My Heart’s Bedroom
“Or didn’t you realize that your body is a sacred place, the
place of the Holy Spirit?” 1
Corinthians 6:18,19
In My Heart, Christ’s Home, Robert Munger shared of the rooms of
our hearts that our Lord wants entrance and access. While we have followed
the path through each of them, there is one that Dr. Munger didn’t reference,
but I will add today. While his book was
complete in every sense, we need to let Christ into the bedroom of our homes.
In recent decades, society’s attitudes towards sex have been flipped
upside down. We live in a
culture saturated with sex. Sex is one
of the biggest god and idols of our times. In many cases sex has replaced God
as the object of worship and it’s become the ultimate goal in life for some.
Yet in the church we hardly ever talk about it. A study estimates that the average person views over 9,000 sex acts, or
implied sex acts, every year on television. Of that, over 80% is by people who
aren’t married. The average kid, watching television, from age 8-18 (ten years)
watched 93,000 scenes of sex, over 72,000 of these scenes would have been
premarital or extramarital affairs. Guess what has happened? Teenage
pregnancies have skyrocketed. So the government said, "Hey we better start
passing out condoms at school." Did it stop the pregnancies? No, pregnancies
have increased 400%.
While we sometimes
see the Bible’s view of sex as outdated, it is actually way ahead of the curve
and will always be due to the fact that painful things occur when we don’t
follow God’s heart. Let’s do away
forever with the idea that many people have about the Christian view of sex,
that God created us male and female and then simply said, “Don’t.” A little boy ran into the living
room where his father was reading. “Dad, where did I come from?” The boy’s
mother cleared her throat and excused herself to let the father answer this
long-feared question. The father then cleared his throat and went through a
long, careful explanation of how children are born. When he was finally
through, his son commented, “That’s OK dad; but my pal Joe down the street says
he comes from Texas
and I just wanted to know where I came from.”
We are given a gift. God has
created us with it.
God reminds us that He created
sex for our enjoyment. God invented it and He knows how
we can best experience it. In 1 Thessalonians 4:3, 4, Paul writes, “For this is the will of God, your
sanctification, that you should abstain from sexual immorality and each of you
should know how to possess (or control) his or her own body.” That says to
me…it’s possible to find God’s strength in the sex saturated world. So, what can we do to steer clear of sexual
immorality? The simplest answer is to follow the Biblical guidelines of sexual
restraints.
Get control of your sight and mind! Remember the children’s
song, “Oh be careful little eyes what you see…” and “Be careful little feet
where you go…?” We need the Holy Spirit to saturate our lives so that He begins
to renew our thinking and approach toward sexual areas. He then
turns us from being undisciplined to being disciplined. We begin to make the right choices as the
Holy Spirit leads us. We move your
computer to a non-private place; we
cancel the magazine subscription; we subscribe to the right movie channels; and
we begin to fill our minds without looking at what is harmful to your eyes,
heart, and mind; don’t go to the movies, or the bars or other places where you
know you give in. Paul added Colossians 3:1, 2, that we begin by, “seeking the
things that are above, where Christ is.
Motivational guru,
Zig Ziglar, tells about some reading he has done on Puritans in the New World. He says Puritans have gotten a bad
rap in our popular literature. Based on his research, he says the Puritans “were
far more fun-loving than they’ve been
accused of being, but they insisted that the pleasures of the flesh be
subordinated for and to the greater glory of God. They were not ascetics, and
they never even hinted that they wanted to deny or prevent the enjoyment of
earthly pleasures.” In fact, he reports that Puritanism was a youthful, highly
educated movement. The Puritans revived Cambridge University
We discover that sex
is dangerous outside of God’s design.
Drano is a great product that can unclog the most disgusting and difficult
sinks and toilets, but only when it is used properly. Fire is a beautiful thing
in a fireplace but a horrific thing on the family room carpet. It was created to be used appropriately. It can
be very dangerous and cause a lot of pain and discomfort. This is the same when
it comes to sex when it is used outside of the way that God intends. Really,
there is only one guideline that He gives us – sex is to be reserved for
marriage.
Honor God with your
body. 1 Corinthians 6:18, 19 says, “Or didn’t you realize that your
body is a sacred place, the place of the Holy Spirit?” Jesus Christ
died to save us. We belong to Him, in body and soul, because He paid the price.
Our body is a temple of the Holy Spirit. Think about that the next time you
attend a movie. The next time you're on a date. The next time you are tempted
to engage in
risky or degrading behavior of any kind. Your body is a temple. We need to make Christ at home in our
bedroom. After all, He invented it.
Terry Risser
Reflections:
1) How has sexual victory been
a challenge in your life?
2) Are you willing to give the “Bedroom
of your Heart” over to Christ today?
Copyright 2014- Terry Risser
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