I Love You for Who You Are But I Still Want Your Body CotM Sermon Notes 3.1.

.2014 - Pastor Willie George, Fixing Us, part 5 Credit for material in this message to: Timothy Keller with Kathy Keller The Meaning of Marriage and Mark and Grace Driscoll Real Marriage

One of the key elements of a happy and fulfilling marriage is the sexual relationship between husband and wife. This is Gods idea! This is the churchs story to tell because it comes from God and His Word as a special gift to us. We need to get better about telling our storyand telling it appropriately for each age group involved. Our young people need to grow up with a healthy appreciation for this wonderful gift for a husband and wife within marriage, and people of all ages, married and single, need to hear about sex from Gods point of view. Sex is Gods idea. It is His gift to husband wife within the covenant of marriage. Sex is beautiful! Sex is not dirty. It is the highest expression of covenant love on this planet. Gods Word makes it clear that sex is created to be enjoyed within certain boundaries. Sex without marriage covenant is harmful both to individuals and to families. Each persons standard of beauty should be his/her spousenot a pornographic image.

From ancient times, many cultures were sexually active outside of marriage. Those who rejected Gods standards even turned sex into a form of pagan worship in their temples. What is different today is the impact of modern communications and how easily sex can be abused through pornography and then can be transmitted for anyone to see.

Although our society today is very quick to label as a bigot anyone who does not agree with the approach of encouraging sexuality outside of marriage, we have no choice but to seize the opportunity to tell the truth. This is our story and God has given it to us to tell! Many people in church are uncomfortable with the discussion of sex, but its time to get past that. Sex is Gods gift to a husband and wife and belongs in marriage. This is our story to tell. This is our issue. We need to rejoice in Gods gift and learn how to present it accurately. Sex education should be our narrative, not the schools. Through various misinformed people over the centuries, we have become ashamed of the topic. We should help young people in these matters. They are vulnerable; uninformed or misinformed. Young people, hold to Gods standards; put marriage first and then sex. Protect the privacy of your body and your future family. Genesis 2.21-25: God very carefully sculpted Eve; when Adam sees Eve, he breaks out into poetic song; it is a picture of Christ and the church. God didnt have to make Eve out of Adam, but He did it that way to teach us something important. He caused a deep sleep to come onto Adam and created Eve from Adams rib. There is symbolism to this. God knocked out Adam and pulled from him what was to become his wife. This is symbolic of Christ sleeping in death to bring life to the church, His bride. In verse 24, the boundaries to sex are established: there is to be no incest, no fornication or adultery, no homosexuality, no bestiality. It did not take long for the world to redefine sex by removing it from the context it was supposed to be in. Religions of ancient days used sex as a means to bring in followers. Numbers 25.1-3 reports that through promiscuity, Israel was joined to Baal of Peor and Gods anger was aroused. Sex was closely akin to spiritual things. When not governed by scripture, sex becomes a god that is worshipped. Porn revenue is greater than all major sports combined in this country. Oneeighth of websites are porn. The largest internet consumer category for porn is boys 12-17. This is why we cant ignore or delay talking to our kids about sexuality.

If sexual freedom set people free, then those having most sex (prostitutes) should be most free, but the statistics do not bear this out. It has been found that most people who become prostitutes were sexually abused as a child. 75% of prostitutes have attempted suicide. 15% of all successful suicides are women prostitutes. Sex outside of Gods boundaries is selfish. 2 Samuel 13.1-2: Amnon feigned being sick in order to get his half-sister Tamar to come to his house so he could have sex with her. After he raped her, instead of the love he had felt for her earlier, he hated her. (13:15) Young women, dont fall for the lie that the person who wants to have sex with you really, really loves you. Statistically the chances of staying with the guy are almost zero. Young ladies, be careful with your body and make the man wait for sex until marriage. Over time, many wrong attitudes toward sex have arisen in the churchall of them distortions of Gods wonderful gift. Sex became seen as necessary but dirty. This thinking came from the Greeks, a culture that had almost no sexual inhibition. This thinking crept into the church such that sex, even in marriage, was thought to be evil. Some men viewed women as a source of temptation and their societies treated women as second class citizens. Greek philosophy entered the church and strengthened this view. Third century theologian Origen is said by some to have castrated himself. Some strange ideas came into the thinking of the church. Some thought that Adam and Eve didnt have sex before the fall. Thomas Aquinas: sex only permissible for procreation. So who brought truth back to the church? Surprising to some, the Puritans were the ones who turned this thinking around. They read the Bible and saw the truth of Gods gift. Prudishness was brought about by the Victorians, who shut the door to sexuality. The Bible extols virtues of passion and sensuality in marriage. Proverbs 5.18-19:
Let your fountain be blessed, and rejoice with the wife of your youth. 19 As a loving deer and a graceful doe, let her breasts satisfy you at all times; and always be enraptured with her love.

This says nothing about limiting sex to a means of reproduction.

Sex was not only meant to be a physical act, but it also a spiritual act! Sex is a way to overcome temptation. I Corinthians 7.1-5: Now for the matters you
wrote about: It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman. 2 But since sexual immorality is occurring, each man should have sexual relations with his own wife, and each woman with her own husband. 3 The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife, and likewise the wife to her husband. 4 The wife does not have authority over her own body but yields it to her husband. In the same way, the husband does not have authority over his own body but yields it to his wife. 5 Do not deprive each other except perhaps by mutual consent and for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer. Then come together again so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.

One flesh refers to the personal union of a man and a woman at all levels of their lives. Sex is a uniting act and thus belongs only in the context of the marriage covenant. I Cor 6.17,18,20: 17 But whoever is united with the Lord is one with him in spirit. 18 Flee from
sexual immorality. All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually, sins against their own body. 19 Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; 20 you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.

One flesh means more than just sexual union. It refers to the personal union of a man and woman at all levels of their lives. A prostitute unites to the other person on all levels through sex. Sex constitutes a unique way of self-disclosure and selfcommitment. Sex outside marriage actually works in reverse and makes it more difficult to unite with a spouse at a later time. When you have sex outside marriage, it excludes Christ. Sex within marriage pleases God. D. S. Bailey The Man-Woman Relation in Christian Thought Pauls thought . . .
displays a psychological insight into human sexuality which is altogether exceptional by firstcentury human standards. The apostle denies that coitus is . . . no more than an appropriate exercise of the genital organs. On the contrary, he insists that it is an act which . . . engages and expresses the whole personality in such a way as to constitute a unique mode of self-disclosure and self-commitment.

What would happen if we used our faith to believe God to guide us to the emotional fulfillment that sex can bring? What if the church became the experts on the subject of sex instead of giving it to the world? It belongs in the church. Our kids need to know the truth about sex and we need to know it as well.

There is no greater relationship than a born-again Christian couple who know how to love each other in every possible way.