Wise About Sex

I want you to grab the message notes. The art of living. Well after Easter we started the series in the book of Proverbs and now I want to dip back into Proverbs as we wrap up for a couple of weeks because there are three major themes that we didn't get to yet. For example today let's talk about how to be wise about sex. Yes that got your attention a lot of nervous laughter there right. Sex always gets attention.

When I was in high school when I was a senior over at Branham High in San Jose I ran for student body president and all three candidates for student body president had to give little speeches and that the speeches happened in the cafeteria during lunch and so you can imagine how riveted everybody eating lunch was to the student body president candidates. Nobody was listening. There were food fights. It was just chaos and I was number three in the list of people who had to give speeches and so number one got up there number two got up there and you know they're going and if elected I hope to work more closely with the trustees and nobody is listening.

So I thought man I gotta do something so that people pay attention and so I thought what is what kind of gets the attention of high school students. I'm thinking about this as a 17 year old myself. So I get up to the microphone and here's my speech. I said three words sex and violence and there was quiet in the entire cafeteria. Literally people were like mid food fight just stopping like that. What did he just say and I paused and I said now that I got your attention my name's René vote for me. Thanks a lot. I sat down. I won the election that semester so true story.

Sex always gets your attention but sex not only gets your attention sex can make you feel a little bit awkward to talk about it even to say the word can feel a little bit awkward. My wife Lori had a great aunt aunt Hazel when she grew up in Missouri and aunt Hazel was a very kind of rigorous you know Puritan righteous religious woman but aunt Hazel literally thought it was vulgar or inappropriate to actually say the word sex but once in a while that does come up in conversation and so aunt Hazel's solution was she would say part of the word and Hazel only said sec because apparently to say that would just be too awkward and vulgar.

That would be awkward so she would say things like you young people always thinking about sec like and you know what I'm talking about and that's that was her solution to the problem but even if it kind of gets your attention and even if it feels a little bit awkward you have to talk about sex when you talk about the book of proverbs because it's all over the book of proverbs to kind of give you some context the book of proverbs was written to young men about how to be wise in their lives and so when you're talking to young men you've you've got to talk about the subject of sex of the first nine chapters of proverbs five deal with sex and sexuality and sexual temptation it's in the rest of the book of proverbs from time to time as well.

And I want to talk about the context because in the book of proverbs sexual temptation is often referred to as of the female variety but that doesn't mean that's the only place sexual temptation comes from it was written to young men that's the historical context the literary context but it doesn't take much imagination to kind of turn it around and see how it applies to women as well so the book of proverbs talks a lot about this and we not to talk need to talk a lot about this if we're doing the book of proverbs.

Now I want to say up front some of you are going to yourself why did I choose this weekend to invite grandma to come to church with me I know it can be a little bit but listen probably at some point in this message I am going to say things that maybe you feel a little bit uncomfortable with whether you have grandma sitting next to you or not and there are times in this message when I'll say things that probably you don't even maybe agree with or you're not certain if you agree with them well hang on because I want to make sure you get the whole message that the kind of the the full picture of what the book of proverbs says about sex and I may say some things early on in the message that you really do agree with and you're going right on preach on well hold on because I might get to some places that I hope I get to some places that are going to be challenging for you as well.

But this is important because if you're going to be a wise person you need to understand the power of sexuality in at least three ways here's three ways the book of proverbs talks about this wise people understand three things about sexuality and again today I'm deeply indebted to Tim Keller pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan for his excellent thoughts on this subject three things the first one is this as humans we tend to actually undervalue sex you say undervalue in a culture that seems obsessed with sex well look at how highly the bible values it.

It might surprise you sex is described in the bible in terms so erotic and so explicit that it actually really does earn the pg 13 rating of this sermon here today and I'll show you what I mean look at proverbs 5 verses 15 through 20 verse 15 drink water from your own cistern running water from your own well now stop right there for a second because the cistern and the well in Hebrew poetry is an image for female sexuality because you have to go into the cistern you have to go down into the well to get the water this is female sexuality on the other hand next couple of verses guess what they're about should your springs overflow in the streets your streams of water in the public squares let them be yours alone never to be shared with strangers next verse may your fountain be blessed now again the fountain the spring the stream these are pretty graphic images of male sexuality so you have the well and you have the fountain everybody got that are we clear on what we're talking about here if you don't get this ask your parents on the way home from church today and if you're over 20 email mark at tlc.org.

