Belt of Truth Ministries

Interview on the Dustin Daniels Show

By Stephen Kuhn | Filed Under: Announcements, Speaking/Media |

I’m excited to announce the first part of my interview on the Dustin Daniels show just went live online, a full day before it airs on the radio.

We talked about a lot of topics:

How hiding my porn addiction and pretending to be a “good christian” caused way more harm than good.
How my attempts to protect myself were actually contributing to my bondage.
How the majority of guys I’ve met who struggle with porn are believing the same lies.
How these lies can still cause damage even though they aren’t true.

Go ahead and give it a listen.

If you have questions or comments related to the show, just hit me up in the comments below.

Thanks!

Weekly Web (W)roundup

By Stephen Kuhn | Filed Under: Weekly Web (W)roundup |

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Each week, I roundup the best resources, articles, and videos I find that are relevant to finding freedom from porn addiction. Please note that by posting a link here it does not mean I agree with everything in the linked article. It just means I found it interesting enough to share.

Covenant Eyes: Destroying Porn Addiction Starts with Destroying Shame

“Destroying porn addiction starts when we choose to confront the shame we feel around it. We must choose to come out of hiding, confess our struggle with others, and build safeguards that prevent us from hiding ever again.”

Fierce Marriage: 4 Surprising Facets of Transparency in Marriage

“When we talk about transparency, the response is nearly unanimous: it’s a vital part of marriage and relationships. You really can’t build a meaningful bond with your spouse if you’re hiding part of yourself. But most often, hiding is our first instinct.”

Gospel Coalition: Mutual Confession—A Holy Experiment

“Our secrets are usually secret for good reason. Our secrets are the worst of ourselves. Our secrets are foibles, faults, and harmful follies that have pierced the hearts of others, and far worse, the heart of God himself. Many times, our greatest secrets conceal our gravest sins.”

TrueFaced: Very First Moment

Smart Quote: Brennan Manning

By Stephen Kuhn | Filed Under: Smart Quotes |

"Faith means wanting God and wanting to want nothing else." -Brennan Manning

Thoughts on this quote? Feel free to discuss them in the comments below.

If God asked You to Jump off a Cliff, would You Trust Him Enough to do it?

By Stephen Kuhn | Filed Under: Faith |

This post has been adapted from the chapter, “Lie #7: God Can Set Others Free from Pornography Addiction, but Not Me,” in my new book, 10 Lies Men Believe about Porn.

This is the first post in an 8-week series on life-changing faith.

I don’t mean to brag or anything, but I live in the most beautiful state in the Union. Sure, some states have great beaches. Some states have great mountains. You can find amazing forests in Vermont and spectacular deserts in Arizona. Oregon, however, has all of these. So, as you frequently hear on ESPN during football season…Oregon wins.

A few months back I went for a hike to Steelhead Falls, a 25-foot waterfall along the Deschutes River in the high desert of Central Oregon. I had only been planning on a leisurely hike, but once I reached the falls, plans changed. I ran into a group of college kids jumping off the cliffs into the river below. Immediately, the part of my brain that still thinks I’m a teenager began pushing me to jump off the cliff as well.

Come on, old man! It’s hot. The water is perfect. Everyone else is jumping in, so you know it’s safe. Do it! What’s the matter, McFly? You chicken?

I took off my backpack, stripped down to my shorts, walked to the edge of the cliff, looked down at the water…

Nope.

Fear showed up. Logic kicked in. I came up with many compelling and well-thought-out excuses of why this was a terrible idea.

I backed away from the cliff.

•••

We do the exact same thing with God, don’t we?

When was the last time you felt Him leading you to do something that made no sense or was outside of your comfort zone? Perhaps it was an urge to share your faith with a friend. Maybe you felt you needed to ask forgiveness from someone you had wronged. For me, it was coming clean and confessing the full extent of my pornography addiction and adultery to my wife.

Why would I ever do that? That makes no sense at all.

But God’s ways aren’t always logical in the eyes of man. He knew the only way I could ever be free from my addiction, and the only way our marriage could ever heal, was if I brought everything into the light where it could finally be dealt with.

I wrestled with God for years on coming clean. I kept inching up to the cliff, looking over the edge, and saying no. I was too afraid it would cost me my marriage. I kept telling God He didn’t know what He was asking me to do. I convinced myself that what He was asking simply wasn’t logical.

I wasn’t being logical, though. I was being a coward.

I looked for other ways down to the water, such as marriage books or counseling, but those roads never led anywhere. I tried wading into the water slowly by confessing only part of my sin to her, but that only caused pain without opening the door for any real healing.

Ultimately, I didn’t believe God could be trusted.

But He kept standing right there with me, gently saying, “Jump, my son. Jump into this adventure of faith. There is no other way to get to where I want to take you. Just trust me in this. It’s worth it.”

And so one day, when I realized I had no other options left, I jumped. I confessed everything to my wife. Yes, there were tears. There was immense pain. The consequences were devastating.

But in that moment—when I finally jumped in and trusted God no matter how illogical it seemed—He became real to me.

•••

You can believe jumping off the cliff is safe. You can watch others do it. You can admire the drop from the top, carefully climb down the rocks, and dip a toe in the water. But no matter what you do, if you don’t jump, you will never experience the thrill of jumping off the cliff. There’s just no way to experience it halfway.

Likewise, you can’t go halfway with Jesus. If you aren’t all in, you’re not really in at all. You must come to a point where you trust Him enough to jump off that cliff.

Being all in is not about being perfect. It’s about believing that Jesus really is the Son of God and that He knows what’s best for you, and trusting what He asks you to do no matter what. It’s an absolute trust that every word, every promise, and every blessing spoken in the Bible is true—even for you—whether it feels true or not.

