We have a young sister, and she hath no breasts:
what shall we do for our sister in the day when she shall be spoken for? If she
be a wall, we will build upon her a
palace of silver: but if she be a
door, we will barricade her with
boards of cedar. I am a wall,
and my breasts like towers: then was I in his eyes as one who found favour - (Song of Solomon 8:8-10)
INTRODUCTION
What kind of youth are you – a wall or a
door? Are you a person of easy virtue or a person of strong moral fibre? Are
you easily swayed by the sweet nothings of what you hear and see? Are you
controlled by the inclinations of your lower nature or are you subject to the
principles of the higher calling of God to live in consonance to His Will?
Are you a moral weakling or a moral
hero? A moral weakling is one who cannot say, “NO!” to the amorous invitation
of a degenerate: a sweet-talking, immorally-enticing person to wine, dine and
have a fill of the sweet poisons of immorality. A moral hero is one who has
learnt to say “NO” to sinful persuasions and immoral lifestyles.
We live in an era where antiquated
immorality has become the modern morality, where taboos have become norms, a
sign that one has arrived, a sign that one has become a “Big Gal” or “Big Guy.”
We are constantly sold the dummy on TV, movies, magazines, novels, etcetera
that compromising our moralities is the sure way to become reckoned as a happening person. Girls are busy baring
their breasts without qualms while boys are exhibiting that which makes them
males with reckless abandon.
Today, majority consider foolish
people wise and wise
people foolish. Today, God’s kind of morality has taken the backseat while
Satan’s immorality has taken the centre-stage. Many are eating poisoned fruits and
drinking poisoned wines thinking that they are enjoying themselves.
Today, illicit sex is associated with
millions of youths who are unaware of its many dangers spiritually,
biologically, and socially. Our youths have taken pre-marital sex as a normal
thing and a way of life.
The
topic assigned to me is, “Premarital Sex
and Its Implications In Christian Living.”
DEFINITIONS OF
CONCEPTS
Who is a Christian?
By definition, a Christian is one who
has heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ, believed in Jesus, repented of his/her
sins, confessed faith in Jesus, is baptized into Jesus in the name of the
Father, Son and Holy Spirit and then added into the Body of Christ, the Church.
These processes make one a Christian. In actuality, however, a Christian is one
who is not ashamed of the Gospel, nor a shame to the Gospel (Romans 1:16; II
Corinthians 6:3; cf. II Samuel 12:14).
What is Pre-marital Sex?
- The prefix, “Pre” connotes before.
- “Marital” refers to marriage. Marriage is a union of a man and woman in a covenant relationship for the rest of their lives.
- “Sex” is an act of intimacy between a man and a woman a legal relationship of marriage.
Succinctly
stated, Pre-marital sex is sex before
marriage. It is fornication.
Pre-marital sex is jumping the gun, it is an experimental act that jeopardizes
the spiritual, physical, emotional, psychological and social interests of those
involved. It is an act of opening a package meant for its owner before it gets
to the owner.
CAUSES
OF PRE-MARITAL SEXUAL ACTIVITIES
Unrestrained chemical reactions
What
young people call Love is not love
but Lust. Lust is an unrestrained
chemical reactions between two young unmarried people.
Peer influence
Peer groups encourage young people to
engage in pre-marital sex. This, they do by making mockery of anyone who is
chaste by referring to them using unkind remarks. They tell them to “wise up”
and to “belong.” Young people who lack judgement and do not have moral strength
buckle under such pressures but those who their God are strong and resist such
pressures.
Curiosity
Another reason young people indulge in
pre-marital sex is their great curiosity to explore what sexual activity is all
about. They do this without considering the damaging consequences.
Cohabitation
Cohabitation breeds sexual immorality
and leads to pre-marital sex. Examples of people who fall into this category
are betrothed couples who engage in
sexual activity before the anticipated marriage.
UNIVERSE OF PREMARITAL SEX
Pre-marital
Sex is Prostitution
In
Bible, a prostitute is one who commits fornication. One may prostitute himself or
herself for any kind of gain, not just money. It may be the pride of continued
association, or friendship with someone.
Premarital Sex is A
Three-Dimensional Sin:
Fornication
is a sin against God. Pre-marital
sex goes across or contravenes God’s explicit commandment. Pre-marital
sex is a sin against God. Sin is transgression of the Law of God (I John 3:4). Pre-marital
sex goes against, or across, what God has commanded.
Fornication
is a sin against the other person involved. It is always a mutual sin
engaged in by two or more persons.