But look at this this verse is a request for divine blessing on the male fountain have you ever asked god to bless your fountain have you ever asked god to bless your well and yet that's what this verse talks about because the bible isn't shy about this and the rest of the verse may you rejoice in the wife of your youth you might have noticed this whole passage like every passage in proverbs about the subject is basically saying casual sex is out don't let your streams flow into the streets sex with people outside marriage is out and then you get to the next verse and again you see how erotic sex within marriage is described verse 19 a loving doe a graceful deer may her breasts yes this is in the bible may her breasts satisfy you always may you ever be intoxicated with her love and the word intoxicated there literally means to stagger as when drunk.

This verse is saying may your sex with your wife be so good it kind of makes you stagger it makes you feel drunk and what I'm trying to get at is this I think you'll agree with me when I say that the bible is more erotic than many people imagine and that's a fill in on your notes probably the only time the word erotic is going to be a fill in on your sermon notes so go ahead and write it in here but I love this because what you have here in these verses is a combination of attitudes that you couldn't think could be combined you really have a combination of what you might call liberal attitudes and conservative attitudes all rolled into one on the on the one hand this is an amazingly erotic positive view of sexuality this is total rejoicing in sexual pleasure and there isn't the tiniest little bit of prudishness about it at all this is very explicit and there's a joy about it there's an unselfconscious celebration of sex.

On the other hand not only is it a high view of sexuality it's also a very high view of marriage this is the loftiest view possible of human sexuality and the loftiest view possible of marriage and that's a combination you just don't see a lot in our culture's media right hot sex in marriage and this theme is consistent all throughout proverbs look at proverbs 30 verses 19 and 20 I love this the writer says there are three things that are too amazing for me four that that I don't understand and again this is a Hebrew literary device this was used in Hebrew poetry that the author says there are three things no no wait oh there's there's four things that just blow my mind they're so beautiful the way of an eagle in the sky the way of a snake on a rock the way of a ship on the high seas and the way of a man with a young woman and these are all sensual images these are all amazing and beautiful and captivating things.

Sex is likened to soaring to sailing to propulsion to flying and then the very next verse is jarring and it's meant to be jarring it's a literary device it's jarring in terms of image because sex isn't likened to soaring or sailing but to sloppiness verse 21 of proverbs 30 this is the way of an adulterous woman she eats and wipes her mouth and says I've done nothing wrong kind of like burp I've done nothing wrong and so not only do you have a contrast in image but you have a contrast in attitude there's this well what what's your problem here in this verse sex is routine this person's attitude well sex is just an appetite just an appetite I get hungry I eat I get horny I have sex that's all it is fulfilling an appetite what's the big deal there's no wonder there's no beauty there's no mystery there's no joy and verses like this mean don't make sex primarily about your appetite because then you're just turning it into groceries it's just a way to satisfy your hunger.

See sociologists have a term really for this it's a term called commodification and there's a you know two dollar word but but it's a great word to know commodification and what they mean by this is the process by which things that used to be free things that used to just be available to everybody that that were based on relationship become commodified they become products meant to be purchased in the marketplace and so sociologists are saying that in our society in our market-driven culture everything's becoming commodified like you know water water used to be you know considered available freely to all and now it's commodified it's you go to the store and there's all kinds of different bottled water you buy water's become commodified but sociologists say it goes much deeper than that in our society almost everything's becoming commodified friendships are becoming commodified you kind of shop for your friends they're not really friends for life they're based on what have you done for me lately and you shop for churches and you shop for sex.

Sex is becoming commodified and they're warning that that's what's happening in our culture it's no longer about commitment it's about meeting your appetite and are you willing to pay the price that's being asked to meet that appetite that's the adulterous woman here sex is just groceries and one problem with this is it'll become routine and it'll become boring and all the mystery will go away so I need to ask myself is my sexuality commitment driven or consumer driven is it commitment driven it's about giving fully of myself or is it consumer driven basically I'm buying it like I buy a movie rental or something so what's proverb saying in all of these verses in the first point about sex don't let your springs overflow in the streets rejoice in the wife of your youth don't be like the adulterous woman the most pointed application here is this and you probably knew this was on the way at a message about sex the bible says very consistently be married to have sex.

Now this does not mean other people have a right to judge you this does not mean you're not welcome here at church I want everybody to be here at church learning about Jesus but what this does mean is you need to be committed fully with your whole life for life to really enjoy sex as the way god meant it to be because when you don't do that you begin to commodify it at some level it begins to be just about fulfilling an appetite for a price you have negotiated and not about unconditional commitment anymore.

