Love and Sexuality is a trick, touchy subject to say the least.
One thing we do know is that we live in a hyper sexualized culture. Sex sells: Sex Sells- A study in The Journal of Sex Research gave some interesting statistics. Men think about sex 19 times a day, while women think of it 10 times a day.Whichever way you look at it, 10 to 19 times a day is significant and would surely tickle any advertiser. Also, a study in 2012 reported 92% of songs featured on the Billboard’s Top 10 included sexual references. One way to look at it besides the songs being hit songs is that sex sells.
It is Into this context that Historic Christianity holds forth the view that Sex is meant to be enjoyed only within the bonds of Marriage between one man and one woman.
Culture often feels like the Christian Sexual ethic is restrictive, old fashion and out of touch with reality. That it is loveless and sexless.
Is this true? How should we view sex and our cultures value of it?
As before we will see that Love and Sexuality is neither shunned by our faith nor is it to be worshipped as ultimate.
Love/Sex is a
The Bible teaches that human beings were created by love, for love. And nowhere in scripture do we see this better displayed than the Song of Solomon (of Songs).
E.J. Young “Not only does it speak of the purity of human love/ but, by its very inclusion in the canon, it reminds us of a love that is purer than our own.
At the core of the idolatry of Love/sex is that we pursue it out of a selfish, lust driven heart. It is all too often pursued out of self-gratification. “It feels good, I like it, I desire it, I need it”.
A desire of the flesh rather than an expression of shared love that sex is meant to be.
1 John 2:16 For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world.
Galatians 5:19 Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, (unbridled lust, excess, licentiousness, lasciviousness, wantonness, outrageousness, shamelessness, insolence)
When sex is pursued apart from God’s loving plan for our lives, only then does it become a high place of worship to dark deities destined to leave us in loneliness and corruption.
The
What’s the big deal about sex? Why do you or for that matter anyone care other people’s sex lives as long as no one is getting hurt?
At issue is, as Christians, what type of people we are, who God is and who we are in Him and what love/sex points to. And what are our bodies for?
Paul wanted to let them know not a bunch of rules about sex, but about learning to use the human body in the right way and of our sexual nature.
V12a everything may be lawful, but by no means is everything beneficial.
Paul would not allow his freedoms to become the place of actual bondage. There is a self-deception that can come with acting on our “freedoms” that brings enslavement of the worst kind. To the very freedom we think we have.
V13 An excuse for immorality. Food is for the stomach and the stomach for food. So, by implication sex is for the body and the body for sex.
Paul doesn’t deny that God has made sexual organs for their particular purpose, but he does deny, very strongly, that this purpose is fulfilled by any and every sexual practice
What is the body made for? It is made not for sexual immorality, but for the Lord!
Paul envisioned our relationship with Jesus not just as spiritual, but as physical. After all God raised Jesus from the dead (V14) and will raise us too; so, what you do with your body matters.
V15-17 We belong to Jesus as a Christian, you are part of His body (Chapt 12). This union of spirit it seems can be damaged by inappropriate unions of the “flesh”.
There is no such thing as a casual sexual encounter. What you do sexually you do with your whole self, not with just part of you. What you are as a Christian, you are and do with your whole self, not just the spiritual part.
Paul’s final argument (about what the body is for) goes back to foundational Christian beliefs, to the spirit and the cross.
In 1 Corinthians 3:16-17 he said that the whole church was God’s new temple, now V19, he insists that the individual Christian is now also the temple.
If we are a Christian, we don’t only have dealings with the spirit when we are doing spiritual things, church or worship or praying. But he takes up permanent residence in us. We can never stop being someone who has been bought at a high price.
Those who have been “bought” at a great cost must remind themselves of what special people they are and learn to behave accordingly.
Love/Sexuality is a gift given to us from God that is meant to be expressed appropriatly according to God’s plans and purposes. It is not something that is inhearently bad or that needs to be embarrased by. But it is not something that we “use” in a way to fulfill our own needs and desires. When we make love/sex ultimate, it becomes an idol- and all idols do is take from us. In this case it detracts from our true humanity and who we have been created to be. To make love/sex an idol is to misuse our bodies.