Our desires shape us and dictate our decisions, and one of the strongest  desires inside every human is the desire for knowledge. The 21st century has given us an unprecedented ability to indulge this hunger, to  the point that we have access to an almost limitless amount of information.

On the surface, this abundance of information seems to make  limitless progress attainable for us. But it also comes with a price,  especially since most of it comes from a world of lies. Today we tackle  three areas that cater to this deception: mass media, the internet, and pornography.

In this interview with long-time Residential Program counselor, Ken Larkin, we discuss the hopelessness that often grips sex addicts. Hopelessness can lead to self-pity and despair, which will prevent us from finding victory over sexual sin and create a barrier between us and God.

Ken, as we continue to sketch out the profile of a typical sexual addict in the church, we've come to this idea of just feeling hopeless. I know a lot of people are there, and I wanted to start by playing for you the description Pastor Steve gave of this particular characteristic:

“Living in spiritual defeat over a prolonged period of time causes the man to waffle back and forth between an inflated sense of his own spirituality and a feeling of overwhelming hopelessness. Part of the problem is that for years he has run to books, seminars and support group meetings in the hope that he can overcome his problems with a minimal amount of effort. His dilemma has been exacerbated because he has gotten his hopes up many times over the years by the exaggerated claims of people offering help. ‘Read this book it's powerful;’ ‘this seminar will change your life!’ He dutifully reads those books and attends those seminars but finds that nothing is changed. Each promising situation that doesn't bring victory leaves him more cynical. After a while he even becomes skeptical about the promises held out by Scripture.”

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Ken, Pastor Steve mentioned that people tried different kinds of things unsuccessfully to find freedom oftentimes. What kinds of things have you known for people to try in order to get free from sexual sin?

Really the full gamut; I mean first of all just sheer willpower—just trying hard enough. And then as pastor Steve mentioned self-help books, materials, conferences, seminars, support groups, accountability; different types of therapists and counselors; psychoanalysis: going to see a psychiatrist or psychologist.

Internet filters will be another one: “if I can just put a filter on the device that will help me.” Even getting rid of a phone or a computer or a laptop. And even going the spiritual route: praying more, getting more into the Bible; some guys have even fasted for extended periods hoping to get free through those efforts.

When Christians aren't seeing change and they feel this hopelessness because of their failure, I'm wondering what's really the root of that because I think, maybe, some people are hopeless because they know they failed God, whereas other people it's more because they feel like God failed them.

So, first, how common would you say it is for addicts to feel hopeless in the sense that they have this intense guilt about their failure that's constantly plaguing them?

It's very common and as a matter of fact the reason why it's there is because they have a real, objective guilt. They are living a lifestyle of sin, so they are guilty before a holy God; their conscience and the Word of God testifies to this fact. Their lifestyle does not line up with the truth that they know to be true from God's Word.

Yeah, I imagine it would be very easy to get into that place, but you've observed this quite a lot. What other dynamics would you say kind of feed into that mentality and reinforce that guilt getting so strong in someone's life?

Well, we're talking about hopelessness, so it's not just guilt—the fact that I'm guilty—but it's like this nagging thing that says “I'm never going to be out from under this guilt,” and of course when you're living in habitual sin, you're focusing on yourself and what you want, your desires. So they're caught up in their own little world and are stuck on themselves instead of turning to God. And with that the enemy of our souls, the devil, will try to feed on that and actually lead someone into condemnation, that there's no way out of that guilt. And then instead of turning to God, they turn to despair and hopelessness.

When you're talking about this whole topic of guilt, we all would say that's a good thing—someone ought to feel some degree of guilt about what they've done—but it seems like you're saying it can actually overwhelm someone to the point where they're paralyzed.

Yeah that's correct.

You touched at the end there about people feeling almost under accusation from the enemy. I have talked to people like that; people who really struggle with this dark spiritual mindset. They are doubting that God loves them; they even might be having blasphemous thoughts about God and really feeling bad about that. Where does that kind of thing come from?

Well it's definitely from the enemy. You can't rule out the person's own sinful nature: the flesh. If you're living in sin and God's telling you that you need to live differently, and you're rebelling, it is going to be natural to have antagonistic thoughts against God that might escalate into blasphemous thoughts, accusing God or cursing God. But ultimately, I believe it's the enemy. And the enemy would do anything he can to keep someone from God and from really knowing the freedom that's found in Christ.

