Everything seemed perfect . I was the oldest of three children in an immigrant family. We had a home, tucked away in a nice middle class neighborhood, surrounded by other financially secure families. We attended church every Sunday. We were living the American dream.
The cancer diagnosis forever changed my world.
A few months before my 12th birthday we would bury my father and with him most of my stability. I had responded to Christ and was baptized that fall after my father’s passing. But with the death of my father loneliness became my companion. When I lost my father I lost the only consistent and godly male role model that I had known.
One day I took my lonely heart to a magazine store to get an automobile magazine. While scanning through the magazine rack, I noticed a group of guys huddled in the back of the store. I thought, “There must be something of interest to me over there”, and so I joined them. What I saw that day began a 25 year addiction. What at first grossed me out, began to entice me.
Before I knew it, that peek at a magazine led to trips to the adult movie store. Then the internet found its way into my home, and I spiraled down into even more destructive behavior. I became like a crack addict looking for a fix. Which, interestingly enough, recent studies have shown that pornography use changes the brain’s dopamine patterns—thus making it equivalent to cocaine or heroin addiction. I didn’t think of in those terms at the time—but I was as hooked to my pornography as others are enslaved to white powder.
In the book of Luke, Jesus tells the parable of the Prodigal Son. When the son had lost everything, he was reduced to working in a swine field. He hit rock bottom. Pornography held my hand to that swine field.
I was addicted.
Marriage, children, and church hopping did nothing to stop my addiction. My pornography began to slowly diminish . But whenever there was a stressful day or when I felt alone, and was by the computer with no one was watching, I would return to pornography as a release and a way of dealing with the issue at hand.
In 2009 I attended a Men’s Conference in Navasota, TX by myself. At first it was just another gathering. But in the afternoon a baseball player got up and shared his testimony. There was a cross at the front, he said “Whatever hang-up or issue you have you can break free through Christ and what He has done for you. Write down that issue, come forward and use a hammer and nail it to this cross”! Through the Holy Spirit’s prompting, I went forward and it was the beginning of the end of my addiction.
The second week after I returned from Navasota, I had a very trying day. I felt the urge to go online, but remembered what I nailed to the cross and did not. There were some slips, however. In late 2009 I met with a pastor and shared my story with him. This led to me publiclyHow share my testimony and story with a men’s lunch group in 2010. In March of 2011, at a Christian retreat, God finally broke my pornography addiction.
Are there times where I get tempted? Yes. Are there times where my eyes wander? Yes. When temptation and wandering come up, I go to God, ask for forgiveness, and move on. Because God is a God of Grace and forgiveness because we are NOT perfect, just forgiven.
It was not easy, but reliance in and through Christ and coming back to Him was and is the only answer. I’ve found that, even though I cannot/could not break this addiction on my own, it can be broken. Through confessing of sin (to God first, 1 John 1:9), and then opening up to a friend, pastor, confidant, etc. we bring our sin into the light. Remember, sin will take you farther than you want to go. But don’t forget grace can transform you deeper than you’d ever imagine.
—
Jon Perera is married to his wife Anne of 16 years. They have 3 children Andrew,Audrey, Austin. The couple has lived in McKinney TX since 2004 where they attend Crosspoint Church. Jon is blessed to teach an Adult Bible Fellowship class and teach 1st graders on Wednesday nights.
