Hot Topics Week 1 / Holy Sexuality

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The Lies We Tell Ourselves

Let’s just jump right in…
Our culture tells us many lies about sex and sexuality
It tells us that sex doesn’t matter but also that sex is the most important thing about us.
It tells us that gender is a social construct but also that gender is whatever I make it.
It tells us that our sexuality is personal thing but also that our sexual identity better be affirmed by everyone.
It celebrates sex work while also longing for real intimacy.
It promotes consent while also pushing gender reassignment surgeries for minors.
It tells us that sexual fulfillment will bring the greatest happiness while we look around at the brokenness of folks who lived simply for sexual pleasure.
It tells us that transgender ideology should be embraced while also telling us that folks who experience gender disphoria have higher rates of self harm and suicide and mental health problems. We don’t tell folks with disordered eating that they should embrace anorexia or bulimia because it will destroy them. Neither should we tell folks with a disordered sexuality or gender identity that they should embrace a false reality about themselves because it will destroy them.
The culture tells us many opposite things as if they can both be true.
It is possible for two things to be true at once.
But it’s not possible for a lie to be true.
Our culture tells us that we are to be WHOLLY SEXUAL - that our self-defined sexuality is the truest thing about us.
God tells us something different.
God tells us that we are to be HOLY SEXUAL - that our God-defined sexuality is merely a part of our identity as image-bearers of God.
Those two things cannot both be true.
Here’s the truth - our bodies, our sexuality and gender point to something even better than mere sexual pleasure or self-expression…
Our bodies help reveal something about our Creator.

Male & Female. In God’s Image.

I believe scripture is clear, true, right, and loving. We are image-bearers of our Creator. We, male and female, were created in the image of God to represent God in creation. Part of that image-bearing is found in our created bodies- our male and female bodies. That fact has profound consequences in how we are designed to live as male and female.
Our bodies reveal a God who is creative, life-giving, with character traits that are understood as both masculine and feminine. Not a sexual God, but a God who within Divinity has characteristics that are explained and revealed within the “Our image, male and female” language of Genesis 1:27 . Our bodies help tell the story of our Creator.
Genesis 1:27 CSB
So God created man in his own image; he created him in the image of God; he created them male and female.
Scripture teaches us that we then, each of us, are formed in the womb by the will and handiwork of our Creator-God. Our God began a process in the Garden of reproduction. The Prophet Malachi tells us that God designed this male-female image-bearing creation to partner with the Spirit to produce godly offspring to continue to live as godly representatives and caretakers of creation. To live as godly men and godly women reproducing, as an act of sexuality and religion, godly men and godly women.
The fall has brought with it all sort of problems. But your body isn’t one of them. We, you and I, are still image bearers of the Creator. Our male and female bodies still matter. Sin has marred our understanding of our bodies and our identity within them. Sin brings death. Brought death. Within that death lies the possibility of separation of our created physical design with our created psychological design. But that separation isn’t God’s design.
God’s desire for us as image-bearers is for wholeness within our created design as either male or female as witnessed by our physical created self. Jesus came to bring life not just to our spirit, but even to our mortal bodies, to restore what sin has separated - even our understanding of our own sexuality and gender.
Our bodies testify to our creative design and God’s creative intent. We are male or female. Our bodies tell us. And God says that’s good.