Now you say wait a minute René don't you realize you live in san jose yes don't you live you're preaching in san jose yes don't you realize it's 2013 not 1950 yes and therefore I know somebody here right now is offended by what I just said and I don't have anybody particular in mind I really don't but I know somebody here is saying I'm offended right now because I am committed and I do love the person I am involved with sexually right now outside of marriage well I'm not saying that you don't love that person but I am saying listen carefully if you are retaining the right to get out of that relationship if the cost for the product gets too high for you then at some level it's a commodity and it's not a commitment it's a consumer relationship to some degree and the bible says you're not getting it get yourself in a fully committed relationship why so that you can soar.

So first of all the bible says we tend to undervalue sex actually by forgetting its beauty and mystery and making it into a product for our appetite but second and this takes some real talent but at the same time that we undervalue sex we tend to overvalue skin and by that I mean we tend to overvalue physical appearance externals sexiness and I want to illustrate this by showing the lengths to which our society goes to improve the beauty of even people who are already beautiful but apparently are no longer beautiful enough because the bar in our culture keeps going up and up and up look at some of these before and after pictures uh first let me show faith hill she's gorgeous right but look at the original photo shoot and the look at how it showed up on the cover of red book magazine her arm has been made thinner the little roll of fat in the back has been airbrushed away her back has been made flatter her blemishes her wrinkles in her face have been taken away because apparently this beautiful woman was not pretty enough the way god already made her and I love the fact that on the cover of redwood magazine it says look and feel your hottest but you see the the subtitle red book love your life they don't want you to love your life they don't want you they want you to hate the way you look so that you'll buy their advertisers products probably.

And then next look at angelina jolie already a beautiful woman but there's the original photo shoot and here's the way it appears after being photoshopped in the magazine uh her blemish is taken away and you'll notice her eye there on the left is a little bit too low it's not quite even with her right eye so they have to lift it up just a little bit it's crazy but they have to take this already beautiful woman and try to make her more beautiful and then finally not just women but here's george cluny you know here's the way he looks in real life and here's the way they photoshop it out all of his wrinkles and stuff being removed what I really don't understand is that they are removing his beautiful gray hair his best feature that is a big mistake but my point is in our culture we're almost addicted to an obsession with physical beauty beyond any reasonable standards and proverbs warrants against this proverbs 11:22 great verse like a gold ring in a pig's snout is a beautiful woman who shows no discretion.

Now this is kind of disgusting right and it's supposed to be disgusting because the idea is this you see a beautiful ring and you just want to reach out and grab it and own that ring and make it a part of your life it's so beautiful that it entrances you but if it's attached to a pig that rolls around in the dirt and the muck and the mud and eats slop and if you pull that ring to yourself and you didn't notice the pig suddenly you've got a real mess on your hands right now you say what kind of an idiot would do that well all men here raise their hands no this is uh this is saying that if you look at somebody's physical attractiveness on the surface somebody who's all striking and shapely and sleek and sexy and just smoking hot and they're like a gold ring and you grab the ring but if you don't know if that person is shallow or foolish or internally is just a mess you're just as much of a fool because it's the inside that counts not the outside because it's that person's character not their looks that's going to determine what their life ends up being like and what everybody around him or her is going to have as an as an experience.

You're just as foolish if you go for a beautiful person and don't see their bad character as somebody who grabs a gold ring and doesn't notice that there's a hog attached to it now this is not a slam of beautiful women there are wonderful godly beautiful women frankly these verses directed to men are a slam of men this is a slam of the habitual tendency of men to objectify women by evaluating them almost strictly on their looks and this is saying that is destructive foolishness that has real consequences.

In fact one result for women of this tendency for men to look only at skin at external beauty is shattered self-esteem and this is getting really bad in our society look at these stats eating disorders for women are three to five times higher in industrialized nations than in poor countries so in other words here in countries where we have plenty to eat eating disorders are three to five times higher than in countries where people are actually starving now keep that stat in mind when I let show you the next one eating disorders are twice as high among college educated women who probably tend to be less poor and actually have more to eat but they're higher among college educated women than other women.

Here's what I think stats like this mean the closer you get to the center of our western culture industrialized nations college education the more you are bombarded by our western cultures message that you are fat and you are ugly no matter who you are and no matter how much you've achieved and women really suffer on the other hand this emphasis on external beauty also has results for men and one effect of this addiction to skin to external beauty only is of course pornography.

Now I realize that it is very difficult for a pastor to talk about porn without sounding like a pastor lecturing and scolding and who wants to listen to a pastor so don't don't listen to me let me quote a couple of super hipster secular magazines I'll start with new york magazine which is totally not a religious magazine I mean it's it's liberated a few years ago was all about how the sexual revolution is awesome well they have run six or seven articles in the last couple of years about how bad porn is for you and just one example I put the url for this article in your notes the porn myth subtitle in the end porn doesn't wet men's appetites it turns them off to the real thing and it quotes man after man saying my porn addiction is actually ruining my life.

