality, and it's porneia. That's where we get our English word pornography from. What is porneia? Porneia was understood in the time of Jesus and in the time of Paul. And when Paul's planting all these churches in Corinth and Ephesus and Galatia, it was understood as a sexualized environment. So notice how Jesus is presenting it and then how Paul is dealing with it. He's not just saying, it's this one thing over here in this corner. It's this one thing over here. No, he's saying it's actually an environment that is actually perverting the ideal of what makes a man a man and a woman a woman. And then here's the other thing that often people will say. They'll say, well, Joel, like, how do we even know that he was even that bad back then? Like, we're in a totally different context. Like, our cultural context is different. To which point I would just say, I wish y' all walked around Ancient Rome. Ancient Rome would make Las Vegas look like it was PG compared to what Ancient Rome was.

Jim (23:37)

Absolutely.

Lisa (23:38)

I mean, we were just this past year in Ephesus.

Joel (23:41)

That's right.

Lisa (23:42)

And it was. It was a lot.

Joel (23:44)

It was a lot. And so I want to bring that context in because it's important for us. There are these Roman emperors, Claudius, Caligula, and Nero, who were known for, like, their sexual exploits were so horrific that historians, Herodotus, Tacitus, Roman historians would not even write it. Like, they wouldn't even depict the stories of it. And I actually think, Jim, you probably have a lot of thoughts on this. I actually think that we actually live in a world that's actually a little bit more challenging than the Romans in this way. At least it was out in the open back then. Right. Like, I think we were in Ephesus and they had. Remember, it was a private entryway.

Lisa (24:32)

Yes.

Joel (24:33)

Go ahead and explain it.

Lisa (24:34)

Yeah, it was a private entryway where if you were a boy, you went. And they had like footprints in the.

Joel (24:44)

Stone to let you know.

Lisa (24:45)

So if your feet were bigger than the footprints in the stone, then you were allowed admission into the brothel.

Joel (24:52)

Into the brothel. And there was like these private entrances. It was just out there.

Lisa (24:57)

And you could also be like, you could tell your wife that you were going to. Was it the library?

Joel (25:02)

The library, yeah.

Lisa (25:03)

You were going to the library. But then there was a tunnel that went underneath the library from the library straight into the brothel.

Joel (25:10)

And so the other thing. So you have the social life, but you also have the religious life. And so you think about the temples in Corinth, you think about the temples in Ephesus, that these were known places where temple prostitution where sexual exploits were taking place. And so when Paul is dealing with these things, when he's talking about them, he's talking about something that's incredibly pervasive in the culture, in the society. And it's something that is pervasive in the culture and society today. And there's a reason why Paul and Jesus, when they talk about pornography, they almost, and I want to be careful and precise in my language, it's not that pornography is a greater sin or a lesser sin, but it does seem to suggest that any type of sexualized sin has a greater level of gravity that is associated with it because it's a direct offense against the image of God that you bear.

Lisa (26:04)

And the fact that we are the.

Joel (26:05)

Temple of God and we are the. We are the temple of God. And the goal of pornography is self fulfillment. It's self glorification. And it actually totally subverts the image that God has for a husband, one man and one woman to come together in holy union and to give themselves over to each other. Right? And so the point of marriage and sex in the context of marriage is actually mutual gratification. It's to love, outdo one another in love. Pornography is actually you're trying to outdo your own love for yourself, you know, and it's this hyper focus on self gratification and self obsession. And it was a disaster. It was a disaster. And one of the reasons why the church was so hated in the first century is because as Christians began to follow the way of Jesus, they turned their back on the brothels. They turned their back on sexual exploitation. It messed up the temple systems, it messed up the brothel systems. It created, you know, once again, going back to the Ephesus thing, like, it was interesting that there was a pie, basically looked like a pie. And that was the symbol, as you were going through the marketplace in Ephesus that would let everybody know that you were a Christian, that this was a Christian business, you know? And so almost instantly, like, I didn't even think about it until just now. Lise, you have this compare and contrast of a sign and a symbol of sexual exploitation and self deception. But simultaneously, you have a sign and a symbol of the way of Jesus, of the way of the people, of God, and really the people then. And today, you and I have a decision to make. Which way are we going to go? And the issue with the sexualized environment I would just suggest is so serious. And again, I want to be careful in how I'm talking about this, but I wrote a forward for a friend of mine, and he wrote on spiritual warfare. And in it I used an example of a frog. And I think this is true of spiritual warfare, and I think this is true of pornography. And there's this old story of a frog and boiling water. And if you put the frog in a pot of boiling water, the frog just jumps the heck out. Right. Like, I'm out of this. But if you take that frog and you put that frog in just cool water and then you turn the burner on slowly, slowly, and the temperature, the frog just goes, this is nice. I'm in a sauna, I'm in a hot tub. And then all of a sudden, the frog is boiled alive and dead. And what I'm watching in our culture, in our society today, what it seems like is this sexualized environment and the burner is just dialing up, and we're becoming more and more accustomed to things that are being presented in front of us as good and beautiful. But it's actually a deception of the enemy because it is sexualizing and it's actually devaluing a woman. It's devaluing a man. And if we don't open our eyes and allow the Holy Spirit to convict us and to say, oh, I'm not going to participate in those activities. I'm not going to like those pictures on Instagram. I'm not going to follow those accounts because of what it's doing. It's not about them, it's about me.

