Overcoming Masturbation

Masturbation, sex with self, usually accompanies porn addiction. With 70% of Christian men and one third of women viewing pornography as the surveys show, many believers are struggling with a habit that is largely ignored by most churches. In this episode, Mike looks at how masturbation affects us chemically, emotionally and spiritually, then gets into the process of  breaking free.

Overcoming Masturbation – Transcript

ANNOUNCER:

This radio program is PG13. Parents strongly cautioned: some material may be inappropriate for children under the age of 13.

Jesus’s mission was to comfort those who mourn, bind up the broken hearted, proclaim liberty to captives, and open prison doors for those who are bound. For those who want more than status quo Christianity has to offer, Blazing Grace Radio begins now. And here is your host, Mike Genung.

MIKE GENUNG, HOST, BLAZING GRACE RADIO:

Hey, Mike Genung here and welcome back to Blazing Grace Radio. And you heard that PG13 warning, so if you have four and five year olds in the car, then you might want to take that to heart a little bit, because we’re going to be delving into a topic that a lot of people are struggling with, but there is very few voices talking about this openly. And that topic is masturbation. And you hear me talking about pornography and masturbation all the time, but I’ve never done a show focused solely on masturbation before.

There are a lot of people who are – men and women – who are struggling with this issue. Have you ever been to church and, I don’t know, heard the word mentioned? Or had a sermon on it? But it is something we need, because there are a lot of people who are in bondage to this stuff. And yeah, I know the outside world would say something like… you know, “There’s nothing wrong with it,” and “It’s good“, but I’ll tell you from the decades I’ve had experience helping people with this and being around others, I’ve never heard a person say “I had a great time having sex with myself last night”. But I’ve heard many – and we get emails from many every day – saying, “I struggle with masturbation. I hate it. I want to get over it. How do I break free from it?”

So a couple… There’s not a lot of surveys out on this, but when you know that 70-80% of men are viewing pornography, masturbation is always connected and coupled with it. And it’s not just a man’s problem. Not by a long shot. And the gen – the female gender – women are struggling with that more and more. Porn and masturbation. So those numbers continue to go up. I saw one survey recently that said that among 18-30 year old females, 70% are now struggling with viewing with pornography. So you can attach masturbation to that.

So this is a survey that came out in the Daily Mail in the UK, January of 2022. And the UK is the world’s 2nd largest consumer of porn. And to our shame, the US is #1. So the numbers are going to be similar with both countries. And what they said is this. There were two universities that took part in this survey. And men in the UK normally masturbate an average of 2-3 times per week. Researchers said people were more likely to attribute the increases in porn use and masturbation to boredom and more free time. So, “Got nothing else to do, so I think I’ll have sex with myself.” Men in the UK normally masturbate an average of 2-3 times a week, while women do so once a week.

And then this was from a 2009 survey in the US. Both for both boys and girls – we’re talking youth now – engaging in masturbation was associated with greater odds of engaging in sexual relations with a partner, compared to adolescents who did not masturbate. So masturbation is a doorway to promiscuity and other types of sexual issues including oral sex, they said, partnered masturbation, and other types of intercourse.

So this is a big deal that a lot of people are struggling with. This is not just a one or two person thing, and it’s the same thing with pornography. This is a big deal that a lot of people are struggling with, and so… you know, if this is just like 5%, maybe I wouldn’t even be on the radio, but when you have 3/4 of the men in your church and mine viewing pornography and masturbating, and a substantial amount of women with the same struggle – especially youth – we cannot back off from this. We have to dive in and equip people on how to break it.

So a couple of… let’s look at a lit