Mark and Beth Denison, married for 36 years, launched There’s Still Hope as a national movement to call men and women into lives of sexual integrity. Their ministry offers 90-day recovery plans for addicts and one-on-one and group coaching for addicts and their spouses. TSH also produces resources for pastors and churches to confront the porn epidemic that is destroying so many lives. Dr. Denison was a senior pastor for over 30 years, NBA chaplain, and board chairman at Houston Baptist University three times. With a Master’s Degree in Addiction Recovery, Mark is a certified PSAP and active member of the American Association of Christian Counselors. Mark has written four books on recovery: Porn in the Pew, 365 Days to Sexual Integrity, A 90-Day Recovery Guide, and 40 Days to Porn-Free Living. His latest book, Jesus on the 12 Steps, will be released later this year.

Lincoln, Churchill, and Ali All Had It

It brought Abraham Lincoln through the Civil War. It carried Winston Churchill through the darkest days of WWII. It energized Steve Jobs, inspired Martin Luther King, Jr., and drove Muhammad Ali. Passion. G.W.F. Hegel said, “Nothing great in the world has been accomplished without passion.” But this isn’t a column on charging the next hill,…

I Write the Songs

On this date in 1975, Barry Manilow reached #1 on the Billboard adult contemporary charts with his greatest hit ever, I Write the Songs. There was just one problem. Manilow didn’t write the song. The 32-year-old singer-songwriter was proud of his songwriting skills, but he had not written anything that was really that successful. Producer…

The First Heart Transplant

Dr. Adrian Kantrowitz made history when his team performed the first heart transplant in America, at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, on December 6, 1967. Neary 41 years later, on November 14, 2008, Dr. Kantrowitz died – of heart failure. Putting the irony of his cause of death aside, Dr. Kantrowitz taught us an important…

Pythagoras

There is a famous line from the movie Network. “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore.” Let’s talk about that – anger. The Bible warns us, “Let not the sun go down on your wrath” (Ephesians 4:26). There are actually two distinct kinds of anger identified in the Greek New…

Elvis

The most successful musician in American history said, “I don’t know anything about music, In my line, you don’t have to.” Elvis had a good point. It is not knowledge that matters as much as what we do with that knowledge. My favorite author said is like this: “We don’t fall because we don’t know…

Made by God, for God

Augustine said, “Thou has created us for thyself, and our heart is not quiet until it rests in Thee.” That quote should be taped onto the bathroom mirror of every person in recovery. When we remember that we were not only created by God, but for God, we get an idea of how special we…

Through Many Dangers

“Through many dangers, toils and snares, I have already come. Tis grace has brought me safe thus far and grace will lead me home.” Those immortal words by John Newton have brought comfort to millions, if not billions of saints for the last 250 years. And we need those words – to read, quote, and…

Instant Gratification

“Give careful thought to your ways. You eat, but you never have enough. You drink, but you never have your fill” (Haggai 1:5-6). Addiction seeks the next thrill, the next hit, the next high. But it is never enough. To that way of thinking, George Orwell said, “Men can only be happy when they do…

Tag Team

It was one of the most significant events in sports history. The date was March 31, 1985. In Wrestlemania I, The Iron Sheik and Nikolai Volkoff defeated Barry Windham and Mike Rotundo for the WWE World Tag Team Championship. A lot of us treat the Christian life as a tag team event. When we get…

Free Bagels

Trevor started a new job. On his first day, he noticed a box of bagels in the break room, with a sign that read, “Please drop in a quarter for every bagel.” After a few days, Trevor noticed that no one seemed to be monitoring the payment system. So he’d occasionally take a bagel without…