God’s Plan for Sex & Marriage: Boundaries

Hey everybody, Greg Laurie here thanking all of you who have supported us in this last year with your prayers and financial support. 2021 was an epic year for Harvest Ministries.

Listen to this, over a hundred thousand people made a profession of faith to follow Christ from viewing or watching or participating in one of our events and we gave away 20,000 new believers Bibles shipped to people that helped them get started in their new relationship with Jesus Christ. So thank you. I could not do what I do if you did not do what you do.

So please continue to pray for us, continue to support us as we enter in to 2022. Let's see what the Lord will do. I think sometimes people think that God disapproves of sex.

How ridiculous. God created sex. Our culture has hijacked this gift God created.

Pastor Greg Laurie says we need to get back to God's original plan. It doesn't have to be a dirty word. It doesn't have to be a taboo subject. It's something that can be enjoyable, pleasurable, and listen to this, even blessed, but only in the in the boundaries and safety of a marriage relationship. Some people may think taking God's advice on sex is like taking the principal's advice on how to have a fun day at school.

Just a lot of don't you dares. But today on A New Beginning, Pastor Greg Laurie reminds us God created us and sex was his idea. And we'll see that as we follow his guidelines, we'll find the fulfillment we long for. It's one in our series of top 10 most requested messages of the past year.

And for a copy, go to harvest.org. The title of my message today is God's plan for sex in marriage. How many of you are glad you came to church today? Ok.

So yes I use the word sex and I am going to talk about that. God has a lot to say about this subject and I want you to grab your Bible and turn to Ephesians chapter 5. God takes us back to the very beginning. Verse 31. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife and the two shall become one flesh. This is a great mystery but I speak concerning Christ and the church. Nevertheless let every one of you in particular so love his wife as himself and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

We'll stop there. You know it's interesting after Adam and Eve were married. The Bible says God called their name Adam. He saw them as one flesh.

To become one. And so when you're married you're technically one flesh. But it's a lifetime now of discovering what that means. So first you leave and then you cleave. Now what does the word cleave mean? Well it doesn't mean to divide as in a meat cleaver. It actually means to bring together. It suggests a determined action.

There is nothing passive about the act of cleaving. It's like climbing a mountain. You're hanging on. I see these people who go and scale the sides of mountains and they have their little tools and their and their little hammers and nails and and lines that they hang and I can't believe what these people do.

You know they get up there and they reach up and and they ding ding ding ding ding and then they put in a little put the rope through and they'll swing. That's insane to me. But that's what marriage should look like. You're holding on. You're clinging to each other. It doesn't mean you're stuck together.

It means you're sticking together. You ever work with super glue? I've had some bad experiences with it actually. I was always a bad model builder when I was a kid but I loved models. I think it was because I was impatient. You know because I wouldn't wait for the glue to dry and then I would want to paint it before it was ready and all that. But then super glue came along and you know the first time I pulled it out I thought wow it's like there's nothing really even there. It's almost like it's invisible and so I did something they told me not to do.

Don't put it on both your fingers and I glued my thumb to my finger like this and so people thought I was saying okay for about a month. So it's not being stuck. It's holding on to each other and one of the ways that we express that love. One of the ways that we demonstrate that love is through the sexual union. You know I think sometimes people think that God disapproves of sex.

How ridiculous. God created sex. And clearly in the Bible we can see that He gave it to us to be fruitful and multiply. So yes it's for procreation.

Yes it's for bringing children into the world. But God didn't say you couldn't have some fun while you're doing it. And you can't have fun in sex. It doesn't have to be a dirty word. It doesn't have to be a taboo subject. It's something that can be enjoyable, pleasurable, and listen to this even blessed but only in the boundaries and safety of a marriage relationship. That's the only place God will bless us. Outside of marriage actually sex can be an extremely destructive thing. It's sort of like dark rich soil. It's beautiful in the garden.

Not so nice if you bring it in on your white carpet in the house. So we need to keep sex in its proper place. But casual sexual encounters are made to look harmless and fun and sitcoms and and music. Today it's celebrated about all these things that people are going to do to each other. And you know you think of the impact that's had on our culture. Think of how different our world would be if we just obeyed one of the ten commandments.

Just one. Thou shall not commit adultery. That means that families would be together. So many families are broken up because of adultery. And then there are people that have premarital sex that never get married so the child is conceived out of wedlock. I was conceived out of wedlock by the way. So I know a little bit about this. I know what it's like to never have a stable father figure in my life.