By involving others in your own sin, you sin against them and vice-versa. If
your convictions had been strong perhaps they would have been encouraged to do
right. The sin, the shame, the wrong is shared by both.
Fornication
is a sin against oneself.
I Corinthians 6:18 says, "Flee fornication. Every sin that a man
doeth is without the body, but he who commits fornication sins against his own
body."
Pre-marital Sex Will Provide Temporal
Pleasure But It Will Leave You Tormented.
By default, sin provides passing pleasures (Hebrews 11:24-26),
which leaves the sinner with a terrible sour taste (Romans 6:21). Someone aptly
remarked a few moments of joy will usher
in an eternity of misery. Would you want to trade in a few moments of
pre-marital sexual pleasure for pain and shame?
CONSEQUENCES OF
PREMARITAL SEX
There are many consequences of
pre-marital sex. There are damages which cannot be remedied because colossal
damages have been brought by young promising persons on themselves which they
have to live with it for the rest of their lives.
God knows that there are dangers in
pre-marital sex that is why He wants us to flee from youthful lusts (2Timoty
2:22).
Sex is a powerful force that can destroy
if not used properly. Like atomic power, sex is the most powerful creative
force given to man. When atomic power is used correctly, it can create
boundless energy, when it is used in the wrong way it destroys life. Sex is the
same kind of powerful force.
Sex is a gift from God to be expressed
within marriage. But if you play with this powerful force outside the bounds of
marriage, it will destroy you and those who are close to you.
Following are some of the consequences
of pre-marital sex:
1.
It arrests their psychological, social and academic
development of youths. Studies show that when young people engage in
pre-marital sex, their academic performances. It also affects their social
relationships with family and friends. This is because adolescents are too
immature to deal with the explosive sex drive and it tends to dominate their
lives.
2.
Pre-marital sex is fear-inducing. Pre-marital sex
usually takes place sneaking around in hidden places, dealing with the fear of
being caught, the fear of pregnancy and feelings of guilt.
3.
Pre-marital sex leads to loss of a vital asset. Your virginity
is to be given to the most important person in your life – the person you will
be committed to stay forever in marriage. Your virginity is the most precious
thing you have to your spouse. Once you lose it nothing in the world can bring
it back.
4.
Fornication is one sin that attracts other sins. Most pre-marital
sex ends up in pregnancy, sickness, abandonment or sale of babies. The rate of
abortion has increased because of increase in pre-marital sex. A large
percentage of youths have committed murder before reaching age 25. Some of them
abandon their babies in dustbins, gutters and other public places which is an
increase to their original sin of fornication. Some secretly sell their babies
to ready buyers who use such babies for rituals.
5.
It creates an ungodly soul tie (Genesis 34:1-3a). A soul tie is an agreement one enters
with another that creates a special bond between two people. Soul ties are
common and exist everywhere – husband and wife.
Sex is not just
a causal fun as most people think and take it to be. It is much more than that,
it involves blood. The Bible says “Life is in the blood” (Leviticus 17:14). When
you have sex with a person, you have given a part of your life to that person
and in return the person has given you a part of his own life in the spirit
realm. In the spirit realm, two of you have become one. You start to share
things in common. That is why disease, sickness, demons and many things and
many things pass through during sexual intercourse. In addition, you have just
created “a soul tie” between you and the person involved. Since God does not
permit pre-marital sex, it becomes an “ungodly tie” in the sight of God. That
is why some girls find a special liking or memory on the day of dis-virginity,
the blood that flows out that day becomes the blood of the covenant or
agreement. Genesis 34 Shechem the prince of the land of Hivite committed
fornication with Dinah, the daughter of Jacob. The soul of Shechem claved unto Dinah.
6.
It fragmentizes your soul. Since sexual
intercourse creates soul ties, each person you have sex with you have given
part of your heart or soul in the spiritual realm. That is why people who were
promiscuous before settling down for marriage find it difficult settling down
at all because their souls have been divided; they are always thinking of their
relationships with their previous partners, thus making it impossible for them
to settle down in their marriages. If a person has slept with a thousand
persons in his life, his love, heart and several other things has been shared
with these thousand persons. A close look at the society shows that wayward
people find it difficult to have a fulfilled marriage life because they have
shared their lives with several people.
7.
Premarital sex will lead to extra-marital sexual
activities. Most promiscuous
people are involved in extramarital relationships. They are never satisfied with
one person just for no reason, always looking for their lost souls. It is
dangerous engaging in pre-marital sex because it can affect your marriage in
future.
8.
