6 Truths about Sex

The church isn’t always completely honest about sex. Neither is the world. So what is the truth about sex? It would be super helpful to know what God himself, the person who created sex, said about it. That’s what this post would like to focus on. The Bible actually has a lot to say about sex. Below are a few key truths that we can pull out of the Bible about sex. This is far from an exhaustive list, but I think it’s a good starting point.

It’s for marriage

The book of Genesis tells us that sex is for marriage. In Genesis 2:23-24, it tells us that God created woman to be with man. When the man sees the woman for the first time he says, “’This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman,’ for she was taken out of man.’ That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.”

In sex, the bone and flesh that were taken out of man to create woman become one again. It is a bonding experience, uniquely uniting two people in a way that is only possible through sex. This bonding was designed to happen in the context of marriage. It binds together husband and wife physically, emotionally, and spiritually so that they can weather the storms of life together. They truly become one though sex even as sex is a physical representation of their two souls mingling in marriage.

Marriage is simply a covenant between two people. It’s two people declaring to God and to the world around them that they are committed to each other, whatever may come. That’s why marriage is only supposed to happen (in God’s perfect design) between two married people.  

Sex isn’t a casual thing. It is meant to be a unique experience for two people who have committed themselves to one another for life. That’s why it’s such a powerful and bonding experience. Because sex is so intimate and vulnerable, we can find sexual safety within marriage. There is already acceptance there. When we have sex outside of the commitment of marriage, we violate God’s original design and often get hurt in the process.

It’s meant to be between a man and a woman

Okay, I know this is not PC to say, but God designed sex to be between a man and a woman. Not between two men or between two women. There isn’t anything in the Bible that supports sex between two people of the same gender. On the contrary, homosexuality is never mentioned positively in the Bible. The two main places it shows up are in the Old Testament law codes, where it is forbidden, and in the “sin lists” in the New Testament. All other mentions, while not prohibitions, are negative portrayals (Sodom and Gomorrah, Romans 1, etc.).

God designed sex to be between two people of the opposite gender. That’s just how our bodies function. Real sex can really only happen that way.

I should be clear, that doesn’t mean that people who have same gendered sexual relationships are doomed or written off. On the contrary, Paul points out that many in the church at Corinth had engaged in such activities. Grace saves all, regardless of their sexual past. However, in order for sex to perform the function it was created to have it has to be between a male and a female.

Sex is for procreation

One of the reasons that I think God prohibits homosexual activity is because one of the important functions of sex is impossible in that circumstance. Sex was designed to make babies. In Genesis 1, the first commandment to humanity is for them to “[b]e fruitful and increase in number;.” This increasing only happens through heterosexual sex.

Despite how our current culture views it, one of the main purposes of sex is procreation. By engaging in sex, a husband and wife can participate as co-creators with God. Through the sexual act, they can create a new human being, made in God’s image as well as their own. It is a unique way that we can work with God here on earth. It’s one of the three essential functions of sex that the church has pretty much always agreed upon.

Because procreation is a possibility in sex, that keeps the husband and wife from becoming overly focused on themselves. They come together out of love and desire for one another, recognizing that there is a possibility that their love can grow to include others. This possibility reminds them they are meant to love each other, but to love others outside the couple, whether those others are biological children, adopted children, or just other people around them. This possibility of procreation reminds husband and wife that it’s not just about them.

Though modern forms of birth control have all but done away with this aspect of sexuality, it is still an important part of how God created sex to work. When we ignore it and focus only on ourselves and our needs, we misuse sex, even if between husband and wife.

It’s to be pleasurable

God designed sex and it made it to be fun. He could have made it a boring process, but he didn’t. God wants you to feel pleasure in sex. To make that abundantly clear, there’s even a whole book about sexual pleasure in the Bible, the Song of Songs (or Solomon, it has two different names for some reason). We should never deny the fact that pleasure is an important part of the sexual experience.

Let’s be honest here. it isn’t always naturally pleasurable. Sometimes making it pleasurable takes work. Married people should put in the work necessarily to make sex a pleasurable experience. It’s not selfish to pursue pleasure. God wants that for you! He designed your body to work that way.

However, we also have to be clear. Pleasure isn’t the only purpose for sex nor is it the most important, contrary to what the world around us says. It’s one of many purposes. We can’t deny or ignore the pleasure of sex, but we shouldn’t blow it out of proportion either. It’s a delicate balance we have work towards.

Sex is a sign pointing to God

Earlier, I mentioned that there were three important functions of sex that the church has pretty much always agreed on. In the Bible, we can see three clear functions: 1) Bonding husband and wife together, 2) making babies, and 3) an object lesson of God’s love for humanity.

Ephesians 5 tells us something important about marriage and about sex: they are earthly representations of God’s love of humanity. They can also be representations of how perfect love works within God’s own character, i.e. between the Father and the Son.  In marriage, and particularly sexually, there is mutual giving and receiving, submission and love by both parties. The same is true in the relationship between the members of the Trinity. They mutually love and submit to one another.

The same type of sacrificial love that should be present in both marriage and sex is an illustration of how Christ loves the church. He was willing to submit himself to a humiliating death in order to redeem his bride. We, in marriage, should be willing to put the needs of our spouse first in order to display love to them. That doesn’t mean we become a doormat for our spouse, simply giving in to whatever they want. It does mean that we should constantly be putting ourselves in their shoes and treating them the way we would want to be treated.

It’s so much more than just a bodily function

Often, we operate in a mind versus body way. We see our minds as one entity and our body as another. We often think what we’re thinking won’t affect our bodies and what we’re doing with our bodies won’t affect our hearts or our minds. The problem is, that’s not how God created our bodies to function.

In the Hebrew language, which is the language the Old Testament was written is, there really isn’t much distinction between soul, spirit, and body, at least not the way we think of them. The Jewish people knew that the body effects the mind, the heart, and the soul. The reverse is true as well. They didn’t try to divide and compartmentalize them the same way we do today.

 The Greeks did and Western thought has followed a more Greek pattern where it is believed you can separate body, mind, and soul. That’s not how God created us though. He created us to be one integrated person, not one person with many parts that aren’t connected to one another. Because of how God designed us, the physical sexual act affects so much more than just our bodies. It is meant to be a body, soul, mind, and heart activity, drawing together two people who are committed to each other for life.

Photo by Alexandra Gorn on Unsplash