Ryan Swanson: Hello and welcome to the Satisfied program here on the Thee Generation Podcast. This is Ryan Swanson, and we’re gearing up for episode number eight as we work together, taking steps forward in the battle for moral integrity.

This podcast is going to take a little bit of a different turn from where we’ve been, and I’ll explain that in just a moment. But before I give the direction for the coming months, let me just mention, I’m excited about a new piece of material, and it’s actually just an update of the, what we’ve called the frontline battle plan. But this is the Satisfied Battle Plan. So we’re updating the branding, if you will, on it just to make everything coherent.

The Satisfied Battle Plan, if you’ve already gotten the frontline, it’s very similar to that. But instead of having to email me every time, we’ve had so many that are asking for this, it will be listed on the Satisfied web page. So that is a part of theegeneration.org. If you go to theegeneration.org/satisfied, you will find this. It will be there soon. It’s not up right now, but you’ll be able to go there and download the PDF of the Satisfied Battle Plan. And who knows what other resources will be there in the future, but for now, this is what we have.

This is not a totally comprehensive guide and everything you need to know for moral integrity. That’s not the purpose of it, but it gives you some of the main points, and maybe there’s somebody that you’re wanting to introduce to Satisfied and get them on the journey towards moral integrity, and if it was a group, it’d be a great way for you just to send this to them, say “hey take a read, see if you can identify with any of this, see if this clicks for you, and if so, then start listening to this podcast and jump on board and start your journey.” So we wanted that to be available to you. So that will be on the Satisfied web page again. That’s the generation org/satisfied. Also on that page, of course, you can find all seven episodes that we’ve done so far, and this eighth one will be up there as well.

In this episode, I really want us to take a step back and look at some of the history and how we got to this point. Satisfied is growing very quickly, and I’ve been thrilled with the feedback that I’ve been getting, guys that have been helped by this, and guys that are wanting to be helped. But the faster it grows and the more excited we get about the principles we’ve been going over and the tools that we have, and accountability and all these things that are exciting us and giving us hope, I’ve realized that I can’t move past where it all started. So I wanna give you a little bit of my testimony going back about two years, a year and a half to two years ago, and telling you a little bit of how this started in my own life and my own journey. And then based on that, tell you where we’re going to be headed in the coming months in the next series.

Just over two years ago in the summer of 2019, I thought everything in my life that was worth living for was coming crashing down. My sin, the pornography addiction that I had been trying to fight on my own for so long had finally come out into the light. And I thought it was going to keep me from everything I wanted the most. It was keeping me from a marriage. It was keeping me from ministry, from relationships, and it was hurting the people I loved the most as it came out and just devastated family and friends. And I was really at the end of my rope. I had tried everything. I had tried many of the things that you’ve tried. I had tried trusting God, tried faith, tried prayer, tried Bible reading, Bible memory, everything, even accountability to an extent. And just looking for that one quick fix. Someday, I thought someday I’ll have the victory. It’ll just kind of click, something will happen, and it’ll just kind of phase out of this, whatever it is. But I always thought it’ll be really frustrating because I’ll have no idea why it stopped. And that’ll be hard because when you’re someone who’s addicted to that, there’s already a desire within you to help other people who are in it. But how am I going to help them? I always thought if I have no idea why I’m delivered, I mean, I’ve tried everything. So there can’t be just an answer, something that will just solve it. It’s just eventually going to stop, I thought. And it never did just stop like that. Well, in the summer of 2019, when that all came out, I just thought everything was over. And I really for a while just gave up on the visions the Lord had given me for ministry and really stopped trusting God for anything for a while. There was a period of time where I was close to even being suicidal just because I didn’t have a reason to live. And in the coming months, no, I didn’t run back to the pornography addiction, but I knew in my heart that it would only be a matter of time. The pain from it coming out and the embarrassment and the shame. Sure, that will keep us from it for a little bit, but I knew from experience that it will only last so long, and I knew I really hadn’t found an answer still. And what scared me the most is that even at this point when it seems like everything in my life depends on me getting victory, I can already see where the slide is coming and I’m heading downhill in my thoughts, and I knew it would only be a matter of time when I’m back in struggling in pornography. And so several months went by, even at the beginning of 2020, and I’m just petrified, scared to death that it’s going to be any time now, I’m going to fall back into it. I still had no bearing on victory at all. It was at that time that I met someone else, another young man, who was just as desperate and just as much sick of the sin of pornography. And who himself had tried everything and still seemed to be locked into it. We committed to each other to talk every day about this, stay accountable, and seek the Lord together for deliverance. That was really the beginning-ish of the COVID period when things got serious. I had gone out of the country to Mexico for a friend’s wedding. So when I came back, I had to quarantine, of course. And, you know, couldn’t go to work, couldn’t go anywhere. During that quarantine, obviously, that normally would be a very dangerous time for someone with a past and sexual addictions because it’s a time where you have a lot of time on your hands, a lot of free time. Also, there’s a lot of aloneness that comes with that. But instead, I made it a routine at the time to drive many of those mornings to Lake Michigan. I was living in Wisconsin just north of Milwaukee at the time, and I would spend the time at sunrise just standing there looking over the water and pleading for the Lord to show up in my life. And it is from those times that the Lord revealed different passages—Ecclesiastes chapter 4, different things in Proverbs chapter 5, a verse in Matthew chapter 5 that I’m going to share with you later on in this podcast. Just so many things and gave me promises and hope that came not from anyone’s system, not from a book but came straight from the Lord during those times. Desperation for a relationship with Jesus was the first step in my journey towards moral integrity. 

