Sex and the City of God: More Than Just Sex

Posted on Jun 20, 2010 in Sermons | Comments Off

Speaker: Andrew Brown
Key Passage: 1 Cor. 6:12-7:9
Date: 20 June 2010

Looking at our new sermon series today I suppose we should be talking about football.  Football would be very topical at the moment (wouldn’t it), but I think the ‘Sex and the City’ movie released in NZ recently raises a whole lot of stuff that we need to talk about as Christians.  How many of you will confess to seeing it?

For those of you who haven’t seen the movie, it is kind of fun because it’s focused upon fashion and you get to see the very latest in fashion styles, but it is also quite disturbing.  As an elderly woman (a heroine of mine) explained when she was interviewed about the movie, she said, “It’s about a group of women who are more concerned about which dress they will wear than which man they will sleep with.”

Maybe there is a generation gap, but somewhere in last 40-50 years something has gone seriously astray in our society.  And not just for the general public, but also for Christians.  We have become unsure about our standards of sexuality.  Over the last year people have asked me a number of questions about what do Christians think of sex.  For instance, is it okay for people who aren’t married to sleep together?  What about gays –are they welcome at church?  How about divorce and remarriage?  So I want to try and answer these questions from a Biblical and evangelical perspective over the next three weeks.

Now I’m aware though that culturally some of you will be uncomfortable.  “No sex please, we’re British.”  Or “No sex please, we’re Asian or Kiwi or whatever.”  But can I encourage you to bear with us, because the question is whether you and your household would rather get your guidance from the media, from shows like ‘Sex and the City,’ or from the wisdom contained in God’s word?

-Anyway one of the major facts that we all have to face is that this world has changed forever since the 1960’s. We cannot simply put things back in the box and go back to the way things were.  There is no going back to the past.  Western society is in the middle of a major social change right now that is affecting personal relationships right across our planet.  Other civilisations like Islam are only just beginning to grapple with it, but you and I are in the middle of it.  What is this change?

Well George Friedman, a leading futurologist from the United States says that the situation facing women has changed so thoroughly in the last few years that life will never be the same again.  For example, in the 1800’s the average number of children per woman in Europe was what?  6.5-8 kids!  Now not all those children survived, but it made economic sense to have as many kids as you could, because the more hands you had working down on the farm the greater your security in old age.  Since women died relatively young in those days, this meant that they spent most of their lives raising kids.

But compare that to now days.  Today most women tend to marry much later in life, around about 28 or older (if they marry at all) and they might have on average two kids before going back to work (usually when the second child starts school at 5).  This means that the total time when childbearing is the ‘primary’ activity of a woman is now only eight years.  Given that modern women tend to live to 80 years on average –this means that the modern woman is only engaged in full time childbearing for just 10% of her life!

Okay it’s not as easy as it sounds, but the net result is that today’s women quite simply don’t need men and marriage as much.  As one bumper sticker said, “A woman needs a man in the same way that a fish needs a bicycle!”  Quite simply the time in which women need a man’s support and his money is now much more limited, and with an adequate social welfare system there is little or no economic necessity for marriage.  So why do people get married and stay married now days?  It’s for love -and we all know how fickle love is, don’t we?  The old social pressures on how one should behave (like village life with everyone telling you what to do), the financial constraints of having kids for years on end, and a legal system that once favoured marriage over being single are now mostly gone.  There is a remarkable degree of freedom for folk to hook up with whoever, whenever, “whatever” and that’s clearly what large numbers of folk are doing.  The question you have to answer is ‘how do we as God’s people adjust to this new reality that we live in?’

-Well one major argument is that while the world has changed a lot, human nature and spirituality have not changed that much! In some sense we have been in this quandary before!  The passage that we read earlier, for example, was addressed to the church in Corinth, which was a city in southern Greece, which sat on a 6km long strip of land between northern and southern Greece.  This city was morally corrupt even by Roman standards and it was renowned for its depravity -because high above the city on an acropolis stood the Temple of Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love.  At one stage her temple housed over 1,000 priestess or religious prostitutes who would come down after dark and offer their ‘worship’ in the city at night.  This was a very popular attraction for travellers and locals alike.  (Think of Las Vegas –what comes to mind?  Gambling!  Think ‘Bangkok’ –what comes to mind?  Maybe rioting, but also prostitution?  Think ‘Corinth?’  You get the picture).  Life expectancy in Corinth was around about 25-35 years tops and with all the free sex going on in the streets the idea of staying faithful to one person for life was quite novel.

