Identity Conquers LustSample

The Addicted Brain → Renewing the Mind

The second root of the addiction to compulsive sexual sin is the Addicted Brain. Paul’s instruction to “be renewed in the spirit of your minds” (Ephesians 4:23) provides a powerful solution to this root.

Renewing the mind involves putting off old patterns of thinking that keep us stuck in our old identity and sin. Instead, putting on new thinking helps us to walk in our new life in Christ. God changes us by changing how we think. This applies to every area of our lives, including living out a new identity and overcoming sexual sin.

Recent discoveries in brain science have helped us understand what is involved in renewing our minds. When we think a thought or engage in a behavior (good or bad), our brain forms neurological connections that make that thought or action easier to repeat.

The thoughts and behaviors that are repeated regularly form strong neural pathways. A sexual sin that has been repeated for years creates what some call neurological highways in the brain. When porn is used as a way to medicate the pain and discomforts of our life, those neurological highways become even stronger and more difficult to avoid.

If someone tries to stop a porn habit, they will quickly learn that simply avoiding the old pathway is not enough. The old pathway must be replaced with a new one. This is how lasting change happens. Repetition of porn pathways gets people into addiction, and repetition of new pathways can help get them out.

Understanding a little brain science enables us to more effectively renew our minds.

We do not have the time here to fully unpack the tool BRACE that we teach in the Freedom Fight program, but I wanted to offer a quick overview. At the moment someone is tempted, BRACE can help them build a new brain pathway. They breathe deeply, remember the truth, ask God for help, call and escape. Compare the old pathway of porn with the new pathway of BRACE:

As one example of the two paths, notice how the porn pathway involves isolation. When people are triggered, they seek to be alone because that enables them to act out. They usually move toward isolation subconsciously. But the new BRACE pathway leads them to reach out to others for help. In 2 Timothy 2:22, Paul commands,

“So flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.”

We should not flirt with temptation but flee it. We are to flee, not alone, but with those who are also seeking purity of heart. Fleeing and reaching out in the midst of temptation is a key part of the new pathway.

God wants to renew our thinking because when God changes our thinking, He changes us. The more we have learned about brain science in the last couple of decades, the more we realize how much it aligns with what the Bible has always said about the mind. Romans 12:2 tells us that the renewing of the mind is how transformation takes place. Building new pathways is only one important aspect of renewing the mind. Renewing the mind in the context of freedom from sexual bondage also involves:

• Regularly washing our minds with God’s word.
• Meditating on certain truths and promises that shape our identity in Him.
• Replacing lies with God’s truth when we identify a lie we have believed.
• Building new pathways when tempted.

Renewing the mind is a powerful way to both walk in our new identity in Christ and walk in freedom from sexual sin. Why? Because when God changes our thinking, He transforms our life.