8. Stare at Jesus, not at porn.
Trying harder and harder to stop looking at porn isn’t the way to stop looking at porn; you must look somewhere else, namely, the person of Jesus Christ.
Paul in 2 Corinthians 3:18 writes, “And we all with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.” True inward change comes from beholding Jesus, not from not looking at porn. As it has been said, what you behold you become, or as biblical theologian Greg Beale puts it, you become what you worship.
Look at porn and become a person controlled by lust and idolatry, or look at Jesus and become a glorious and whole human being that reflects the beauty and glory of God.
9. Fight as a son of God who has been freed to walk in purity.
As a Christian, the key to fighting lustful temptation (and any temptation for that matter) is by knowing who you are, not by evaluating what you have done.
Becoming a son of God is not dependent upon your not looking at porn, but upon being united to Jesus by faith and the result of the Spirit of God’s work in your heart (Ro. 8:3-4, 14). No longer are you defined by your entanglements with porn, but by your connection to the person and work Jesus. Jesus was crucified for your lust, and he has made you objectively pure in him.
Therefore, you can work from a place of purity as covered in the righteousness of God in Christ (2 Cor. 5:21), not toward a place of purity to earn righteousness. Kill the urge to view porn because you are a son of God who is dead to sin and free to walk in purity (Ro. 6:1-14). Pornography is no longer your master—God is your father who radically loves you (1 Jn. 3:1), and Jesus is your sin-bearer who is not ashamed to call you, with all your inordinate lusts, “brother.” (Heb 2:11)
So fight the temptation of pornography, to paraphrase John Piper, as a victor, not a victim.
