Title – Closing the Window: Steps to Living Porn Free

Author – Tim Chester

Publisher – InterVarsity, Downers Grove, IL 2010

I highly recommend the book for good counsel to those who have been exposed to pornography in the past and also in the assisting of those who are counseling other men (and women) caught up in the seductive snare.

Here are some brief quotes:

1. Dr. Alvin Cooper says pornography has “the triple-A engine”: accessibility, anonymity, and affordability (9).
2. There are five key ingredients in the battle plan:  abhorrence of porn, adoration of God, assurance of grace, avoidance of temptation, and accountability to others (17).
3. Triggers for porn:  boredom, exposure, loneliness, opportunity, stress, tiredness, and rejection (37).
4. “Every man who knocks on the door of a brothel is looking for God.” – G.K. Chesterton (43).
5. “Sexual sin is not primarily about lust. . . . it is first and foremost a violation of the first Great Commandment, an idol that replaces the Creator.  This means in the face of frustration, loneliness, anxiety, stress, etc. the individual runs to a false god.” – David White of Harvest USA (44).
6. “Whatever porn offers, God offers more” (44).

And as a guy who loves to climb mountains, this is one of my favorite illustrations in the book:

“I was presenting some seminars on the struggle with porn at the Keswick Convention in the Lake District in the United Kingdom.  During a break I climbed the mountain Skiddaw with a friend, approaching the summit from the steeper west side.  It was a hard work!  The final push is across loose rock at a forty-five-degree angle.  Each step is agony.  The calves are aching as you try to lift your weight on tired legs.  It feels like a form of torture–and this is what we do for leisure!  So why do we do it?  Why don’t we just give up?  Because we’re confident that the view from the top will make all the effort seem worthwhile.  And so it was, for me and my friend.”

“This is a great picture of the way we’re sanctified by faith.  Sometimes it can be agony.  Each step is hard work.  You feel like giving up.  But you press on, because faith tells you that the view from the top will be glorious.  Legalism would make you climb the slope by berating you or beating you down.  And if you’ve ever tried climbing a mountain with reluctant children, you’ll know that that approach doesn’t work very well.  At best you might get them up one mountain, but you’ll not get them up a second!  The gospel gets you up on the mountain by promising you a glorious view from the top.  The path is not less hard, but there’s a spring in your step as you anticipate what’s coming.  Faith is fixing your eyes on the mountain top.  Every now and then you can turn around and get a glimpse of the glorious view, just as we experience more of God the more we know him and serve him.  And those glimpses are a foretaste of what’s to come:  the mountain top of God’s eternal glory” (60-61)

Amen.