There's a great quote in this article the relationship between the multi-billion dollar porn industry and sexual appetite has become like the relationship between processed foods super sized portions and obesity it always takes more junk to fill you up great article if you read the whole thing another article this time in slate magazine again definitely not your typical christian voice here the article is called sex is cheap and I put the url for this in your notes too this is by two authors who just wrote a scholarly report called pre-marital sex in america now I want to emphasize these are not pastors these are public university funded researchers their report is pre-marital sex in america and their conclusion at the end is they are extremely alarmed by it they're like not for it but they have some interesting arguments listen to this they say that young men in america as a group are failing failing and here's just some of their stats earnings for 25 to 34 year old men have fallen 20 since 1971 college enrollment for men has plummeted today only 43 of new college students are male that's great for women but what's happening to the guys why are their earnings going down their their their unemployment is going up their college enrollment is dropping and so on well these researchers blame a lot of it on pornography and here's the reasoning follow this if men have to woo women if they have to win the hearts of women to have sex then men will have good jobs they will get good degrees they will have good manners partly in order to win wives and satisfy that drive you know they want to have nice plumage so they will be chosen as a mate but if men can satisfy their sexual urges with a click of the mouse that drive for real women is drastically decreased and the authors say consequently men are less motivated to clean up and they succeed less and they have less drive and they say consequently there is astounding pressure on young women to have premarital sex just to have any kind of hope of any kind of relationship with a guy it creates the hookup culture and again these authors say and again this is not this is not you know fundamentalism today this is slate magazine and they say this is radically changing our society in unpredictable and unforeseen ways for the worse.

But there's a second way in which this addiction to physical beauty is hurting men and women really and it's this dating standards dating standards the way in which men determine who they're going to date or who they're going to mate honestly like 80 percent of women most men don't even think about they don't even look at them because they're not pretty enough now when they get to the 20 percent that they think maybe are pretty enough then maybe they might skip over somebody who they think is shallow oh I don't like her why not well she's pretty but she's shallow oh she's shallow I see and this is such a problem because there are so many wonderful single women who would be wonderful wives and mates and frankly would be wonderful sexual partners but they're not even considered passed right over because they don't quite meet the beauty standard and this is creating isolation and loneliness and bitterness and antagonism between men and women in just alarming ways.

Okay now maybe you're saying all right you're a pastor so I guess it's part of your job to alarm me well I'm alarmed okay so here's what I'm motivated to do I'm gonna leave this and I'm not gonna give in to our culture I'm not gonna be a shallow person I will no longer look just at appearance I'm not gonna obsess on beauty I'm not gonna obsess on my own beauty or somebody else's I'm gonna change well that's awesome how I'm gonna try I'm gonna leave here and I'm gonna try harder well you are never going to overcome your obsession that way you're never going to overcome an obsession with overvaluing physical beauty and sexual attractiveness by trying harder you need a power that is greater than your willpower it's not just going to happen by trying hard.

So where do you get that power well I'll tell you where to get that power you get it by finding true beauty you get it by finding the beauty of real love and specifically the source of all this is we need to value the love of our savior we need to value the love of our savior check this out the book of proverbs repeatedly personifies sexual temptation as an immoral woman because it's addressed to young men remember but it says I saw a woman calling this is from proverb 7 I saw a woman calling I have perfumed my bed come let us drink deeply of love until morning let us enjoy ourselves with love my husband's not at home her house is a highway to the grave but then what does the author say so try real hard not to do it with her is that what he says no he says there is also another beautiful woman also calling out to you does not this is in verse uh proverbs chapter 8 does not wisdom call out wisdom has built her house she has prepared her meat and mixed her wine she has also set her table she has sent out her servants and she calls come and eat the food and drink the wine that I have mixed.

