This article will review and recommend a pair of books for you: 1) Rescue Plan: Charting a Course to Restore Prisoners of Pornography and 2) Rescue Skills: Essential Skills for Restoring the Sexually Broken. These books written together by Deepak Reju and Jonathan D. Holmes are recommended for anyone who wants to be rescued from porn or who supports others in the rescue of sexual brokenness. Comprehensive issues are included for a range of readership: sufferers, dabblers, addicts, helpers, parents, friends, spouses, males, and females. And even if you aren’t in the heat of battle right now, you could add these books to your personal library as an excellent resource for dealing with this common matter anytime it may come up. The authors each have a solid background in pastoring and biblical counseling so you’ll know you’re getting the wisest strategy and skills for the issue of porn and sexual brokenness.

Authors, Pastors, & Counselors, Reju & Holmes

The Rescue Plan book: for the helper and the struggler

• Is formatted so you can skip around by topic and solution
• Describes patient, grace-filled, humble discipleship
• Demonstrates how the Bible has much to offer for fighting any battle, including a fierce one like pornography
• Celebrates God’s honorable, fulfilling design for sex
• Gives clear explanations and visuals of the addiction cycle and also for a destructive marriage cycle
• Answers tricky questions around the topics of: healing from shame, confessing responsibly and thoughtfully, initiating hard conversations, etc.
• Provides gentle, deep, and realistic questions throughout the book to overcome self-loathing, loneliness, etc. and to grow self-awareness and perseverance
• Replaces any negative, discouraging thoughts about personal struggles, sin, and behavior with having forward-focused dialogue for a stronger relationship with Christ
• Provides exercises at the end of each chapter to build an individualized plan
• Details how others have successfully developed and implemented rescue plans
• Addresses the elephant in the room – the habit of masturbation – (fully unpacking the arguments for and against it), including 10 strategies for overcoming and gaining freedom
• Includes the similarities and differences of men and women and singles and marrieds when it comes to porn use
• Coaches men and women of older generations and the church how to come alongside youth and women who have very different experiences and challenges due to growing up in the Information Age
• Calms parents who have to navigate a delicate subject matter with their children when they wish they didn’t have to
• Counsels the heart, soul, and whole person so that the struggler gets to root issues and preserves holistic identity

The Rescue Skills book: for the helper who wants to become more skilled and confident

• Functions as an exhaustive handbook
• Is grounded in Scripture and the gospel for empowerment and Christian virtues
• Gives you what to listen for when someone is confiding in you about sexual brokenness, and how to handle excuses, etc.
• Teaches you how to ask questions to get below superficial topics and onto challenging issues such as anger, trauma, escapism, etc. and provides simple visuals to use as well
• Lists the right ingredients for a battleplan to be effective
• Lays out the physical, emotional, social components of implementing a good plan
• Describes how to create good accountability
• Provides easy-to-find accountability questions throughout the book that you can select based on where you and a struggler are in the restoration process
• Guides you into discerning fake repentance & encouraging genuine repentance
• Dives into the challenges of having a dulled or dead conscience and restoring a new identity
• Includes an entire second part of the book devoted to helping the struggler to learn new skills, such as:
  • Walking by the Spirit
  • Overcoming temptations
  • Replacing bad desires
  • Recovering after a fall
  • Understanding guilt and shame
  • Disciplining the body
  • Glimpsing the big picture
  • Acknowledging true beauty
  • Fighting battle weariness

Recommended

If you’re a millennial or younger and have wondered how to merge being a Christian with being surrounded with porn as norm, the Rescue Plan book is strongly encouraged. If you’re a parent of anyone living at home or if you provide discipleship to anyone in the next generation, both Rescue Plan and Rescue Skills are highly recommended. And if you’re already a struggler or come from sexual brokenness, both books are highly recommended for you as well, along with finding a companion and accountability partner.

Prayer & Blessing

Therefore, do not throw away your confidence which has a great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that after you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised… (Hebrews 10:35-36)