All right then let's flip it around maybe and talk about the other type of person. Tell us maybe about the kind of guy that you counsel regarding sexual sin who feels more like God's the one that has failed them. If they're in that place, why do they feel that way and where does that end if they keep going down that path?

Well what they typically will say is "I've cried out to God, I've prayed, I've done all the right things, yet God still hasn't come through for me"; they blame God that they're still in their addiction. Now of course this could also be an excuse that they really haven't come to the place where they want to be free from their sin because they still love their sin and God is really just a scapegoat: "well God hasn't delivered me," but all along their still holding onto their sin. This mindset could be an excuse that will lead to staying in your sin. You're not repenting, you're not changing, you're actually staying in your sin and eventually, maybe, deluding yourself to think it's OK.

The other reaction if you're blaming God is, obviously, you can become angry with God, bitter toward God, even hating God or turning away from God because you've tried to turn to him and he didn't come through for you, so what other recourse do you have? "God isn't helping me, I'm going to find help somewhere else." Some men just give up and go over to their sin and live a lifestyle of perpetual sin.

You're describing a lot of different mindsets and a lot of different places that people come to but the same result: this hopelessness that comes over them for a variety of different reasons. Now I know that Pastor Steve also mentioned that, for these kinds of Christians, they'll often end up even doubting the scripture and all the promises that are there about change. We know that's wrong, but why would you say someone who claims to be a Christian could get to that place where they're convinced that the answers of scripture are just not going to work for them?

I would say a lot of it has to do with guys that have been professing to know Christ, saying they're Christians, but they've been in sin for so many years that an unbelief has settled into their hearts. A lot of them have, on some level, tried to hold on to the promises of God's Word; maybe memorized scripture, quoted scripture and stood upon it, yet they're still bound to their sin. And the reason they're bound is because they're trying to deal with the symptoms and have never really dealt with the roots.

And, ultimately, we find these guys have never really surrendered their lives to God, and they're trying to be free from their sin without really allowing God to do that work in their lives. The reason why that unbelief is there is because they've been really trying to do things themselves, and that lends itself to failure because you're not going to save yourself. I mean it's impossible for someone to free themselves from their sin.

OK so you're saying there's been something missing in their spiritual journey even if they've tried different, important steps like seeking God to a degree. Do you think they see that? Do some of them sense there's something still missing or oftentimes not?

A lot of them do but a lot of them don't. And they've been stuck for so many years and they've been living in this darkness (because you can't live in habitual sin and not at some level be in darkness) and they don't see a way out. Some of them have gone to the point where they don't really even see that they have much of a problem; they've minimized it to the point where it's one small, little problem, when actually their whole lives are in disarray.

You know it's interesting—we're kind of going on a tangent here—but, what you're saying is on the one hand they're hopeless because they feel like this is overwhelming their life, but at this very same time, you're having to deal with the fact that they're missing the rest of their life and thinking that this is the only issue that they have. How do you account for that paradox in their thinking?

There's a lot of different factors. One of them is they may not really understand what true Christianity is, and what God is really calling them to, and they've never really had that deep heart change where their whole life has been turned over to the Lord where they've experienced true repentance, true brokenness for their sin, and God has been able to revamp their life from the inside out. So all they've been doing is what our culture basically teaches us: to deal with the symptoms. And they've never dealt with the fundamental roots of their sin, which is their own pride and selfishness.

Well I know we can't get too far into this topic, but I did at least want to touch on the area of psychology since I'm sure a lot of guys come to you who are holding on to various psychological concepts. For you, where does psychological thinking fit into this topic of hopelessness.

Well, I would say psychology, as well as the other means people have used to seek freedom, actually foster hopelessness. The reason why I say that is psychology tends to promote a victim mentality—number one—"it's someone else's fault," or "you're a victim of your environment, other people." And the other thing is "once an addict, always an addict."

They may be great at identifying problems in telling you what's wrong with you, but they never deal with the root issues, and they don't offer any true solutions for lasting change. There's no hope, there's no way out; "once a sexual addict always a sexual addict." And that fosters extreme hopelessness in the end.

Any other things you want to touch on that you have found contribute to this hopelessness? Things you would point out to leaders who are listening and need to be looking for the problems that are in those they counsel.

Well one of the interesting things I've found is a lot of guys that seem to be the model example of a good Christian—have given themselves to ministry, are involved in all types of activities in church, and it seems like they're doing great spiritually—have a secret double life and they're living in sin. They justify their sin and think they're going to overcome their sin if they just throw themselves into ministry or maybe into work, but freedom still eludes them.

