Imagine with me for a moment that you’re a leper in the times of the New Testament. Not only are you battling this painful illness, you’re battling it alone. You can’t live in town with your family, you can’t go into the public spaces, you can’t even enter the temple to worship. Not only that, but you have to cover your face and yell “unclean, unclean!” everywhere you go so that everyone around you knows to stay far, far away. To put it simply, in the days of Jesus leprosy = isolation.

Now let’s speculate that somehow, you have the opportunity to conceal your leprosy from the world around you. You aren’t contagious, but you’re given the chance to live a normal life. You can be with your family, you can interact in the public spaces, and you can worship in the temple. There’s just one catch: to keep your secret means to sacrifice your only chance of healing from it. So then the question becomes: is it worth it? 

For many people – for many sisters – the answer is yes. 

Here’s where I come clean. I’m not talking about leprosy. Instead, I’m talking about its modern day equivalent: pornography addiction. Let me explain what I mean. In today’s society, the idea of pornography addiction, sexual addiction, or sexual sin in general, is taboo. It’s more wrong, dirtier, and more unholy than any other sin out there. We don’t think about it, we don’t talk about it, and we certainly don’t struggle with it. Especially not God’s precious little princesses (Christian women). That would be unimaginable, wouldn’t it?

No, no it wouldn’t. How would I know? I am the modern-day leper. I am the girl who is addicted to pornography. I am the girl who has spent years battling in isolation because the shame was so loud I couldn’t imagine telling a soul. I am the girl who took the deal to not live in isolation at the cost of my shot at healing. And the craziest part? I am not the only one. 

So how do we get to a point where isolation is more appealing than transparency? 

Well, to put it bluntly, the church doesn’t do her job. It’s as simple as that. The church has not been taught how to have conversations about sexual sin. No one knows what to do with a young woman who is pregnant out of wedlock. No one is prepared for someone to say that she’s tempted by homosexuality. No one knows how to handle a confession about pornography addiction. How would I know? I am the modern-day leper. After years and years of fruitlessly attempting to fight this battle on my own, I decided to bring it into the light. 

I talked to my parents, which went very well. Not everyone can say the same. A while after that, I took it before the church. At first, everyone was so kind and loving. I got more hugs than I can count, promises of more prayers being prayed for me than ever before, and I felt so much love and support in that moment. Next thing I knew, it was right back under the rug. In the months following my public confession, I received exactly one (1) card from my 400+ member congregation. That one card, plus a woman who checked in with my mom at their ladies Bible study were the only words ever spoken about it. Not a word from the elders, not a word from their wives. Not a word from the ministers, not a word from their wives. Throughout it all, not a word spoken to my face. That stung. It stung more than I would realize it did for two and a half years. 

I carried on fighting this battle as I was before, steadily making progress thanks to the grace of God, the accountability and support of my parents, and my own resilience. Fast forward a few years, and I’m in college. While here, I’m asked to facilitate a group for other young women battling this same addiction. That opportunity is the answer to the prayer I’ve been praying for more than a decade: God, please help me through this, and when you do, please let me use my experience to help someone else who feels just as lost as I do. So I jump on it. I recruit a facilitator for the men’s group. He and I meet with faculty who have offered to help. We make chapel announcements. I make a PowerPoint slide to go up in every academic building on campus and in chapel. We print flyers and hang them in every dorm building plus a few extras. I prep, I pray, and then I wait. 

I get to the meeting spot, wait 15 minutes, and then finally allow myself to admit that no one is coming. That I poured my heart and soul into my most vulnerable ministry yet, and I was left on that limb I’d stepped out on alone and exposed. That I had gotten my hopes up that some other girls were just as desperate for this as I was, and didn’t show. I was crushed. More crushed than ever before. 

It isn’t sin that left me there alone. It isn’t my sisters who can’t bring themselves to ask for help for something they can’t handle alone. It isn’t a poor job of advertising the groups, or a lack of a support system, or anything of the sort. It is one of Satan’s most powerful tools: shame. The shame of sexual sin, and the church’s failure to practice working through that shame, is what resulted in me being in that room alone, waiting desperately for someone to help. Shame seeks to define you. More than that, shame seeks to define you and then convince you that its definition was yours all along. It seeks to morph your view of yourself so beyond recognition that you can never imagine someone else seeing you differently than you see yourself, so you decide it’s best if they don’t see you at all. Or at least, not the real you.

So here’s what I have to say in response to Satan and his attempts at shaming us into silence about sexual sin:

To the sister who knows about the struggle, please learn to love the leper. We know it’s hard to talk about. We need you to show us that we’re worth it. If someone has trusted you enough to tell you that she’s struggling with this, there is nothing she needs more than for you to demonstrate that she’s worth having the awkward conversations with. Here’s what you may or may not know: sometimes, the shame gets so loud that we can’t even bring ourselves to pray about it. So loud that we can’t even mention it to God, our loving Father. Pray about it for us. Pray about it with us. Historically in the conversation of sexual sin, the church has a habit of shooting her own wounded. Please, I beg you, learn to love the leper. 

To the sister who knows the struggle, please learn to expose the disease. You have to believe me when I tell you that the silence is not worth sacrificing your chance at recovery. 1st John 1 promises that if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we are covered and cleansed by His blood continually (1st John 1:7). He goes on to say, If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1st John 1:9). Confession is terrifying, but it is critical. We have to walk in the light, which means walking out of the darkness where this sin thrives. 

Here’s the best news of all, no matter which category you fall into: Jesus always healed the lepers, and He still does. Look at Matthew 8:1-4, Mark 1:40-45, Luke 5:12-16, Luke 17:11-19, Matthew 11:5, and Luke 7:22. He was always willing to forgive and to heal the repentant leper, and that hasn’t changed. In these accounts He models for us the love that we should show to other sisters and brothers who are entangled in this sin, and the love we should show ourselves when we are the ones entangled. He changes the cry from “unclean, unclean!” to “I’m clean, I’m clean!” And that’s what I’m here to tell you today. How would I know? I am the modern-day leper. I am the girl whose life was changed by a Savior who was willing to help with the sin others couldn’t even acknowledge. With the sin I had a hard time even acknowledging. I am the girl whose salvation allows me to attach my name to advertisements and chapel announcements about pornography addiction support groups. I am the girl whose decision to walk in the light means that I’ll be back next week, waiting for sisters to serve, not because I am good, but because God is. I am the modern-day leper, and I am clean. 

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Ariana Crowell

Hey everyone! My name is Ana and I'm currently a junior at Freed-Hardeman University, double majoring in Bible and Physical Therapy Assistance. I live in Bethel Springs, TN. I've been a Christian for five years and have spoken for ladies events both stateside and abroad. I love the Word of God and I love sharing it with others!

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