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‘We’re Helping Couple Have a Healthy Sex Life’…
Orginally published on Tuesday, April 22, 2008 at 7:21 AM
by Todd Rhoades
“What’s wrong with married couples having hot and holy sex?” is the question more and more pastors and Christian counselors are posing to believers. Once regarded as a hush-hush topic in church, sex is increasingly being openly discussed and even promoted by an unlikely ally – Christian pastors. But this effort comes with strings attached – it’s only meant for married couples. "People carry a lot of guilt from parents who said sex is bad," said the Rev. Kerry Shook, senior pastor of the 15,600-member Woodlands Church outside Houston, according to ABC news. "We help them (couples) to have a healthy sex life. One of the things we cover in scripture is how to meet each other's needs in bed."
Shook and his wife Chris recently delivered a popular sermon titled “How to Make Your Marriage Sizzle” where they combined culinary tips with sex talk that touched on intimacy, marriage, and problems that come between couples.
Meanwhile in Kansas, the Rev. Adam Hamilton of the 14,000-member United Methodist Church of the Resurrection says, “Sex is a gift, a good thing.”
“God allows you to have pleasure,” Hamilton said. “That’s how he designed your body. Once you learn it’s a gift from God, you embrace it and lay aside the shame.”
Hamilton noted that while many churches still consider sex a topic not to be discussed, he contends that more open discussions will actually strengthen marriages.
Earlier this year, popular emerging church leader Pastor Mark Driscoll of Mars Hill Church in Seattle opened the floor up to questions about sex from the mainly young adult congregation. The open talks were part of his sermon series “Religion Saves and 9 Other Misconceptions.”
During his sermon on sex, birth control and abortion, Driscoll said God didn’t create sex only for procreation, but also for pleasure, comfort and protection within marriage.
“There are books … even from Christians who love Jesus that talk about all the pleasures and joys and the anatomical structure of the body and the ways to please your spouse and to have the most joy,” Driscoll said in response to an attendant’s question about pleasing one’s spouse. “And you know what? I would whole-heartedly encourage it.”
“Looking for ways to please your spouse is wonderful. It’s biblical,” he added. “It builds intimacy, love, joy, trust and pleasure. Furthermore, it helps to safeguard and protect a marriage from temptation,” he said.
“I think Christian marriage gets a really bad rap. I don’t think it needs to,” Driscoll said. “I think it was Garrison Keillor who said ‘It’s good old fashioned monogamy that’s really sexy.’”
More here at The Christian Post...
QUESTION: What do you think? Has all the ‘sex talk’ at church been good or bad? Has your church done a recent series on sex? What was the effect on your congregation?
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Posted by
Tuesday, April 22, 2008 at 10:09 AM
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Posted by Peter Hamm
Tuesday, April 22, 2008 at 11:29 AM
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Posted by John Cheatham
Tuesday, April 22, 2008 at 1:00 PM
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Tuesday, April 22, 2008 at 2:34 PM
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Posted by free
Monday, May 05, 2008 at 10:01 AM
Post Your Comments:“What do you think? Has all the ‘sex talk’ at church been good or bad? Has your church done a recent series on sex? What was the effect on your congregation?”
Churches need to talk about love and how it relates to the married couple, absolutely. People need to know God’s true desire for love and sex so that we do not have sexual immorality.
When sex is being used as the draw card to pull people into church, that’s where it gets sketchy. As I have heard a wise man say, “What you use to draw them with is usually what you have to use to keep them there.”
Also, most of the advertising that makes the news reports such as ABC is sensationalistic in nature. It would be one thing to have a sermon on sex, it is another thing to try to make a controversy out of it.
I recall reading a story about one church recently that put up billboards, made fliers, and then sent a press release to the media that said, “Look how controversial our ads are.” Of course they were controversial--you designed them that way. What were you expecting?
If my church wanted to talk about love and sex, that’s fine. If it were done through mass-mailers, billboards, and news reports, however, I would protest.
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CS
Also,
A marriage might grow healthier if couples are committed to a healthy relationship with Jesus first, so something like this is great in concert with regular teaching about how getting close to God works.
I wholeheartedly agree that pastors should teach on sex. Often I see the problem of pastors teaching on sex to build intimacy (often through “love languages") and not teaching that its “one man, one woman, one lifetime.” We must not be afraid to confront those living in sexual sin - homosexuality, adultery, premarital sex, pornography, etc. (Sexual Sin was the actual title of the Mark Driscoll message that was cited in the article.) We must lovingly rebuke them, show them biblical truth about these sins, and offer them the true hope of the transforming power of the gospel.
John:
“We must not be afraid to confront those living in sexual sin - homosexuality, adultery, premarital sex, pornography, etc. (Sexual Sin was the actual title of the Mark Driscoll message that was cited in the article.) We must lovingly rebuke them, show them biblical truth about these sins, and offer them the true hope of the transforming power of the gospel.”
Very true. Going further back into the layers of the church, there needs to be sound Biblical teaching that shows how loving correction like this is actually a GOOD thing to have.
For example, I chatted with someone recently who divorced and remarried not too long ago. This person said that they were saved back in their teenage years, had been married for some time, and then divorced. And this person said that those at their original church were “judgmental” for the act of divorcing.
Now, while I don’t know all of the details behind this case, and cannot judge on this particular situation, yes, people in the church should lovingly reach out to a person in this type of situation and say, “Hey, what you’re doing isn’t right.” And that action should not be seen as “judgmental” so much as defending the purity of the church overall. If done in love, with the person repenting of the sin, and the church receiving them again in love, this glorifies God through proper discipline.
Instead, what I am seeing in many churches is avoidance in these types of situations, or gossip being spread, rather than confronting the sin and the sinner. Sometimes, it’s even permitted and allowed to continue, like people wanting Ted Haggard to start a new church and remain in the pulpit.
Good call, John.
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CS
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