We must know what the truth is if we are going to be able to avoid drowning in deception. A great portion of our culture believes that there there is no such thing as absolute truth--so we can't turn there. But could it be that turning to the American Church to find the truth is potentially just as dangerous as turning to the world? In part three of our series, World of Lies, we ask the tough question, “Is what much of the church culture sees as truth actually just more deception?”

America has often been called the greatest nation on earth, founded on the belief that life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are God-given rights for all. But what has been the outcome and the fruit of such noble-sounding ideals?

Today you may believe things like "I deserve  everything I want;" "my version of the truth is obviously right;" "the government exists to serve me;" "no one can judge me." How could the  ideals of our founding devolve into such selfishness and pride? In this interview, we discuss how the lies of the academic, business, and political realms have helped form us into The United States of Deception.

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One of the resounding messages sent forth from the pulpit of Pure Life Ministries is that there is a huge difference between speaking and acting like the Christian culture and having a real encounter with God. In other words there is religion, and then there is reality. Many professing Christians in America are content to look at their outward performance without examining their hearts. In this segment, Pastor Steve Gallagher exhorts the men in our residential program to seek after a real Christian life. (From #396 - Hypocrites Go To Church Too)

Jordan got up and shared about those two buildings: one built on sand and one built on a rock. The way it was coming to me in my mind is the different elements of Christianity: the church, worship, the word of God, Prayer—those kinds of things—and how you can have all those elements in place, and have one guy whose life is built on the rock and he has one experience with those things; but you have someone whose life is built on the sand—they might be sitting right next to each other in church having completely different experiences. So let me just take a look at them real quick.  

First of all, the church. What is the church there for? The building that you go to every Sunday, why is it there? You know it's kind of a replica of the temple situation in Jerusalem way back in the day. The temple was there because it was a place where the presence of God dwelt. OK, now we know that a building doesn't have the presence of God in that sense, but believers do and so believers come together. When you go to a church you should be going there not to just perform your religious duty for the week—just to put in your time and get your "Get Out Of Jail Free card.” You make your appearance, but you can't wait to get out of there and get home. If that's your attitude either something is terribly wrong in your life—well that's for sure anyway—but maybe something's terribly wrong in the church you're at. Because the presence of God should be there and if it's not, you're at the wrong place. And when you go home... Many of you are going to leave this place walking with the Lord, and you get home, you're going to find that church isn't like you remembered it. You know back when you were back-slidden it all looked really spiritual, but when you come home walking with God that church better be on fire or you're going to be really disappointed. Believe me I've heard many many many stories of that down through the years, or staff members who just go home for vacation and go to their old church and they come back—wow— just in shock. Make sure you're in a Godly church.

The Word of God. When you open the Bible... If you approach it with the typical, academic, mental, head-knowledge mindset that's out there so commonly now, you're not going to walk away with anything. The Word of God is there for a purpose; it's for you to meet with the Lord, not to just fill your head with more information—you don't need more information, you need an encounter with God. And so your approach to the Word—this is on you now and I can't blame the pastor, we're talking about you and the Bible. First of all you've got to have it, you've got to spend time in it—but you approach it saying, "Lord speak to me, speak to me, Lord. Speak for your servant listens."  

Prayer. Don't just go in with your laundry list of all the things that you want so your life can be better. "Oh yeah and save," you know "my brother and sister my wife," or whoever—no, you go to talk to the Lord to really communicate with someone; He's a person, He's there! You know, you're going to be in a transition, hopefully, while you're here: transitioning from religion into a relationship with a person. That person is Jesus Christ, the most awesome person who has ever lived on this earth by far.  

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And just one more quick thing. I was thinking... There's the Broad Way: living for this world, yet claiming to represent Jesus Christ—that's the Broad Way. I would like to think that at Pure Life Ministries, we're pretty much on the Narrow Way here. It certainly is our heart to be that. But there was one—only one who ever did it and that was a razor thin line of perfection. Only Jesus did that. Only Jesus. No one else ever has. Only Jesus Christ. I mean you talk about narrow... We're talking perfection His whole life. What a savior!  

Lord, I just love you this morning I praise your name. You are worthy, Lord, you are worthy of our praise and our worship. We want to be in relationship with you, Lord. It's not about religion it's not about going to church, it's about meeting what with the King, the only one who is worthy. And we worship you and praise your name this morning, Lord. And I just pray that as Nate comes up, Lord that you will just anoint your word. And Holy Spirit, magnify Jesus Christ this morning. Magnify him, Lord, not just that we learn some more stuff, but there would be something that would be imparted into our souls and into our spirits that we can walk away from here feeling like we have met with the Lord. It's you that can do that, Lord and we're asking you, regardless of whatever the sermon is, Lord, we're asking you to please, Holy Spirit, please magnify Jesus in our hearts in such a way that when we leave it stays with us—a sight of the lowly King. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.

