Purity In Today’s World

I was a youth minister and the mid 80s and we spent time talking with our youth about sexuality and we inadvertently just went too far and some of it became creating a picture of this is what purity is and if you're not hidden this bull's-eye than there something wrong with you, so listen to the message. If you live perfectly. If you make this choice and you walk it out then you will have a wonderful marriage, all your dreams are going to be fulfilled on the back. I basically told you know that's a prosperity gospel. Welcome to family life today. We want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most and I'm Dave Wilson and you can find us@familylifetoday.com for on our family life. This is family life today when our boys were. I think 1513 and 10 we heard this epic story, actually without a friend of ours whose son was getting married and his wedding was going to be his first kiss in talking to questions about my Queen. The first one to be found in front of all beget €500. I would like is the greatest vision ever. That's what we want for our sense of a memo and shared it with them all yeah I would like were doing this this is amazing that one of our sons is like I'm doing that. That's my goal above and I'll never forget which.

I say which one you think the other night while the other son said that is the dumbest idea I've ever because quite a conflict in our home but it cause great discussion and I was thankful for that. But I think his parents were always wondering what is the appropriate way.

What does God want for our kids in terms of sexuality Yen. Back in those days, which would been about 2025 years ago there was a whole movement birth around that sort idea sir be known as the purity, culture, and so discussion today about this purity idea and sexuality in biblical and God's view on sexuality so we thought let's bring in some really wise experts still easily love that know a lot. We scoured the country, the world who would be the best to bring in our listeners are thinking. Ron Diehl and Dr. Julie Slattery I that's is sitting in the studio with us.

They were excited because these guys bring a lot of knowledge letter with them a lot of experience into this topic.

Yes, I welcome the family today is have a fun conversation. Looking for to you I think I got Eric just because my calendar was open. I think you know that's not at all well most of our listeners know Ron is the leader of our blended family ministry of family, years come in on 10 years now. Overly yeah yeah yeah monitor and speaker, and I mean really the best in the country best in the world and blended nope no question in one letter and very wise and so that's a lot of information that he wants to share with us about sexuality. That's like your topic right now.

I don't think so. It's a topic I'm interested in the outline is sitting beside you is a woman who's devoted your ministry really to help and not just women but men, women understand God's heart and views on sexuality wrote a book years ago called rethinking sexuality. You have a podcast Java with Julie that talks about all things that you really have a heart to help people understand God's heart of sexuality right yeah yeah absolutely I sexuality has caused so much pain critically for women and men. And it's not sex. That's because the pain it's our misunderstanding that was perversion of a hidden and similar organ talk that today with some of the teaching coming out of the church that hasn't been nuanced. Well, that's been a source of pain for people that's a good way to say it.

You remember that culture that time where I do. I was a youth minister and the mid 80s and that's when it was swinging big, you know it was sort of like coming on strong and Lusby were talking about it, and books were coming out and we had to purity rain yeah the purity and I was a major emphasis of youth ministry during those days so I bet you're right in the middle that I was right in the middle of all that.

And I gotta tell you, there were moments where I thought. Not sure I really buy into that. But there were parts of it that I was very drawn to and we spent time talking with our youth about sexuality and you don't design things to try to activate conversations between they and their parents, and it really can't hit it head on. Even though I was still wondering how I'm still struggling with some of the stuff myself from a theological standpoint as well as a practical standpoint, what, what were the positives that train Julie when he think what I think you have to look at it in context with what was happening in society the same way that things happening in society today, there are pricing for this conversation was really reacting to the sexual revolution. So when birth control came along it. All the sudden divided reproduction from sex, which meant sex can be recreational for the first time and so we had a few decades of what that looks like free Saxon. This is just about hooking up with people and I think that the church was really saying how do we protect our kids from this. How do we give them a better vision of what marriage could be, and the consequences of just random sexual encounters, no strings attached, because there was fallout from yes and I think even as we talk about followed a purely culture we have to also recognize that there's a fallout of just doing what the larger culture is doing and said the answer isn't.

Let's just get rid of biblical sexuality and standards that God gives us and the church is really responding to that out of the healthy, wanting to protect out of fear of we want our kids to experience what we experience, that sort of thing. And there's some get there. I would say it was an attempt to right the ship but a lot of times.

