STAYING PURE

Theme: “We believe that God has commanded that no intimate sexual activity be engaged in outside of marriage between a man and a woman.  We believe that any form of homosexuality, lesbianism, bisexuality, incest, fornication, adultery and bestiality are sinful perversions.”

Today’s society mocks God’s order of things and encourages you do whatever you want with whomever you want. But did you know that you will get hurt if you do that?  God isn’t trying to spoil anybody’s fun. He knows that sin hurts you in the long run even though it might seem attractive at first, and God loves you too much not to warn you about something that will hurt you.

In particular, society has moved toward “acceptance” and “tolerance” of this kind of sin, labeling people who still stand against it as “intolerant”, “bigots”, “old-fashioned” or “propagators of hate speech”. But sin still pays you a paycheck, and its paycheck is death (Romans 6:23). God wants you to have abundant life, not death.  God does not engage in REAL hate speech.  No serious Christian is going to get involved in “gay-bashing” or condemning people (as opposed to condemning behavior).  When Jesus walked the earth, He spent time with immoral people and showed them God’s love.  Of course, He didn’t get into immorality with them, and He did warn, “Go and sin no more.”  But “Go and sin no more” is not hate speech.  You can hate sin and still love people, which is what Jesus did.  If you’re involved in any of the things described above, God loves you and Jesus died for you.  But that doesn’t make what you’re doing OK.

God’s pattern is shown in Genesis 2:23-24:  “And Adam said, ‘This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.’ Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” As they say, God created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve, which I’m happy about, especially because my name is Steve. The Bible doesn’t say, “Two men shall be joined to each other in gay marriage, civil unions and domestic partnership arrangements.”

In Sodom, there were men who saw angels that came to visit Lot.  They thought the angels were real men, and they told Lot to bring them out so that they could engage in homosexual acts with them (Genesis 19:5-7). Sodom was burned up because its sin was very grave (Genesis 18:20). If people call you intolerant, you are good company, because God was intolerant of what went on in Sodom!

A ruler named Abimelech had the hots for Abraham’s wife, not knowing that they were married. God spoke to Abimelech in dreams (Genesis 20) and warned him that he would be in sin and as good as dead if he did anything with her because she was married!  So here God Himself let it be known that adultery is sin.  (The world calls adultery “an affair”; God calls adultery “sin”!)

When the Law of Moses came, the seventh of the Ten Commandments was, “You shall not commit adultery.”  That’s pretty plain, wouldn’t you say?  Leviticus 18:20 says, “You shall not lie carnally with your neighbor’s wife, to defile yourself with her.”  Someone might object, “But we’re not under the Law of Moses and the Ten Commandments!”  True, but you ARE under the New Testament! There was a big debate in Acts 15 over whether believers have to keep the Law of Moses.  The answer was no, but there were four things they urged believers away from, and one of them was sexual immorality. Jesus even took things a step farther to indicate that you could sin in your mind by fantasizing about committing adultery with someone even if you don’t physically do anything (Matthew 5:28). The body is not for sexual immorality, but for the Lord (1 Corinthians 6:13). Hebrews 13:4 is certainly New Testament; it says that God will judge fornicators and adulterers.  Jesus said that He would throw a woman named Jezebel into a sickbed and kill her children because she led believers into sexual immorality (Revelation 2:20-23).  Movies and TV may make light of such behavior and make it look normal or even desirable, but God hates it with a passion. He knows that these things hurt people!  If you’re messing around with someone else’s wife, three people get hurt – you, her and her husband! Sin causes all kinds of trouble you don’t need!

The Bible also warns about contracting disease through illicit relationships.  There is only one form of “safe sex” and that is between a husband and a wife. Otherwise you run the risk of destroying your body with a horrible disease (Proverbs 5:11). “Loose” people are the way to hell and the chambers of death (Proverbs 7:27). Most radio stations play songs that tell you, basically, “It’s so good / It’s so right / Fornicate with me tonight.”  You must reject this ungodly way of thinking and do what the Bible says – “flee sexual immorality” (1 Corinthians 6:18)! Don’t see how close you can get without falling into it – run the other way! If that boyfriend or girlfriend is trying to put the moves on you to get you naked under the sheets, run! You don’t need a “friend” who is going to try to pull you into sin.  Don’t flatter yourself and think it’s so nice that someone is after your body like that.  There’s nothing nice about the wages that sin pays.