I know what it's like to make a lot of bad choices and face the consequences for them. That was my trajectory until Jesus Christ came and turned my life around. But so many kids today haven't heard about Jesus Christ. There is no dad. There has never been a dad. Mom just got pregnant.

And maybe it even happened two or three times. Or maybe it's even different dads if you want to call them dads. Though they are really not much of a father in my book. So you have a bunch of kids that are stepbrothers to each other. Stepsisters and so forth.

And then you have this kind of lifestyle that is being lived. And you can take almost every social ill in America today and specifically break it down to the breakdown of the family and to the absence of fathers. There is a lot of stats to back that up by the way. 63 percent of teenagers who attempt suicide live in fatherless homes. 71 percent of high school dropouts are from fatherless homes. 90 percent of all runaways and homeless children are from fatherless homes. 85 percent of all youth sitting in prison grew up in a fatherless home.

Fatherless sons are 300 percent more likely to be incarcerated in state juvenile institutions. Oh my. If we would just do what God said. If we would just get back to what He tells us about a husband and a wife and a father and a mother.

It would change our country. But we say oh well no. God doesn't know what He is talking about.

You know I want to go out there and I want to have fun and I want to have sex with whoever I want to have sex with. And besides what is the problem as long as they are consenting adults. Why has God even laid down a law like this?

Doesn't He know we have raging hormones? God laid those laws down for your own good. Sort of like traffic laws. You know when you are backed up for two miles in traffic and then you see the ongoing lane and the other direction is empty it can be tempting sometimes to leave your lane.

Sort of like the way they drive in Italy. Last time I was there I had an afternoon off and I rented a Vespa scooter. And so I said come on Kathy. Let's just ride around and roam. And she wasn't real excited about this idea.

But I was. I ran a motorcycle too. So I felt pretty confident in commandeering a little scooter.

And so we got on it. But I realized people in Rome Italy drive differently than we do here in the United States. They see lights as I guess a suggestion.

I am not even sure. They go around. They go into oncoming traffic. It is crazy.

So there are so many scooters there that they are like little swarms of bees that just kind of go through those lanes and they go into the oncoming lane and come around the front. At first I thought this is crazy. This is insane. This is fun. I like this. Kathy is terrified.

But she was holding on very tightly so it was good. You know. But see that is a crazy way to have a road system. We need order. We need structure. People get killed when you live that way. And the same is true of marriage.

If we would just obey what God says in His Word. Because you see when you engage in a sexual relationship with a person you enter into a state of oneness. Sex is meant to show oneness.

A bond. So if you say well it meant nothing. You know it was a one night stand.

No it wasn't. Actually the apostle Paul said if you are even involved with a prostitute you enter into a oneness with her. First Corinthians 6 16. Don't you know that when a man joins himself to a prostitute he becomes one body with her for the Scripture says the two are united into one.

But the spirit who is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him. So run away from all sexual sin and be joined to the Lord because sexual sin affects the body and it is a sin against your own body. So there is no such thing as a one night fling.

There is no such thing as some little hookup you had that you think is meaningless. It means a lot to God and it means a lot to you. So you need to do it God's way.

Well come on now Craig. Does it really hurt anyone? Yeah it hurts a lot of people. What about innocent babies killed through abortion?

What about that? That alone is mind blowing how many millions of children have been eliminated. Who knows out of all those millions of children that have been aborted if we would have not had the next doctor who would have found the cure for cancer. If we would not have had the next who knows great preacher to reach our country whatever. But all those lives needlessly thrown away.

And then it doesn't hurt anybody. What about the mother that contends with the abortion years later? Sometimes the pain of the abortion doesn't fully sink in until that young girl who may have got it in her teens now realizes what she did.

And as the years pass by and she sees other little children who would have been the age of her child if she had brought the little one to term she realizes the significance of what she's done. What about that? What about venereal disease? What about the AIDS virus?

Yeah it does hurt people. God has laid these laws down for our own good. So we want to pay careful attention to him because God will bless this as you come together in his perfect plan.

His perfect plan. Pastor Greg Laurie will have something special as today's program continues in just a moment. You know sometimes we can't always make it to church but here's the good news. Church is coming to you.

It's coming to you on your tv screen or on your tablet or your computer or even your phone. We do it every weekend and it's called Harvest at Home. We have worship, we have a message from the word of God.

