Yesterday I had a plan. I focused on my change, thought about it, wrote it down, prepared, got ready, and... failed again. It was not a lust-related issue. But the point is, I wanted that change, I tried, planned, focused, and failed. My old habit in that situation took over. I was disgusted when my carefully laid plan failed. But, then I realized, it takes on average 66 days to form a new habit. One of the biggest challenges to quitting is: Most people just don't believe that life will always be better when they quit. They believe they will be better off without the destruction, but they also worry that they may be worse off without that short-term pleasure. I can and will tell you 1000 times – you will be better off. You will be happier. But, you won't believe it until it really sinks in. You need to have faith that my promises and God's promises (The Bible says “In My presence is fullness of joy)” are true. The Bible says that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. The person that studies and meditates on the verses for quitting starts to increase in their belief. If you memorize and quote these scriptures, your faith skyrockets. Back to my failed plan. I knew my plan was right, but something kept me in failure. I only 90% believed. At the key moment, I decided to think about whether my new plan was better. Once I allowed myself to consider my options, I was sliding right back into my old habits. When we embrace the Word of God as if it will give us success. It will. Never, think about whether your new way of life is better when you are tempted. Run immediately back to these verses. They will increase your faith and make you know what is right and good. It takes time to build up these new habits for quitting. But, once you really believe that your life will be better off without lust – then, it is just a matter of time. Lastly, Jesus died on the cross for our sin. When we follow His example of fighting temptation with the Word, we are showing Him that we have a full appreciation for what He has done for us.
It takes time to develop the habit of turning from lust, but you can do it. One verse that helped me was Proverbs 28:1 The wicked flee when no man pursueth: but the righteous are bold as a lion. One of my goals this year is to become bold and courageous, so I am currently focusing on that verse. In order to be bold as a lion I must be righteous. So I have doubled my focus on going to war with sin. The more we focus on going to war with sin the more we will realize that turning from lust is one of the smartest goals we can have. In the Bible, part of righteousness is focusing on loving others. Consider printing out 1st Corinthians 13 to help with a focus on love. 4 Love is patient, love is kind, it is not jealous; love does not brag, it is not arrogant. 5 It does not act disgracefully, it does not seek its own benefit; it is not provoked, does not keep an account of a wrong suffered, 6 it does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; 7 it [b]keeps every confidence, it believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Merry Christmas
It takes time to quit because we not only have a lust habit, but we also have a dozen other habits that feed our lust habit. Things like fantasies that we don't instantly nip in the bud. Risky TV. Going to movies without first checking out how much trash is in it. Going to places that will probably tempt us. What habits feed your lust habit? What new activities can you do to replace bad activities? What new thoughts can you work on having to replace bad thoughts? Second, what habits have you tried to learn this week? Glance over a few old articles and rate your success at trying to implement new things suggested instead of the old way of thinking. Trying some of these new things is a positive habit that feeds our new “finding joy” habit. Quitting is very mathematical. The quicker you get rid of habits that lead to lust, and replace them with new habits that start to lead to joy, the quicker you will quit.