I love this because it doesn't say okay there's a beautiful seductress trying to rule you over here so instead go over to those sour faced puritans over there who are going to tell you don't have sec you know is that your option really you know your options are you can party with the hooker or you can pick at the porn shop with the religious weirdos are those your choices now it says there's an even more beautiful woman wooing you there's a better love inviting you over it's personifying wisdom as a person in love with you but as we asked at the beginning of this series what if this isn't just a literary device what if it is possible to fall in love with wisdom incarnate well of course it is and that's the whole point of the gospel that's why god the father became incarnate into the world because the message of the gospel is not try harder to be good it's that god so loved the world that he sent his son and what about his son I want you to think of this for a second think about what jesus taught about sex for a minute most of the time he didn't talk about most of the time he was criticizing religious people religious leaders but on a few occasions he was asked about sex and marriage in his tea would you characterize his teaching about sex and marriage as strict yeah it was pretty strict stricter even than the pharisees teaching he said no adultery and not just no adultery no lust and no divorce ever it's pretty strict so strict his disciples were like wow that's intense jesus and yet who were his followers adulterers divorced people lustres that's interesting the very people you think would be alienated by his teaching they're magnetically drawn to him.

Think about the woman at the well think of the story of jesus meeting the samaritan woman this is a great rembrandt sketch of that story but do you know that story this woman had been married and divorced five times and the woman she was living with when she meets jesus she's not married to and jesus makes it clear he knows that but then does he scold her for that does he tell her do you try harder to not do that no why because he knows that's not the solution for her problem the solution is the living water the solution is she needs to know him and be in a relationship with him as her savior and she gets it and she turns into the first evangelist ever and I was thinking about this if our church is going to look like the ministry of jesus then it's got to look like that it's got to be absolutely biblical when it comes to teaching sexual ethics like jesus was and at the same time it's got to be totally welcome welcoming to the very people that you'd think might be alienated by those teachings in other words jesus you might say jesus was conservative in his morality and liberal in his welcome he was strict in his teaching and unconditional in his love and if our church is going to look like the ministry of jesus then it's going to look like that because we're all sinners we're all prodigals and what we need is not primarily to be more moral what we need is a relationship with god through jesus christ and then he changes us from the inside out.

Look I want you to see something as I close let me leave proverbs at the end here and let me just show you that jesus shows you and I love that goes beyond mere external beauty and this is really the solution to find true beauty because in isaiah 53 it says about the messiah about jesus he had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him nothing in his appearance that we should desire him now there's a couple of hebrew words used here beauty and appearance which can also be translated shapeliness and it what's interesting is these are the same two words in the same order that are used to describe rachel earlier in the bible now rachel is one of those beautiful women in the bible and it says she has beauty and shapeliness attractiveness she was so stunningly beautiful do you remember her story jacob was her husband now jacob was a typical guy he had kind of a messed up life and his boss had two daughters one of them was gorgeous that was rachel it's again same two words beautiful and attractive and then jacob says he looks at rachel and says if I could only have her as my wife then I'd be complete then I'd feel good about myself.

Now leah was the other sister she was the sister that nobody wanted her dad didn't want her he tricks jacob into marrying her first jacob didn't want her he ends up marrying rachel and then basically ignoring leah for the whole rest of her life their marriage but get this god shows her leah not rachel leah the girl nobody wanted the homely girl the cross-eyed girl the overweight girl to be the one through which the messiah's lineage would come because leah ends up being the great great great great etc grandma of jesus and isaiah saying in this verse when the messiah comes into the world he also comes deliberately not as rachel but as leah you know he shows up like the unbeauty queen like the one who didn't even get invited to the prom the girl or the boy that nobody wanted why would jesus christ come to earth deliberately unsightly to show us real beauty deep beauty on the inside and the only lasting way that you and I are going to get shaken out of the sexual illusions that mess up our lives is this knowing that in heaven jesus had all the beauty all the glory but he emptied himself of all of that when he came to die on the cross for our sins he gave it all up to love you not because you are beautiful but to make you beautiful through and through beautifying you with his love and that's the solution to this whole mess to know how deeply I am loved.

See god made us not just as his subjects but to be his lovers and it's the degree to which you realize wow I am loved to that degree you are freed from the hold that an obsession with external beauty might have on you so love jesus and be free.

Let's pray with our heads bowed you know I'm sure this stirs up a lot and if today you're feeling any shame that certainly was my was not my intent but if you're feeling shame because of past actions be be drawn to jesus like the woman at the well and know that he loves you and he gives you a fresh start and he can make you so clean that you feel white as snow inside he loves you that much heavenly father we want to be wise not stupid about sex and love so make us wise by looking at your son jesus christ who though he was beautiful gave up his beauty that we might become beautiful in your sight and receive the only beauty that will last forever and we also ask that you would change the way that we deal with each other make twin lakes church a community of people who look to the heart and not on the outward appearance make us a community of people that teaches biblical standards when it comes to sex and marriage but also has an arms wide open welcome to those who feel like they might not meet those standards help us to be a place where we realize that we're all sinners in need of a savior and a place where we're so grateful that we have a savior and we pray this in jesus name amen.