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| Section: Basic Christian Living:
courses for new Christians |
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Growing in God |
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7. Putting Sex in its Place: |
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The Christian and Sexuality |
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Thessalonians 4:3-6 'It is God's will that you should be sanctified:
that you should avoid sexual immorality; that each of you should
learn to control his own body in a way that is holy and honourable,
not in passionate lust like the heathen, who do not know God;
and that in this matter no one should wrong his brother or take
advantage of him.'
A good
servant, a bad master
In the first lesson of this
course—Temple Maintenance: You and your body—we
noted that sex is one of the basic bodily drives. Like the other
drives, such as hunger and the need for sleep, it has to be kept
in its place, and the Bible provides some clear guidelines to
help you with this.
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Kept in its
place, sex is a good servant. But if you allow it to assert itself
it will quickly become a tyrannical master that will make your
life a misery.
Sex is God's
gift
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Sex is a gift from God, given
by him before the Fall (Genesis 1:27-28). Because God
gives only good gifts (James 1:17), sex is fundamentally good.
In fact God views sex within marriage so highly that he uses
it to illustrate the intimacy of Christ's relationship with the
church:
Ephesians
5:22, 25, 31-32 'Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord…Husbands,
love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself
up for her…"a man will leave his father and mother
and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh."
This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ
and the church.'
So sex is good, but it can,
of course, be abused, as we shall see.
Variations
in sex drive
The sex drive is stronger in
some people than others, and some have none at all. Jesus said:
Matthew
19:12
'Some are eunuchs because they were born that way; others were
made that way by men; and others have renounced marriage because
of the kingdom of heaven.'
By 'eunuchs'
he meant people who did not marry and have sexual relations.
He mentions three reasons why people take this course:
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 | Some lack any sexual drive
and therefore have no interest in sex at all.
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| Some men have been castrated,
rendering them incapable of sex.
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| Some choose to abstain from
marriage and sex in order to concentrate on God's work. Jesus
himself was in this category.
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| The third category, however,
does not mean that celibacy is a higher state than marriage.
On the contrary, the Bible assumes that sex within marriage will
be the experience of most people, and there is a whole book of
the Bible devoted to it: the Song of Solomon.
God's
guidelines
1. Marriage
The only context in which God
permits sexual activity is marriage. The key element in
marriage is not sex, as some imagine, but the commitment
of a husband and wife to one another in a lifelong relationship.
Sex is one of the ways in which that commitment finds ongoing
expression:
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1
Corinthians 7:2
'Since there is so much immorality, each man
should have his own wife, and each woman her own husband.'
God gave us sexuality for two
purposes:
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| For procreation. It is the means by which the human
race is perpetuated.
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| For pleasure.
Sexual activity is God's provision
by which a husband and wife can express and confirm their mutual
love and commitment.
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Hebrews
13:4
'Marriage should be honoured by all, and the marriage bed kept
pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral.'
This verse mentions some non-permissible
ways of sexual expression. Let's now consider what God says about
these and some others.
2. Adultery
Adultery takes place when a
married person has sex with someone other than their marriage
partner, and God condemns it without reserve. It is a denial
of the marriage promises and brings misery to all concerned,
including children of the marriage.
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Because adultery
is such a serious threat to marriage and family life, God included
a clear word about it in the Ten Commandments:
Exodus
20:14
'You shall not commit adultery.'
3. Sex outside
of marriage
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God opposes sexual activity
among unmarried people, too. It is sometimes called 'fornication'.
Sadly, today this is considered normal, but it produces a sad
harvest of spoilt and ruined lives. Avoid it at all costs because'
God will judge…all the sexually immoral' (Hebrews 13:4).
The fact that 'everybody does it' is another good reason for
you, as a Christian, not to do it. The Bible says:
Romans
12:2
'Don't let the world around you squeeze you into its own mould'
(J.B. Phillips version)
Take a stand on this issue
and 'keep yourself pure' (1 Timothy 5:22).
4. Homosexuality
In spite of efforts by gay
and lesbian liberation movements to have homosexual sex accepted
and approved, the Bible condemns it outright—as it does
other forms of sexual perversion, like bestiality:
Leviticus
18:22-23
'Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable.
Do not have sexual relations with an animal and defile yourself
with it. A woman must not present herself to an animal to have
sexual relations with it; that is a perversion.'
God overthrew the Old Testament
cities of Sodom and Gomorrah because of the rampant homosexuality
in them (Genesis 13:13; 19:1-29). The New Testament is equally
clear. Describing those who reject God, Paul says:
Romans
1:26-27
'God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged
natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men
also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed
with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other
men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.'
While as Christians we reject
homosexuality as a form of sexual expression, we must have compassion
for those caught up in it. By embracing the gospel, they can
be delivered—as some of the Corinthian believers had discovered
(1 Corinthians 6:9-11). Moving
towards marriage
If you're single, make up your
mind now that you'll only marry another Christian.
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The Bible says, 'Do not be
unequally yoked together with unbelievers' (2 Corinthians 6:14).
Marriage is a 'yoke'—it compels two people to walk together,
and that's impossible if only one of them has a commitment to
Christ.
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If you develop
a relationship with another Christian that might lead to marriage,
don't overdo the physical aspects, which can easily get out of
hand. Heavy petting of the kind that normally precedes sexual
intercourse is unwise when, as believers, you can't go on to
intercourse until you're married. So set limits for yourselves
and look to God for help to stay within them.
Sexual self-control
Self-control is a great Christian
virtue and part of the fruit of the Holy Spirit:
Galatians
5:16,22-24
'Live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of
the sinful nature…The fruit of the Spirit is… love,
joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness
and self-control… Those who belong to Christ Jesus
have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires.'
1. Flirting
Flirting is dangerous. It has
been called 'attention without intention'. It plays at relationships
with no serious intention, which devalues the kind of man-woman
relationships that God wants people to build.
So avoid it, and treat members
of the opposite sex with respect. Paul told the young man, Timothy,
what his attitude should be to the younger women in the church:
1 Timothy
5:1-2
'Treat…younger women as sisters, with absolute purity.'
2. Masturbation
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| Masturbation
is self-stimulation in order to find sexual satisfaction.
The Bible says nothing explicit
about it. But it's clearly wrong if it's accompanied by sexual
fantasies and becomes addictive. God meant sex to be 'other-oriented',
that is, providing satisfaction for one's marriage partner (1
Corinthians 7:3-4), whereas masturbation is 'self-oriented',
that is, satisfying only oneself.
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It's hard to imagine that Jesus,
who was 'tempted in every way, just as we are' (Hebrews 4:15),
took this route when faced with sexual pressure. There's no need
for you to take it either.
3. The mastery
of sex Sexual desire is like a burning fire
(Proverbs 6:27-29). A fire in the house is fine, so long as it's in the
grate. If it's in the middle of the lounge floor, you've got problems! The
right place for sex, as we've seen, is in marriage. If you're single, keep
yourself for your husband or wife when the time comes.
In the meantime, or if you intend to stay single, avoid
sexually stimulating reading and TV, and channel your energies into other
activities. Above all, walk closely with the Lord. That's the route to a
life of fulfilment and joy, as countless single Christians have discovered.
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