Tag Archives: sexuality

July 15, 2021 · 7:36 pm

Men, women and sex

things on my mind today…

For those who haven’t read it, here is what this verse says:

4 The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. And likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. (1 Cor. 7:4)

When you read the whole verse, you can see something jump right out at you off the page. It is NOT saying that it is the woman’s duty to have sex on demand whenever the husband desires it. According to the text, her right to say “no”, or “yes” for that matter, is as absolute as the husband’s.

It does not say that the husband has a sex drive and the wife does not. It does not say that the wife has to put up with the lust of her husband and satisfy it or she is to blame if he turns to porn.

So, that being said, take all of your “Christian” sex books and throw them away.

What this verse means is this: God designed sex to be mutual, exclusive, egalitarian – the joining of two into one flesh. Two bodies, male and female, exploring, joining, touching, giving pleasure, receiving pleasure. Neither is “in charge” in the bedroom, for both have “authority” over the body of the other. They truly become “one flesh”.

Both the husband and the wife have equal authority when it comes to sexuality. This means one flesh, not dominance. This frees the body and the soul to explore, to love, to truly unite, to be free.

Explore this. Think about it. Learn how your wife ticks, what she feels, how she loves. Learn what her triggers are, learn what she fears, what she loves. Wives, explore your husband, learn what his fears are, what his triggers are, what he fears. What causes him shame. What causes her shame. How can you make the other safe in the midst of the greatest vulnerability there is.

When she is safe with you and when you are safe with her, then you can truly know what it means to be naked and not ashamed, as you were created to be.

For this reason, most of what passes for marriage counseling misses the mark completely. It is so frequently taught that sex is just for the man, and it is the wife’s duty to perform.

But, men, if the only reason your wife is having sex with you is because you are making her, that is not Biblical sexual morality. That is called “rape”.

If you are using this verse (the first part of it) to manipulate or coerce your wife into having sex with you, that is also called “rape” and it is the worst kind – cruelty under the name of “Biblical womanhood”.

True sexuality is not coerced, not manipulated, not used as reward for good behavior. True sexuality is not “for the man”. It is not something that the wife has to endure. It is mutual, joyful, fulfilling, intoxicating, loving.

But first, you have to pursue it diligently. You have to put aside all ideas as to “Who’s in charge, here” and simply learn to love her. Find out what makes her rejoice.

Women, if you have never enjoyed sex before, there is help available. If there is pain, if there is trauma, if there is anything getting in the way between you and your husband, this is not how God intended you to live. There is help available.

If you have never had a mutual, fulfilling sex life, there is help available.

Start with Sheila Wray Gregoire’s book “The Great Sex Rescue”.

By the way, men. Learning how to please your wife isn’t a suggestion. It is a command from God. When you obey this command, implied in the seventh commandment, you will be surprised at how much more responsive your wife will be.

A word to the wise is enough.

(Deu 24:5)   “When a man has taken a new wife, he shall not go out to war or be charged with any business; he shall be free at home one year, and bring happiness to his wife whom he has taken.

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January 29, 2021 · 8:27 am

Marriage is not a cure

One of the most pernicious lies to come out of the “purity” movement is the lie that a young man can cure his ungodly lusts by getting married.

The damage that this has done to marriage is astounding. All false doctrine destroys in one way or another.

Young women are guilted into marriage, and the subjected to all sorts of abuse inflicted on them. And then they are denied any sort of help or relief, because “God hates divorce”, which isn’t even in the Bible.

So let me give you a interpretive guide. According to Jesus, everything in the scripture is for the purpose of increasing our love for God and our love for our neighbor. (Matthew 22:36-40)

So if you believe that Scripture is giving you a justification for marital rape, abuse, assault, neglect and any other forms of hatred, I am here to warn you and to disabuse you of that notion.

God hates pride, scorning, reviling and the twisting of sexuality into a weapon of hatred.

So, where does the idea come from that if a man is burning with ungodly lust, then he is to get married and inflicted it on his wife?

From this passage:

8 But I say to the unmarried and to widows that it is good for them if they remain even as I.
9 But if they do not have self-control, let them marry; for it is better to marry than to burn. (1 Cor. 7:8-9)

Is Paul really teaching that self-control comes from pouring your lust upon your spouse? That cleansing and healing come another way than by the gospel?

Certainly not.

Paul is answering a specific question. First century Christians had a lot of questions about life and how to live now that Christ has come. Some early Christians were plaguing the church by teaching that really holy Christians didn’t get married. Others taught that really holy Christians were always married. Paul answers one of these questions, and then another.

In our text, he is responding to the accusation that he wasn’t really an apostle because God intended people to be married, and Paul wasn’t married. Paul is answering that accusation.

But he doesn’t want the “anti-marriage” party to have ammunition either. He is promoting love, not quarrels over the law.

So now, suppose there are two young people who have fallen in love. Both are believers. They can hardly sleep at night. They long to hold one another and live together as husband and wife.

And someone tells them that they can’t marry because…whatever reason they wish to insert here.

Paul is teaching them that marriage is good, designed by God. Sexuality is created by God and is good. A whole book in the Bible is about godly sexuality and how it is a picture of Christ and his church.

When we deny the right of  lovers to marry in the Lord, we are needlessly putting them at risk of fornication, but far worse than that, we are denying the goodness of God’s creation, teaching them that there is something about their bodies that is evil and wrong. False teaching about sexuality always increase shame and guilt and drive us into hiding, just as it did with our first parents in the Garden.

Even if they manage to avoid sinning against God, they are burning with passion with no relief in sight. It is like telling a starving man that food is a sin. It is not only wrong, it increases the torment of the conscience with no relief.

This is Paul’s concern. Let them marry!

