(LifeSiteNews) — On this week’s episode of The Van Maren Show, Jonathon interviews Sam Black of Covenant Eyes to discuss his new book The Healing Church: What Churches Get Wrong About Pornography (And How to Fix It).
Black tells Jonathon that the reason why he wrote the book is because he found that most Christian pastors do not know how to address porn addiction and the damage that it has on their congregations. According to Black, pastors “didn’t know really where to go and they didn’t have the basic understanding of why someone might struggle [with porn addiction].”
In the book, Black compiles new research attained from interviews with over 70 pastors and ministry leaders, in an attempt to discover how pornography affects their congregations and how some of them managed to fight it well.
Asserting that pornography is negatively affecting the health of Christian congregations, Black says that “if you don’t have the right culture, if you don’t create the right mission in the church … then you will never really step forward. And what you’ll do is continue to minimize it. Your church is going to miss beautiful opportunities to raise disciples, because when a stronghold is in place, it’s a great opportunity for deep discipleship.”
Black also addresses the issue of taking responsibility for one’s own actions, stressing that those addicted to pornography must acknowledge that their actions have caused serious harm in their lives.
“You have to make amends for the damage you have caused, without causing more damage,” Black asserts.
Black also discusses ways in which those struggling with pornography addiction can ease their use, such as holding a “crash investigation” to understand why they fell and adding boundaries so that they can avoid a future fall, especially with the support of a group.
“You’re not waking up as an adult and suddenly going, ‘Oh, well, I’m struggling now with pornography,’” he says. “No, you give this lots of practice and often you have used pornography to soothe your emotions, to maintain your feelings, to manage your moods.”
“It is imperative for us to set healthy boundaries because we have trained our brain that when we need to relax, when we feel bored, when we feel anger or fear or frustration or lack of self-worth, there is an easy escape to pornography,” he continues. “And the brain is so trained in this, it [has impacted] our conscience.”
“When we just continually meander through life and not be conscious of what we’re thinking, what we’re feeling, what we’re doing, and what we’re thinking of doing, then we’re just setting ourselves up for failure,” Black contends. “And we have to ask … do you want to be well? Do you want to be healed? Well if you do, it’s going to take some work. It’s going to take some conscious effort. It’s going to take a deeper leaning on Christ. It’s going to take a deeper leaning on the Body of Christ to really find freedom.”
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