I've been having a lot of thoughts recently about sex. Not in the World's way, but from how the World's thinking has permeated the mainstream Christian life.
Over the last few years I have actually heard leaders in local churches state that there are worse things you can do than sleep with your girlfriend. And they said this in youth services, youth groups and I've heard it from individual counselling sessions too.
Comparing this attitude to Paul's letter to the church in Corinth there is a massive difference.
"Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a harlot? Certainly not! Or do you not know that he who is joined to a harlot is one body with her? For “the two,” He says, “shall become one flesh.” But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with Him.
Flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body. Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s." (1 Corinthians 6:15-20)
We get this teaching that our bodies are the Temple of the Spirit, but we skip the part often about how to keep it clean. Everywhere we turn today there are images of a sexual nature around us. Walking through the local stores almost every magazine that is not about country life or re-decorationg carries a picture of a girl, usually in little or no clothing, and boasting how to improve sex, increase endurance or prolong orgasm. Even Christian magazines are not always immune from the pictures, although the articles, usually, are less explicit.
The attitude of the World is clear. Sex is normal in any encounter - and the answer to infections is not abstinence but condoms. If you don't experiment sexually then you get branded as wierd. A colleague from my work who is married recently showed me a photo she'd found online and asked me if I'd "tap" the girl in the picture. She was horrified when I said I wouldn't consider looking because I was married.
Now I'll admit I'm not perfect, and as most men are visually visually wired - and I'm no exception - I have to work at not seeing things sometimes. Summer is often a difficult time for me as the outfits women are coerced into wearing by fashion designers are smaller each year, and the women as a result show more and more of themselves. It is put forward as their "right" to wear what they want. There is no understanding that there are consequences for exercising those rights. Men have a responsibility to themselves to behave appropriately under all circumstances, but the World will tell us that it's impossible to do other than your hormone's drive.
The concept of self-regulation when it comes to our sex lives has been laughed at. Young men seem to believe that because they spent money on dinner they are entitled to sex in return.
The World's views are insipid. They act inside like a cancer, eating away at the fabric of our self until they leave us hollow shells of what God intended us to be. We can treat the cancer by using the Word to overcome it. Our lives can be transformed, or they can be conformed to the World.
Personally, I want to make a difference.
