Theology of Sexuality
From the Series—Body Language
May 25, 2004Last week’s evotional kicked off our Body Language series with a theology of the body. This week’s evotional focuses on a theology of sexuality.
Before we jump into a theology of sexuality let share a couple of email responses to last week’s evotional. They’re definitely worth the read, but if you want to jump right into this week’s evotional you can scroll down to The Talk.
Gross Anatomy
As a physician your message brought to light so many things that I have experienced: the wonder of the human body was one of the main reasons I entered the field of medicine at age twenty-one. I recently completed eight years of medical training and now have the privilege to care for some of the most important people in the country at the Pentagon. Honestly, each year of my medical education, my faith grew stronger and stronger simply because I was able to catch a glimpse of the amazing handiwork of God through my coursework. I also saw fellow students discover God in medical school largely as a result of their training. I sometimes wish every atheist could take Gross Anatomy or Physiology at a medical school level.
I will be honest, medical school is more about describing things in the human body, not explaining them. For example, even today we don’t understand how your ear and auditory system functions as an information processor, analyzer, and pattern recognizer, all from a set of chemical events set off from a few vibrations hitting your ear drum! Next time you recognize Martin Sheen’s voice in a commercial or IMAX film, make sure to appreciate it!
Embryology itself is nothing but describing how a fetus develops over time, little is known about how it occurs or how certain sets of cells know how to become a heart, how to form an eye, and how to form an ear, let alone wind up in the right spot. Yes, we understand the genetics, but not the specific reasons behind the process.
Anyway, I am just very privileged to have been able to study medicine but really also study theology at the same time. This may also explain why when I ask patients if I can pray for them this often means a lot more to them than anything else I could ever give them. I think deep down they know the wonder they walk around in too!
Thumbprint
I just wanted to shoot you a quick email about Sunday’s Body Language message. I’m a firm believer that, in order to really learn something—especially about God—you have to experience it for yourself and own it. Well, I got a unique and quite uninvited opportunity Monday night to “own” a new appreciation for this temple that is my body.
I was opening a can and gashed my thumb on the lid—I wish there was a cool story behind it, like I was protecting a small child from a large animal and got bit, or I saved someone from an attempted mugging and all I got was three stitches—but there isn’t. It was just a can of corn.
Two hours and much throbbing and profuse bleeding later, I knew it was more than “merely a flesh wound” and headed to the ER to get stitches. The whole time, I had one question in mind: was my thumbprint going to be altered? I had just gotten fingerprinted for my new job and I wondered if I was going to have to get it redone. Not only that, the little man who took my prints told me they were very “clean”—which I guess means it’s a good thing I didn’t choose a life of crime!
I couldn’t help but think that this was going to “dirty” my thumbprint and for some reason that made me a little sad—as if the pattern God had chosen for my thumb was now going to be less than perfect. But the PA told me that the skin would grow back in exactly the same pattern. How amazing!
It’s enough that every person on the planet has a distinct print they’re born with. Add to that the ability of the skin to retain that print through wear and tear—and the occasional slightly more serious wound! One of the things God has pressed on my heart this week is the fact that He designs us perfectly. It is through our choices that we get cuts and scratches and bruises—emotionally, mentally, and spiritually—but no matter how much we hurt ourselves, He is always able to stitch up our wounds, heal us, and return us to His perfect image in the end.
Ironically, I opened a bottle of Snapple this week and found Fact #171: the most sensitive parts of the body are the mouth and fingertips. Yeah, thanks for that pearl of wisdom!
Now, every time my thumb smarts—which it does a lot—or each morning when I’m trying to wash my hair with one hand, I’m reminded to thank God for His creativity and His unique way of dealing with each of us. I didn’t think all that was necessary to drive your message home and remind me to appreciate my body. But, when I’m asked at work what happened to my thumb, I say, “It’s just a little reminder to be thankful and to be amazed.”
The Talk
This is one of those subjects that pastor’s approach with fear and trepidation. What’s interesting is that what I’m experiencing as a pastor really parallels what I’m experiencing as a parent. Our kids are getting to that age where we’re getting ready to have “the talk” with them. And I’ll be perfectly honest—it gives me the heebie-jeebies (that is the Greek word for awkward). There is something about sex that is tough to talk about. I’ve never met a parent that said, “I can’t wait till I can have ‘the talk’ with my children.”