Now what’s so easy for me to do is to take all the tools and truths that the Lord’s given me through that time and just the excitement of that will just drive and emphasize everything that has resulted from that. But I cannot move past the fact that it started with meeting with Jesus. This is the very reason why if you read the Battle Plan, it starts off by saying that the only people that qualify to be a part of this journey towards moral integrity are those that are absolutely desperate. It’s generally those that can relate to statements like, “I’ve tried everything and still failed” because they have nowhere else to turn. It’s not that they have nowhere else to turn and then finally they find the Satisfied podcast. It’s not that they have nowhere else to turn and then finally they find the Satisfied Battle Plan. It’s that they have nowhere else to turn and finally they find Jesus.

I’ve been reminded of this recently as I’ve gotten phone calls since we’ve last talked, since podcast number seven that have really brought me back to where this all started because now there’s guys that have been following this battle plan even though it wasn’t called satisfied and there wasn’t the podcast the whole time but for about a year or a little over and there’s guys that are following and it seems like they’re doing everything they’re supposed to and still they’re struggling. And I mean struggling on a regular basis, failing. Now, I think we’ve mentioned it here, and it’s something you should know, that this journey is not something, it’s not a quick fix. The addiction that’s in that’s your heart, if you’re one that has been deep enough in pornography where it is like a chemical addiction in your brain, it is likely to take two to five years, they say, before things are completely rewired. And even then it’s not that you’re invincible, but at least the habits are broken and you have a different thought pattern when it comes to combating those temptations.

But when I’m getting calls from guys who have been doing this for a year, year and a half, and they’re saying that they’re still falling, and I mean relapsing in pornography several times a week, there is a problem there. And honestly, I didn’t know what to tell them. I was just as desperate, maybe more. Because when you have a lot of guys calling you and looking to you for the answer and I was talking to my wife, it’s just I’m shrugging my shoulders like I don’t know. I mean, I know this worked for me, but then it hit me. No, this didn’t work for me. These tools are not what did it. It was a relationship with Jesus. And if I don’t start there to emphasize that, these guys are going to totally miss it and just focus on this Battle Plan and the truths I’m giving them.

Now, when I say relationship with the Lord, there is so much in this, in a discussion of this relationship that could be entirely cliche. I don’t know about you, but I’m one that cannot stand cliche. It drives me crazy. I want someone to be genuine, even if it’s not as pithy, and it’s not as exciting or fluent, I don’t care. Give it to me, give me what’s real. That’s what I want. Not cliche. But many of these things I’m going to give you will sound cliche, but sometimes they sound cliche because they’re just truths that we’ve heard over and over. Truth from our preachers, from our parents, from those in our life that have tried to lead us in this way. 