Pre-marital Sex Is Lust
Love is from
God. It gives unconditionally and it can wait. Lust is from Satan. It is
selfish and wants immediate gratification. Any man that loves you will never
demand sex from you as a proof of your love for him. Love is patient, is long
suffering and endures. Many young people today have the spirit of Ammon (2nd
Samuel 13:12-14). Beware!
Other Dangers of
Pre-marital Sexual Activities:
- Premature parenthood – becoming a father or mother before time.
- It makes you marry the wrong person who may not be supportive, friendly or compatible.
- It leads to rejection, abandonment by family or a benefactor.
- Infertility.
- It kills your vision.
- It takes away your dignity and makes you cheap.
- It brings shame – shame is accompanied by sense of guilt, whose consequence is death (Romans 6:21).
EFFECTS OF PREMARITAL SEX IN CHRISTIAN LIVING
1.
It Destroys Your Spiritual Fortifications. This is perhaps
the most worrisome part of pre-marital sex. Demons and other problems gain
entrance into your body and spirit through pre-marital sexual activities.
Ecclesiastes 10:8 says:
He who digs a pit shall fall into it and whoever breaks his hedge, a serpent shall
bite him.
1 Corinthians 6:16 declares:
“Know ye not that he which is joined to a harlot is
one body? For two saith He shall be one flesh.”
2 2. It Taints
Your Testimony. Nothing
counts more than your testimony. When you taint (soil) your testimony, you
would have nothing more to live for. A good name remains better than silver and
gold (Proverbs 22:1). When you lose your good name, it is as good as losing
everything.
Sinful
lifestyles dim the light that should be the Christian youth. No matter how
beautiful you can sing, preach or pray, tainting your testimony makes nonsense
of all these. The name of the Lord and image of our local Congregations will be
subjected to ridicule when Christian youths make a mess of their
testimonies. At Romans 2:17-23, Apostle
Paul by inspiration of Holy Spirit asks several powerful rhetorical questions:
But
if you bear the name of Jew and rely upon the Law and pride yourselves in God
and your relationship to Him. And know and understand His will and discerningly
approve the better things and have a sense of what is vital, because you are
instructed by the Law. And if you are confident that you [yourself] are a guide
to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, and [that you are] a
corrector of the foolish, a teacher of the childish, having in the Law the
embodiment of knowledge and truth– Well then, you who teach others, do you not
teach yourself? While you teach against stealing, do you steal (take what does
not really belong to you)? You who say not to commit adultery, do you commit
adultery [are you unchaste in action or in thought]? You who abhor and loathe
idols, do you rob temples [do you appropriate to your own use what is
consecrated to God, thus robbing the sanctuary and doing sacrilege]? You who
boast in the Law, do you dishonor God by breaking the Law [by stealthily
infringing upon or carelessly neglecting or openly breaking it]? For, as it is
written, The name of God is maligned and blasphemed among the Gentiles because
of you! [The words to this effect are from your own Scriptures.]
When we give in and listen to the
allure of the world, we stand to lose. An anonymous writer had asks and
observes,
What
happens to the testimony and influence of a Christian youth who becomes …
delinquent? His or her reputation is damaged and a good name forfeited.
Pointing to this failure, others excuse their sins and question the validity of
Christianity. More happen, too, a life for which the Lord shed His blood is
marred. A voice that spoke for Christ is stilled, or else mumbles the hollow
testimony of a hypocrite. A witness is compromised… a family is saddened… and a
Church weakened… a society looses.
3 3. It Defeats
the Purpose of Your Christian Race.
The purpose of our Christian race is to make Heaven.
However, Scripture inundates us with several warnings of what immorality will
do to us: deprive us of inheritance of God’s eternal Kingdom (Galatians
5:19-21; I Corinthians 6:9-11). Hebrews 12:14 attests that “without holiness no one will ever see God.”
We are encouraged in Scripture to make pursuit of sanctification our moral
watch-word (I Thessalonians 4:3). We should as a matter of urgency remove from
our lives every form of “moral and
spiritual defilements, perfecting holiness in the fear of God” (II
Corinthians 7:1).
Holiness remains the beauty of a Christian. Without moral
purity, a Christian loses his or her relevance to God and society.
HOW TO OVERCOME OR AVOID PRE-MARITAL
SEX
1. Have A Die-Hard Heart And Spirit
Of No Retreat, No Surrender
One
of the most appropriate responses to immorality is an uncompromising stance
that says, “No!” and standing by it (Titus 2:11). When faced with such tempting
moments the only good thing to do is to throw your heart over the bar and stand
firmly on what you believe.
