10 Commandments: Do Not Commit Adultry
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Welcome back to our series in the 10 commandments, also known as the Decalogue.
We have been journeying through these well known commands from God to discover their purpose and see how they apply to us today.
Illustration: Hobbies, Astrophotography, Hubble Telescope
This brings us to our 7th commandment in our 10 commandments series.
While my hope is that this is a series that we enjoy and explore God’s purpose and plan deeper
What I also realize is how painful and difficult this journey can be as well.
Each week as we look at these commandments we discover the beauties and wonders of God.
But, we also recognize how we have failed at these commandments
With failure comes shame, guilt, and sorrow.
On one side we are seeing the glories and holiness of God,
On the other side we are fallen and brokenness caused by our disobedience.
The Christian life consists of this dance between sorrow and celebration.
Pain and Praise
Failure and Faith.
Heartache and Hallelujah
What makes these feelings of emotion and sadness worse is that breaking these commandments not only effect our relationship with God, but effect our relationship with each other.
That is exactly what these last 6 commandments are about.
Our relationship not only with God but our relationship with each other.
Not only is great emotional distress and shame caused “To” the one who breaks these commandments.
It isn’t just yourself that you are hurting. But, those whom are the closest can take the full force of your failures.
But, let me share with you the hope that we will also discover within the destruction.
When we are surrounded in the darkness of sin and death, the penetrating light of Christ illuminates and brings life.
What we will see today must not be missed.
The harder the fall, the deeper the depths / the more miraculous the rescue and more wonderful the Salvation.
If you find yourself this morning at the bottom of the deepest pit of despair and are looking for any possible hope,
Today, you will see that hope is not in a program, hope is not in a set of rules, hope is not in a society or a culture.
Hope will be found in a man.....not just any man, but the God-man, the Christ, The Son of God: Hope will be found in Jesus.
And I can’t wait to share that with you this morning.
So, here we are, in the 7th commandment.
The failure of this commandment has plagued our society, our families, and even our own heart and mind in such a drastic way.
But, before we explore this commandment in detail, I want to share how we will be framing our exploration.
1.) How does this commandment Report the Character and Nature of God?
This commandment gives us a report on the nature and character of God.
Like a journalist who reports the news, God reports his Character and Nature through this commandment.
How does this commandment show us God more clearly?
2.) What does this commandment Require of us?
This commandment tells us what God Requires of Us to live in obedience to His command.
Remember that a commandment is a divine authoritative order.
3.) How does this commandment Reveal our depravity, our sin.
Do you follow this commandment?
Have you ever failed at this commandment?
Has there been a time, an event, a moment, a second, in which you did not follow this commandment.
Then this commandment will reveal our disobedience to God.
4.) How does this commandment call us to Respond to Jesus.
This commandment will drive each of us to find a solution to our inability.
Does this commandment make you look to “be” a better person?
Or does this commandment make you look “to” a better person?
Ultimately this command shows us our need of Jesus.
Thus we must respond with faith in our Savior.
We are also going to look at a common misunderstanding and a common misconception about each commandment each week.
This week is a bit different as what is commonly debated isn’t a denial of the commandment but a dismal of the severity of it.
When speaking of this commandment it is often said that it isn’t a big deal because breaks it.
If it is hard wired into our human nature then it can’t be wrong.
Which commandment am I speaking of?
Today we are going to explore sexual immorality through the 7th commandment.
Let’s go ahead and begin our investigation into this commandment by opening our Bibles or turning them on if that is your preference.
We are in the book of Exodus, Chapter 20, verse 14.
The 5 words of this commandment are as follows.
“You shall not commit adultery.
Last week we spent the majority of our time together making sure that we had a robust biblical understanding of the word Kill.
We had to do this because the english language of “murder” was not clear when it came to the 6th commandment as it is in the Hebrew.
Today’s commandment does not suffer from the same language limitations.
What is meant in biblically in the Hebrew is conveyed biblically in the English word Adultery.
Definitionally speaking: Adultery is the voluntary sexual intercourse between a married person and a partner other than the lawful spouse.
The first important distinction is the word voluntary. This does not apply to someone who is raped.
