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As Jenny and I searched for a new house we knew that we had to have one thing: a fireplace.  We have always lived in a home with a fireplace, except at our last rental and it was horrible.  I love fire, I love watching fire, I could watch it all the time.  We also put in a gas stove, so we cook with fire and our furnace is gas so it heats with fire.  Fire is the most wonderful gift ever!  It heats our house, makes meals safe to eat and delicious, it provides nice ambiance.  But, if that fire were to come out of our fireplace and into our carpet or walls or attic – it would be a curse.

Sexuality is the fire in our marriage.  It is beautiful, creative and comforting, but when sexuality is removed from its place it can be completely destructive.  As a matter of fact sexual infidelity is the one clear and listed reason in scripture for divorce.

I know that there are some who would say, “Why are you talking about sex in the church?”  If you’ve been following along in the small group book you’ll notice that much of this week is dedicated to purity, particularly from pornography.  The problem is that I’ve heard sermons on pornography and I’ve heard sermons on purity, but I’ve yet to hear (in person) a sermon celebrating sexuality.  It’s easier to say, “Sex is bad outside of marriage and pornography is corrupting.”  It’s a lot more difficult to say, “Sex is so good and we should celebrate it.”  I believe we must capture and reclaim our sexuality.

There is a great and beautiful description of sexual intimacy, found right in scripture in the book of Song of Solomon.  If sexual intimacy was important enough to get an entire book of the Bible dedicated to it, then it’s important enough for us to talk about.  In the midst of a book that borders on explicit this strong statement on covenant love is found…

“Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm; for love is strong as death, passion fierce as the grave.  Its flashes are flashes of fire, a raging flame.  Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it.  If one offered for love all the wealth of one’s house, it would be utterly scorned.”

-  Song of Solomon 8:6-7

Purposes of Sexuality

1. Creation – Genesis 1:24
   1. Create a new identity.  When joined physically a spiritual union takes place between the man and the woman.
   2. Animals mate by biological instinct, man has sex on reason, we are the only created species able to have sex with the whole person: mind, soul, body.  There is no mistake that the word used throughout scripture starting Genesis 4:14 is that we know each other as a euphemism for sex.
2. Re-creation – Song of Solomon 4:9-15
   1. Sex is a place of recreating the original identity or restoring it and strengthening it.  Sex was designed to celebrate and restore wholeness in the marriage.  Sex does not happen in isolation.  Great sex happens in great relationships.  It is not a substitute for one – it can’t be.
   2. To know your wife – increase intimacy and celebrates our intimacy.  Our great problem today as articulated by Randy Garris is that we have mistaken sex for a physical drive, when it was created by God in us to be an emotional drive.  Certainly sex is physical, but our greatest sex organ is our mind and when we forget to think and feel we neglect the wholeness God wants for us in our sexuality.
3. Pro-creation – Genesis 9:1
   1. I dare say that procreation might be a by-product of true love which creates an identity.  Procreation is not the sole purpose for sexuality as some have said over the years.  It is an overflowing of the love in a marriage.
   2. How do you know when you are ready to have children?  When you have more than enough love.  Sexuality creates a married identity, it recreates and refreshes it as often as it is practiced and as a result the overflow of creative energy produces new life – children.
   3. Listen to the language of Proverbs 5:15-20.  This passage is letting us know about the blessings of sex, particularly in bearing children.  Solomon is asking why would we allow our blessing to go to another man or family.

Taking these purposes of sexuality in mind we can then evaluate any practice of sexuality in accordance with God’s original design for expressing our sexual nature.  Particularly there are two broad and sweeping categories that fall under this.  I recognize that there are specific questions about practices of sex that might be of interest to you, unfortunately this is not the place to address those.  So, we must be content to look at these overarching principles and then draw conclusions about specific practices from them.  For answers to more specific questions see Intended for Pleasure by Ed & Gaye Wheat

Practices of Sexuality

1. Mutuality in marriage
   1. Mutuality in marriage means two things: 1) that both willing consent and 2) that it remains between the both of them.  This mutuality speaks to influences a couple may bring into their sex life including sex manuals.  Dr. Kevin Leman who says that as couples we don’t lack information, we lack innocence.  I agree.
   2. 1 Corinthians 7:3-4.  Our bodies are mutual property.  So, sexuality is a mutual process of submitting to each other and their desires.
   3. 1 Conrithians 7:5 tells us that sexuality is so important that we should not deprive each other.
   4. So serious was the establishment of good sex in marriages that in Deuteronomy 24:5 a man is given a year off to learn to pleasure his wife.
2. Abstinence outside of marriage
   1. In marriage abstinence is a sin, but outside of marriage it is the best and only way to preserve the purity of the marriage bed. (Hebrews 13:4)
   2. Outside of marriage this is the choice for the faithful believer, because without a marriage it can not fulfill the creation purpose of sex.  We are unable to create sustaining relationships outside of the bond of covenant in marriage.
   3. There is no doubt that abstinence is a difficult proposition.  As beings made up of thoughts, feelings, spirit and physicality draw closer to each other in dating relationships it is only natural that our physicality would desire the same.
   4. No way to be one flesh without a covenant, because only in the bond of covenant is our spirit bonded together.
   5. The problem is that sex is sacramental, the physical act represents and enacts a spiritual reality as well.  1 Corinthians 6:12-20
      1. Notice the body is meant for the Lord, our physical nature is under his lordship.
      2. The problem is when we forget that our sexuality is an emotional drive and think it is a physical drive.
      3. Our sexuality is a controllable expression of our inner thoughts and feelings – not a primal urge that can’t be contained.

What happens when we guard our sexuality and pre-sexuality?  Read Song of Solomon 8:8-14 and you will see these two truths…

• The Shulamite guards her sexuality and rebuffs the vain attempt of Solomon to buy her love.  She has saved herself for marriage.
• Having maintained her purity, she calls to her lover with modest means and they live upon “the mountains of spice.” A Hebraic way of saying, “happily ever after.”  Following God’s plan for sexuality in covenant is what truly brings us blessing.

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