Last week I was actually reading a book that we got to read to our kids to begin teaching them about sexuality. Pray for me! I’m actually thinking about just asking our next babysitter to read the book to our kids (just kidding).
All of that is to say this: sex is tough to talk about. There is part of me that would rather be reading this than writing this, but I’m also excited about this evotional. Here’s why.
Some of you are struggling spiritually. And you’re struggling spiritually for one reason: you’re struggling sexually.
I heard Bart Campolo speak a few years ago and I’ll never forget what he said. “Ask the average teenager how they are doing spiritually and what they tell is actually how they are doing sexually.” I think that is true of every person reading this evotional. How you’re doing spiritually is a reflection of how you’re doing sexually. I don’t think you can compartmentalize spirituality and sexuality.
So some of you are struggling spiritually because you’re struggling sexually. You’ve got sexual scars that you can’t seem to heal. You’ve got sexual addictions that you can’t seem to break. You’ve got sexual issues you can’t seem to figure out.
And here is what it’s doing: it’s weighing you down spiritually. You’re lost the joy. You’ve lost the victory. You’ve lost the peace. It’s like walking about with a fifty-pound backpack all the time or a fifty-pound anchor attached to your ankle. There is a cloud of guilt that hovers over your head.
I’m excited about this evotional because I know that if I can help you sexually I can help you spiritually. This may be the most spiritual evotional you read all year.
Underpinnings
Let me share a couple convictions that serve as underpinnings for a theology of sexuality.
I believe in God’s grace.
Where sin abounds grace does much more abound. You’re never beyond God’s grace. I love the way Jerry Bridges says it. “Your worst days are never so bad that you are beyond the reach of His grace. And your best days are never so good that you are beyond the need of God’s grace. Every day should be a day of relating to God on the basis of His grace alone.” I don’t care how many mistakes you’ve made. I don’t care how many sexual scars you have. His grace is sufficient.
I believe in God’s power.
Some of you have tried so many times and so many ways to overcome sexual addiction. Jesus said, “He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoner; to set the burdened and battered free.” I don’t care how many times you’ve fallen. I don’t care how strong your sexual addiction is. I believe there is an anointing that breaks the yoke of bondage.
I believe in God’s truth.
I don’t know how many people notice it, but everybody who walks into Union Station walks under some Scripture verses that are inscribed in marble above the main archway.
This week I was praying those passages of Scripture. One of them is from Isaiah. “The dessert will rejoice and blossom as a rose.” I’m praying that this church and this city would experience a spiritual resurgence in seemingly barren places!
Right over the middle arch—the centerpiece of Union Station—is John 8:32. The part inscribed says, “The Truth shall set you free.” But the entire verse says, “You will know the truth and the truth will set you free.” I’m praying that passage of Scripture for every person that walks under it.
What does that have to do with a theology of sexuality?
I think we have a distorted view of freedom in our culture. I’m not really pulling any punches, so let me just say it like it is. I think freedom in America is often nothing more than the right to do what’s wrong. But true freedom is the exact opposite.
Let me give you an example of what I’m talking about. I believe in freedom of speech. But I think we use the freedom of speech to protect what’s wrong. I’m no expert in constitutional law, but I think the framers of our constitution coupled it with freedom of religion for a reason. But we use that freedom to protect things like pornography. Here is the great irony, for many people that “freedom” has resulted in what I think would be fair to describe as “slavery to sex.” Millions of Americans are addicted to pornography. So what I’m saying is that the freedom to do what’s wrong doesn’t result in freedom. It results in slavery to sin.
I know that we live in a culture where people don’t want their “freedom” limited or restricted in any way—“How dare you tell me what I can’t do!” I’m not saying you can’t do it. All I’m saying is: don’t call the right to do what’s wrong freedom. It’s the exact opposite!
Jesus said, “You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.” If you want to experience true freedom—the right to do what’s right—you’ve got to acknowledge the truth. And the truth will set you free. It will begin a process of healing and deliverance in your life!
A Theology of Sexuality
What a week. I knew I’d be sharing a theology of sexuality this week, but what a week to be sharing it. Here are some of the stories that hit headlines last week. “Homosexuals ‘marry’ in Massachusetts.” “Transsexuals can compete in Olympic Games.” And “Anglicans see gay bishop removal.”
