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With Valentine’s Day fast approaching, throughout the month of February, we are diving into a series on The Song of Solomon and Christian Romance. Now, those two words might seem like contradictions – Christian Romance – and many people both inside and outside of the Church say things that make it seem that way, but is that really what the Bible teaches? Stick with us this month to find out!
Here is an excerpt from a Psychology Today article written by Dr. Phil Zuckerman back in September of 2020. It details a supposedly real life exchange that he had with his teenage child when they asked him about sex.
“What’s wrong with sex?” my fourteen-year-old asked the other night.
“What do you mean?” I inquired.
“There was this Christian lady out in front of the skatepark telling us we’d go to hell if we had sex before we were married.”
“Oh, yeah. Many religious people have issues with sex.”
“But why?”
“Well, um… they see it as a sin.”
“But why?”
“Uh…”
“Isn’t sex how people are made?”
“Yeah, but—”
“Doesn’t every mammal have sex? I mean, is it a sin when raccoons have sex?”
“Well—"
“And why would one part of our bodies—like our hands or elbows—be considered clean and normal, while other parts—like our genitals—be considered dirty and shameful?”
“Um…”
“Why is scratching your head or massaging your calves at night OK, but not rubbing your privates?”
“There’s no good answer," I said. "There’s no good reason.
The religious stigmatization of sex, the construction of our sex organs as dirty, the idea that self-pleasure is a sin, the notion that sex is immoral—these are baseless, damaging ideas that have no foundation in nature, nor in any sound ethical system.”
First off, I highly doubt that this exact conversation took place. We did change a few specific words to keep everything PGish, but this is supposed to be a retelling of a conversation he had with his 14 year old kid. To me, it sounds like an adult writing a script for a movie that no one would watch. But, let’s give it the benefit of the doubt, that his kid comes home from the skate park and has this exact conversation with him. Is what he proceeded to tell his child about the Christian or religious view on sex actually true? Is sex a sin? This might come as a complete shock to Dr. Zuckerman and his kid, but no! The Bible does not say that sex is a sin, but timing is everything. The Bible also doesn’t say that eating is a sin, but to take food that does not belong to you and then eating it is. Why? Because that would be stealing. In the same way, taking someone who is not your spouse and having sex with that person is a sin, you’re taking something that does not belong to you. Now, maybe you have issue with that type of verbiage. Maybe you think that sounds patriarchal and misogynistic. Again, you would be wrong and it comes straight from scripture.
“The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband. For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.” - 1 Cor. 7:3-5
So, it’s not just that the husband has authority over the body of the wife, but she has authority over his, too. It’s not domineering or subjugating, it’s a mutual agreement to put the wants and needs of your spouse ahead of yourself.
From the very beginning, sex was not only a gift that God gave to mankind, but it was also a command.
“And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” - Genesis 1:28
God told Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply. Human beings don’t reproduce by osmosis, so clearly God knew what would have to happen for them to fulfill that command. So, Old Testament to New, from the very beginning to the end, we can see that sex, in and of itself, is not a bad thing; it’s not a sin. But, the God does place limitations on it, and this is the part that people don’t like. Sex is meant to happen within the context of marriage between a man and a woman. In the very next chapter of Genesis, we see this laid out.
“Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” Therefore, a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed. - Genesis 2:23-25
Some people get upset about the marriage part, thinking that they should be allowed to have sex with someone who is not their husband or wife. Some people get upset about the man and woman aspect, thinking that as long as it is consensual, we should be allowed to have sex with whomever we want, whenever we want. Neither of these views is healthy, though, because they ignore the fact that God is the One who designed sex and called it good in the first place. Human relationships were created by God for a specific purpose and meant to operate in a specific way. Sex within God’s design is not only good, but blessed. Taking it outside of its proper place is a form of idolatry, putting something or someone in a place in your life that only God is able to satisfy.
For anyone that thinks that the Bible is anti sex, did you know that there is an entire book in the Old Testament that is just love poems from a bridegroom and his bride? In fact, this book is often skipped over by many well-meaning believers because, at times, it’s imagery and euphemisms could actually be described as erotic! Because we live in such a heavily eroticized and sexualized world, some of us in the Church have become so sensitive to it that we have withdrawn almost completely and decided that sex is something that should not be talked about and we’d all be better off pretending like it just doesn’t happen. As crazy as it may sound, I believe this can be just as harmful as going off the rails in the other direction. Just as the Bible tells those who think there should be no or almost no moral limitations when it comes to sex outside of the issue of consent that sex is good between a married husband and wife, it also tells those who always view sex as shameful if not outright sinful that between a married husband and wife that sex is good! In the Old Testament book, the Song of Solomon, we get to read the love letters between a soon to be husband and wife. As we do, we get to see the familiar longings, the anticipation building, the joy waiting to be fulfilled. We read descriptions in artistic detail of how these two lovers plan to explore and adore every facet of one another's bodies in words that would make even the most sexually experienced among us blush. Why? Because what we are seeing displayed in this poem is not pornographic, it is erotic. That word comes from the root word Eros which means physical, sexual love but specifically a type of love that seeks fulfillment without violation. Porneia, on the other hand, is the biblical word often used for fornication and means illicit sexual activity. While our culture today may be inundated with the latter, it is still longing and searching for the former. That is why so many people have settled in their relationships for sex without love, meaning or connection. Those things require vulnerability and put you at risk of being hurt when the object of your affections leaves you. In contrast, the Bible is not anti sex, but elevates sex to the highest form of human connection, when the two become one flesh, and consecrates it as a unique and sacred act to be shared between you and just one other person. This is why the Song of Solomon repeats this exhortation 3 separate times;
“I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, that you do not stir up or awaken love before it pleases.”
Song of Solomon 2:7; 3:5; 8:4
What they are getting at is, “You don’t get this kind of love by rushing in and taking it.” We aren’t meant to be satisfied with a low level, pornographic type of sex. Today, more than ever, we could fill our eyes, our minds, our hearts with as much “sex” as we could possibly muster as fast as it takes to type in a description in a search bar. Does it satisfy? Does it fill that deep place in your soul longing for beauty, connection and love? Or, has it desensitized you so much that you don’t even have those longings anymore? The Bible and Christianity are not anti-sex, far from it. But, we want sex to be everything it was meant to be while not looking to it to be something that it is not.
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