The other thing is that when you hear “relationship with the Lord”, there’s several things we could mean by that. For example, I’m down here in Greenville, South Carolina now. When I say, if I ask someone at their door if they have a relationship with Jesus, they could very well say, oh yes, absolutely I am, because I have a membership at this church. They might not even be saved, but they would claim that they know the Lord because they have this membership at a church, okay? Well, even someone who’s saved might say that they know Jesus just because they’ve been saved and they’ve truly been saved, but they say, yes, I know the Lord, and that’s just kind of a cliche way of saying, yes, I’ve been saved. Okay, what about if we go beyond that, maybe someone is saved, and now they’re at a different level because they read their Bible and maybe even pray. So they have times where they’re speaking to the Lord. Who knows if they’re actually expecting that he hears it or expecting to do anything with those prayers, or if they’re expecting to hear back, but at least they’re reading their Bible and they’re doing their devotions, as we would say.

But then there’s this fourth level of people who say they meet with Jesus. And I don’t know about you, but that sounds kind of weird. That’s a whole other realm. It’s one thing, I get it, if you go to church and you’re saved, and you know the Lord because of that, or you read your Bible and you pray, and you talk to God through prayer, and you know the Lord that way, that’s great, and I understand that. But when someone says that they know Jesus and they enjoyed meeting with him this morning or they heard from Jesus and he spoke to them. Like that would just creep me out to be honest. And it’s not that I didn’t want it. Like I just think that sounds great but I never really believed him I guess. But one thing you can’t deny is that the people who truly meet with Jesus, there’s something different about them. Now they’re not perfect but there is something different about someone who meets with Jesus every morning. 

So what is it about this? What’s so important about meeting with Jesus that just when it happens everything changes? That all of a sudden you have power to combat things as strong and as deep as sexual addiction. And how does that come about? Because it seems like when someone has reached that point and they met with Jesus, like they know it. And there’s no going back. And it does change their perspective on things and they are sold. But how do you get there? Maybe that’s the bigger question than what it does because we kind of expect that, yeah, if you met with God, it would probably do something positive, right? But how in the world do you reach that point? 

If that’s where you’re at and that’s how you feel and that question has been on your mind in the past, whether you’ve spoken it or just thought it, I can empathize with you.

I remember as a teenager having a preacher come to my church and he preached an entire message and even dealt some with my sin of pornography that I was struggling with at that time and he just gave and he led up the whole message. It’s just Jesus, it’s just Jesus, it’s just Jesus, it’s just Jesus, you need Him, you need Him. And then he closes in prayer. And I tell you, I was mad. I’m sitting in the sound booth in the back of the church, I was running the mics at that time and I couldn’t believe it. Because he let up this whole time in a beautiful message telling how Jesus is the answer but when it came down to the practical of what does that look like he didn’t say a word and here I was as a teenager I know the answer has to be Jesus somehow. I’m a Christian I know that but I have no idea what that looks like. I was upset. 

Look, there is an aspect of which I can’t tell you how you can meet with Jesus. There’s something so subjective about this. I don’t know the formula for it. I can’t do that. But what I want to do is take the next several months as we go through our podcasts and maybe give you from personal experience, share you truths from Scripture. I want to, as the Lord leads me I want to lead you in a relationship with Jesus because that is where it’s going to start. Now, as I’ve gone and have counseled different young men and even some young women now with my wife, I’ve found that there is a dichotomy. There’s two different types of backgrounds that young people are coming from that are setting up their worldview a little bit differently. And if I’m going to help them with their struggle and with their addiction if I’m going to set them on the right foot and their battle for moral integrity I’ve got to identify what background they’re coming from let me explain those to you real quick and I’ll let you decide and try to identify what background you’re coming from there’s the one side that focuses so much on the practical and so everything is about the tools and it’s about the accountability and all these ways that you can structure life and focus on the character and things, the practical steps to gaining victory and freedom. It focuses a lot on the brain, on the science of things, and on the habits, on the psychology, and it’s just all about the practical, not as much an emphasis on the spiritual, but it’s on the tools. Okay. Then you have someone that comes from the background on the other side of a very spiritual focus on the truths. This person was just told, “Look, you just need to read your Bible, you just need to pray, and those things, your secret sins, will fade away if you just read your Bible and pray. If you just focus on these truths, the positional truths of who you are in Christ and those kinds of things, if you just quote these verses and have them in your mind, then you can’t possibly fall again to those things.” And they may even speak of a prayer life and even a relationship with Jesus on this side. So, me, I came more from that end. I came more from a spiritual, Godly background that really focused on the truths of who I am in Christ. And it set me up wonderfully for victory in that way. But because I’m coming from a background that emphasized that so much, I tend to assume all of those things, assume the spiritual life, assume the Bible reading, assume the prayer, assume the relationship with Christ, and just focus on the tools, on the practical side. But someone else who came from the side of the tools and the truths, and where it’s all practical, they’re coming through, The Bible reading’s not assumed, the prayer life’s not assumed, the relationship with Jesus is not assumed. And so when I try to help them in the same way I was helped and just give them the truths, we gotta slow down and back up and say where does this start? 