Not only is fornication bad, but telling dirty jokes about it and doing anything to give the impression that it is going on is unbefitting a Christian:

Ephesians 5:3-7:
But fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness, let it not even be named among you, as is fitting for saints; neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor coarse jesting, which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks. For this you know, that no fornicator, unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.  Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.  Therefore do not be partakers with them.

Now let’s talk about “gay” behavior. The word “gay” at least used to mean “happy”, but there is nothing happy about flouting the instructions of a God Who knows what’s best for you.  Some gay people will tell you they were born that way, and false “science” tells us that some people have a “gay gene” that makes them homosexual.  A few years back, scientists claimed they had uncovered an “adultery gene” too.  No wonder Paul had this warning for Timothy:

1 Timothy 6:20-21
O Timothy! Guard what was committed to your trust, avoiding the profane and idle babble and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge [“science” in the old King James] – by professing it some have strayed concerning the faith.  Grace be with you.  Amen.

Even if someone says that morally unaccountable rats may exhibit certain behavior doesn’t mean that God creates people gay any more than present-day small-scale evolution proves that everything was created by evolution! According to the Bible, no one is born gay.  Being homosexual is always against nature. The natural has to be exchanged for the unnatural:

Romans 1:26-27:
For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature.  Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in the lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due.

This does not mean that God “uses” AIDS as a special judgement against homosexuals.  He doesn’t have to do anything; “death” is built into sin.  God knows about AIDS and other similar conditions and that is one reason He warns you away from things that can lead to it! The wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23); there is a penalty associated with sin.  However, Christ has redeemed you from sin’s penalty, and a born-again Christian who has renounced this kind of sin has just as much right to be healed of HIV or AIDS as he would to be healed of a headache.

Even if there were such a thing as a “gay gene” that predisposes you to homosexuality, it would still not excuse it any more than an “adultery gene” would excuse adultery or a “murder gene” would excuse murder! Would you let a mass murderer go free because of some “scientific” proof that he had a mass murder gene?  Would that make his actions okay because they’re “natural” to him or he is “more genetically predisposed” to it?

While on that subject, I do not dispute the fact that some people grow up more predisposed to the “gay” lifestyle than others because of their environment and experiences.  Some, though not all, had traumatic experiences earlier in life that messed with their heads concerning right relationships. We should have compassion for such people, of whom there is definitely no shortage, but that doesn’t mean that we contradict the gospel to please men. God is very strong in his condemnation of homosexuality.  He loves the sinners but he hates the sin!

Leviticus 18:22:
You shall not lie with a male as with a woman. It is an abomination.

Since homosexuality is wrong, bisexuality, which implies both normal and homosexual relationships, is by definition wrong since it includes homosexuality. Lesbianism was condemned in Romans 1:26-27 above as “against nature.”

Incest was prohibited in various very detailed forms in The Law of Moses:

Leviticus 18:6-18:
None of you shall approach anyone who is near of kin to him, to uncover his nakedness; I am the Lord.  The nakedness of your father or the nakedness of your mother you shall not uncover.  She is your mother; you shall not uncover her nakedness. The nakedness of your father’s wife you shall not uncover. It is your father’s nakedness. The nakedness of your sister, the daughter of your father, or the daughter of your mother, whether born at home or elsewhere, their nakedness you shall not uncover. The nakedness of your son’s daughter or your daughter’s daughter, their nakedness you shall not uncover, for theirs is your own nakedness. The nakedness of your father’s wife’s daughter, begotten of your father – she is your sister – you shall not uncover her nakedness. You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father’s sister; she is near of kin to your father. You shall not uncover the nakedness of your mother’s sister, for she is near of kin to your mother. You shall not uncover the nakedness of your father’s brother. You shall not approach his wife; she is your aunt. You shall not uncover the nakedness of your daughter-in-law – she is your son’s wife – you shall not uncover her nakedness.  You shall not uncover the nakedness of your brother’s wife; it is your brother’s nakedness.  You shall not uncover the nakedness of a woman and her daughter, nor shall you take her son’s daughter or her daughter’s daughter to uncover her nakedness. They are near of kin to her. It is wickedness.  Nor shall you take a woman as a rival to her sister, to uncover her nakedness while the other is alive.

