PRAYING FOR THOSE WITH ADDICTIONS TO PORNOGRAPHY

QUESTION: How do I pray for Brandon who is addicted to pornography? This problem began when he was only 5 years old. Whenever he is feeling down, he turns to porno. When he is bored, he turns to porno. MOST IMPORTANTLY, when he's getting closer to Jesus, he turns and porno draws him back. He was raised in church, but he doesn't feel right going to his church for help because they don't treat porno addicts the same way they treat others with more "acceptable problems." I've asked for prayer for him for years, but all the prayer groups ever do is pray for his salvation and totally ignore his pornography problem. He is already saved, but he still cannot shake the porno addiction. Can someone pray about this porno addiction for Brandon?

ANSWER: We will pray for Brandon. I hope you have read my three books regarding the personal use of binding and loosing prayer principles that I teach from Matthew 16:19. If you have not, then please get Breaking the Power immediately. Start there, and then read the other two books, using the prayers in them. Each one of these prayers can be adapted to praying for Brandon. At the end of this page, I have also included a short version of a prayer with these principles. I also strongly advise that you read the difficults issues page on my website about the person who could not overcome this type of addictive wrong thinking: ANSWER TO CRY FOR FREEDOM FROM TEMPTATION AND SINFUL THOUGHTS.

Such wrong thinking patterns come first from unmet needs and unhealed hurts within a person's soul. The hurting soul learns to reproduce a behavior that releases endorphins (feel good hormones that everyone has in their bodies). This behavior then becomes addictive because the temporary good feeling that these hormones release into the body and the brain becomes like a craving for more. These hormones are called endorphins. God has obviously given them to all of us, because He also has fashioned "opiate receptors" in the human brain that receive any release of them. These God-created internal hormones are capable of elevating or lifting ones' thoughts and feelings, strengthening the immune system, and breaking up pain signals the body sends to the brain. Remember the Scripture that says a merry heart doeth good like a medicine.

From the available medical research I have been able to find and understand (as most of the research seems to still be pretty clinical at this stage), there are certain "right" behaviors that God seems to have intended to release these internal opiates into our systems: right prayer, creative activity, laughter, appropriate marital sexual activity, and physical exercise. The problem with the "opiate receptors" in our brains is that they do not recognize the difference between an intended "proper" release of endorphins (this word means "morphine within") and a release self-induced by a destructive human behavior. There is a further problem because these opiate receptors in the brain also do not recognize the difference in chemical opiates introduced into the body from external sources, i.e. manmade drugs. The addictive side of this is that every time there is a "release" of these opiate hormones within the body (natural or chemical), there is a neural pathway laid down between the brain and the body that the brain remembers. Each release seems to etch this pathway deeper and deeper, which seems to cause a "need" for an increase of the hormones to reproduce the same feeling produced before.

Self-induced actions and behaviors that are inappropriate to a godly life style can cause a mind-body agreement that produces "pleasure" on demand, a mental/physical cycle which is very hard to break when the person knows no other way to try to lift themselves out of pain, discouragement, and depression.

This cycle can be broken with the kinds of binding and loosing prayers in my books. Print out the article referred to above (and linked below) and try to get Brandon to read it, as it would help him have some understanding of his behaviors. Let him know that some people are born with endorphin deficiencies, which science has proven makes them prone to depression, reduced natural immune systems, and self-addictive behaviors. This is a very interesting fact, perhaps giving some insight as to a repetitive pattern of increased unnatural endorphin releases thereby causing a natural endorphin deficiency in depressed and addiction-prone families.

As you are praying for Brandon, and especially if you can get him to agree with you, pray and loose--smash, crush, and destroy--the wrong mind-body agreement going on between his mind's thoughts and his associated physical actions and behaviors. I don't know what your relationship is to Brandon, but I strongly urge you to read the chapters in Breaking the Power and in Producing the Promise to break any soul ties you have formed with him, even if you are married to him. Soul ties with another soul will always pull on you to be most concerned with another human being first instead of being most concerned about your relationship with God first. You will not be anywhere near as helpful to Brandon if you have a soul tie with him and cannot think clearly when God speaks to you regarding him. Breaking soul ties with another person you care a lot about does not mean that you are abandoning them or caring less for them, it means that you will not respond to their soul's attempts to involve your emotions when you should be responding to God for instructions on how to pray and be most helpful. You can be much more helpful if you and God are in perfect agreement that His will be done in Brandon's life, in His way, in His manner, in His timing.

Father, I bind __________ 's will to your will, and I bind __________ 's mind to the mind of Christ. I bind __________ to the full truth of your love and concern, and your willingness to empower __________ to overcome all wrong behaviors designed to dull or pacify the pain in __________ 's soul. I loose the enemy's assignments from __________ that would attempt to plunge __________ deeper in despair and addictive bondage. I loose all wrong beliefs, wrong ideas, and wrong mindsets from __________ 's soul. I loose the effects and influences of wrong agreements, wrong covenants, and wrong vows from __________. I loose the influence of soul ties from __________. I loose the mind/body connections that are pulling __________ back into addictive behaviors and causing an ever downward spiraling of any hope for freedom. I loose all stronghold thinking protecting wrong beliefs that this is the only way __________ can ever feel any relief from the soul pain being experienced. Lord, please pour great mercy and mercy and forgiveness upon __________ and meet the unmet needs, heal the unhealed hurts, and answer the unresolved issues in __________ 's soul. Thank you Lord for doing this.
Amen

I hope this will encourage you to pray and press forward in believing God will meet Brandon's needs. Rev. Savard

P.S. Just click below and go right to the article. http://www.libertysavard.com/difficult_cry4free.html