Lisa (29:20)

And it's slowly turning the temperature of the water up.

Jim (29:23)

Yes.

Joel (29:23)

Because it is a step towards the justification of sinful behavior. Right. And I just. I think that when Paul and when Jesus talking about in Matthew 19:9 and when he's addressing the churches in Corinth and Ephesus and Galatia. When he's talking about the devastation that takes place in marriages because of porneia and because of living in these sexualized environments and being okay with them, he's like, hey, there's a reason why you ought to turn away from those things and turn towards the way of Jesus. Because when we turn towards the way of Jesus and we actually uphold the dignity of the man and the woman actually serves as a winsome witness to the world of an alternative way, there's another way that you don't have to give yourself over in self destruction to pornography or to sexual activities that are, that are self deprecating, like they're, they degrade who you are, you know, and in fact there's a way that you can find that God actually, and you actually kind of just joked about it, but mentioned it's like man sex can be a phenomenal in the context of marriage where there's trust, where there's love, where there's high honor for one another, you know, and the Lord's like, hey, enjoy it in that context. But when it goes outside of that context, it is absolutely devastating.

Lisa (30:52)

So Joel or Jim. Thank you, Joel. What do you say when a woman comes into your office and she says I need help? Like where does she start? What does she do? And then what do you say if a couple is sitting in front of you? So let's start with the woman first.

Jim (31:11)

Well, either way I'm going to start with the two Ds of discovery or disclosure. Now I'm not a robot, so I may start here one time and that one time I'm also wanting to get into the story, but before I would get into her story. In that case, I want the story, the narrative of did you discover something? If so, or has he disclosed something? Most of the time it will be discovery. What did you discover? I want you to know this is confidential. Tell her we're going to talk about this. I'm not going to judge and rush to judgment of your husband. She might, but I want to know what happened. I want to know a little bit. Best you can remember of the history of it. How long ago do you think I saw a sign? You know, I would go down and saw a blue light or I came in and he closed the old days, you know, close the laptop down, change the channel when I walked in the room or I found a burner phone or two, you know, I found that he had another phone or I saw a history trail or something. I thought maybe it was Something I began to find evidences of something. And so I would say, well, let's walk through. Give me some ideas of what you think found and how long was it there? I want to know, does he know I have women come in my office and say, I'm about to blow his life up, or I'm about to go to confront, or I'm going to go to the pastor. He doesn't even know I've discovered it yet. So I have to meet them uniquely there and kind of warn and guide. Because part of this is once you go and say to him, here's everything I found, you know, he might start hiding stuff real quickly. So that's on her part. I'm letting her know ahead of time that, okay, you're in a journey now that you're going to need to go do. Whether it was with me because I work with a lot of women or with someone else, you're not going to need to go explore your part of the trauma because you're in ICU right now. Again, he T boned you in an intersection. You're on a bicycle. Let her know. Because sometimes and for years it was very common. It's him, him, him, him. And I go, it is him, what he's done, but you need to go do your own work. So I'm kind of just laying that out. In some cases, they're not ready to. To hear that you're like, this isn't about me. I say, okay, so then I want to. Is he willing to come in? Helps a lot for me, at least at some level can if a person is a Christian, but I work with non Christians too. Is he willing to come in and does he know ahead of time? Yeah, he knows what I've discovered. And then if they come into the coupleship, I'm willing to say, she's discovered. Let me hear you. Not your side of the story, but what's happened? What are you willing to own? And we say, if Chaz knows this, your husband, you know, in addiction stuff, those of us in recovery, if you spot it, you got it. I was a porn addict for years. And with that is if I see everything from breaking out in a sweat or getting angry, I read their eyes, their nostrils flare or they begin to. Yes. But if they give an excuse, an excuse is just the skin of a reason stuffed with a lie. So I'm knowing already and I'm going, okay. I don't judge them right away or confront them. I'm trying to get the narrative out and just feel the vibe, trusting the Holy Spirit of what I see, that's the beginning point. And then if they'll do the work, then I want to say if we're going to do the work, we're not going to do this simplistically. I need to get both of their stories out in detail. And I think every time, if not nearly every time with a guy in porn, I'll be able to see the etiology, we call it, or the origin of probably this is where this all started, way back here.

