Open Text: Consequently, including the words “animal” and “porn” in sequence within your title opens you up to an entirely new audience. Google, Yahoo, Bing and all the like send me a breakdown of how my blog is found, what people type to find my blog, and how many times the specific topic is searched ultimately leading to… here. Needless to say, my blog is now exposed to a new audience. An audience I warmly welcome. And since you are now here, how ever you got here, I want to tell you: 1. You are not alone. Both men and women live with the same struggle everyday. There are tons of resources for both men ||Click Here|| andwomen ||Click Here|| out there just waiting for you. 2. Your sin and struggle is not your identity. You are not some swamp monster living in the Florida marshes. Whether you believe it or not Jesus died for your sins and would love to take the burden off your shoulders. 3.You CAN live without it. I remember the first guy I met who told me, “I don’t look at porn.” I pegged him as a liar at first, but have since joined him along with tons of other men and women living happily porn-free lives. 4. Feel free to email me Here.
–@NicksEdwards.
It was my first time walking into the Nagel’s. I don’t remember who wrangled me into going to a small group called “Guys Group”. Small groups usually weren’t my thing, but then again this was not really a small group. It was actually just a bunch of guys from different churches and different school getting together every monday night since… no one remembers. The first night I remember the blood rushing to my feet when the guys began to share all of their struggles with an alarming amount of transparency. Alarming only to me because most of my secrets were tucked deep inside me. The first week I didn’t open up because heck… I don’t want to tell anyone any of the struggles I had. I was 14 and wanted to be cool. Cool kids don’t have struggles. Luckily for me, these young guys, with puberty in full swing, became my type of cool kids. This group radically transformed my early walk with the the Lord. I found healing in sharing my struggles, and felt empowered to walk with others in theirs.
The Nick that found his identity in the quiet of porn and video games was no more. That animal inside me that longed to be desired was replaced by a Savior that desired. From 8th grade to 9th grade I experienced the radical transformation that takes place in the early years when someone meets Jesus.
Along side this guys group, I was fully attending a local church. The same church that sponsored that “rock n’ roll” concert. The same church I met Jesus truly for the first time. Now, before I continue I want to forgo any offense that might occur when reading my experience with this church, but if you will trust me, and read to the end, I think you’ll like it.The church I attended was a fantastic church and was formative to my young adulthood. For that, I can’t thank them enough. But as is normal for most churches, this church was full of people, and whenever people are involved you better be ready for the good, the bad, and the ugly.
It didn’t take me long to figure out how to become one of the star youth group guys. I was attending events no less then three times a week. I had “prioritized” God, giving up sports so that I could be at all the events. I picked up guitar, which is quintessential for any young christian dude. Within the year, I was up on stage. I had made it into “that crowd” at church, and if you have gone to church for any amount of time than you know what the “it crowd” is. I felt confident in my identity, and could not have been more pleased with myself. Unfortunately, during that time, I was unknowingly feeding that animal, no longer through porn, but through the affirmation and acceptance of people. The animal, being the desire to be desired, was on a heavy intake of self glorification. While I thought I was building my identity in the Lord, I was really building my identity in the leaders and peers around me. I worked hard for my acceptance at this church and was reaping the fruit, but again, my identity was in the praise of people, and acceptance of God. Fortunately for me God saw it was due time to take his rightful place in my life.
The formal meeting of “guys group” ended when everyone graduated, but I was the youngest in the bunch and still had two years left. Up to this point I had not realized the importance of this group in my life. It had been my outlet of transparency. Somehow I separated my church life with this group of guys, and quickly realized how dishonest I was with the church side of my life. It wasn’t full of lies, but it was absent of true transparency. Some how I learned, and no one taught me, to put on a glossed and polished face when involved with anything church. Of course it was easy because I always had this counter group to be completely real with. But the group had gone to college and I was left with just church.
I was completely naive to church politics at the time and I thought the transition into transparency at church would be seamless. I remember sitting down with a leader and truly opening up to him for the first time. I had just broken up with a girlfriend on the grounds that we were making out way too much. And by “way too much,” I mean hardly at all, but when you have never kissed a girl before and you are going to a church that thinks holding hands in public is a bit dodgy, then way too much is fitting. But the real reason we had broken up was my inability to not crumble under the guilt that I felt every time I went to a church event. And I only had my identity in church. I was not willing to lose my identity that I worked hard for over a relationship. My 16 year old mind thought that was a godly enough reason.
I shared the whole break down of the relationship with my leader, making out and all. I also told him that I was, “Pissed at God right now because….” and I gave him the list. I was pissed at God because there was some gnarly stuff going on at my private christian high school which made me question the character of God, I had just broken up with my girlfriend, I hadn’t been getting along with my parents (probably because I wanted no curfew and they said 10 o’clock, but I can’t remember), and one of my friends was sent to juvenile detention for something he had kept secret for years. All these things made me question things about God, and I felt liberated when telling this leader in the youth group about it. Near the end of the conversation he suggested I take a step back from leading worship until I got some of these things sorted out. Within two months I was no longer on the rotating worship schedule. What was really happening didn’t really hit me till one week prior to our annual spring break mission trip when that same leader let me know in common conversation that the baton for leading worship on the missions trip had been passed along to somebody else; on the grounds that I wasn’t ready. Of course it had been three months since we last talked about my “progress” towards perfection. And at that moment I realized I was no longer the poster boy for this youth group. My identity, which was misplaced to begin with, had been stripped from me because of transparency.
I could continue to explain how the next year of my life was lived in relationship with God away from church and the process of hating, and then falling in love with it again, but I will leave you with this: Your identity is not in church, nor is it in the works you do in church. Your identity is not in your paid worship leader position, nor any ministry you lead. Your identity is not in your high paying job or your music career. All those things are imperfect and, if you allow it, only create an imperfect identity. The only perfect identity comes from the identity the Lord has already given you.