It’s always good to check the New Testament, though, since some things in the Law of Moses do not apply to you today. For example, you don’t have to keep those ceremonies or slaughter animals. Incest is covered in the passage below and it is clear that God still condemns it under the new Covenant:

1 Corinthians 5:1-5:
It is reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and such sexual immorality as is not even named among the Gentiles – that a man has his father’s wife!  And you are puffed up, and have not rather mourned, that he who was done this deed might be taken away from among you.  For I indeed, as absent in body but present in spirit, have already judged (as though I were present) him who has so done this deed.  In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, when you are gathered together, along with my spirit, with the power of the Lord Jesus Christ, deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.

There is hope and healing for the many people who have been involved with incest at some point in their lives.  But the practice is banned for Christians, and anyone who insists on practicing it, and even flaunting it, without repentance, is to be kicked out of church, not welcomed as the Corinthians were doing.

“But isn’t that walking out of love?”  No, it’s the same as the command to boot out divisive people.  If someone is going to hurt the local church by his unrepentant behavior (which will inspire others to copy his error), he needs to be excommunicated.

Now let’s cover bestiality for a minute. You might wonder if anyone would really do something like that, but some people do. If they didn’t, God wouldn’t command against it!

Leviticus 18:23:
Nor shall you mate with any animal, to defile yourself with it.  Nor shall any woman stand before an animal to mate with it. It is perversion.

This practice is not mentioned explicitly in the New Testament, though by definition it would be part of “fornication” since it doesn’t involve your spouse.

Please note that in cases regarding all the forms of sin we’re discussing here, the thought or temptation to commit the sin is not sin. If so, Jesus sinned because He was tempted to sin! You are only in sin if you actually do something wrong or willfully fantasize about doing something wrong. For example, if you felt “attracted” to someone of the same gender, you would not be in sin unless you acted on that.  But if you keep walking with the Lord, you will lose those desires. This happened at Corinth, which was probably as immoral as modern society:

1 Corinthians 6:9-11:
Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?  Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, not idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites [the words for both homosexuals and sodomites denote people who are involved in homosexual activity; the first refers to willing “victims”], nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.

We need to keep the balance of welcoming sinners into our midst on the one hand so that they can hear the good news and be saved, but shunning people who engage unrepentantly in the kinds of sins described here while claiming to be Christians.  Paul describes how this balance works:

1 Corinthians 5:9-13:
I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. Yet I certainly did not mean with the sexually immoral people of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world.  But I have written to you not to keep company with anyone named a brother who is sexually immoral, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or an extortioner – not even to eat with such a person. For what have I to do with judging those also who are outside? Do you not judge those who are inside? But those who are outside, God judges. Therefore “put away from yourselves the evil person.”
 

Question 19-1: Why should anyone care what people choose to do in the privacy of their own homes, whether homosexual or otherwise?  It doesn’t hurt anyone.

One of the world’s big lies is, “Homosexuality and extramarital sex don’t hurt anyone, so it doesn’t matter what consenting people do in private.”  First, God says these things are sin, so they hurt EVERYONE who engages in them.  Second, if allowed unchecked, they encourage others to copy the destructive behavior and get hurt too.  Therefore, they cannot be allowed to continue among people who claim to be believers in a local fellowship. Paul said while discussing the incest issue, “Your glorying is not good.  Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump?  Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump...” (1 Corinthians 5:6-7). I’m sure the parties involved weren’t doing whatever they did in the road for all to see, but it still mattered to Paul (and God) what they did in private!  Third, knowing that such activity is around grieves God-fearing people and brings a reproach upon the area.  2 Peter 2:6-8: “and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to destruction, making them an example to those who afterward would live ungodly; and delivered righteous Lot, who was oppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked (for that righteous man, dwelling among them, tormented his righteous soul from day to day by seeing and hearing their lawless deeds)”.
 