So this week homosexual marriage was legally sanctioned by the state of Massachusetts. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) cleared transsexuals to compete in the Olympics if their sex-change surgery is legally recognized and they’ve gone through two years of post-operative hormone therapy. And the Anglican Church is threatening to expel the Episcopal Church if it doesn’t revoke the ordination of a gay bishop.
I think what those stories illustrate is that fact that our culture is full of sexual confusion. Right is called wrong. Wrong is called right. And a clear definition of right and wrong is called intolerance.
And it really shouldn’t come as a surprise. I couldn’t help but think of Isaiah 5:20 when I read those articles last week. Isaiah said, “They say that what is right is wrong and what is wrong is right; that black is white and white is black.”
Here is one of my fundamental convictions: God is the One who created us as sexual beings. To ignore sexuality is to ignore God. Sex was God’s idea and that makes God the authority on sex. That may come as a shock—it’s not Dr. Ruth or Dr. Drew. What I want to do is to allow the authority on sex to speak into the sexual confusion.
Reverse Engineering
We live in a culture with so much sexual addiction, sexual dysfunction, sexual brokenness that I’m not sure we even have a picture of what healthy and holy sexuality looks like. So I want to do some reverse-engineering.
Software engineers and car manufacturers often solve problems via reverse-engineering. They take the problem apart and go back to the original blueprint or source code. Genesis 2:24 is the original blueprint or source code when it comes to sexuality. It is God’s original intent. “A man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife and they will become one flesh.”
At-One-Ment
I think there are certain theological threads that are woven throughout the tapestry of Scripture and one of them is atonement. But don’t think of it as one word. Add a couple hyphens and you get at-one-ment. I think that single word may be the best description of what God wants you to experience with Him on a vertical plane and what He wants us to experience with each other on a horizontal plane.
I think marriage models on a horizontal plane what God wants us to experience with Him on a vertical plane. A husband and wife become one—emotionally and spiritually and physically.
When I marry couples sometimes I give them a multiple choice question: when are you really married? Is it when you say “I do” or when I pronounce you husband and wife or when we all sign the marriage license?
In the eyes of the state, it’s when you sign the marriage license. But in the eyes of God, it is when you consummate the marriage with sexual intercours. Sex is what seals the deal. Sex is a sacred covenant between a husband and wife.
I don’t know if you’re ever thought of sex in those terms, but here is the cool thing for married couples. That means that every time you have sex you are renewing your sacred covenant with each other.
Sex Without Shame
Why did God establish those sexual boundaries? Genesis 2:25 explains. “The man and his wife were both naked and they felt no shame.” Here is God’s original design and ultimate goal: God wants us to experience sex without shame.
How do you experience sex without shame? The answer is pretty simple: when you do some reverse-engineering you discover that sex without shame is sex within marriage. Another way of saying it is chastity before marriage and monogamy during marriage. Anything else or anything less devalues something that God intended to be a sacred covenant between a husband and a wife. Hebrews 13:4 says it this way. “Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure.”
Pro-Sex
Let me be very clear about something: God is pro-sex. It’s not like God is a cosmic killjoy. Read the Song of Solomon—the entire book celebrates sexuality between a husband and wife. Read I Corinthians 6—it basically says to married couples don’t not have sex. God says “no” to sex outside marriage because He wants us to say “yes” to something better—sex without shame.
I have a pastor friend who preached on this topic a few years ago. It was around the time that Wilt Chamberlain said he’d had something like 20,000 sexual partners. My friend got up one morning and said, “I’ve had sex 20,000 times, but it’s been with one woman—my wife.” He said that and right after he said it he realized he had made a mistake by the look on his wife’s face. And he noticed that people’s mental calculators started working. At that point he’d been married sixteen years. I think that works out to something like 3.4 times per day!
William Frey said, “One of the most attractive features of the early Christian Communities was their radical sexual ethic.” Wouldn’t it be wonderful for our church to find such counterculture courage today?
I’ll put God’s plan up against any other plan and in the end it will win the day! You may experience some “cheap thrills,” but it’ll end up costing you more than you wanted to pay. You’ll experience a growing emptiness that sex can’t fill. You’ll get some sexual scars along the way. And you’ll experience the guilt that comes with living outside the guardrails of God’s will.