Clear Out The Confusion

But the lies of the culture, the world, the flesh, and the devil have confused and castrated us.
We see celebrations of confusion on awards shows, department store aisles, tiktok, cartoons, and even in some churches - but God has never been confused about our creative purpose or sexual design.
Jesus affirms this purpose and design.
In Mark 10:6-8 Jesus says this,
Mark 10:6–8 CSB
But from the beginning of creation God made them male and female. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and the two will become one flesh. So they are no longer two, but one flesh.
Hear this, male and female, one flesh.
This again is a throwback to our origin story in Genesis 1:26-31 and
Genesis 1:26–31 CSB
Then God said, “Let us make manF in our image, according to our likeness. They will rule the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, the livestock, the whole earth, and the creatures that crawl on the earth.” So God created man in his own image; he created him in the image of God; he created them male and female. God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it. Rule the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, and every creature that crawls on the earth.” God also said, “Look, I have given you every seed-bearing plant on the surface of the entire earth and every tree whose fruit contains seed. This will be food for you, for all the wildlife of the earth, for every bird of the sky, and for every creature that crawls on the earth—everything having the breath of life in it—I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. God saw all that he had made, and it was very good indeed. Evening came and then morning: the sixth day.
in Genesis 2:24-25
Genesis 2:24–25 CSB
This is why a man leaves his father and mother and bonds with his wife, and they become one flesh. Both the man and his wife were naked, yet felt no shame.
This an affirmation by Jesus of gendered sexuality rooted in our God-designed physiology.
God created them male and female.
Until recently this was understood across time and cultures.
We have always been able to easily look at our bodies and determine what we are.
Only recently have we decided that gender and sexuality are not rooted in any tangible reality.
But Jesus binds our gender and our sexuality to our bodies.
A post modernity would tell us that truth is relative but there is a truth that cannot change - it takes and egg and a sperm to reproduce a human.
Our bodies are by created design only capable of producing one or the other.
Two eggs cannot partner together to create life.
Two sperm cannot partner together to create life.
Our bodies contain a sexual truth - we are either male or female.
And Jesus says that is God’s good design.
And we are designed to live within that truth.
Something else Jesus tells us about our gendered sexuality - the two become one flesh.
This One Flesh language isn’t only about the act of sex but it definitely includes the act of sex.
Our bodies, our whole bodies, not just the parts we see, were created with sexual expression and procreation in the mind of God.
What we see is but a part of who we are, but its not the wrong part.
We are sexual beings by God’s good design.

Sex Is God’s Good Design

So our bodies are God’s good design.
And since our bodies are God’s good design, our sexuality is God’s good design.
Follow me…
God created humanity.
He created them to be His image-bearers - to subdue chaos, to procreate, to rule, to make good things.
He created them as male and female.
He created them male and female so that they could fulfill the creation mandate.
Our mission from His mission.
Our purpose to mirror our Creator.
Our mission and purpose to fill the earth and bring order requires ordered sexual expression.
The enemy of God desires chaos and confusion to thwart the plan of God for humanity.
But even nature tells us that our bodies speak a truth that is inescapable - our bodies reveal part of God’s purpose for us.
So simply put:
God Made Us Sexed Sexual Beings
2. Sex Has Pleasure And Purpose
3. God Set Boundaries For Our Sexual Expression & Activity - Namely Male-Female Monogamous Marriage.
4. Sin Broke Our Right Understanding Of Sex (it told us that sex is more about pleasure than purpose)
5. God Gave Laws To His People Thru Moses To Push Us Back To The Purpose Of Sex
6. Jesus Defined Sexual Expression By Going Back To Creation
7. Sex, Love, And Marriage Is God’s Good Idea To Remind Us Of The Creation Mandate - Of Our Purpose To Counter The Chaos With Ordered Sexuality
8. Our Sexual And Gender Expression Should Be Holy
And since our sexuality is God’s good design, our sexual and gender expression should be Holy.
I love how Dr. Russell Moore confronts the confusion of gender and sexuality in this statement,
“First, we must bear witness to the goodness of what it means to live as creatures, not as self-defining gods and goddesses. God created us as human, and within humanity as male and female (Gen. 1:27). We are all sinners, so we chafe against having ourselves defined by a Creator, and not by ourselves or our ideologies. Our nakedness shames us, because our physical difference reminds us that we are not self-contained. Man needs woman, and woman needs man. I really do not contain multitudes. My maleness and your femaleness aren’t about us at all. They fit us within a much larger stream—of a species by nature and of a communion by grace.
The church must teach God’s good creation design of male and female, yes. But, beyond that, the church should teach a Christian anthropology that shows us that living within creation limits is never easy for anyone. We are all seeking to transcend our limits in various ways. The way of discipleship is to settle on the fact that we serve a God who knows more about humanity, and more about us personally, than we know about ourselves.
At the same time, the church should not see everything through the grid of gender. The Sexual Revolution, chaotically, wants to tell us that gender means nothing and that gender means everything. Neither is true. We should recognize that unbiblical caricatures of masculinity and femininity were always harmful, but now are potentially deadly. The little girl in your church who doesn’t like princess movies or dolls, and who would rather spend a Saturday in the deer stand, increasingly now is told by the culture around her that maybe she’s not a woman at all. Only a church that defines its vision of masculinity and femininity from the Word of God, not from cultural tropes, can speak to her. If you don’t have a category for a rough-and-tumble woman, like Jael, or a harp-playing man, like David, your church is handing over your children to the gender ideologies of the moment.
The truth is that the male/female sex difference is objectively real. Biological science is built off of this reality. More importantly, the mystery of Christ tells us that the male/female binary points us beyond nature to the gospel itself (Eph. 5). We must tell the truth about this. John the Baptist lost his head for saying that Herod could not have his brother’s wife. Some now will be targeted as culturally unacceptable because they tell Herod he can’t be his brother’s wife. That will take courage and compassion and, above all, it will take Christ.”
So what does holy sexuality look like?
Paul address this topic a lot, because the early church lived in a culture that told them that sex was more about pleasure than purpose, more about self-expression than sacrificial obedience.
God made sex pleasurable so that we would participate in the purpose for which God made us.
The sin isn’t the pleasure of sex, the sin is living for the pleasure outside the boundaries of its purpose.
So, again, Paul addresses the need for sexual holiness often - the culture required the reminders.
Paul writes to the Thessalonians,
1 Thessalonians 4:3–8 CSB
For this is God’s will, your sanctification: that you keep away from sexual immorality, that each of you knows how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not with lustful passions, like the Gentiles, who don’t know God. This means one must not transgress against and take advantage of a brother or sister in this manner, because the Lord is an avenger of all these offenses, as we also previously told and warned you. For God has not called us to impurity but to live in holiness. Consequently, anyone who rejects this does not reject man, but God, who gives you his Holy Spirit.