Question 19-2: Is it a sin to marry your dead spouse’s brother or sister based on the incest laws in the Bible?

No, it isn’t a sin.  Notice Leviticus 18:18:  “Nor shall you take a woman as rival to her sister, to uncover her nakedness while the other is alive.” There were cases of people raising up children for former sister-in-laws that were not in sin in the same Old Testament that condemns incest. If the person in question is dead, the incest laws concerning that person’s siblings do not apply.
 

Question 19-3: Does a gay person really change on the inside or must he simply suppress his inbred gay nature for the rest of his life to walk as a Christian?

He changes on the inside, as Paul said in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 cited above.  “Homosexuals, sodomites…such were some of you.  But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.”  Once you are born again, it is no longer your nature to sin in any way, and that includes getting involved in homosexual relationships.  Your mind may take some time to get renewed to this, but it is the truth. The truth sets you free from the bondage of homosexuality!
 

Question 19-4: Can an unmarried man and woman live together?

If you do, you have one of two problems. Either you are really doing something you shouldn’t be doing, or everyone will think you’re doing it even if you’re not!  Since fornication is not even to be named among us (Ephesians 5:3), giving people the impression something immoral is going on is still a reproach on the Church.
 

Question 19-5: I’m involved in a relationship where we’ve been doing some of what you’re talking about for a long time.  You really don’t expect us to just stop “cold turkey”, do you?

YES! Stop sinning NOW!  Go and sin no more. Sin is not like smoking, which you can sometimes “ease off” a little at a time. God never told someone in sin to “gradually ease off your sin the way a smoker would ease off cigarettes with some help from a patch.” He has always said repent.  That means you quit immediately.  You renounce your sin.  It may cost you your relationship, but if it does, God can find you someone better who won’t lead you into sin. On the other hand, if you’ve been the instigator, your repentance might help your friend come to the Lord.  No person or relationship is worth the wages of sin.  Sin will cost you in the long run!  You have God’s Word on that! Ignore it at your own peril.
 

Question 19-6: I want to get out of sin but the temptation is SO strong! How do I deal with that?

Adultery is cited as an example of “the works of the flesh” in Galatians 5, which is the same chapter that tells you the cure! “Walk in the Spirit, and you will not fulfill the lust of the flesh.” Get caught up with God and the things of God, and the things of the world and fleshly lusts will lose their appeal and their hold on you.
 

Question 19-7: Does God hold people to gay marriage vows?

There is no such thing as a gay marriage in God’s eyes.  They’re still just two sinners who have vowed to practice an abomination together.  A gay marriage vow is a vow to sin, as would be a vow to rob banks for the rest of your life or a vow to blow up as many buildings as you can. If a vow contradicts the Bible, you need to break it; God will not hold you to a vow that forces you to disobey Him! Although God wants people to break their gay marriage vows, the people involved may have to go through legal channels to get a gay divorce before society will release them from their contractual obligations to each other.
 

Question 19-8: Does God forbid any particular physical acts between married couples?

God does not put any restrictions in the Bible about what married couples can do if they both agree. The only issue here is the law of love.  If one spouse objects to something, the other should not insist on doing it anyway since love puts the other first instead of pleasing itself.
 

Question 19-9: Is masturbation a sin?

The only Bible verse that I consider directly relevant would only apply to married couples.  1 Corinthians 7:4 says that you don’t have authority over your own body; your spouse does.  So if you’re married, your physical enjoyment should involve your spouse.  For single people, there are no prohibitions against the practice in the Law of Moses or elsewhere, and it’s risky to try to get dogmatic in cases where the Bible is silent. I don’t think that anyone can say with any authority that the practice in and of itself in sinful.