So imagine growing up in this culture and then becoming a Christian.  What would it have been like?  They lived in an over-sexed culture.  They must have found it very hard to break free of this mindset.  Much like many children today –these people did not know of any other way of life!  As a result they had a man in their church fellowship who was committing incest with his stepmother and no one batted an eyelid.  In fact they felt kind of proud to have him around to show just how modern they were, and just to complicate matters further Christianity had given greater freedom to the women.  God had given women spiritual gifts and they were playing a leading role in this new movement.  But now some married women in the fellowship were wondering if they could take their newfound freedom a wee bit further by asking, ’is it okay to ditch my unbelieving husband for a higher spiritual purpose?’  So the apostle Paul is forced to offer a crash course in Christian sexuality in order to bring everyone up to speed.  And this is where it gets interesting for you and I because of what Paul does and does not do.

1. What Paul does is that he reminds them of what is right and what is wrong. Whether they are supposed to know right and wrong already, I’m not sure, but he does not try and fudge things.  He doesn’t try and minimise the issue.  Paul just lays everything right out there in the open for everyone to see.  You know sometimes we can be tempted to be very gentle and to downplay things – “It doesn’t matter.  It’s not that bad.  You didn’t know.  You had a good excuse to sin,” but Paul blows the trumpet loud and clear.  Verse 18 is the key.  He tells them that you should not be involved in any kind of sexual immorality at all.  “Flee from sexual immorality.”

The Greek word he uses here for “flee” means ‘to run away, escape, or vanish’ and the word he uses for sexual immorality, ‘porneia,’ covers every kind of sexual behaviour you can conceive of, except for sex between a husband and a wife.  So sexual sin like prostitution is out, adultery (having sex with someone other than your spouse) is out, sex before marriage is out, sex with animals is out, and so is pornography too -pursuing any insatiable lust for sexual pleasure is out in full.  In fact Paul makes matters very clear.  God’s standards have not changed or moved because of their context.  Just because you are Gentile Christians living in the Sex City of the ancient world, you do not receive a special exemption clause.  You are not free to violate any of these values.  This is what is acceptable and unacceptable to God [square].  God has very clear boundaries.

However, where Paul is different is that he tells them why -because the temptation here would be to simply tell the Corinthians (and along with them us too) “do not touch, do not go near, do not get involved” in any kind of sexual sin because I tell you to.  I mean this was Paul’s background in Judaism.  They had some very strong social controls.  After all the Jews knew the score.  He could have threatened these Gentiles with the Ten Commandments, all the punishments of the Old Testament (in Exodus and Deuteronomy), and even the fires of hell.  He could have told them to do what your parents, the church and other authorities tell you to do.  Like a parent he could have said, “Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord (Col 3:20).”  In other words, he could have tried to assert some form of social control.  He could have put them in a pastoral headlock – “Do as your Pastor tells you to do,” but as we all know being bossy very seldom works.  Don’t we?  Most of us like to make our own way in life and to figure out for ourselves what we need to do, and so Paul offers some reasons why they should go in this direction.

In short Paul’s answer is that, “You are responsible for what you do with your body.  You are responsible for what you do with your body.”

2.  For a start (v12-13) you are responsible for any harm that you do with your body. No one else is.  You are the one.  If any damage is caused through your willing sex with somebody else, then the responsibility usually comes back to you.

The thing is that the people of Corinth had a saying that basically meant ‘I have the right to do anything I like with my body.  I am free.’  Paul says, “Yes, you are free, but you are not free to do harm to yourself or to others.  Even something that is good can enslave you and do harm to others so beware.”  In other words, don’t believe all of the ‘spin’ that you hear.

