Why doesn’t God take away your porn addiction? People tell you to give your addiction to Christ, and it doesn’t seem to work for you. Why?
I remember how frustrated I used to be by this concept of giving my porn addiction over to Christ. People advised me to simply surrender to Christ and that was the answer to get sober. But it didn’t work for me. I thought this might be because God didn’t love me, didn’t care, or that I was simply too sinful a person.
I’ve worked with men across the world who struggle with these beliefs, and I’ve helped them find success in porn addiction recovery.
The key is not to simply give your addiction to Christ, but to understand how to successfully integrate truths and approaches from spirituality, religion, and psychology to provide a powerful force for quitting porn. God can be an integral part of this as He inspires you to understand your brain, your addiction, and how to get sober from porn for good.
By combining methods from both psychology and faith, you can overcome porn addiction. I did it myself and I teach men across the world to do the same.
Empowering Recovery Through Effective Spiritual & Psychological Practice
Regular spiritual practice is a catalyst for growth in all other areas of your life. It acts as a driving force for positive growth in your sobriety, relationships, career, health, ambition, and more.
This article will give you insights into why spirituality and faith are so crucial for recovery, how to include both psychology and God in overcoming porn addiction, and common mistakes that addicts make when asking God to help them quit porn.
Why Spirituality Matters in Recovery
I believe that a quality, daily spiritual practice is the single most important thing you can do each day for your sobriety. Why? Because it addresses a fundamental aspect of what characterizes you as a human being.
If you want to recover, you must address the following critical aspects of what makes you you:
You must address all of these parts of you. Including your spiritual part. If you do not, it will be very difficult for you to stay sober.
Getting sober is not just about abstaining from your drug of choice, it is about transforming into a healthier, stronger version of yourself.
Religion has an amazing capacity to bring peace and power to your life, but only if your belief in that religion is not founded on things like fear, shame, perfectionism, and self-judgment. It must be something that adds to your life, rather than takes away, and it must be something that is personal for you.
If you are simply attending church and saying prayers for a couple minutes each day, this is not going to be sufficient to empower your recovery. Spirituality can only lead you to stop porn addiction if it takes a central role in your life and is founded on gratitude, love, service, and a belief that God has your best interest in mind.
How Spiritual Growth Strengthens Porn Addiction Recovery
Addiction isn’t just about physical or emotional cravings—it’s often tied to emotional wounds, fear, loneliness, and a lack of purpose. Spirituality helps you:
Find deeper meaning beyond pleasure-seeking behaviors.
Address unresolved pain with compassion and self-forgiveness.
Develop inner strength that isn’t dependent on external validation.
Spirituality also replaces destructive coping mechanisms. Instead of numbing pain with porn or unhealthy habits, you can turn to meditation, prayer, or mindfulness to cope with stress. Switching your coping mechanisms to these mild, positive outlets can sound impossible at first, but over time it can become your go-to.
Instead of seeking control, you can trust in a Higher Power to guide you. You can learn to rely on this power in everything you do, and it can become the bedrock of your sobriety.
Religion vs. Psychology in Porn Addiction Recovery
Many people argue for either religion or psychology in their effectiveness for stopping porn addiction. Some say one is better, and other people say the other.
Neither is true, because they are inseparably connected.
Using psychological frameworks for processing thoughts and emotions (such as CBT or IFS) is crucial for sobriety. These do not take the place of religion and spirituality. Instead, spirituality and religion can make these frameworks truly effective. Reliance on Higher Power breathes life into psychological techniques.
Without my reliance on God and my education in religion and spirituality, I never would have developed my porn addiction recovery program. I believe that God’s light and inspiration are the forces that brought me out of darkness, taught me how to understand my brain, and motivated me to learn about psychology, healing the brain, and how to quit porn.
This doesn’t mean I’ve had no work to do on my end. Quite the contrary. It’s meant more work. As I come to understand sobriety better and better, I reach toward higher and higher heights, because that's what God's Spirit inspires me to do. It’s hard, but a much better “hard” than being addicted.
It’s also meant a great deal of practical learning and implementation on my part. I needed to deeply understand my own mind and why I kept going to porn addiction. My research into psychology has been a tremendous and irreplaceable way to do that.
God and psychology are not opposites, but work in tandem. God has been there to inspire and facilitate my learning, point me down effective roads, and strengthen me as I’ve learned how to live sober. Without Him, I would not have the motivation to stay clean from porn. Without psychology, I would not know how.
God has not simply taken my addictions, but instead inspired me to actions that have enabled me to learn through them and overcome them.
The Psychological Benefits of Spirituality
How does spirituality help you psychologically?
Helps Fill the Void Left by Addiction – Addiction often replaces deeper spiritual needs. Reconnecting with presence, peace, and Higher Power fills that emptiness with something meaningful.
Improves Response to Stress – Spiritual beliefs and practices give you something to lean on when cravings and struggles arise.
Encourages Letting Go of Control – Addiction thrives on self-will and compulsive behavior. It is all about a mentality of control. Spirituality teaches surrender, trust, and humility.
Reduces Shame and Guilt – Spirituality can foster self-compassion and the belief that you are worthy of healing.
Creates a Sense of Belonging – Whether through a spiritual community or a connection with a Higher Power, spirituality works counter to the isolation that fuels addiction.
Foster Long-term Commitment to Recovery – Connection with Higher Power can give you a higher purpose and motive for staying sober.
How Spirituality and Religion Can Either Help or Hinder Recovery
Many people associate spirituality with religion, but in the context of addiction recovery, spirituality is much broader.
Spirituality is about connection—connection to a Higher Power, to a deeper sense of purpose, and to inner peace. Religion, on the other hand, often involves specific doctrines, rituals, and organized beliefs.