However, that doesn’t mean that sin can’t be involved! In particular, remember what Jesus said when it comes to fantasies (Matthew 5:28) – fantasies are wrong if they involve doing things that would be sin if you actually did them. That can easily lead to committing the sin that you keep daydreaming about. (If you’re not engaging in lustful fantasies while engaging in the practice we’re discussing, this does not apply to you; it is possible to do one and not the other.)

Then remember what Paul said about not being brought into bondage by anything. Something that is not explicitly labeled “sin” can still become “bondage” when it’s a habit you can’t break. 1 Corinthians 6:12 says, “All things are lawful for me, but all things are not helpful.  All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any.”  You are under the power of a habit if you can’t stop, and God does not want you to be in that position whether it’s this, coffee drinking, or anything else.  For example, drinking wine with your dinner without getting drunk is not labeled a sin, but God doesn’t want you to be addicted to wine.  Playing the lottery is not declared to be a sin anywhere (except in some churches when you’re not buying one of their raffle tickets for the youth group!), but if you’re a lottery or gambling addict, you have been brought under the power of something that is not explicitly declared sinful. That is a position you need to avoid. (If you want to see if you’re addicted to something, try stopping for a while. You’ll find out!)  Also, the fact that something is not explicitly a sin in and of itself doesn’t make it a good idea or mean that sin could not be associated with it. For example, I’m not a fan of lotteries or casinos, but I can’t tell you never to play based on any Bible verse. However, if your reason for playing is not casual enjoyment but your only hope for getting rich, you have crossed the line by failing to trust God’s provision for you.

Other than what I mentioned above, I can’t think of anything else the Bible says that definitely pertains to the matter.  You can see that the sometimes-cited story of Onan (Genesis 38:8-10) has nothing to do with this topic if you read it with any care at all, so the name Onanism is a misnomer.  Leviticus 15:1-15 contains some laws pertaining to an illness that would not apply; Leviticus 15:16-17 might seem to apply, but it is unclear whether this speaks of something happening naturally at night or something else.

I think a lot of young men out there feel guilty unnecessarily because they think the pastor would say that they’re in sin but they’ve never asked. So I’m sparing them having to ask!

I will say that there is disagreement even among mature Christians on this whole subject, at least among those who would even discuss it with you.  Unless someone can show me something I’ve missed in the Bible, I don’t think I or anyone else can say any more on the subject with any authority.
 

Question 19-10: This lesson is pretty explicit about some “adult” subjects.  Did you really need to discuss all these things when young people might be reading this?

Anyone old enough to get at and read this lesson is probably old enough to have heard hundreds of songs on the radio and CD’s, seen dozens of movies and thousands of TV episodes that joke about and promote various things discussed here, often leaving little to the imagination. The devil and the world certainly don’t wait until people are adults to start trying to fill their minds with filth about such matters, so I believe we shouldn’t wait to fill their minds with truth about such matters!  I think you’re kidding yourself if you think a child old enough to read this doesn’t know a lot about what this lesson is talking about. If you ask your child to have a talk about such matters, his answer may be, “Sure, what do you want to know?”

In terms of the previous question, the practice is engaged in by the vast majority of teenage boys (95-98% with no difference between believers and unbelievers, according to Dr. James Dobson, who suspects many of the others are lying).  To me, it would be a serious omission to avoid talking about something that pertains directly to about half of the people who ever read this, assuming an even mix of men and women! Christian Web sites that dare to discuss it usually indicate that pages devoted to the topic are either their #1 most visited page or close to it, probably because the Internet users are not comfortable talking about it with their parents or pastors, who may avoid the subject completely to avoid embarrassment or controversy.

Also, the Bible itself is rather graphic and explicit about a lot of things (much more so than this lesson!) and would definitely get at least an “R” rating, and Junior has access to a Bible and reads it – we hope!  If God Himself can be that explicit with material He expects everyone to read, I think we can dare to be at least as frank here to discuss what the Bible says and doesn’t say! In my opinion, someone old enough to read Genesis 38:8-10, Leviticus 15:16-17 and other explicit Scriptures is old enough to read this.

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