Do the Opposite – The Courageous Journey of Recovery

John 5:1-9 “Would you like to get well?” That seems like an odd question for Jesus to ask of a man who has been sick for 38 years. But it’s the question we must start with. Do you want to get well? What are you willing to do to get well? Notice that this man’s first response was to blame other people. Sounds about right for an addict, right? We have spent years, maybe 38 or longer, blaming, making excuses, minimizing, justifying, rationalizing, etc. It’s someone else’s fault. But Jesus put the responsibility for getting well solely on this man – “Stand up, pick up your mat and walk!” As soon as he took responsibility for his own recovery, the healing began.

Now, all of us would like our healing to be instant like this man’s. However, the healing we experience in recovery is almost always a gradual journey that begins with a recognition that we need healing. The first step of the 12-step model says, “We admitted we were powerless over our sexual addiction and that our lives had become unmanageable.” You may have been struggling with problematic sexual behavior for a long time, but now the consequences have become unmanageable. Maybe your wife found out or maybe your behaviors at work were discovered, and you lost your job. Perhaps you are suffering from depression or are even suicidal. Whenever the pain of continuing your unwanted sexual behavior outweighs the perceived pain of leaving it behind, you are ready to change.

The biblical word for this is repentance, which literally means to change your mind and go in the opposite direction. “Do the opposite” became a mantra for me in my recovery journey. What I had always done had gotten me to this unmanageable place in my life, so I knew the only solution was to do the opposite of what I had always done.

First, I began to pursue intimacy with God instead of hiding and running away. I was terrified of intimacy. I did not even think it was possible for me. I had shut down my emotions as an 8-year-old after a traumatic encounter with my mom. I made an unconscious vow that day to never lose control as she had done. So, intimacy with anyone, including God, did not feel safe or even desirable to me. I protected myself by living in isolation, which I now know was one of the key drivers of my addiction. That morning in March, 2015, I changed my mind about intimacy and broke my 50-year-old vow. Protecting myself from intimacy with God had landed me in this awful place. I changed my morning routine that day to begin pursuing the very thing I had always run away from. “Quiet times” had always been a religious duty to me; something to check off the list. I had pretty much given up on those by now. For the past several months leading up to that fateful day, I had spent my early mornings pursuing a false intimacy with the women of pornography. This had become my worship at the altar of sexual idolatry. Now I began pursuing real intimacy with God. Ever since that day, my morning routine has consisted of Bible reading, prayer, recovery reading, and reading to fuel my awareness of God’s presence in my life. It is no longer something to check off the list. It is where I start a conversation with God that continues throughout the day. I call it prayer without an Amen at the end.

At the same time, I started pursuing emotional intimacy with Susan. This had always felt so scary and unsafe to me, but now I was ready to move toward her instead of away from her, even when I knew it would be messy. Initiating hard conversations, answering her questions, redefining sexual intimacy as emotional connection instead of orgasm, staying present with her in challenging times when my old pattern pleaded with me to run away, were just some of the ways that I pursued my wife in ways that I never had before. The old ways of relating to her had gotten us to a place where she was seriously considering leaving me. I refused to continue living in insanity, doing the same things over and over and expecting a different result. A different result would require different actions, so I repented (changed my mind and moved in the opposite direction). Susan will tell you that my lifelong coping mechanisms of defensiveness and blaming were replaced with humility and accepting responsibility. I was doing the opposite of what I had always done, and it was apparent to her.

Another big opposite for me was to immediately seek and find help for my addiction. I discovered resources online, enrolled in a 30-day workshop, started reading, listening and watching anything I could find about getting free from this addiction. Over the next few weeks, I continued to be faced with the reality that isolation had driven my addiction, so I decided to do the opposite and join an online recovery group. This may have been the scariest thing I did. Opening up to God and my wife was one thing. Opening up to complete strangers was quite another. I was so fearful that even in this online group, someone might actually know me and spill my secret to others. What I found instead was a group of guys who understood my struggle, accepted me without judgment, loved me and provided a safe place for me to be authentic and vulnerable. Those guys were a lifeline for me, and I would not be where I am today without them.

Repentance also meant changing my environment. This involved things like rearranging the furniture, so I would not sit in the same place I had been watching porn, moving the laptop to the kitchen island in clear view so Susan could easily see anything I was seeing, installing filtering software on my devices, designating a specific chair for my morning time with God, giving her access to all of my passwords, etc.

However, the biggest opposite and underlying issue was inviting God in and trusting Him rather than trusting my ability to white-knuckle through sobriety. I realized that behavior modification would never be enough to set me free. I had “managed” the addiction for most of my life through various forms of behavior modification, but what was necessary for true freedom was a change in control. I had to repent of my feeble attempts to “control” my unwanted sexual behavior and surrender control to God. I had to connect to the new heart He had given me and begin to live out of that heart. I had to identify the lies I had believed and the agreements I had made and replace them with the truth. I began to trust what God says about me.

Please don’t misunderstand what I’m saying here. This was and continues to be a journey for me. I was not suddenly healed or delivered from my lifelong battle. But something radically changed that March Day that has led to where I am today. I made a once-and-for-all decision about USB (unwanted sexual behavior) that I have been living out ever since. I made the switch from “not free to” (abstaining but still desiring) to “free not to” (no longer desiring). USB had almost destroyed everything that mattered to me, so I humbled myself, surrendered to God, and began the journey of hope, healing, and freedom. This is not to say that I am no longer tempted or exposed to sexually stimulating situations. But it does mean that I no longer have the compulsive desire to act on those. I am free not to act on them because this kind of sin has lost its power over me. I died to sin with Christ on the cross and I was raised with Him to a brand-new life. He died for me so He could give His life to me. I do not give myself permission to be swept away in lustful thoughts like I used to do. I am walking in freedom, and so can you!

I recommend that you adopt this mantra as well. In any situation, ask yourself, “What did I use to do?” and do the opposite. This is what Paul describes in Romans 12:2, “Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect” (NLT). You have unsuccessfully tried your way, so now do the opposite.

What does this look like for you? Invite God to show you.