Secondly, we see that it can be with two married people who are not married to each other or one married person and the other person unmarried, and not the lawful spouse.
While the definition is accurate and correct and we do not need to try to figure out a better word.
We do find that the biblical definition is much more vast than the english definition.
Jesus, when he gave His sermon on the mount shocked everyone when he gave the robust biblical definition.
Jesus is not going to change anything that has not already been revealed throughout the Old Testament.
So do not look at what Jesus is about to say as changing the commandment, he’s not changing anything or adding anything to the commandment.
This isn't a new definition that only came about with Jesus, but it is the first time it has been condensed and connected the way Jesus is about to do.
Let’s jump to the Gospel of Matthew to see what is about to happen.
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’
But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
First and foremost this transforms the common understanding from a physical issue to ultimately a heart issue.
This does not negate the physical issue or lessen the physical issue but expands the physical nature of adultery.
Thus this not only includes the physical action between a married person and someone who is not their spouse,
But now includes voluntary sexual intercourse between two non-married people due to lustful actions outside of the marriage unity.
Sexual intercourse between two non-married people is now adultery because they looked upon each other and carried out the lust of their hearts physically outside of what God has prescribed for Marriage, in marriage.
So, we see that whatever is done physically with lust towards someone who is not your spouse is biblically defined as adultery.
Not only does this include physical intercourse but now includes all lustful physical acts to anyone who is not your spouse.
Even if you have every intention to one day make them your spouse, you are still breaking this law.
The Biblical term is still adultery but the definition for what all this includes is vastly expanded.
When I say expanded, I do not intend to mean that this wasn't always what was meant by adultery.
That somehow this only went into affect at this moment with Jesus on the mount.
It was always meant this way, as sexuality was always meant exclusively between a married man and a woman.
We see this reality at the very onset of Creation in the second chapter of Genesis.
Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.
Jesus continues to pinpoint the matter of the heart by using wording that not only included all physical forms of intimate lust and touch, Jesus also included, get this, mental forms of lust.
To correctly define biblical adultery is to include physical AND mental lusts outside of the marriage unity.
This now includes looking upon someone with lust.
Using your imagination in lust.
Watching something that engages your lust.
Listening to something that brings forth lust.
If you look at someone walking by, someone at work, someone at school, someone at the theme parks, and they are not your spouse, and begin having sexual thoughts about this person, no matter how brief, you are now committing adultery.
If you begin having sexual fantasies about someone or even dare I say, some thing, you are actively committing adultery.
This includes non-fictional and fictional lustful intents.
There is a large movement in this age of cartoon or animated content designed to arouse sexual lusts.
Which targets our teenagers and younger kids.
The mindset could be that as long as it isn’t a real person then this is ok as it isn’t hurting anyone.
But, the reality is that it is biblical adultery because you are using the gift that is given for you and your spouse and placing it upon someone or something that is not your spouse.
Great harm and damage is done to the person committing this mentally, as well as damage and harm to their future spouse, as they cannot physically compete with something that is animated.
This will bring forth great harm to your future marriage by committing this form of adultery.
I don’t care what kind of super model you are, you will not be able to compete with the curves of Jessica Rabbit in Who Framed Roger Rabbit.
(I probably lost all of our 20 somethings and younger, but its probably for the best)
Using your imagination and creating scenes and images to satisfy the lust of your heart is to be committing adultery.
Watching something that engages your lusts is the same thing.
Now, we instantly think of pornography in these cases.
While this is 100% correct and to watch pornography is to commit adultery. Even if you are married and both spouses agree to it, it is still biblical adultery.
But, it goes beyond pornography and goes to anything that you watch that illicits lust.
Illustration: I remember having to make this decision a few years ago during the wildly popular TV show called Game of Thrones.
I am a huge fan of dragons and fantasy realms. I love Lord of the Rings and Narnia.
However, with Game of Thrones the amount of nudity and sexual encounters was so vast that it made it impossible for me to view without being tempted in the lusts of the heart and mind.
Later, I discovered that the producers designed the show with this in mind in order to get more viewers.