As Julie pointed out when society goes one direction we swing the pendulum in the total opposite direction were trying to get it back headed towards North again. But sometimes we inadvertently swing it too far. I think in this case. Looking back, even at the things that I taught 30 years ago in youth ministry. We inadvertently just went too far and some of it became crystallized almost legalized and the talk in the rhetoric was so strong and we were so wanted to help children see God's best for them and experience what he is designed for them that we inadvertently started making laws and creating a picture of this is what purity is and if you're not hidden this bull's-eye than there something wrong with you. I think we just wanted to far and it's sort of like maybe now what were doing today is trying to find a balance trying to say. What does the Bible really say and what would it look like going forward for parents and children and for singles and for married couples to really understand this well so that we are following God with our hearts. Yeah that's thing I'd like to start there because it's like the reason Anna and I heard that story.

Like all just awesome is because it was a beautiful picture of man you want to protect yourself.

You want to save yourself for the covenant of marriage.

So this was this beautiful picture like love never heard of that, you know, like I've heard of. Be careful, draw line, but never kiss until the wedding day and again one of our sons was like that's my goal. And I think he hit it yet he did.

I mean it was I wasn't on the wedding day but it was his wife. He death the first kiss with his wife and then have another son.

There was like well there's going to be the reactions you're going to get from almost anybody I tell you what, honestly, at the time is like I'm with my older son.

I think that's like a beautiful thing, but I didn't really think the reason we thought it was a good idea wise because we had experienced the trauma of our own sexual baggage before we got married carried that into our relationship, and there was all kinds of fallout from that, also linking all that's really emphasize this because it's not wrong to encourage our kids to remain sexually pure before marriage.

We all want that. And yet when we say we went a little too far.

Ron, how do we go too far. Like some parents are thinking is there too far.

Yeah, it's sort of like the messaging again. Best of intentions, but I think looking back, I think some of the messaging just got to be overpowering and controlling. We set up these parameters and this is the way it's gonna look this is what is going to be and all of a sudden you hear those stories and know your as a 16-year-old going oh so I have to wait until I get on my wedding day before I can kiss my spouse, let alone experience any sort of physical intimacy whatsoever so inadvertently. Yeah, like now, here are the rules and if you don't follow these you know than there something wrong with you know, one of the things I think happened with the purity message is we took a biblical truth which is God created sexual intercourse for the covenant of marriage and we built a whole sexual theology only on that one piece of truth to the point where it became like a sexual gospel and kids were growing up, even thinking, my whole standing before God is based on if I've been sexually pure or not. And what's the definition of that is that having intercourse is he going to fires and looking at pornography and it lost sight of the true gospel which is none of us are pure and whether we've had sex or night. We all need the saving grace of Jesus Christ and said to get good teaching and blew it out of proportion and took it out of the larger story of God's hypersexuality when healing looks like what redemption looks like and it got unbalanced and I also think a big part of it was that it was unbalanced in the messaging of guys versus the message to women and said that's also a piece of the fallout of this if I could add to that, I would say we attached a prosperity gospel to this purity gospel yeah because not only did we say this is the only piece that were to focus on sexual intercourse. Save it for marriage. Here's the line.

Then we said, and if you do right, you will have everything you've ever hoped for and dream for a wonderful marriage, your physical intimacy will be un-made it will be amazing.

You'll never have problems getting pregnant. Infertility will be part like there were all these implied promises that came along with so listen to the message. If you do right you're going to get right. If you live perfectly. If you make this choice and you walk it out then all your dreams are going to be fulfilled on the backside basically told our kids, you know, that's a prosperity gospel, and it is you.

If you do a you get be you is the prosperity part of it but I mean the truth is there's a lot of beauty like you are saying Julie in the mess and that's what we want to say I will make sure listeners don't misunderstand, we agree with what it was trying to teach Fred but when all of those little principles became sort of rules and laws and standards and rituals and it crystallized into this thing. Then it became something else.

Julie and I go back to what you said you said that it hit girls harder than guys when you mean by that kind of the narrative with a purity culture and we still are feeling some of this today is that guys really can't help themselves and they last, by nature, and so it's your job as a young woman to dress modestly to keep the guys in your life from stumbling, and you really the gatekeeper of sex.

And so you should expect guys to always be thinking that way to be pushing the boundaries and dating relationships, and that went so far as since I know some women are going identify with this when there is any sort of lines crossed or even sexual assault.