He does not at all mean that a man who is addicted to pornography, violence, ungodly lusts and other sins can be “cured” by inflicting them on his wife.

There is only one cure for that. Repentance and faith and crying out daily for the gift of the Spirit.

Jesus died for us so that we might live. He did not die that we might continue in our pursuit of death.

Marriage is about love and unity, becoming “one flesh”. Sex is powerful and can become a tremendous weapon of hatred against those who are supposed to be safe. Love is safe, affirming, mutual and life-giving. Hatred destroys.

Don’t use the Bible to justify hatred.

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March 25, 2019 · 11:41 am

Sex and sandwiches

3 But fornication, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not be once named among you, as becometh saints;
4 Neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient: but rather giving of thanks. (Eph 5:3-4)

This horrible meme has been floating around – about how a husband needs sex, sandwiches and submission.

I don’t want to link it because I don’t want to give the godless people who support it any more support, even by a click.

But it got me thinking about this false idea promoted by patriarchialists of every stripe. The idea is this: the cure for fornication is to get married.

The problem is that it is unbiblical. Now I know that many of you are thinking about 1 Corinthians 7:

Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband. (1Co 7:2)

In fact, there are many false teachers that teach that it is the wife’s duty to make herself available at all times in order to keep her husband from committing adultery or watching porn.

I wish I could tell you how many times I have heard of pastors giving that counsel to wives whose husbands would rather use porn. “Well, are you making yourself available to him?”

We have to do better. All of scripture is inspired by God. There are no contradictions. There is only one route to purity, and it isn’t taking your fornicating heart into the marriage bed. “Let the marriage bed be undefiled”, the scripture says (Heb. 13:4).

What does Paul mean? As a Reformed pastor, I hold to historical/grammatical exegesis. In order to understand any portion of scripture, you have to look at it in the historical context to see what it is addressing. Paul is addressing a specific situation, which he summarizes in 1 Corinthians 7:1. There were those who were teaching that marriage was not good, and a man should just avoid it all together.

But then what about those young couples in love? Do you remember those years when the bloom of spring is upon you and young hearts are turning to love? Do you remember not being able to keep your hands off of each other?

And now some false teacher is forbidding you to marry. Paul says, “What do you think you will accomplish?” God created sexuality and called it “very good”. Let them marry. Let them rejoice in the wife of their youth. Let them give thanks to a good God who created them and who rejoices at their union (Song of Songs 5:1).

In a twist of self-contradictory thinking, many patriarchialists also throw so many obstacles in the way of their sons and daughters dating and getting married that fornication increases ten-fold in those kinds of circles…This is exactly what Paul is addressing to the church at Corinth.

 

Paul is most certainly NOT teaching that the cure for a fornicating and adulterous heart is to inflict yourself upon your wife. He is not teaching spousal rape, sexual abuse and domination – no matter what you call it.

Because Paul wasn’t a fool, who said one thing in one place and another thing in another place. The opposite of fornication, according to Ephesians 5, is thanksgiving.

The opposite of fornication is NOT marriage. It is thanksgiving. “But rather, giving of thanks,” God says.

God created men and women and filled the earth with wonderful, beautiful things. He created beautiful things, things with color, shape, form, texture. He gave men and women bodies and made them beautiful. Sin twisted that beauty. Fornication lashes out at beauty, consuming and devouring it for our own twisted lusts. God, who created men and women, created them to be “one flesh”, with sex and touch and sight and smell and taste all rolled into the relationship. Spirit and matter united in a holy bond of love and unity.

And we made it hateful – possession and conquest, lust and demand, devouring and destroying…

The heart of fornication is this: God isn’t good. His gifts aren’t good. I need to reach out and grab the fruit for myself on my own terms. God will not give me every good thing. When you see the heart of the issue, you see that ingratitude and fornication are different sides of the same coin.

Instead of rejoicing at the beauty of the world, the unthankful heart says, “God just created all sorts of beautiful women and then said, “Don’t touch”. But I’ll show HIM!”

It isn’t enough to have EVERY OTHER tree in the garden. I must have them ALL!

THAT is what fornication is, and that is how it has twisted and devoured beauty as God created it. The powerful seduce and devour and consume the weaker like a rich man roasts and eats a lamb (2 Sam. 12:1-4)

And the cure is not to take your twisted, hateful self and inflict it on your spouse. The cure is to take your naked, sinful self to Christ and throw yourself on his mercy. Listen to the accusation of God’s prophet: “THOU are the man!” and then follow David in repentance and faith.

Then you will know what love is. Then you will see what it means that “Christ loved the church and gave himself for her”.

And that is when you are ready to learn how to love a woman (or a man, as the case may be. I do want to be “gender inclusive” in the call of the gospel).

 

In the Heidelberg Catechism, written over 450 years ago, the Reformers understood that. In the exposition of the 7th commandment, they wrote:

108. What does the seventh Commandment teach us?

That all unchastity is accursed of God, and that we should therefore loathe it with our whole heart, and live chastely and modestly, whether in holy wedlock or in single life.

You CAN be unchaste, unholy, ungodly in wedlock. If you treat your wife like an object to be used, a thing to be broken and discarded, if you refuse to learn what makes her rejoice , then you certainly do not have the heart of Jesus Christ.

Before you can even begin to understand the problem with “Sex, sandwiches and submission”, you must first understand that no one who knows Christ can possibly say such a thing. You are in great danger. Flee the wrath to come.

This is not the heart of a thankful man or woman. This is the heart of fornication – I demand to be served. I demand my own way. I demand that this woman take up the cross and follow ME. I demand sex now…

You have no idea what love is. And you also have no idea what sex is. You understand rape and murder, you understand lies and reviling. But you do not know what love is.

Go and learn what love is at the foot of the cross. Until then, please keep your hands to yourself.

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