Peter Marshall hit the nail on the head. “We are too Christian really to enjoy sinning and too fond of sinning really to enjoy Christianity.” That is where so many people live. They are miserable because they are “too Christian” to enjoy sinning and “too fond of sinning” to enjoy Christianity. And I think the sin that too many are too fond of is sexual sin. And it keeps us from really enjoying our walk with Christ.
You have a choice to make: do I live inbounds or do I go out-of-bounds? When you choose to go out-of-bounds you’re second-guessing the authority on sex. You’re saying to the author and authority on sex, “I think I have a better plan to experience sexual fulfillment.”
Choosing to stay inbounds isn’t easy. But when you choose to live inbounds it is one way of acknowledging God’s authority in your life.
Sexual Addiction
Let me close with a story that I was given permission to share. I think it will resonate with many of you.
Pastor Mark,
I can’t express my gratitude to you through words because words seem to little, but I will be able to express it through my changed life very soon.
I came to this church looking for healing and change—a place where I don’t need to hide anymore, a place that will not condone my sinful lifestyle by watering down and ignoring what the Bible says about it, a place where people will open their arms in love and help me to break free of this bondage—and so far, that’s what I have found.
It’s amazing to think that a year ago I was at the lowest point in my life with this sin—hiding it all and being eaten up inside day after day.
For me, it started when I viewed my first porn movie when I was ten years old. I didn’t go to a friend’s house to see it. No one gave it to me. I didn’t find it discarded on the side of the street or in the woods. The pornography was in my house. My older brother had discovered it, and encouraged me to watch it with him. It was kind of weird at first, but I thought, hey, if it’s in the house then it’s all alright, and my big bro is watching it with me, so what’s wrong with it?
The problem was that the more I saw, the more I wanted. I had the desire to see that first video again, so a few days later, I watched it again, and then again, and then again. I began to invite my friends over to watch the movie, joking and laughing at it for hours. One friend refused to watch it though, and I have never forgotten what he said, “That stuff will warp your mind.” Whatever! I could stop watching this stuff anytime I wanted—and that’s when Satan had me.
With high school approaching, I thought dating would replace the pornography. Instead, I spent my high school years buying it illegally since I was underage and renting NC-17 videos at Blockbuster to feed my mind. My 18th birthday was more exciting to me than 16 because now I was of legal age to buy this stuff. In college, I discovered the Internet one semester. It consumed me. My grades dropped and I didn’t hang out with my friends. I’d come home from class, flip on the computer, and view these images for hours. After graduating and moving to DC, I went into a video store one night to rent a movie and found myself being pulled toward the adult section. The power was impossible to resist. Satan had me hook, line, and sinker. On my twenty-third birthday, instead of going out to dinner with friends or talking to my family on the phone, I went out in search of pornography.
I knew at that point that something had to change. Pornography controlled me. It dictated my life. Those images I saw when I was 10 were burned into my mind in twenty seconds and have haunted me for twenty years. But I didn’t know what to do, where to turn. I thought I was the only one like this. And how could I fight this alone—I would fight it a couple of days, maybe a week, and then fail miserably. Finally, I built up enough courage to confess this sin to a couple of Christian people in my life. It wasn’t easy, but it’s been the best thing I have done. After confessing this sin, God has been working miracles in my life; He has lifted the burden of this sin off my shoulders. I now have accountability with a friend where nothing is hidden—he knows what happens behind that bathroom door, and Satan can’t trap me in secrecy anymore. Is there still temptation and have I fallen to it? Yes. But I no longer am falling deeper into this sin. I now have people who hold me up in prayer when I am weak to make sure I continue the fight. I’m only going towards God now.
After seeing all that pornography, I never saw sex as a good thing—Satan had warped my mind after all. But now, as I pursue a deeper relationship with God thru daily prayer and Bible reading and weekly accountability, I am slowly but surely seeing sex as a beautiful gift from God and the desire for pornography is lessening. And I no longer have to hang my head in shame. It’s an awesome feeling!
Sexual Purity
God’s desire is that each of us experience sexual purity. The next evotional will give you some ways to maintain it or regain it if you’ve lost it. Until then I have one principle and one piece of advice. Here is the principle: what you feed grows and what you starve dies. Here is my advice: stop feeding sexual desires. Starve them to death!