Jason Shields's Story

Battling Lust

How God broke in and changed my repeated patterns of lust, pornography and pursuing women as objects.

Story Tags

sex, lust, approval, dating, relationships, emptiness

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Even as a Christian, I've always been kind of a loner. I was the quiet guy that sat in the back and really didn't fit in with the rest of the church crowd. Because of this, for a long time I never really knew what fellowship, being with and helping other Christians, was or how important it is. I thought that I had God, and that was enough. And while God is enough, that's not what He, has in mind for us. In the Bible, God commands us to spend time hanging out with other Christians to encourage them. Because I didn't do that, I had kind of an empty, lonely feeling inside of me. And instead of filling that hole with what God wanted me to fill it with; I tried to fill it other ways.

I tried to fill that hole with porn. I had a big problem with lust... pornography, starting with R rated movies, cable television, and stuff like that. It got even worse when I discovered the internet.

Because of this, I had a distorted view of women, and sexuality. Often, I would view a girl that I liked as someone who could meet my needs and desires instead of someone to share my walk in Christ with. Also, viewing porn made me more accepting to sexuality. I ended up sleeping with several girls. Not only did this pretty much ruin the relationships I had with them, it also robbed my future wife of my virginity. I ended up doing a lot of things that I ended up regretting.

The hardest/worst part was when I was dating my first girlfriend. Our relationship was pretty much completely based on lust. Even though I thought that I had finally found what I was looking for in life, I was feeling more and emptier as the relationship went on. The worst part about it was that the emptier I felt, the more I clinged onto my girlfriend. In my mind, she was "all that I had."

I didn't realize it at the time, but if I had kept doing it, I would have continued to feel emptier inside and become more and more depressed. Fortunately for me, however, the Lord stepped in.

I first saw God working in the situation when I was assigned into a dorm room with a guy from Campus Crusade for Christ. We quickly became friends and I went to the Crusade meetings and Bible study with him. God showed me that there was a fellowship of people who had the same beliefs that I had, that also had many of the same problems and struggles that I had. Through this, I was shown that the relationship that I was in actually was getting in the way of what I really wanted out of life and what God wanted out of my life. We eventually broke up.

Since then, the empty feeling that I had gradually started going away. I now have a close group of Christian friends to encourage me and help me stay focused. Also, I can see the Holy Spirit working in me more and more, and God has continued to allow me to grow even closer to him.

My battle against lust has since gotten a lot easier. God has shown me through this how important it is to have good Christian friends for help. He still allows me to struggle, and even fail sometimes. However, I know that it's all helping me to grow and preparing me for His plan and that makes it a lot easier.