Lisa (34:33)

And then is there hope? You know, I know that you have done great work and you've seen great restoration in your marriage, but what does it take? And is there hope in this situation?

Jim (34:47)

Yeah, the one that takes a great one. And it means thoroughly. Right? Do your work. The idea.

Lisa (34:53)

And when you say do your work.

Jim (34:54)

Like unpack that, like in counseling to go in. We believe in the sex addiction field as I'm a certified sex addiction therapist dealing with pornography. It's probably a two to five year plan because you need to rewire the brain. Remember this is doing your work. Address the neurochemical part, the brain part. You want to address that you've been pumping those drugs for years. You want to address shame, which you know, I've said is self hatred at my expense. So these guys actually don't have a good view of themselves. They hate themselves. It's a shame based problem. If people only knew what I was doing, what would they think? That's that fear. Look at their thinking. I'm saying, what is your thinking? Listen, even in childhood, what did you had a story you shared personally. So if someone discovers porn, we'll just sweep that under the rug or we shouldn't do that. What's their thinking? View of God, sexuality, wives, husbands, men, women. There's a lot of misogyny. That's that word that means the hatred of women. If you're looking at pornography, there is a hatred of women. That is not a viewing of porn. I have to do so much word we use is psychoeducation because they don't see it. I'm trying to say slowly you begin to see this. They've got to look at the emotional impact. This is what we call an intimacy disorder. When they're acting out to porn, it feels like real intimacy. When they're looking at porn, I've dubbed it modern day polygamy. The average person from 12, man from 12 to 28 and I are in my office, they have looked and acted and the body feels like it's Having sex. Listen, better than Solomon or worse, thousands of women. Most guys don't look at one porn picture and act out to it. And I assess deeper. Like, I don't look at porn. I go, are you looking at sexy images on Instagram?

Joel (36:36)

I'm talking about sexualized environment.

Jim (36:37)

Oh. And I say, have you willfully sought out sexually stimulating material to look at? So I'm getting them to do their work, is to go in. I'm going to start, if they're willing, and they're willing to start unpacking their trauma story, to go back and I'll find. Man, you got. You just told one you found porn. See, this porn problem is accessible. It's anonymous. It's accidental, Right? It's affordable. Nobody should pay for porn these days. It's accidental. It's airbrushed. And it's AI now, like we've never seen. I mean, it's like, this is the one place I don't. I believe in the word of God, but the one place I wrestle with Solomon, that it's errant is when he said, there's nothing new under the sun. Dude, you wait till the Internet comes along. And AI now I believe in the Bible. Don't get me wrong. I'm kidding. Everywhere I speak, I say that because it's not policy.

Joel (37:28)

Jim.

Jim (37:28)

Oh, thank you. Because I'm like, this is not your father's porn or grandfather's porn problem.

Joel (37:33)

Let me just one more thing. Just connect it very practically because I've got a bunch of friends, and in the last couple of years, the Lord's opened up opportunities to speak at some college campuses and do some things there, which has been phenomenal. And one of the big ones that I'm getting on the women's side, young women's side, is like, we're all the godly guys. Like, we're serious. We want to be in a committed relationship. And like, there's no serious. And then on the guy side, it's like, well, there's just nobody out there. There's just nobody out there. And so one day I did this, and it's like, pretty brash. But I was like, hey, let me see somebody I knew. Let me see your phone. Can I. Can I look at your Instagram real quick? It's kind of like, yeah, whatever, sure. And I looked at the Instagram and I started to scroll and go, do you know her? No. Do you know her? No. And these are all just like supermodel, like, you know, And I'm just like, this is a sexualized environment. And you're training your brain, you're training your heart, you're training your mind, you're training your body to buy into a vision of reality. That, my friend, is not reality. And so now look at the deception of this. The deception of this is you're conning yourself out of actually godly women that love Jesus, that are beautiful, that don't look like this, fictitious, imaginative, wiring their.

Jim (38:53)

Brain toward a false template. Right?

Joel (38:55)

So now guys aren't getting like that. Watch this thing, like, play itself out, you know? And I do think that this is a deception of the enemy. This is all connected to the impact of pornography. And it's deeply theological, it's deeply therapeutic, and it is impacting people, children, marriages. You know, nobody goes unscathed. A couple just passages. Because we've been talking a lot about this. I just want to anchor us in a couple places. It's First Corinthians 5 where Paul's just like, y' all are acting wild. It's actually reported. That was me. That's not in the text. It says it's actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you and the kind of sexual immorality that's not even tolerated among the Gentiles.