Sanctified Sexuality

This is God’s will.
This is God’s design.
Sanctfied Sexuality.
Let’s remind ourselves about this word, sanctification.
Sanctification means to be set apart for a special purpose.
It’s like that special set of wedding dishes.
It has a special purpose.
But here’s what Jesus does, he takes that cracked plate and desires to use it for the wedding feast.
So He fills us with His Spirit and uses us to display His power in our earthen vessel.
That’s sanctification.
It’s being set apart so that you can be used.
It’s separation from sinful behavior and separation unto holiness.
This is God’s will, sanctified sexuality.
Solomon, who truly understood living for pleasure more than purpose said this in Proverbs 6:27 “Can you build a fire in your lap and not burn your pants?”
Paul says to keep away from sexual immorality.
1. Keep Away
First of all this word keep away does not mean see how close to the fire you can get.
It implies that the fire is a wildfire that will consume everything that gets near.
Keep away.
Don’t entertain it.
Don’t try to be warmed by it.
Don’t think you can control the wildfire.
The fire has a place, but if the fire isn’t not built in it’s proper place the fire will consume what you didn’t intend to be consumed.
It will burn you.
So keep away from the fire that is not built within the covenant of marriage.
2. Sexual Immorality Is Pronounced Pornea.
Sounds familiar right?
It means any sexual activity outside of God’s design for sex.
Let’s remind ourself, God’s design for sex is male-female monogamous marriage.
So same-sex sexual activity, pornography, adultery, pedophilia, multiple partners, sex work, and we could go on - fall under this category of “pornea”.
Scripture tells us that those who practice this behavior, who continue in pornea must repent and practice this type of sin no more and…
3. Control Our Own Bodies
Hear that, our bodies matter.
And we can control them.
Remember, our bodies aren’t our whole story but they are part of our story.
We understand this concept of controlling our bodies when it comes to food, or violence, or exercise.
We understand that can’t eat what ever we want and expect to be healthy.
We understand that we can’t punch that person who stepped in front of us in line and expect not to get arrested.
We understand that we can’t experience a better 5k time, or a better handle on the ball, or a better max on our lift, unless we control our bodies even when it requires dedication and sacrifice.
We see the purpose greater than temporary pleasure.
And we discover a greater eternal pleasure when we control our bodies for the purpose.
Paul tells us to take this same mentality to our sex.
There is a greater eternal pleasure when we control our bodies according to our designed purpose.
Control your bodies in holiness and honor.
Your bodies are not your own - they were designed by God, in Christ you are a temple of the Holy Spirit - so control your bodies in holiness and that brings honor to your Creator.
Now, listen, this command is just that - a command.
It may not be easy.
It may require sacrifice.
It may require celibacy.
It may require breaking off of relationships.
It may require changing what you watch or read or listen to.
It may require a content blocker on your devices.
It may require you to stop doing things that aren’t sin because they lead you back to building a fire in your lap.
It will require obedience.
And I promise, that obedience is better.
Obedience, while often terrifying, always ends gazing at the face of Jesus.
With Jesus welcoming you into the joys of the Kingdom.
With Jesus making all things new.
With Jesus saying well done good and faithful servant.
Obedience always ends better than disobedience.
4. Not With Lustful Passions
This is important - because of sin your body may want things that you weren’t created for.
Because of sin your mind may wander into temptation and stay there.
5. But You Know God
Since you have been reconciled to God, since you have been born again, since you have been adopted by God, you know God and you are coming to understand God’s sexual design for your body more and more.
You are called to live not as a slave to pleasure but as a God’s image-bearer, sanctified and holy and in that you will find greater joy than mere sex can give.
God’s eternal promise is better than temporary pleasure.
You know God.
Those who don’t know God may believe a lie about sexuality and gender.
But you know God thru Jesus and Jesus has revealed and confirmed the truth about our created sexuality.