No
matter what, do yourself a favour: “Do
not give” your “holy treasure” to “the dogs” nor your “pearls to the swine
because they would not only trample them
down but also turn around to attack you” (Matthew 7:6).
In
other not to be trapped by the deceitfulness of loose living, make a strong
covenant with your eyes (Job 31:1) and ears (II Peter 2:8).
How do we protect against this?
Simple - watch your heart. Renowned Bible teacher and author, John Henry Jowett
in Swindol (1990:51) writing on the
power and place of human thoughts on moral character of an individual observes,
A man’s thoughts determine the
moral climate of his life, and will settle the question whether his conduct is
to be a poisonous marsh or a fertile meadow; a fragrant garden or a barren
sand.
Knowing this and how you can
handle your thoughts are important in
our quest for victory over pre-marital sex in particular and immorality in
general. R. B. Sweet (1965:30) points out,
The root causes of immorality
could be traced to the misuse of certain members of the body. The eyes feasts
upon a seductive picture, giving the green light to evil thoughts. The impure
thoughts poison the mind until the mind loses control and calls upon the body
to act unwisely.
Realize that when you “Sow a thought you will reap an act; sow an
act you will reap a character; sow a character you will reap your destiny.”
Always work on your heart and endeavour to bring every evil thought and
imaginations captive to obedience to the will of Christ (II Corinthians 10:3-5).
Our actions are the by-products
of our thoughts. Someone pointed out that we may not be what we think we are
but what we think we are (cf. Proverbs 23:7). To watch over our hearts, we need
to cultivate the culture of positive thinking (Philippians 4:8) as well as
developing godly mindsets (Colossians 3:2-3).
2 2. Flee
(I
Corinthians 6:18; Genesis 39:7-12).
Sometimes where
we are in moments of temptations make us more susceptible and unable to put up
any meaningful resistance. In such situations, the only way out is to walk
away, Flee!
a.
Martin
Luther King Jr. once said, “If you can’t fly, run; if you can’t run, walk; if
you can’t walk, craw. But by all means keep moving!”
b.
Potipher’s
wife wanted to make Joseph a sex tool but Joseph ran away, leaving behind
everything which would keep a firm grip on him by Potipher’s wife.
(i). Some of us
would have jumped at such an opportunity and then let the
good
times roll. But Joseph knew that to do what her madam wanted her to do would to
sinning against himself, his master, Portiphar and more importantly against
God, his Creator. So, he ran away! (Genesis 39: 9, 12).
3 3. Cultivate Godly Relationships
(II
Timothy 2:22).
a.
Bad
association corrupts (I Corinthians 15:33).
b.
Your
relationships influence you (Proverb 22:24-25; Psalms 100:34-40).
c.
If
Dinah, one of Jacob’s daughters had not gone to “visit with Daughters of the
land” she would not have been “Violated by Schechem” (cf. Gen. 34:1-2).
Do
not let any son or daughter of the land violate your righteousness!
CONCLUSION
Heaven is so
precious and our souls too valuable that we should allow our environment to
destroy the beautiful life ahead of us in eternity with our Father and His
Saints glorified. All we need to do to an environment that hinders
righteousness is to “Say No” to all its suggestions (Titus 2:12-13).
What the Lord
has in store for us are too precious to lose by messing up with low living and
all forms of unrighteousness (I Cor. 2:9).
May the Lord
strengthen us to remain focused on living for Him!
HILARY JOHNSON CHUKWUMA CHUKWURAH
Township/Campus
CHURCH OF CHRIST,
14,
Agbugwu Lane, off, University Market Road,
P.
O. Box 84 and 351, Nsukka – 410002,
Enugu
State, Nigeria.
PHONES: 0803-959-6919.
REFERENCES
Barclay, W. (1976).
The Letters of James and Peter. Philadelphia, Pa: Westminster Press.
Eze, Ada
(Mrs). (2014). “How To Overcome
Premarital Sex” being a Speech to youths of St. Paul’s Catholic Parish,
Umuodagu Ntu, 18th-23rd August.
Halley, H.H.
(1962). Halley’s Bible Handbook. Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House.
Sweet, R.B. (1965).
Achieving Success: Living Word Series Vol. 124. Texas: R.B. Sweet Company.
Swindoll, Charles
R. (1990). Conquering Through Conflict: A Study of Second Peter. Dallas: Word Publishing
Company.
The Holy Bible, New King James Version (1982).
USA: Thomas Nelson Inc.
