“Give thanks to the God of heaven, for his steadfast love endures forever.”—Psalm 136:26 (NIV)
Recently I heard an old song I knew all the words to when growing up. The main chorus was, “I just need your love tonight.” The lead singer was quite clear about his intentions. He simply wanted her love for the night, nothing more. I wondered why he bothered to say love; it was obvious he only wanted sex. Was he confused or was he trying to confuse the young lady? I feel sure it was the latter, because that particular era needed to appeal to a young woman’s heart. Guys knew they’d have to profess their love and commitment if they wanted to get anywhere sexually.
Using the words sex and love interchangeably is obviously not a new thing. I still hear the same type lyrics while shopping, waiting on hold, and from car speakers in traffic. However, today’s message has turned it up a notch. The brazen hype for today’s heart is the hook up. While the moral landscape has changed in reference to sexual boundaries, the one thing that will never change is that sex without love will always result in emotional abandonment and leave battered hearts strewn along the roadside in a blind search for the enduring power of commitment.
From high profile people in the public eye to everyday relationships within our own families, we see many professing a perfect soulmate but very few make it even a couple years beyond their genuine pledge of undying love. We have moved from feeling better about having sex if we responded to professions of love and commitment to a recreational act with no strings attached. With either mindset, we’ve missed the true understanding of sex and love.
If you want to know the rules of a board game, you read the established game rules. If you want to know the particulars in reference to a party you’ve been invited to, you ask the hostess. And if you have questions about sex and love, you should talk to the One who created and defined them. There is no other authority taking responsibility for creating and defining family, love, marriage, and/or sex other than the God of the Holy Bible. It is worth a sincere examination to see what He has to say.
Let’s start with sex. We are created in the image of God. Every human being has a body, soul, and a spirit, and the spirit is the part of us that is the image of God. It equips us with the ability to know the difference between right and wrong, and it provides a basis by which we can define things such as love. Human beings are sacred, and sex is sacred because it results in human life. Every egg and sperm we release has the potential to create sacred human life.
We misunderstand the true meaning of love. It is something we are quick to confess, but it is so much more than an emotion. Love is an act of the will resulting in staying power that grows deeper over time. The emotion of falling in love is effortless, but staying in love is an act of the will.
On the front end of a relationship, we connect love with the way someone makes us feel. He dresses a certain way, looks handsome, or he says nice things etc. These things will change and fade. When those feelings are gone, it’s the decision to stay committed that sets the roots for long-term commitment and manifests true love.
I do not know a single person who has not looked at her spouse and wondered if getting married was a mistake. It’s not if the falling in love stage fades, it’s when that stage becomes a rollercoaster ride that you must choose to stay committed.
A marriage vow is a covenant. I say that because it doesn’t matter if a couple is married in a church or not, marriage is a sacred act. God is the only deity who takes responsibility for establishing the union of marriage.
A biblical covenant is an agreement between God and mankind, and it is the most solemn and indissoluble pact conceivable. If you look at the Hebrew root of the word covenant, it means “to cut.” Be it circumcision, the sprinkling of animal blood or the best-known example when Jesus’ blood was shed on the cross, whenever God entered into lifelong covenants with man, it involved blood.
Another lifelong covenant close to God’s heart is that between man and woman in the form of committed love known as marriage. Before paper licenses, before the government attempted to track marriages for tax purposes, etc., God recognizes the union between man and woman when they “lay together” or have sex, specifically intercourse.
This lifelong, committed relationship was entered into with the shedding of blood by way of a woman’s membrane (the hymen). Intercourse tore the hymen and caused it to bleed signifying, in the Lord’s eyes, that the covenant had been entered into.
Sex without a covenant agreement is simply a physical act. While temporarily pleasurable, it is void of the sacred. Void of the sacred creates vagabond hearts that tolerate abusive relationships, experience confused judgment on how to decipher real love, and feed into drama with escalating extreme emotions.
Satisfying sex and the enduring commitment of love hinges on covenant.
If you do not follow the rules written for the board game, confusion and chaos set in. If you show up for the party at a time or day more convenient for your schedule than indicated by the hostess, you will be turned away. And if you redefine God’s ordained definition of love and sex, it will weigh heavily on your emotional health and, quite possibly, your physical health as well.
It took me years of searching God’s heart in order to understand His intention of love, sex, and the sacredness of the two. So if saving oneself for marriage has not been your experience I want you to know that God sees our heart and the backstory to why we’ve made the decisions that we have. He has so much more to offer us. Truths that set us free from the baggage of this world.
He is the One who can lift heavy burdens and remove any separation caused by our choices. God’s covenant commitment to us will never fail even when we do. It is His Fatherly heart that longs to lovingly restore the broken places.
Open your mouth and your heart. Pour it out to Him and receive His comfort and forgiveness. He is the standard of perfection when it comes to His committed enduring, unfailing patient love for you. Absolutely nothing has the power to separate you from His love. If you choose to love Him in return, you get to experience His deep, mad, crazy love for YOU!
While God’s intention to save sex for marriage seems unrealistic, it is simply a Father’s heart desiring to keep His beloved children emotionally, physically, and spiritually safe and offer them the best possible scenario for enduring love and for the most satisfying sex life possible. He has a higher standard because He sees us worthy of deep committed love. He sees us as sacred.
Now LIVE LOVED and THRIVE!
These questions are in no way a substitute for healthcare professionals or any level of professional counseling. I’m an advocate for taking care of oneself mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. These questions reflect my heart, NOT my profession.
This questionnaire is an opportunity to journal your thoughts and feelings. It can serve as a launching pad on which to evaluate your heart condition as you understand it. My hope is that you will take what you discover and hold it up to the Light to evaluate it against who God says you are.
- How do you define romantic love?
- Do you see love as an emotion, an act of the will, or both?
- Why do you think we use the word love for such a varied list of things: pets, cars, a new dress, pizza, people?
- Did you know sex was sacred? Do you agree with the blog post definition?
- Do you agree that God is the only deity who has defined and created marriage, family, love?
- When you look at the life of Jesus and the examples He has given us, do you feel He reflects a sacrificial life?
Use God’s word to take control over traumas in your life. Whenever you feel terrorized by your thoughts, take them captive by replacing them with the truth of God’s promises found in His word.
Print, then cut and carry this Scripture with you and/or post it in places where you will see it often. Ground yourself in God’s truths not Satan’s attacks. Encourage your heart and mind every time you are reminded of His great love for YOU!
Here is what God’s word says to encourage you and to give you an example of His unfailing, relentless, unending love for you:
“Give thanks to the God of heaven, for his steadfast love endures forever.”—Psalm 136:26
When you read God’s word, say to yourself: God loves me with an unchanging, never-ending, deeply-rooted love, and nothing can come between me and His love for me.
Now LIVE LOVED and THRIVE!
