Sexual Immorality

It seems a little odd that one particular sin is listed in almost every list of sins in the Bible. Just about anywhere you find a variety of sins laid out in a text, sexual immorality is there and, usually, near the top of the list. Why is that? Why is that specific sin so commonly listed ... so prevalent? Let us consider. First, an explanation. The term "sexual immorality" (sometimes translated simply as "immorality") includes all sexual sin. Scripture delineates a few kinds of such sin. There is "fornication" which is sex outside of marriage and there is "adultery" which is sex inside of marriage but not with your spouse. The Bible lists specifics like homosexual sin (e.g., 1 Cor 6:9) and incest (e.g., Lev 18:6-18) and prostitution (e.g., 1 Cor 6:15-16), and all of these fall nicely under the umbrella of "sexual immorality."

I think there are two fundamental reasons sexual immmorality is so often warned against in the pages of Scripture. First, the origin of sexual sin is explained in the first chapter of Romans. After explaining that God's wrath is against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of those who suppress the truth (Rom 1:18), Paul explains that the truth that is suppressed is the truth of who God is (Rom 1:19), a truth that God made clear (Rom 1:20). Paul goes on to say,

For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures. Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. (Rom 1:21-24)

We see here the origin of sexual sin. It isn't lust; it is the suppression of the truth about who God is that is displayed in failing to honor and thank God. The first result of this lie that humans tell themselves is "foolishness" in which God "gave them over" to ... lust. That is, the origin of sexual immorality is our refusal to recognize or appreciate God. Other sins ensue (Rom 1:25-32), but sexual sin is listed first. So the first reason sexual sin is so prevalent in Scripture is that it is fundamentally a basic rejection of God; it is an exchange of the truth of God for a lie (Rom 1:25). That's much larger than a minor infraction. The second reason is the effect. Paul gives a generalization of the effect in the text above ("so that their bodies would be dishonored"), but a clearer explanation occurs over in 1 Corinthians.

Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take away the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? May it never be! Or do you not know that the one who joins himself to a prostitute is one body with her? For He says, "The two will become one flesh." But the one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him. (1 Cor 6:15-17).

We live in a "mechanical" worldview where people are just meat and everything is just physical, but Scripture is clear that there is more to this world than the merely physical. From the beginning God designed human sexual relations to produce a fusion -- "The two will become one flesh." In fact, Paul explains that this "two become one" fusion is part of God's design to demonstrate the relationship of Christ to the Church (Eph 5:31-32). In the 1 Corinthians 6 text, Paul explains that we are supposed to be fused with Christ, so if we violate that design by sexual sin, we are disrupting everything that God had in mind for His people. Not a minor issue.

Our society has put the pedal to the metal on this particular sin. They changed a common moral code -- sex only in marriage -- to "whenever with whomever you want." Our entertainment and media took the "free love" movement out of its time location and fed it back into historical events to convince us all that it has always been this way. (It hasn't.) We complain that they've been normalizing homosexual behavior, but they've been normalizing sexual immorality in all its forms for decades. They've done their job so well that Christians who can read Scripture just fine don't even notice that they are involved in sexual sin. But Scripture is clear. Don't resist it; flee (1 Cor 6:18; 2 Tim 2:22)! It is the equivalent of idolatry. "What You have given me, Lord, is inadequate and I will satisfy my desires my own way." And the consequences are much bigger than God's disapproval. Sexual sin joins us to "not God," something that should be abhorrent to every follower of Christ. Sexual sin takes the "temple" of God and joins it to a person not approved by God. "You are not your own," Paul says, "for you were bought with a price, so glorify God in your body" (1 Cor 6:18-19).