Accountability partners are a great help in the fight against pornography.

James 5:16 says, "Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed."

However, many people are surprised that their confessing and praying is not always bringing the healing. Well, confessing is a bit more than "I looked at porn yesterday."

When I managed a staff of employees and something went wrong, I led them through an examination of the process that led to the mistake. We then determined if we needed a new way of doing things to avoid the mistake in the future.

Accountability is the same way. Identify the series of steps that led to the sin.

James 1:14-15 explains this process. I'll number the steps. "Each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own (1) evil desire and (2) enticed. Then, after desire has (3) conceived, it gives birth to (4) sin; and sin, when it is (5) full-grown, gives birth to (6) death."

"I looked at porn yesterday" is just step four. Confess all the steps.

Covenant Eyes has produced a wonderful tool called "Christian Accountability: A Discussion Guide." This worksheet includes the following exercises.

1. On a scale of 1 (HELP!) to 9 (Stable), rate the following

• I have actively avoided known triggers of sexual temptation or titillation.
• My time with technology or media has not displaced time with God, family, friends, work, or my neighbors.
• I am resting completely in what Christ has done for me-not obsessing about my own failures nor putting stock in my own performance.

2. When it comes to my habitual sins, is there a time of day, a place, a person, or a mood that tends to open the door?  

 

This deeper accountability leads to more specific prayer and allows God to bring the healing.

James 1:14-15 says sin (step 4 in the article above) can become full grown (step 5) and lead to death (step 6).

Eric's program on pornography "Images or Glory?" uses the graph above to explain what happens chemically in the brain when we use pornography.

The "thrill" of this sin is so great that thrills from non-sinful activity (including sex inside of marriage) are not thrilling in comparison. This leads the porn user to turn more and more to pornography. However, the thrill of porn begins to normalize and tolerance is reached. Now the pron user must move to a new and more thrilling form of pornography. (This is sin becoming full grown according to James 1:14-15.) Pornography's ever increasing and other thrills becoming less and less truly is a death to any kind of normal life.