Because of this, as much as I love this genre of story telling, I had to make a decision not to watch it as I knew I personally would not be able to watch without leaving myself vulnerable to lust.
Maybe you are able to watch it without any sort of thoughts or dreams or images coming to your mind that would bring forth sexual lusts.
I made a personal decision for myself and myself alone that I would abstain as I can only know how it would effect myself.
However, I did find a workaround.
I discovered that there are programs out there that would filter the content, removing scenes that would be inappropriate, so that you could still watch.
This was exciting until I realized that with Game of Thrones instead of a 50 minute episode I would get only 30 seconds of watchable content.
It’s really hard to keep the storyline intact with only 30 seconds.
It isn’t just being mindful of what we watch that brings forth lusts of the heart it is also what we listen to.
When the music industry thrives on sexuality and pinpointing the lusts of the heart, it is no wonder songs are so sexual in nature.
It doesn’t matter what genre you listen to, many songs glorify the lusts of the flesh and paint word images of sexual acts that bring forth the imagination into sin.
I used to DJ proms and homecoming dances for area high schools and one of the greatest struggles I had to deal with in those environments is what music to play while still being a Christian.
I would often refuse to play certain songs as they crossed a line for me.
I would then be yelled at by the students and told to play the clean version.
On some of the songs the clean version would require me to just play a beat and nothing more.
I remember listening to one clean edit of a popular song and I couldn’t even figure out what anything meant because for every word I heard 3 were bleeped out.
Jesus helps us see the root of the issue is not whether or not you commit a physical act. When we think of adultery we think of the physical act.
But Jesus helps us see the real issue begins even before the act but begins in the heart.
This fight isn't won by avoiding a physical action but with a fight against a lustful and sinful heart that is riddled with selfish desires over godly pursuits.
Which is ultimately a battle where victory is not wrought by the human will but won through a bloody cross.
But that is jumping ahead and we are not quite there, yet.
It is our corrupt and wicked heart that takes what God has designed as a beautiful and wonderful gift and perverts it.
If we are going to find a solution we are going to have to find a solution to our heart and a solution to our sinful nature.
But, in order to see our need for a solution, we need to understand the consequences of breaking this commandment.
What is the result of breaking this commandment? Judgement.
Simply put: Those who physically defile God’s design for marriage and those who mentally defile God’s design for marriage will be judged.
Whether physically or mentally, both have eternal consequences.
Both have the same rebuke,
Both require death.
The payment, the sentence, the wages of this sin is death.
“If a man commits adultery with the wife of his neighbor, both the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.
This may sound wild and crazy to our standards today, but the point was for Israel to be Holy, set apart, other than the nations.
But remember, it isn’t just the physical act, all aspects physical and mental requires a payment of death.
Romans 6:23 (ESV)
For the wages of sin is death.
While the earthly consequences will vary based on the physical nature of adultery and the mental nature of adultery.
There is NO difference in the eternal consequences.
Both are condemned and both deserve just judgement.
I am not trying to minimize the earthly consequences of adultery because it is deep and vast.
But, you must not miss the eternal consequences of breaking this commandment.
Yes, you are dealing great damage to your current or future spouse by breaking this law.
But, you are ultimately, first and foremost, doing great damage to your relationship with God.
Now that we understand a fuller picture of this commandment, what hope do we have for those of us who have broken this commandment?
Let’s look to our 4 points today and see what we can discover.
1.) How does this commandment Report the Character and Nature of God?
First we see God is Holy. He is morally excellent.
Not only is God Holy he calls us to be Holy.
“Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them, You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.
God is the standard of excellence and displays what is truly good and right.
God is Holy, set apart, other than His creation.
God calls us in marriage to be Holy, set apart, and other than the world.
We see this much clearer through the 7th commandment.
We also see that God is faithful.
This is a great contrast between us who are unfaithful in comparison to the faithfulness of God.
Though we break covenants of marriage, we would expect God to break His covenant with us.
Yet, God is faithful and displays this attribute even in the midst of our failure.
So, we see God more amazing and incredible through this commandment and His attributes displayed, but how do we live out this commandment?
That leads us to our second question.
2.) What does this commandment Require of us?
This commandment requires us to be faithful and holy.