God Cares About Our Bodies

God cares about our bodies.
God cares about His creation.
God cares about what harms His design and intent for men and women and our sexuality.
God The Son, The LORD (Jesus) Is An Avenger
This is about the future.
Jesus will avenge the harm done to others because of sexual sin.
Those who abuse or confuse others sexually Jesus will judge and He will be on the side of the one sinned against.
Those who willingly engage in sinful sexual activity will face judgement because of their rejection of God’s design for their bodies.
2. God The Father Has Called Us
This is about the past.
It’s plainly revealed in our created bodies and supernaturally revealed in the moral law given to Moses and it’s divinely revealed in the person of Jesus.
We have been called to sexual sanctification.
3. God The Holy Spirit Helps Us Live Sexually Sanctified
This is about the present.
You say that your desires are too strong, or your passions too great, or the pleasure too enticing - that you can’t not do what you feel like doing or be who you feel like being…
The Holy Spirit is here to help you.
You do not have to walk this road alone.
You do not have to depend on your own strength.
You do not have to trust yourself to get it right.
You can walk empowered by the Holy Spirit to live according to the holiness in which you were designed and commanded to walk in.
John 14:15–17 CSB
15 “If you love me, you will keep my commands. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another CounselorF, to be with you forever. 17 He is the Spirit of truth. The world is unable to receive him because it doesn’t see him or know him. But you do know him, because he remains with you and will be in you.
Jesus has made a promise, the Father fulfilled the request, the Holy Spirit is available to “go along side” you and empower you and equip you to… Titus 2:12
Titus 2:12 CSB
instructing us to deny godlessness and worldly lusts and to live in a sensible, righteous, and godly way in the present age,
You can live up according to your created purpose and find pleasure in obedience.
Joy is set before you.
There may a be cross to bear but there is a crown to wear.
And there is a Savior who saves, heals, delivers, and makes all things new.
Surrender your sexuality, your identity, you body to the Truth of God’s Good Design - You are made in God’s image, male or female you were created, find pleasure in your God-given purpose - to bring peace to the chaos.

We Need Jesus

Because of the fall, because of sin we are all sexually broken.
Because of Jesus we can be sexually holy.
We all have temptations and desires that we must bring to Jesus.
And we have a Savior who understands our temptations and weaknesses and who took our sin and and makes us clean.
Hear me, your temptation is your identity.
Being tempted isn’t sin.
We are all tempted.
We all need Jesus.
Turn to Jesus.
Run from sin.
Don’t give in to temptation.
And don’t allow the Tempter to condemn you when you haven’t even bitten the forbidden fruit.
Remind yourself that the Tempter has been defeated and that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
And will in sexual sanctification, this is the will of God.
I want to give you an opportunity to take a step in sexual sanctification this morning and I want to pray for you and I want this church to pray with you.
If you need to repent for behavior, or find encouragement in holiness, or need strength for sanctified living, I invite you to come near the table this morning. Before you receive communion let us pray for you and with you.
Let us stand and prepare our hearts to come to the table.
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