I don’t know how many of you have heard this story, but recently an Australian woman discovered that her great-Uncle was not only a famous horse thief, who was sent to the Melbourne Gaol, escaped and then robbed the Melbourne-Geelong train six times, before finally being convicted and hung in 1889, but she also discovered that he was the great-uncle of the Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd as well.  This is the only known photograph of the man, Remus Rudd, standing on the gallows in Melbourne Gaol.

So she emailed the Prime Minister asking him for information and a member of his staff replied: “Remus Rudd was famous in Victoria during the mid to late 1800s.  His business empire grew to include acquisition of valuable equestrian assets and intimate dealings with the Melbourne-Geelong Railroad.  Beginning in 1883, he devoted several years of his life to government service (that’s when he was in prison), finally taking leave to resume his dealings with the railroad.  In 1887, he was a key player in a vital investigation run by the Victoria Police Force.  In 1889, he passed away during an important civic function held in his honour when the platform upon which he was standing collapsed.”  Now that’s spin for you!

In a similar way Paul points out that you need to be cautious about all the spin surrounding sex.  Sex is not always good all of the time.  There is ‘bad sex.’  For example, we know that you can damage your health through sexually transmitted diseases like Chlamydia, syphilis, or gonorrhoea, or as a large number of women recently found out on TV in Australia you can contract aids by sleeping with strangers.  The wrong use of sex can also destroy homes.  Marriages that were intended for life can be broken, often beyond repair, and children devastated so that they carry the emotional effects well into adulthood (just ask Tiger Woods).  Ultimately the wrong kind of sex can also destroy your soul through guilt, and the loss of friendships whose trust you violated, and it can increase your sense of isolation.  Some reports I have read recently say that sex before marriage actually reduces your chances of being married in the future, reduces the odds of your marriage being a success once started, and raises the likelihood that you will have an affair once married.  I have had to tell quite a few young couples, “You have damaged your future marriage by living together beforehand.  Now what can we do to fix this?”  It would have been far better if they had simply avoided the trouble in the first place.  The bottom line from Paul is don’t believe everything you see at the movies or read in the magazines about sex!  It is only wise within one context and that context is marriage.

2. But more than that Paul goes on to say that you are responsible spiritually for what you do with your body (v13-17).  You are spiritually accountable for your sexual activity.  This is because the Corinthians were saying that ‘Well I can do whatever I like with my body.  It doesn’t affect me spiritually or change me as a person.”  How many of you have heard this expressed before?  In effect they were saying, “Sex is just like food.  Food is made to be enjoyed.  It simply goes into your stomach.  It’s the same thing with sex.  It’s just a physical pleasure to be enjoyed.  Sex is natural.  It’s no big deal!”

However what Paul argues is that you cannot separate the physical from the spiritual and psychological quite so easily.  The holistic view is far more complex.

For instance, did you know that you are your body?  It sounds like an odd comment doesn’t it?  But Paul says that your body is very much a part of who you are and who you will be in the future.  Sorry folk, you can’t get away from it!  For example, your body is not like some disposable container that gets thrown away when you die so that your spirit can float off somewhere else to be with God.  What you do in your body stays with you.  How do we know this?  Well such is God’s care and respect for the body that He raised Christ’s body physically from the dead and one day if you trust in Jesus He will raise your body to new life too.  Although your new body will be different in certain ways from your old body, just as Christ’s body was different in certain ways from before, it will still definitely be the same you.  There will some form of continuity.  People will know that your resurrection body is you.  According to the Bible you have an eternal bond with your body.

Secondly did you know that whenever you have sex with someone else you are united with him or her at a profoundly deep level?  However it happens there is a merging of one human being with another so that, in effect, where there were previously two people, now there is only one.  As Jesus says in Matthew 19:4 “Haven’t you read that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’ and ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’?”  Here the word ‘one flesh’ means that you are cemented or glued at a very deep level with another person, and according to Paul that union can be formed just as easily by a one night encounter with a prostitute as on the first night of marriage.  I don’t think we yet know all that this means, but I think it means that us humans carry around in our flesh the memory of everyone we ever willing slept with.  It remains a part of who you are -for better or worse -forever.