We are to be set apart from the world that recklessly perverts what God has made beautiful and wonderful.
We are to guard our bodies we are to guard our hearts and our mind.
We are to flee that which is sexually immoral and hold fast to that which is good.
We are to save ourselves for marriage and then enjoy the blessings of God within the gift of marriage.
We are to make sure that what we are exposing ourselves to and what we are engaging ourselves with, is honoring God’s gift of marriage.
This is how we will obey this commandment, it begins with having an understanding of the commandment and actively living out the truth of the commandment.
However, the reality is that we have not lived this way.
Which leads us to our third question.
3.) What does this commandment reveal to us about our sin?
This commandment reveals the depths of our depravity.
This is a commandment that is readily and quickly broken over and over again.
When we desire to be entertained more than we desire holiness we find ourselves opening our hearts and mind to that which leads us into lusts.
When we desire the affections and the attractions of others, and willing to act or dress in ways to bring forth the lusts of others, we are complicit with adultery.
Actually, this is a very relevant aspect of today’s message that has implications due to our current cultural context.
The way men and women dress and act can make them complicit with adultery.
While this applies to both men and women, it is more often seen with women and dressing in a way to attract the lusts of men.
1 Timothy 2:9 (ESV)
likewise also that women should adorn themselves in respectable apparel, with modesty and self-control, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly attire,
Paul tells women that their dress should honor God and honor their Brothers in Christ.
What does this mean?
Well, much of the Bible speaks in generalities and not specifics.
The reason is that it isn’t always cut and dry and we need to use our own context and situations.
In light of our current topic, the point is that women are to dress in a way that doesn’t seek sexual attention and cause their brothers in Christ to stumble.
Now, one thing I want to be abundantly clear, and I want to make sure this point is not missed.
Ultimately, we as men, need to view women as image bearers of God and our fellow Christians as sisters in Christ, not as sexual objects to satisfy our sinful lusts.
Regardless of what a woman wears, it is still up to us men to respect and rightly see the value and dignity of an image bearer of God in our heart and minds.
Women are a beautiful gift from God to be treasured and protected, not objects of lust to satisfy your sinful nature.
With this in mind, and not to detract the responsibility of the men, women need to be aware of these sinful battles and seek to dress in a way to not cause their brothers in Christ to stumble.
Girls and Ladies, what is the purpose and what are you hoping to achieve by the clothing that you wear?
Being a DJ and part of the club scene for many years, I know very well the length that ladies go to in order to reveal parts of their body in order to attract the attention from men they desire.
Is your desire to wear certain clothing a desire to have men lust for you?
Do you get a high or a feeling of empowerment when you receive stares from across the room?
Is your self worth wrapped up in how people view you and you know that your clothing can bring forth these desires?
Many of the fashions today leave very little to the imagination.
Perhaps you do not think much about the way you dress.
Perhaps you wear what is comfortable and don’t pay attention to what men will think when they see you.
This may seem noble and righteous, but it is ultimately naive.
We live in an overly sexualized society with clothing designed to enhance the sexuality of the wearer.
Ultimately, women, you should want a guy who finds you beautiful and attractive, and not one that only lusts for what you are revealing.
When you dress in a way that leads men to lust after you instead of be attracted to who you are, you are aligning yourself more to a prostitute than you are a child of God.
While I’m not here trying to go through a list of apparel to tell you what is good and what is not, there are principles that you should think about.
It is true that you could wear a potato sack and some demented fool will still find it kinky.
The goal isn’t to cover yourself from head to toe, but the goal is to know the reality of the fallen and broken world we live in and be set apart not just like the world.
But it isn’t just in how we dress, but also what we watch, what we listen to, what we imagine, what we pursue.
Our culture is one that makes money and finds adultery as humorous.
Illustration: National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.
Coty reminded me of what our holiday traditions is watching National Lampoons Christmas Vacation.
In the movie as part of the comedic parts it has the father lusting after a department store sales girl.
Throughout the movie he imagines her in his new pool and so forth.
The more society makes these things as normal, funny, and the idea that it isn’t a big deal because “everybody does it.”
This brings us to our question of the week.