Lisa (39:36)

Okay, and where is this?

Joel (39:37)

First Corinthians 5. Okay, a man is sleeping with his father's wife. And you are arrogant. Shouldn't you be filled with grief?

Jim (39:47)

Now, big statement.

Joel (39:48)

I think this is huge because it's both saying, the person who's observing the act should be filled with grief. Grief. And the person who is in the act should be observing grief. Both parties should be responding in a certain way, and yet that response is not happening. And then you could flip over to First Corinthians 6, the very next chapter, starting in verse 15. This is what you kind of alluded to, Lys, and quoted. Don't you know that your bodies are a part of Christ's body? So should I take a part of Christ's body and make it part of a prostitute? Absolutely not. Don't you know anyone joined to a prostitute is one body with her? For Scripture says the two will become one flesh. This is a callback to Genesis. But anyone joined to the Lord is one spirit with him. Verse 18. Flee sexual immorality. It's not saying, don't flirt with it, don't hang out with it, don't consider it. Flee. Flee sexual morality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body. But the person who is sexually immoral sins against his own body. Don't you know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have from God. Like one of the most precise Greek sentences that you could have. You're not your own, for you were bought at a price. So glorify God with your body.

Lisa (41:05)

That's good. Thank you, Joel.

Jim (41:06)

One of the big dangers here, so I teach it all day long with people, and I believe it's accurate. And if Joel tells me it's not, I'll still believe it's accurate. That if you're married to your wife and sexually and spiritually, the two become one. And Paul has clearly said here, if you connect to a prostitute, the two become one. The pornography issue, I believe there is the realm of the demonic being opened, but of strongholds and attachments that many of the men, I've helped them renounce it just globally, that the men are actually bonding in an unhealthy way, becoming one with so many pornographic images. It's unbelievable. And I work to say we've got to come out of that, confess it, repent, and say, give it all to God. But there is an attachment and bonding in porn.

Lisa (41:51)

Well, thank you both so much for both sharing your stories, but also your wisdom around this really challenging topic. Jim, as we close, I know you said that it's going to take intensive therapy and there's a lot of layers to the healing, but I love that your story gives great hope because if you will invest the time and get out of the blame and the shame and start moving on to rewiring the brain and having healthy patterns and habits in your life, I love that your story is such a great example of how not only were you restored, but your marriage was as well. So as we end today, can you talk to that couple who is facing this right now? And they're just in this cycle of fear, dysfunction, chaos, blaming, shaming, you know, all the things that are happening. Can you talk tenderly to whoever it is that's listening?

Jim (42:47)

Well, you're at ground zero, aren't you? You're at the 9, 11. Even if it's been months worth of what do we do here? You're at ground zero. And I tell everyone that it's not a bumper sticker. It's true. Come on in here in the office, let's talk. We'll get the story out. We have more help, hope and healing than you have problems. So I want to give them that vision. There is a way out. I've gotten out. There is hope for you if you do the work. But the way out. Robert Frost, the poet, said, the way out is through prepositions matter. We're going to work through this to get to the other side. There has to be healthy me before there's a healthy we. So both of you have to do your own work and don't be dependent on whether your spouse does your work or not. That's happened with so many women I've worked with where the guy just bails or he's not going to do his work. So the idea is do your own individual work and you really need to get that set before you do the deeper couples work. It works. If you work it, it really will. There's more help and hope and healing for this pornography or infidelity problem than you know. It's there and it awaits you.

Lisa (43:51)

Thank you for joining us on this episode of Therapy and Theology.

Shay Hill (43:56)

Lisa, Jim and Joel, thank you so much for today's conversation. Friend after listening, there's a lot you can do with what you heard today. First, I would encourage you to share this episode with a friend who needs to hear it. Send them the link to listen, then maybe go grab coffee and talk it over together. Or like I mentioned at the beginning of this episode, you might find yourself in a really difficult place of feeling distant from God, questioning if his plans for you are real, really good, or maybe something else. If that's you, I want you to know that we deeply understand, but we also want to help. That's why I want to remind you about Lisa Turker's free resource titled Trust is a Track Record 5 Scriptural Truths to remember God's faithfulness. Download it today using the link in our show notes. That's all for today, friends. Thank you so much for tuning in to Therapy and Theology. Therapy and Theology is brought to you by Proverbs 31, the ministries where we believe if you know the truth and live the truth, it changes everything.