TRUTH: If you believe Jesus is Lord,
you can trust that everything He promises
you is true, even for you.

Continue to Part 2: Do You Truly Believe what You Think You Believe?

Weekly Web (W)roundup

By Stephen Kuhn | Filed Under: Weekly Web (W)roundup |

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Relevant Magazine: 8 Warning Signs Your Marriage Might Be In Trouble

“Old-time miners used to keep canaries down in the mines where they dug. Before there were sophisticated instruments, the best way to detect the slow leak of poisonous gas was to have a canary—with tiny lungs—serve as an organic ‘meter.’ If the canary died, poisonous gas was likely leaking out and the miners got above ground as soon as possible. So, what are the ‘canaries’ for marriage? What are some of the signs that a marriage is really in trouble?”

XXXChurch: Secrets

“As a pastor, you get to hear a lot of secrets; but how often do you get to tell your own? I don’t know if you have ever told somebody a secret, but it feels really good. Whether it’s a secret about some new direction your life is taking, or about the surprise party you’re throwing for your best friend’s birthday, or the news about a baby on the way, getting it off your chest and into the air, into someone else’s brain, is a freeing sensation.”

CCEF: Why Keep Sexual Boundaries?

“Recently, I was talking with an older, single man who keeps drifting back into sexual sin. It’s as if the tide of sexuality is going to win in the end—like he is destined to postpone sexual sin—but not to beat it. That way of thinking is scary enough, but there is more.”

Glennon Doyle Melton: Lessons from the Mental Hospital

Smart Quote: Soren Kierkegaard

By Stephen Kuhn | Filed Under: Smart Quotes |

“God creates out of nothing. Wonderful you say. Yes, to be sure, but he does what is still more wonderful: he makes saints out of sinners.” —Soren Kierkegaard

Thoughts on this quote? Feel free to discuss them in the comments below.

Weekly Web (W)roundup

By Stephen Kuhn | Filed Under: Weekly Web (W)roundup |

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Each week, I roundup the best links, articles, and videos I find that are relevant to finding freedom from pornography addiction. Please note that by posting a link here it does not mean I agree with everything in the linked article. It just means I found it interesting enough to share.

Donny’s Ramblings: How Porn Affects Us—A List of Peer Reviewed Studies, as well as Magazine Articles

“At the 2003 meeting of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, a gathering of the nation’s divorce lawyers, attendees documented a startling trend. Nearly two-thirds of the attorneys present had witnessed a sudden rise in divorces related to the Internet; 58% of those were the result of a spouse looking at excessive amounts of pornography online.”

XXXChurch: 3 Things That Kept This Pastor On Porn

“I can clearly remember the crushing weight of carrying my secret porn addiction onto the church stage each week. It felt like a million pounds on my chest. At times I wondered whether or not a person could die from stress. If so, I certainly felt like a candidate.”

The Gospel Coalition: That Relationship will not Complete You

“As you look on your singleness you can feel dissatisfied and even begin thinking of yourself as a second-class citizen because you lack your true soulmate. In an attempt to fill the void you spend months, and sometimes years, searching for the mythical “one” who will supposedly meet your needs and give meaning to your life.”

Pastor Bob Beeman: Repent! Wait … What?

Smart Quote: Nate Larkin

By Stephen Kuhn | Filed Under: Smart Quotes |

“I have found that for short stretches of time I can convince myself that I am being faithful to God if I define faithfulness in terms of only one behavior.” —Nate Larkin

Thoughts on this quote? Feel free to discuss them in the comments below.

2 Reasons My Addiction Evolved From Fantasy To Reality

By Stephen Kuhn | Filed Under: Intimacy |

My addiction isn’t hurting anyone. It’s only pictures on a screen. It’s not like I’m cheating on my wife. There’s no way I could ever do that.

At least that’s what I told myself.

Right up until I had my first affair.

I never would have considered myself capable of being unfaithful to my wife. I loved her, found her attractive, and honestly wanted to be a Godly husband. I simply couldn’t fathom the thought of hurting her in that way.

So what happened? How did my addiction to pornography erupt out of the computer and evolve into multiple real-world affairs?

Looking back now, I can see two main issues that fueled my evolution from online to offline.

Read the rest of the article on xxxChurch.com

If you aren’t familiar with xxxChurch.com, they’re the #1 site on the internet offering biblical help for those who struggle with porn addiction. I suggest you check out all the great resources they offer to help you on your journey to freedom (after you read the rest of this post of course).

Weekly Web (W)roundup

By Stephen Kuhn | Filed Under: Weekly Web (W)roundup |

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Christward Collective: Why Not Sin?

“As a Christian, why not sin? We could give a myriad of answers to that question. However, the best answer is supplied by Paul in Romans 6. Paul could have talked about the misery that sin brings, the pain that it inflicts upon others, the consequences which flow from it, or the penalty that Christ had to pay for it. But that is not where he first turns.”

Breakpoint: The Pornification of the Church

“A group called Proven Men Ministries commissioned the Barna Group to examine current pornography use. You might want to sit down for this—Barna found that 64 percent of American men and 20 percent of women view pornography at least monthly. And for Christian men, that number is 55 percent.”

Covenant Eyes: My Husband Was a Porn Addict—How He Earned Back My Trust

“He had already tried, many times, to stop looking at porn on his own. He had prayed and asked God to take the desires away. He struggled for years. He got so frustrated that he finally gave up and quit trying to quit—all while working every day with Scripture as a Bible translator. Ironic.”

Interview on the Dustin Daniels Show