The biblical writers characterized the last days as deception on a massive scale, a global assault on truth that would deceive not only the unbelieving world, but multitudes inside the four walls of the Church. And it seems clear that we are now living in the very last of those days they spoke of. If that’s true, then there is one thing we know for sure.

We are being lied to every day, all day, in many different ways. Today we look at the truth about deception: what it is, how it works, and why people are deceived.

What hope can we have that we will ever be able to get a hold of Truth?

When we look around Western civilization, we see a self-acclaimed progressive culture that has stripped away any meaning from the word “truth.” Truth has become nothing more than feelings, emotions and subjective experience.

The plight in the Western Church is not much better. Despite overwhelming access to Biblical knowledge, little or no fruit is being manifested in multitudes of professing Christians' daily lives. Even for those who hold tightly to orthodox doctrine, there can be a temptation to keep the Truth from going any further than head knowledge.

Our only hope is a God-given hunger for the Truth. Our only hope is a one-on-one relationship with God. Our only hope is humbly receiving the Word of God and allowing it to transform our minds.

Our newest series, World of Lies, will examine the growing deception of these last days and the threat this is to the body of Christ. Today we tackle the unexpected danger that threatens a person who is constantly bombarded with lies which often grows quietly grow to slowly erode our life in God.

We look at how our culture is sewing this into us and our director of counseling, Ed Buch, joins us as well, to talk about how this concealed threat is a common problem for the man stuck in sexual sin.

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When the biblical writers talked about the last days, one main  characteristic of these times emerged: deception on a massive scale; a  global assault on truth that would deceive not only the unbelieving  world, but multitudes inside the four walls of the Church. I don’t think  that there’s any question that we are living in the very last of those  Last Days. If that’s true, then there is one thing we know for sure. We  are being lied to every day, all day, in a bunch of different ways.  We’re going to look at some of the specific ways that deception  confronts all of us in future interviews, but today we want to look at  the truth about deception: what it is. How it works. Why people are  deceived.

What is the goal of Biblical Counseling? Jeff Colon talks about the misconception many Christians have when they come into counseling and what the correct focus should be. If we have the right goal in mind, we will begin to find victory over the problems in our lives.

Mike: Jeff, today we want to talk about the goal of our counsel. But before we get into the specifics of that, I want to ask more generally, what is the goal of our life as a Christian?

Jeff: I believe most people go into counseling really just looking for an answer as to how they can be happy. They think their problem is that they aren’t happy. And their goal is, sometimes, to be happy. And A.W. Tozer made this statement about being happy,

"God is not concerned about our happiness, but our holiness."

So, in other words, our goal as Christians isn't to be happy. Our goal should be an underlying passion to please God.

Mike: How does that translate to your goal as a Biblical Counselor and what you're trying to accomplish with an individual whose come to you for help?

Jeff: Well, our goal as Biblical Counselors is to bring that person into a spiritual maturity where he begins to exhibit Christlike qualities in his life.

Mike: As we look then at counseling the sexual addict, how important is it for the individual to set specific goals?

Jeff: It is very important, Mike, to have a goal. Most of us, without a goal in front of us, really just go through life aimlessly, without any direction. So, it is very important for a man in sexual sin, or any person being counseled, to have that goal before them so they have a reference point. We can kind of relate it to an athlete who's in training. Think about these gold medal, Olympic winners. They had a goal in mind as a child. They put all their efforts from early childhood into reaching the goal: one day standing on that podium and having that medal placed around their neck. That was all they could see, their whole lifetime leading up to that point. As Christians, we too need that goal in front of us and our goal, obviously, is not temporal. Our goal is eternal. It is to pursue Christ. It's to be like Him. That needs to be before every believer. That needs to be the goal that they're focused on. Everything in their life is revolving around fulfilling that goal.

Mike: Well, talk to us, if you can, about how do we go about establishing a goal.

Jeff: Paul points out to us how a counselor is to do that. He says several things: We proclaim Him. We admonish every man. We teach every man, with all wisdom. And the goal of this is that we may present every man complete in Christ.

Mike: Jeff, can you give us an example of how you begin to apply this, in a practical way, when you're counseling an individual?