So I want you to ask yourself that. Where are you coming from because you’re gonna tend to react to where you’ve been and where the emphasis has been. And look, we need to have a proper balance of the truths and the tools in our life. of the practical and the spiritual. Jesus has given us so many practical tips in scripture, so many. I’m thankful that he was practical and he works through. And there’s so many areas that we’ve been looking at in our last seven podcasts that have focused on practical tools. But we can’t just take those tools without Jesus. And so why don’t you identify what area, what background you’re coming from, where your tendency is and see what you’re lacking? Is it the practical side or is it the more relational, the spiritual, and that knowing the Lord that’s missing in your life? 

Now I would dare say knowing this audience that we have, I would think that most of us are coming from a standpoint of where that spiritual side was emphasized. And there’s many of the practical tools that are exciting us because we’ve not heard it quite like that as we see it from scripture. And those are the things that now we are going to want to focus on 100%. But you know, it’s so easy to do, it’s so easy to forget about everything that we were brought up on, on the relationship with the Lord, on reading our Bible, on praying, and seeing actually how those things are the foundation for our victory that can go forward utilizing the truths, utilizing the tools that the Lord has given us in Scripture. 

So what I’d like to do with this podcast is just give us the simple purpose that scripture gives us for being pure. The one goal, one purpose of why we should be pure. Now there’s so many other reasons that we could give, but this is the one emphasized in scripture as the overarching, this has to be what you’re focusing on. This has to be your aim. And it comes from Matthew chapter five. Matthew chapter five and verse eight. Jesus speaking here, sermon on the mount, He says blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Now I don’t know about you, but if I was writing that verse, it probably would have looked something like this. “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall be pure. Yes, I’ve finally reached it, that goal of being pure. I’ve been longing for this for so long, now I have a clean conscience. Now I don’t have to worry if people know all my background. I don’t have to delete my history. I don’t have to worry about relationships and hurting people I love because I am pure.” And it’s like it’s the ultimate goal that you could reach. Is that a bad goal? Is it a bad thing to seek a clean conscience and that absolutely not. But what does this say? It doesn’t say blessed are the pure in heart for they shall be pure. It says blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God. Do you know what that tells me? That God is both the means and the end of our purity. We do it for Him and we do it by Him. He is the goal. Ultimately, we want to be pure so that we can see God. You know, you can be absolutely as white as snow, as pure as it gets, and if you don’t know God, you’ll still be empty. You see, purity is not just something that Christians seek. There are secular books written, I’ve read them, on how to be free from pornography. This is something a lot of people seek. It’s not just an end for Christians. Purity is something that even secular men seek and want. But can we expect that they would be fulfilled when they just reach purity? Of course not. They don’t have Christ. So how can that be our end? Just to reach purity. And I understand that it’s going to envelop so much of your life, and so it’s going to seem at times like we’re just seeking purity. And if we’re just focusing on the tools and forget our relationship with Christ, that’s what it’s going to be. But you know there’s a big God-shaped hole in your heart that is being covered up by pornography. Not filled. It can’t satisfy. It only gratifies. But it covers up that hole. And when you uncover that hole by taking the pornography away and start reaching purity, you’re gonna find that you can actually end up more empty than you ever have been, have ever felt. Now that hole has been there the whole time. We’ve talked about this back in our first podcast. That hole has been there the entire time, but when you remove that cover, oh man, it’s right out in the open, and you are going to feel empty if you don’t fill it with the one who was supposed to be filling it. Cliché, yeah, maybe a little bit. But let me tell you it’s true. Jesus is the means and the end of our purity journey. 