Thirdly, when you become a Christian you receive the Holy Spirit and are spiritually united to Christ.  Again in some profoundly deep way your body and soul become a part of the body of Christ.  There is a bond formed between you and Christ who sits at the right hand of the Father (and incidentally a bond is also formed with the rest of us).  So whenever you have sex Paul says you spiritually drag Christ right in there with you -so you’d better make sure you’re having the right sort of sex at that time!  Don’t take God with you on a misdemeanour!  Again we don’t know everything this means, but it’s enough to say that nothing is ever hidden from the eyes of God.  Stay holy.  Stay holy!

Anyway the guts of Paul’s argument is this.  The Corinthians are saying, “Sex is nothing.  It simply affects your body.  It is only skin deep.”  Paul says that on the contrary sex affects you at the very deepest of human levels, so be spiritually responsible in the use of your body.

3. And then finally Paul points out that you are responsible for the good that you can do with your body. Your body has tremendous potential, so use it for good -use it in the right way, use it in the way for which it was intended.

The thing is that if you let it, this world will try and squeeze you into its mould.  It will try to tell you that your body is just a toy -that you are in fact just a toy, just a bundle of uncontrollable appetites just needing to be fulfilled.  That’s the message that the Corinthians heard.  “If it feels right, if it feels good, if it’s convenient, then just do it.  Just do it!  It’s your body and you’re going to die one day so have sex whichever way –whatever way you can.”  This world if given its way will often try and turn you into some kind of animal or sex object.  Paul says ‘Don’t let it!  Don’t let it!”  You are worth so much more.  You are worth so much more.

I hope you know it.  The men and women of this world certainly need to know it.

Look quite a number of years ago I heard a young woman speak who had been a groupie, I think with Mick Jagger’s group, but I could be wrong.  She described how she had come from an abusive background.  Her father had sexually abused her at 13 and so she’d grown up thinking there was only one reason why she would ever appeal to men.  You can guess what it was and she decided to exploit it.  She was attracted to the lights and glamour of the rock world and so she began to hang around various groups.  In the end she was taken in by one of the men and she would just make herself available whereever she was needed, if you know what I mean.

For a long while it looked good on the outside.  On the outside, living with the gods of the rock music life looked really good, but one day she said she realised that the sex, drugs and rock and roll really wasn’t really cutting it.  She figured that there had to be more to life than this.

Maybe she was growing up, but one day, somehow, I don’t remember how, someone told her about Jesus, and she began to catch of glimpse of what that was.  She heard about how Jesus came and died for her on the cross –so she could have an eternal relationship with God.

It was then she realised that God was different.  God loved her for herself, not just for her body.  Right away she stopped sleeping with the guys.  She couldn’t do it anymore for she discovered that she had become the Temple of the Holy Spirit.  God was changing her inside, making her different, and making her to want things that she had never wanted before.  Like to be holy.  Like to be pure.  Like to be good.  She began to realise that she needed to treat herself and her body with new dignity, new respect and a new worth.

In the end she left and got board with a Christian family.  She joined a local church and got good Bible input.  She sorted out her life and then around the time of her baptism decided to dedicate her life to God’s service.  When I last saw her she was travelling around the world with YWAM telling young people about God’s goodness, telling everyone she meet about God’s awesome love.

I simply mention her because what the men and woman of this world really need is a higher vision of what life is all about.  They need to lift their eyes a little.  If you have only eighty years to live, then you need to know that you are worth so much more than just your body’s appetites.  You are so much more than just sex.  You are God’s beloved children.  You are God’s beloved people.

See things from God’s point of view.  See things from God’s perspective.  In the end your body doesn’t belong to you any more.  Christ purchased you on the cross.  You and your bodies now belong to God.  Your body is simply back on loan.  God has made you a dwelling for the Holy Spirit.  You are now part of His church dedicated to the service of God, so make sure that your whole life is used for this highest of callings.  Make sure you treat your body with the dignity and respect it deserves and serve God and His purposes.  Verse 20 is a key.  Serve God with your body!  Glorify God with your body!  Honour God with your body!  Give Him your very best!  Make your choices, but whatever you do, do it all for God.  In the end you are responsible for the use of your body to God so offer your best for His highest.  Let’s pray…