The Value of Purity

We take many things lightly that we should not. We joke about things that hurt us deeply. We laugh at things that make us angry. We dance to songs that make us sad. It’s part of human nature to take the deep, passionate reality of the things around us and dull them to a point where we feel like we are in control. We take the full experience of life and dull it down to a manageable sitcom.

Today I’m gong to talk about sex. I’m going to talk about sex, sexuality, pornography, masturbation and the like. It is not my intention to be shocking, but I have every intention of being genuine and face the reality that is around us.

I have heard the excuses for why sex outside of marriage is ok my whole life. You won’t impress me with some new view on the matter. Let’s break down every view into two, just for simplicity sake. One: it’s not that big of a deal. Two: how could you spend your life with someone that you haven’t had sex with yet? It’s too big a risk.

I’ll tell you, in person I have a lot of patience with people who have theses views. I’ve even listened to thoughts like these myself in the past. Without a person sitting in front of me, though, I have to say…these statements make me livid.

I want you to imagine something you’re passionate about. It could be your work or a hobby. It could be an organization, maybe your faith itself. Maybe it’s a school of thought or a movement. Now take this thing that you’re passionate about and imagine it as an oil painting. It’s a glorious masterpiece of a painting and anyone who looks at it should be filled with the passion that you feel when you see it. Now, someone hangs up a copy of your painting next to it. Only, the copy has been done with crayons on printer paper and looks like a small child did it halfheartedly. Someone puts price tags on the two paintings. They are the same price. When you ask why, completely outraged, the response you get is, “they’re the same thing.”

Now, I want to take a quick moment and paint a picture for you of the Biblical view of sex. Genesis 2:24 says that “the two will become one flesh.” It doesn’t take much interpreting to understand that this is talking about sex. I want us to focus, though, on the word, “one.” “The two will become one flesh.” There is another place in the Old Testament that uses that same Hebrew word for one: Deuteronomy 6:4. Now, most of us are familiar with Deuteronomy 6:5 as being the greatest commandment: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” The verse before this, though, verse 4, says, “Listen, children of God, The Lord, who is your God, the Lord is one.”

This is the ultimate sense of unity. This is union in the deepest, most intimate, personal sense possible. We look through scripture and we can see, such as in the book of Hosea and in Ephesians 5:32, that marriage, the union of a man and woman, is used time and time again as a metaphor for the relationship God has with his Church. When we look at this union in relation to God, back in Deuteronomy, we can see that this union demands love with our heart, our soul and our strength.

In this picture of Unity, sex becomes the prefect image of two people bonding, becoming as deeply and personally connected as possible with a love that involves their hearts, their very souls, as well as their passion. It is a heartbreakingly gorgeous picture.

Now take that picture, grab it and rip it right out of the frame. Take the crumpled image in your hand and toss it away and try to replace it with that cheap, crayon drawing, that you’re not even quite sure what it’s of.

I’ll tell you this: I’m not a romantic because hope for what rarely is. I’m a realist because I know how things should be, and I simply refuse to settle for a cheap copy.

Now the cheapening of sex starts WAY before getting under the sheets. It starts with the music you’re listening too. Did you know that almost all pornographic addiction is precipitated by frequently listening to sex-charged music? There is of course pornography itself, which is possibly the greatest cheapening of sex ever. We make out with and sleep with the people we’re dating, even in high school. There’re pregnant middle-school girls all over the state, for crying out loud! We lust after images on TV and in magazines. I ask you this: how do you claim to not understand homosexuality when you yourself struggle with vanity and connecting and being sought after by people of your same gender.

We are a blind, vacuous country that has so cheapened beauty that we cling and grasp onto shadows believing that they can lift us up and inspire us because we have no clue how incredible real beauty is. Masturbation, pornography, lewd behavior, sleeping around, self-love, homosexuality…all of it is normalized or even praised. Our ideas of human dignity, the value of purity, and the glory of sex within a God-blessed union are so depreciated we settle for fool’s gold. Proverbs 26:11 puts it poignantly: “As a dog returns to its vomit, so fools repeat their folly.”

So when you date, you can say that sexual purity is not a big deal and shortchange yourself. You can ask, “how do you know you want to marry someone if you haven’t had sex,” and you can shortchange that person. In either case you’ve cheapened your experience and each other. Or, you can choose to embrace the full, rich romance that God intended for you to experience. 1 Timothy 5 tells us to treat one another as brothers and sisters, “with absolute purity.” You owe it to each other, and you owe it to yourself to experience life and love with the passion and reverence it was intended to have.