A pastor might even say to the woman. What were you wearing your wings when you in the wrong place. You say no and so it's created this culture particularly think Christianity as women are bearing the responsibility for everybody being sexually pure and they guilt if they're not including an marriage. It's a woman's job to give her husband sex enough so he doesn't look at pornography and said that he's not tempted. And so it's not just what singles have heard that it's this thinking about how we operate sexually and who is accountable for what I felt that pressure and I'm sure a lot of listeners have been kind of taught over the years.

Maybe this will resonate if your husband going away on a trip for a few days. Make sure your intimate with him physically before he leaves because he can be so tempted that time you so we as women felt this pressure, like all his purity is based on me what you guys think about that it's wrong.

It's absolutely wrong and I just want you to know I've had a number of conversations as we been planning for this conversation today and over and over and over again. I've heard that there is a line between genders and some of the things that were taught and said communicated a message to women in particular that has been harmful in many ways and it's prompted some conversation in my own household where I went to my wife and said just as read this.

I don't think we taught that when we were doing youth ministry and I never believe that you know you were somehow responsible for my sexual integrity before we got married, or since we been murdered and my wife looked at me and come with women did hear your responsible solely so you experience that yeah you you heard different things and read different books and read them. So I going to marriage conferences when you would have the right ladies, we can have our talk you a lot of it was that it was about Nina.

Keep your husband so satisfied that he doesn't want to look anywhere else. That's a message I heard as a young life is that not true. Here's the hard thing about it. There are wisdom principles and does wisdom principles are true.

So even before we are talking about the prosperity gospel of the if you follow God's design for sex, good things will happen. That's wisdom that there are consequences for sexual sin, our own and others against us, but that's very different than guides blessing and presence in your life and the same is true here.

I think there are wisdom principles that we have to take sexual integrity seriously as a couple. And even as you shared that example and about traveling and being intimate that something my husband and I do together because we talked about how can we protect our marriage.

Both of us and it's something we've agreed on. That's a great way to play offense and think about one another, but I don't ever think about that now. In terms of it's my job to keep my husband from sinning. So I think we've got to be really careful, even as a nuances conversation not to throw the baby out with the bathwater and say that most guys would say this is a really important part of my marriage and when I'm disconnected from my wife sexually when I don't feel like she's on that journey with me. Something is missing so that's one piece of it, but where we take it too far, is when we say to a life no matter what you have to give your husband sex your pleasure doesn't matter, your exhaustion doesn't matter.

This is all on you and so again I think it's really critical that we don't just react to this cultural moment that we go back to what is biblical and what is wise to thoughts. One is of learn to filter things we say to married people through the lens of how would this sound. What is the teaching to a single person. So if you say to a woman you're responsible to keep your husband sexually satisfied and if he's going on a trip, you need to do whatever in order for him to stay pure, what is that say to single men. They have no ability to stay pure. Is that really what we believe is that really what we would want to teach that doesn't hold water at all. Also run it through a different lens and then reflect on it. That's number one. Number two is as Julie was talking I was hearing.

I'm responsible to my wife sexually. I'm not responsible for my wife sexually and I think this is a part of a bigger conversation. I'm responsible to my wife and what I bring as a husband.

I'm not responsible to make her completely, who she supposed to be as a wife I love her and I give and I sacrificed but who I am, does not make who she is.

Like if if everything in marriage is about husbands and wives are responsible to for the other person's needs and satisfying every bit of that so that they remain faithful in the marriage while so were teaching dependence so were teaching.

I'm not responsible for who I am and what I bring no, I am responsible for my sins my temptations my lust that is within me.

That is my job as a follower of Christ, not my wife's job to take care of all of that so that I no longer struggle with those things. Now she helps me with that as a loving partner who cares about what's going on with me and she can in her responsibility to me.

Offer things that are helpful and that's a part of what meeting one another's sexual interests and needs is about but it's not becoming responsible for the integrity of the other person so the you know the dilemma becomes, what is my role in the intermarriage in terms of purity and insurance of the sexuality of our marriage as well because I can remember. Think of this is 4035 years ago confessing my struggle with pornography to and this is before the digital world.

Bernard Freese was a different world but still my struggle and minor but yet it was minor and watch a movie. It was seconds, literally. But that change my mind said I had a secret now. Long story short we shared this before here, but one of Anne's responses are a few.

