The most powerful event in this episode was when Leeanne looked me in the eye and said, “Allan, did you think I thought you would never sin again?” In her kindness I was reminded that the Christian life isn’t usually about radical change, it’s about the lifelong journey of repentance and faith in Christ.

I recently downgraded to a flip phone. There’s a very good reason. But it’s a long explanation.

There was a time in my struggles with same sex attraction that I thought counseling, or prayer, or (just briefly) exorcism would change my ‘orientation’. I put faith in reparative therapy and believed that I could being to live my life when I wasn’t this way anymore. I think that a lot of Christians think that “orientation change” is the answer to homosexuality, and I think a lot of young Christians who struggle with same sex attraction put their hope in something like re-orientation. Most believers I know struggle with the same sins or similar sins their whole life. Maybe to greater or lesser degrees, but it seems that we’re all born with sins and temptation of a certain shape (or orientation). There is, in my opinion, no hope in reorientation …

There is, however, hope in Jesus Christ. Jesus begins his preaching ministry in Mark 1:15 with this simple summary: “Repent and believe the gospel.” The basic way of the Christian life is the constant ebb and flow of repentance and faith. I think that there are some sins which, by God’s grace, we overcome even to the point of not being tempted by them anymore in this life. I do not think that that is the ordinary Christian experience. Ordinarily, Christians struggle with the same types of sins their whole life.

And so, if reorientation isn’t the hope what is? It’s the grace of God, wooing people to repentance; and the gift of faith, spurring us on to thankful love and obedience to our Lord. There is hope in Jesus’ simple message of repentance and faith.

What does all that have to do with my flip phone? In the fall of 2013, I believed that I should be done with this particular struggle by now. “I’m married,” I thought, “I’m a pastor; I shouldn’t struggle this way anymore.” And so, when I started struggling with pornography around Thanksgiving I felt so guilty that I felt like I couldn’t tell anyone. Rather than repentance and faith I chose fear and hiding. Guess what: fear and hiding don’t actually help!

By grace, God pushed me to finally reach out to a friend who helped me cut off my access to pornography – he picked me up and we immediately drove to the Verizon store and dumped my iPhone and activated a cheap flip phone. It’s not the phone’s fault. I was the one who thought, “I should be better by now; I shouldn’t need help anymore.” But being open about my need was God’s way of giving me the grace of repentance and faith in that moment.

The most powerful event in this episode was when Leeanne looked me in the eye and said, “Allan, did you think I thought you would never sin again?” In her kindness I was reminded that the Christian life isn’t usually about radical change, it’s about the lifelong journey of repentance and faith in Christ.

Here’s my point – put your hope in Christ alone, and demonstrate that your hope is in Christ by being willing to practice honest faith and repentance whenever you struggle with sin. Believing that you your orientation should have changed by now, or that you should be done with this or that sin already isn’t helpful. False expectations of change or conquest lead to shame and hiding.

Yes, if you admit that you’re still struggling you might have to go from an iPhone life to a flip phone life at some point … which is hard and embarrassing … but you’ll experience the freedom from guilt and shame that comes from knowing you are putting your hope in Christ and Christ alone.

Allan Edwards is a minister in the Presbyterian Church in America and serves as pastor of Kiski Valley PCA in Leechburg, PA. This article appeared in Allan’s blog and is used with permission.