11.12.2013 “Sex and God’s Word” Let’s pray…Father God, thank You for open, honest, and biblical teaching on the topic of sex. It’s so often overlooked in our culture as embarrassing to talk about or “cool” to boast about, but physical pleasure is a gift from You and when pursued in accordance with Your will, it is beautiful and honors You. Please forgive us, Lord, misusing our bodies, damaging our spirits, and dishonoring You. In Jesus Name, amen!
Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, “The two will become one flesh.” But he who unites himself with the Lord is one with him in spirit. Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body. Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body. 1 Corinthians 6: 16-20
Well, if I ever doubted I was a 21st Century American who is numb to the sexualization of almost everything, I don’t any longer. Although it’s everywhere, sex is not a comfortable topic to discuss in church…or write about on a church blog. Talking about sex belongs, at best, in the bedroom with my husband, and at worst laughing about the latest sexually innuendo-filled joke with friends, and it should be separated by a thick wall from God-talk, right? The answer to that has to be “no” because God spoke about it plainly and openly in His Word. If it’s in His Word, it better be in my heart and be coming out of my mouth!
But sex, thanks to Satan and our sin, has become everything from taboo and dirty to something that is celebrated publicly and discussed as a human right. It seems like sex is the one area where Satan has got almost every person blinded in one way or another: talk about it is prevalent in everyday conversation, it’s all over television programs and movies, and it’s just not shocking that sex before marriage is so common it’s expected. Satan has us duped into believing that God isn’t really concerned with what we do with our bodies or that He is ok with sex outside of marriage as long as “we’re in love.”
But God never meant for us to buy into any of those lies; He meant the act of sexual intimacy to be a physical expression of one’s love for their God-given spouse. We have corrupted it into something unrecognizable, something used for physical release or cheap entertainment. God, I believe, wants to redeem the truth of Godly sexuality from the mess we’ve created and re-establish it as the gift He meant it to be all along. As Christians, He is calling us to a higher standard – can you hear it, too? He is calling us to speak His Word very clearly and not hold back because sex is an off-limits topic in polite society, or to continue to speak about sex as if it’s a game that everyone should play. I’ll end with the words from The Message, which display God’s heart on the subject of sexuality:
There’s more to sex than mere skin on skin. Sex is as much spiritual mystery as physical fact. As written in Scripture, “The two become one.” Since we want to become spiritually one with the Master, we must not pursue the kind of sex that avoids commitment and intimacy, leaving us more lonely than ever—the kind of sex that can never “become one.” There is a sense in which sexual sins are different from all others. In sexual sin we violate the sacredness of our own bodies, these bodies that were made for God-given and God-modeled love, for “becoming one” with another. Or didn’t you realize that your body is a sacred place, the place of the Holy Spirit? Don’t you see that you can’t live however you please, squandering what God paid such a high price for? The physical part of you is not some piece of property belonging to the spiritual part of you. God owns the whole works. So let people see God in and through your body.
Blessings friends, Jennifer