Remember, this was, she felt like it was her fault like I'm not enough. I'm not pretty enough, you have you visit and I would say it has nothing to do with you of course have some, but not really at all. It's my temptation and that's where we see the messaging to women show upright is in those moments right so the question is you know if it's really a man or woman struggle husband with struggle.

What's a better message of what is purity what should be our goal. Single or married. Let's give a better explanation of how you would talk about this if we there were some great things in that message. And there were some negatives. What's better got Julie here that me.

I know you're just ready for the world you live in it is is an idea one answer that question that before ID that I want to go back to something that you said is I think this is key when Anna was saying know this is involving me and I it's bring out my insecurity. I think that men want to compartmentalize the struggle and say note this is something I saw.

I love you. I'm so attracted to you. This is between me and God. And I think one of the things that is gotten lost in some of this conversation is understanding that your battle your sin deeply wounds your spouse and even if it's my responsibility to deal with my stuff and my problem before the Lord our baggage in our choices deeply impact our spouse because we are one flesh. And so you can't compartmentalize and say yeah that's the guys issue in and said I think we've got to know that while there is an compartmentalization in terms of my accountability for God we become one flesh. When one part suffers, both part are suffering and so you're saying if the husband think this has nothing to do with you the life of St. but it.yes because I feel it and I will end and that's so true and what I was trying to articulate right or wrong was if you made love to me every night. Two times a day. I still think I might struggle with this.

If you are the most beautiful woman in the universe and in my opinion you are. I still think this is what I was struggle with this and at the same time. I know this is crushing you. This is crushing our marriage.

I just felt like I was trying to say to her, don't carry this alone were going to carry this as a couple and are part of my struggle because you're my partner to help me when this is now looking back she help me win this not because we had more sex, but because she became a partner and said I'm gonna walk along this journey with you that is so key it's sexual intimacy that matters, not activity, and I think what women have heard and maybe lately yeah so sexual intimacy is sharing the journey of becoming one in every way, including sharing my struggles and my wounds and talking about the difficult things, forgiving each other, that's intimacy activity is what we do with our bodies and I think what Christian might have heard is you need to give your husband sexual activity which actually sabotages intimacy on so many different levels and I think one way to unpack this and even answer the question that you asked and would probably have to save it for next time is to talk about first printing chapter 7 because that's where a lot of this teaching particular as it applies to marriage is kind of sideways most of us recognize that the cultural messages about sexuality, impurity, point us away from God's design, but I think what's less obvious is some of the ways that we have not presented God's truth about sexuality will and when that happens with children and teenagers in the formative years.

The implications for dating and marriage can be profound. I will recommend to you a book that Julie Slattery has written that I think you will find really helpful if you're thinking about purity and sexuality has been confused in any way. She's written a book called rethinking sexuality. God's design and why it matters, and that the book we got in our family like today resource Center you can order the book from us online website is family life to the.com or you can call to order the number is one 800 FL today again the website family life to the.com number to call to order Julie Slattery's book rethinking sexuality is one 803 586-329-1800 F as in family L as in life and in the word today.

You know these kinds of important conversations are a part of our mission here at family life which is to effectively develop godly marriages and families.

We believe godly marriages and families can change the world one home at a time.

Our goal here at family life is to provide you with the kind of practical biblical help and hope you need for your marriage and your family to strengthen to undergird it and the keep you pointed in the right direction. Keep you looking at Jesus and wanting to please him in all that you do I will say thank you to those of you who make these conversations possible. Those of you who are regular family life to a listers some of your monthly legacy partners with us. Others of you will contribute from time to time. We are grateful for all of you who are helping us reach more people more often and on behalf of those who are being helped because of your generosity to say thank you. In fact, we'd love to say thank you today. If you're able to help with the donation of any amount by sending you a couple of books written by Matt and Lisa Jacobson, who were guests this week with the sun family like today.

Matt and Lisa have written about ways we can affirm our sons and daughters. So when you make a donation today, you can request 100 ways to affirm your son 100 ways to affirm your daughter by Matt and Lisa Jacobson. Both books are our thank you to you when you support the ongoing ministry of family life. We and we hope you can be with us again tomorrow when Ron dealing Julie Slattery will take us to first Corinthians 7 to show us what purity in marriage is supposed to look like on behalf of our host Steven M Wilson on Bob Lapine. We will see you back next time for another edition of family life like today is a production of family life accrue ministry helping you pursue the relationships that matter most