And so as I’m talking to these men, one in Russia, one in London. That was all I could say, there wasn’t another tool that I had to give them that they didn’t know it was just… “where’s your desperation for Jesus?” And if we ever come to the point where we’re at the end of ourselves and at the end of doing everything we know and we seem to be obeying everything that the scripture’s giving us to do and to utilize and to keep in mind and we’re doing all these things and still not working, that desperation should always lead us straight back to our knees.

And so I challenged these men to the following morning get before the Lord and say “Jesus, I’m not leaving here until you show up. I don’t know exactly what it’s going to look like. But I know I need you in my life. And so I am not going to leave here until you convince me that you are here. You are with me and you are going to get me through the next 24 hours of my life in purity knowing you” 

The next several days. I was getting pictures sent to me from the man in Russia early in the morning, his time overlooking the Black Sea and him just saying this is where I met with Jesus this morning the next day this is where I met with Jesus this morning another picture. And then he contacted me actually over Marco Polo and just a few days ago he said it’s been two weeks and I’ve had all tens for two weeks. Now, what tool did that? There’s something missing and it’s Jesus. And I don’t want you to have to wait to the point where you’ve done this for a year, year and a half. And then finally, things aren’t working and you’re giving up hope and you’re thinking maybe this whole thing is a farce. I don’t know how. I thought the satisfied battle plan was supposed to get me victory. What’s going on? And I’m telling you now, the emphasis has to be on a relationship with the Lord.

And I want to help lead you in that. Now, that to me is a scary thing, to be honest, because I can’t just give you a step by step. This is what you have to do to meet with Jesus. But again, I’ll give you principles, I’ll give you truths, I’ll give you verses. And we’re going to walk through this together in the coming months. And what I’m going to do, I’m kind of going out on a limb because I’m just going to point you in a direction. Each podcast in this series as we go through this in the coming months is just going to point you in a direction, a direction where according to scripture, as we look at this, I know that Jesus is in this direction and I’m trusting as you take a step in that direction, He’s gonna meet with you there. 

So the first thing that I can say is, I know that Jesus meets with desperate people. He meets with people that need Him. And so if you’re desperate, if you’re at a point where I’ve tried everything, and nothing seems to work if you have a desperation that is from the Lord and allow that desperation to usher you into his presence humbly saying “Jesus. I got nothing I need you”. Will you set aside a morning and get before the Lord? Kneel down before him or or maybe go somewhere outside Get alone and just say “Jesus. I’m not leaving here until you meet with him because I need you more than anything else. I need you more than purity. I need you, I need to see you because Jesus meets with desperate people.” He met with me a year and a half ago during that quarantine And all of this has been a result of that And everything good that he’s done in my life with the marriage and the ministry and everything else that he’s given me Now Is not a result of purity It’s a result of meeting with Jesus that came first. And I wanna do right by everyone listening to this podcast by leading you not just to purity, but leading you now in a relationship with the Lord. 

So I hope you’re excited as I am for this series as we go through this in the coming months. Now let me tell you this, more than ever, this is where it’s going to be really helpful to have your feedback. There may be a different background that you have which I’ve not considered and you say, “hey, “you know, I’ve had this mindset. Would you help me with this? How does this enter in?” And as you share things with me, I learn and it helps me help other people as well. But maybe as we go through this in relationship with the Lord, you might have things that have been helpful to you to meet with Jesus and you could email me and tell me about those. Maybe once I give a step after a podcast, you have just an incredible time of meeting with the Lord that makes a difference for you. Even though it’s the beginning of a relationship on that level maybe, but you really have a time that you meet with the Lord. You know, that’s going to be such an encouragement to others that are seeking that same goal of meeting with the Lord. So, will you shoot me an email and explain the circumstance of how you came to meet with the Lord?

Again, more than ever, it’s going to be crucial and helpful and an encouragement to get feedback as we go through this series so it’s satisfied@theegeneration.org. That’s the email address. Reach out to me. It’s satisfied@theegeneration.org. Let me know, give me a testimony, give me a question. And I know that will be a help to me as we go through this series together. 

Well, that’s a wrap on this podcast. So thanks so much for joining me once again. We’re on a journey towards moral integrity and a journey to see God. So let’s press on and I’d encourage you to take that time. Why don’t you have a sit down with Jesus tomorrow and get desperate before him. Get desperate for your battle to be less gratified and more satisfied with Jesus Christ.