Is it Better to Be Spiritual or Religious for Addiction Recovery?
Many in modern Western Society debate between being religious or spiritual, claiming one is superior to the other.
Some say it is best to be religious, as God has certain requirements and if we do not meet them then we will be punished, or we will not receive the blessings of heaven or be saved in the afterlife.
Others say that we need to abandon religious beliefs as they are old and foolish, made by men who want to manipulate and control people. They state that being spiritual, rather than religious, is more evolved.
I would argue that it depends on how you are living religion or observing spirituality. Is it bringing you peace, purpose, resilience, and a focus on the good of others? Or is it fostering something else?
Fear vs. Faith in Religion and Spirituality
Many of us may say that religion makes people happy. But, if you are living religion out of fear that you will be punished if you don’t, and judging others who don’t live your faith, is that really making your life better?
Does religion bring you feelings of the need to control others, look down on them, and feel ashamed of your mistakes? Does it feed perfectionism, which fuels your need to escape with destructive behaviors like pornography in order to feel some relief?
If you are spiritual but not religious, on the other hand, are you actually living by a code of ethics that keeps you rooted and connected with others? Or are you subject to the whims of your “spiritual intuition” and “personal truth”, disabling you from feeling a sense of commitment to a higher way of life?
Religion can fuel porn addiction if it fills you with fear, shame, perfectionism, and judgment for others. On the other hand, it can fuel recovery if it centers you on a life of compassion, service, gratitude, and reliance on God as your companion and friend.
Spirituality can fuel porn addiction if it is uncommitted, subject to delusion, or isolated from a greater community. It can keep you in the darkness, unaware that you are not sticking to anything other than your own personal preferences, having an unwillingness to choose a spiritual path that could be found in religion. This is aligned with a susceptibility to addiction.
On the other hand, spirituality can fuel recovery if it is a dedicated practice that is centered on specific, sound, and universal principles for the way you live, treat others, and connect with Higher Power every day.
Living By Commitments and Strong Values
I am both spiritual and religious. I believe that each are important for recovery. Taking my individual spirituality seriously and building a personal relationship with my Higher Power has been crucial for my recovery. In addition, commitment and connection to a larger religious organization serves as an anchor for positive living, and helps me aim for higher truths I can base my life on.
Addiction is founded on self-centered values. Being addicted doesn’t make us self-centered, but it does mean that some of our actions are not reflective of what we may see as important and worthwhile.
I believe that religion can be a powerful support and anchor to live by higher values. But simply being a member of a religion, or stating we are “giving our addiction to Christ” is not sufficient for recovery in my experience. Quitting porn requires a more involved approach.
It requires us to practice spirituality in our everyday life. Not just in scripted prayers morning and evening, but on-going practices throughout the day of mindfulness, presence, gratitude, focusing on the good of others, and relying on Higher Power.
Why Doesn’t God Take My Addiction Away?
I think one of the most common mistakes I see in religious individuals who are trying to quit porn, is the constant focus upon asking God to make them sober.
What I’ve come to understand after over a decade of sobriety, and through my professional work with others, is that fixating on addictive behavior in prayer - even if it’s with the intent of asking God to end the behavior - often leads people to obsess over their addiction, and this can actually fuel porn relapse.
Instead, I’ve found it is far more effective to ask God to teach me what to focus on, where to place my time and efforts, good things I can do to feel fulfilled, etc. so that I can stay sober today.
I focus my prayers on those things that match what a truly great person who was sober might focus on, such as:
Gratitude
Making a difference in the world
The well-being of others
Outcomes or goals that benefit my loved ones or community
Characteristics I want to develop
By centering my focus on these things when I pray, I am training my mind to fill the space that addiction has occupied with better things. I am replacing the darkness with fulfillment, positivity, and love.
In many ways, I believe God can only give you what you ask for. You must first imagine and request it. If you’re not specific, His hands are tied.
Now, just because you pray for it doesn’t mean it will happen. That’s not because God doesn’t care, but because He cares a great deal. He wants you to grow and become stronger as an agent and individual. If he simply gave you what you asked for instantly, you wouldn't need to take the journey that will one day bring deep meaning to your sobriety.
If you ask, focus, work, and pursue then you will be far happier in the long run. If things are simply given to you, this does not build your sense of confidence and esteem. You must work for it, solve problems, and overcome obstacles. Only through this stretching can you feel a sense of purpose, which in turn brings happiness.
God will be with you every step of the way if you invite Him to be, but that doesn’t absolve you of the growth and work necessary to earn whatever it is you are praying for.
He can be your guiding light on the hill, but you need to steer the ship through the choppy waters. He can be at the helm, but you need to navigate the storm.
You are the one who must purchase the ship, train as the captain, hire the team, and go on the journey. Then, you need to keep training, keep journeying, and eventually purchase a fleet of ships.
God is your consultant, your mentor, your motivator, your friend, and your confidant, but you need to make the choices and build the skills needed for sobriety.
When you slip up, relapse, or experience hardships, don't blame God. Instead, look at yourself and ask, "What can I change?", "What did I learn from this?", "How can I prevent this in the future?", or, "What is the next right step?"
When life gets hard, it is not because God is cruel or careless, it’s because that’s the way the universe works. We are meant to suffer in this life, and we are meant to grow from it in one way or another. We suffer not because God is against us, but because, out of necessity, reality includes suffering.
It hurts and it's hard, but if we did not suffer there would be no meaning to our lives. It is only through challenge that we grow, and if we so choose, this growth can eventually bring a sense of self-worth and a compassion for others. And through this we may become happy.
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Episode 86 Transcription: Why Doesn't God Take My Porn Addiction? | Spirituality, Psychology & Praying to Quit Porn
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