Just because it is normalized and we are designed for sexual encounters, is it not a big deal and just a natural part of life?
We are not designed for random sexual encounters but designed for marriage, to display the glory of God, and bring about God’s purpose and kingdom.
It is society that takes that which is good and finds a way to corrupt it.
It is our sinful nature that sees a good gift and tries to take advantage of it.
It is not that we should celebrate sexuality because everyone has hormones.
It is that we should discover their God given purpose and use them the way God intended them to be used.
The fact that we do not do this shows is why this commandment reveals our depravity in such a profound way.
In His letter to the church in Corinth, Paul shows us both the problem and the solution.
Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never! Or do you not know that he who is joined to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For, as it is written, “The two will become one flesh.”
But he who is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him. Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body.
Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.
Paul uses these strong words to the saints of Corinth because our bodies are united with Christ for the God’s purpose.
We are united to our spouse and we are united to Christ.
What is the solution to our sin nature?
What is our hope in our inability to follow this commandment as we should?
How can we live in a world riddled with adultery with our heart being the main culprit?
How can we continue knowing that we ourselves are all adulterers.
It is to Jesus that we now turn to in our 4th point.
4.) How does this commandment call us to Respond to Jesus.
Upon recognizing our sin and separation from God due to our rebellion against God’s design, only two options exist for us.
Either we continue in our sin and rebellion and incur the judgement and wrath due to us on judgement day.
Or, someone else pays our debt for us and transfers our sin upon Himself and in return transfers His righteousness to us.
This is exactly what Jesus did upon the cross.
Jesus lived a perfect life and not once, not for a moment, did Jesus lust or view anyone other than who they truly were. An image bearer of God.
Jesus took the penalty of death and paid it himself and then overcame death, defeated death, in His resurrection.
This is what you and I ultimately need. This is why the Gospel is such good news.
We need to be rescued from our adulterous heart.
We need to be redeemed from our inappropriate lustful affections.
We need to be ransomed by someone who has the ability to pay the great price we have incurred
We need to be restored back to our original purpose with godly pursuits.
This is why the Gospel is our hope, the Gospel is our greatest need, and the Gospel is our solution.
The only way we are rescued, redeemed, ransomed, and restored is through Jesus and Jesus alone.
The only way we are given a new life and new pursuit and new direction is through what Jesus accomplished on the cross and the gift the Holy Spirit.
If you try to transform on your own, you will fail.
Sure you may succeed for a little while, but ultimately our flesh cannot provide what only God can accomplish.
It is why we need a Savior.
While we can be given new life and new purpose and new hope, we also need to be given a new identity.
We need to be forgiven.
We need to see our old life as the dead one and the new life as the one that is alive in Christ.
Free from shame, free from guilt, free from sin.
This is not found in and of yourself but found in Jesus alone.
Jesus lived free from sin and rebellion so that he could take your sin and rebellion and pay for it on the cross.
His life for your life.
His righteousness for your sin.
Then Jesus bore the wrath that was deserved for you upon himself, in your place.
Then in Christ’s death, you are given new life.
Jesus’s resurrection tells us that death was defeated and your future secured in Christ.
What must we do with this free gift of grace and faith?
We respond to it by placing our faith upon the only one worthy of this faith and trust.
We trust not in ourselves, we trust not in our failures, we trust not in temporary successes, but we trust in Jesus.
We trust in what Jesus accomplished and what Jesus won for us.
We trust in the forgiveness found in Christ and the new life given to us through Jesus.
Then we walk in this newfound freedom.
Instead of the shackles of sin and despair, we walk with freedom and purpose.
We put away the lusts of the flesh and cling to the hope of the cross.
The Gospel changes everything. Jesus changes everything.
There is so much more I wish I had time to share and maybe one day there will be an opportunity.
But let me tell you this:
There isn’t anything that the Gospel cannot overcome, cannot heal, cannot win victory over.
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While we only just scratched the surface of this commandment, I hope that our time this morning would encourage you to dig deeper into the fullness of this law.
If today’s message brings up any questions, thoughts, or concerns, please reach out to me this week to talk through these situations.
Amen? Let’s pray.