Sex is a wonderful gift from God- what is sad about a post like I am writing today, is that I am attempting to undo damage already done in some respects.
Some of you have been touched by sexual immorality. You may have been involved sexually before you were married with your spouse or someone else. You may be someone’s victim, you may have developed lust issues through straight out pornography, romance novels, soap operas or an overactive thought life. Your husband may be involved in pornography, or maybe YOU are.
You might also be uncomfortable here, wondering if you will be exposed or if what I say will hit too close to home. Be assured that I don’t intend to glorify sin, or gross you out or sensationalize the things I will say here. You need to know what I am going to say today.
Unless you live in a cave there are things you and I as Christian women are going to have to face. We live in a highly sexualized culture where women are often treated as objects of sexual gratification. I have seen the effects of this in my counseling office and among people I know and love.
Sexual sin is pervasive and invasive. If it were a person, it would not care about your income, race, color or creed. Sexual sin is a captor and it takes hostages. The more informed you are the better you will be able to do battle with it.
God designed and “created” sex- Gen 2:18-25. Adam finds Eve and notices she is his perfect counterpart. She was created to be like him but different. There was no shame between them and there was no covering for their bodies. Their love before the fall was pure, and sweet and rapturous. They reveled in each other’s bodies and that is the way God intended it to be.
Let your fountain be blessed, and rejoice in the wife of your youth. As a loving hind and a graceful doe, Let her breasts satisfy you at all times; Be exhilarated always with her love. Proverbs 5:18-19
We only need a few verses in Song of Solomon to understand that what is being detailed for us is the intimate union of a man and woman. The sexual union is intended to represent the intimate relationship between Jesus Christ and the church, between God and mankind (Mark 10:7-9, Matt. 19:6, Eph. 5:25-33).
God repeatedly says two are one flesh. Our physical union is to reflect the oneness God and man are to have in Christ. God’s intention for sex: The sexual relationship is primarily for the creation of children (Gen 1:28) and yet humans are created with an ability to enjoy this act.
We are encouraged to participate in sex often and we are told in Scripture by God Himself that it is to be enjoyable (Prov. 5:19). God was apparently so determined to get that message across that He wrote an entire book of the Bible about it (Song of Solomon).
In fact God designed us so well that our desire for the pleasure of sex is to be met by our spouses frequently to avoid sinning!
The temptation for sexual sin is enormous particularly in our western culture where sex is used to sell everything – hamburgers, tires, beer, and hot wings only to name a few things. Paul understood this temptation a few thousand years ago when he penned 1 Cor. 7:1-4. Refusing sex with your spouse will cause incredible tension to build in him physically, and weaken his self-control. In our society where pornography is so easily available on television and just a click away on your family computer many husbands have found their physical release while viewing these illicit images.
I have counseled many women whose husbands have succumbed to the lure of pornography and I can tell you this is a devastating blow to any marriage, even when the wife is disinterested in sex! It is a blow that can be avoided by satisfying each other’s sexual needs. While he is totally responsible for his own actions, often it is the refusal of sexual intimacy that has played into his falling into this sin.
The sexual union of a husband and wife is also the most beautiful representation of the relationship Christ has with His Bride, the Church (Eph. 5:31, 32). This is one reason that Satan has made sex a primary target in Christian marriages. Anything he can do to spoil this most glorious and intimate picture is good for his purposes.
The sexual relationship reminds both husband and wife that they do not belong to themselves; they belong to each other (1 Cor. 7:3-4). This is another area when women struggle. It is a part of the curse God placed upon woman kind that we desire to rule over our husbands (Gen 3: 16).
We recoil at the idea that anyone would own us, especially in this “enlightened” age of feminism. The idea that we should have to submit our bodies to another person is in some cases horrifying to us. Our heads have been filled with the lies of feminism that tell us that we can do as we choose with our bodies, (“My body, my choice”) forgetting that we have been bought with a price (1 Cor. 6:20) by the precious blood of Christ and we do not have the biblical right to say we can do as we please with our bodies.
Our enemy, the devil has taken this beautiful picture, this one flesh relationship and perverted it. His perversion of the sexual relationship is not accidental, it is intentional. He chose the most accurate and intimate portrayal of Christ and the church and has turned it into filth, smut and a mighty profitable business.
Now that we have God’s viewpoint on some of the reasons for sex, next time we will turn our attention to other areas of mind renewal.