Jeff: Sure, Mike. There's a good example in Scripture. Jesus was really the best counselor in the world - He just knew every man perfectly. He could see right into the heart. When He dealt with the Rich Young Ruler, He confronted him in truth, but also with love because He loved that man. Jesus could see that the young man did not have the right goal. He was looking to his riches in this world. That was the Rich Young Ruler's goal. And he asked Jesus, how he could have eternal life, and Jesus lovingly pointed out to him what in the man's heart was keeping him from having the right goal. As a Biblical Counselor, we need to fulfill our calling by pointing out those things in a person's life that are taking them away from their true goal as a Christian, which is again, to be like Christ and set our hearts on the things of God.

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Mike: Jeff, I know often the men that come into our Residential Program or our Overcomers At-Home Program wanting to know how to deal with their sexual addiction problem. But then, you have to help them to realize that there's really a much deeper goal that they need to have in their lives.

Jeff: Yeah. What the men come to realize is that, really, their whole problem is that their focus has been all wrong. Their goal has been all wrong. And since their goal is simply to get free from sexual sin, they're really missing the more important goal, which is to know Christ, become like Christ, and to exemplify Christ in their lives.

Mike: As you begin to work with this individual, towards that goal, how does that play out in their life?

Jeff: Well, we all come to Christ with baggage. We come with our old thinking. We can call it the old man or the old nature. So, it's very important for a counselee to understand what progressive sanctification means and what it means to deny the flesh. It's important they understand what it means to put on the Spirit. This is a process that we have to choose to enter into. And we have to realize that, as we do that, sanctification begins to take place. And that is when a person is made holy - when a person is conformed, beginning to be conformed, into the image of Jesus.

Mike: How important is it that a believer understand this? I know that, very often what happens is, you begin this process and if you're not aware that it's a process, you may go a few months into your Christian walk or into counseling, but you may not see change happening.

Jeff: Yeah, I think a lot of times one of the biggest problems is that people just want to get zapped and be different. They don't realize it's a process. It's a process of choices. It's a process of yielding to God on a daily basis. It's a process of seeing those things in our lives that are contrary to Christ and contrary to the Word of God and choosing to deny them and to put on the mind of the Spirit and really start applying the Word of God and the truth of God in our lives.

Mike: Can you give us a picture maybe, that will help us to better understand this transformation process that the Lord wants to bring about in our lives – to better understand the change that He wants to bring about in our lives?

Jeff: I think a lot of times, we just don't see our flesh right. I think a lot of times, we try to just fix up what we already have. What we don't realize is that the old has to go. It's like I'm going down a street. I'm driving through this nice neighborhood with all these beautiful mansions lined up along the road. Then all of a sudden, in between these mansions, is this old dilapidated shack. It just doesn't fit in. It would really stand out in that kind of scenery. We really need to see, like Paul did, that in my flesh – in my old shack – there is absolutely nothing good. That old shack needs to be bulldozed over. It needs to be totally torn down so that God can resurrect the new man in us. That can't really happen until a person sees their shack for what it is. I'll put it to you this way, Mike, Jesus tells us to crucify the flesh. If I'm still believing good about myself and if I'm still trusting in myself, then I'm not willing to drag that old man out to the dump and have him crucified. Until I see the worthlessness of my old man and that everything about him needs to die, I'm not going to bring him to Calvary. Instead, I'll try to fix him up and prop him up. But really, he needs to go.

Mike: Well Jeff, that almost sounds like that could be painful.

Jeff: It is painful, but what we don't realize is we're just preventing this glorious new life that God is trying to put in us. It's like an old car where the engine is shot. It's all rusted out, but God's got a brand-new car sitting in the dealership. It's waiting for us to step into. Yet here we are, holding on to this old wreck. It's sentimental. It's got a lot of feelings attached to it, but if we're just willing to let that go, God has something so much better waiting for us. But we'll never know that something until we let go of that old life.

Mike: I hope that helps people understand a little bit more about the goal of our counsel. And I hope it will be an encouragement to them. We do go through those difficult times where we may not exactly be happy about the pain we experience. But with it, comes the destruction of our old life and the emerging of a wonderful new life in Christ.

Every lie and half-truth carries with it a hidden danger ready to steal, kill and destroy our life in God. There’s an unexpected danger that is threatening a person who’s constantly being barraged with lies: a person can start to think that it’s impossible to know what’s true and what’s a lie and this can give way either to despair or to cynicism, both of which are dangerous paths for the Christian.