If you want to find out more just go to harvest.org and join us this weekend for Harvest at Home. Well we're talking about the sexual aspect of marriage relationships today and recently Pastor Greg was part of a panel discussing the subject alongside a couple of his associate pastors at his home church. It's a frank discussion and parents if there are younger ears listening you might want to consider another activity for them for a few minutes. Sex outside of marriage is destructive. So there's somebody listening right now they're saying well actually I think sex outside of marriage is a lot of fun and they're enjoying themselves and you know the bible even says that there can be pleasure in sin for a time. We're not denying that fact but there's repercussions. People don't think about the long term. Why don't we talk just for a moment how can sex or why is sex outside of marriage destructive?

What do you think Jason? Well I think obviously it's a direct disobedience to God. I mean God designed it and so he said you shouldn't and so you're separating yourself from God. It's just sin before God and this is what God says about it. It's a sin and it's wrong. Now on top of all of that you reap the you're reaping what you sow here.

You are going to get as I mentioned you know thoughts and you might even repercussions as let's just say a pregnancy or an STD but even more than that I think is just your relationship with God you know really becomes I'd say in jeopardy because of your your decisions here in in sex outside of marriage. Yeah that's right you know um sin can almost be compared to being drunk. Drunk people don't always know they're drunk. They think they're funny. They think they're cool.

They think they're in control and they're out of control. When you come under the power of sin it's amazing how stupid you can be. So you know sin makes you stupid and so if someone's listening right now and they're like having sex and they've somehow rationalized this is outside of marriage of course and they've somehow rationalized it and said no I think in my case it's all right the Lord spoke to my heart and said it's cool my child have fun or something like that.

Okay first of all that wasn't God because God will never contradict His Word. But if you've gotten into a state where you have managed to rationalize it and you feel okay about it that's actually an indication you are under the power of sin and you're not thinking clearly. So that's why when we come back to Scripture it sort of realigns us like oh right this is what is true because our emotions and culture and so many things are well they're at war with the Word of God is the reality.

What do you think Jonathan? Absolutely is it is so easy to feel like oh well I'm a I'm a special case God made a special exception for me I can have sex with my girlfriend or hey I'm viewing pornography and so it's not the same as going out and sleeping with different girls this is okay with God this is special. Listen First Thessalonians 4-3 for this is the will of God your sanctification that you abstain from sexual immorality this is the Word of God this is what the Bible says and that's what it comes down to. Yeah you know a lot of times people will say I need to know the will of God what's His will and let's start with the no-brainers. The Bible actually has some things very clear it's very clear in certain topics like this is the will of God and this is one of them there and Thessalonians this is the will of God to abstain from these things. You know David fell into adultery with Bathsheba and after he was confronted he lived in sin for quite a long time he was confronted by the prophet Nathan and he finally repented and after that he wrote Psalm 51 and among other things he said uh created me a clean heart oh God and renew a right spirit within me restore to me the joy of my salvation and then sinners will be converted to you so really what David is saying is Lord I blew it uh give me a new heart change me help me and so it's an acknowledgement of that and I do think that once there's been a breakdown in one of these areas you it's easier to fall in that area again so you have to be very careful you can almost like liken it maybe too you broke your arm once and maybe there's a vulnerability there maybe a little more vulnerability than if you had never broken your arm before having said that that doesn't mean that now you're going to fall into whatever because God will never give you more than you can handle and sometimes when we say well there's no way I could resist it well it's because you put yourself in a situation that was insane you know like oh yeah I booked this hotel room with this girl and I'm not married to and we're laying down on the bed and talking and then we kind of got tempted yeah you're an idiot okay what are you talking about so of course you fell into sin doing something like that so sometimes the best way to get out of a sinful situation is literally walk out the door not pray for the strength to resist but literally say I'm walking out I'm hitting the off button I'm terminating the phone conversation I'm not in I'm not gonna I'm gonna block you we're not gonna talk anymore via text or whatever it is but put a stop to it and and you know so you have to take a practical step and then you need to pray and and fill your mind and heart with the word of God so you don't get into that situation again yeah I think of Joseph when is you're talking about a way of escape look at literally what Joseph did when Potiphar's wife tried to pull him down and have sex with her listen there was nobody around this could have been maybe oh this is maybe my way up to climb the corporate ladder Joseph might have thought but you know what he honored God and Joseph ran out of that room she ripped his cloak off of him he's thinking ran out of there naked and it's like hey he was doing what was right and he did what was embarrassing and maybe what the culture would have said you're an idiot for doing that but God had provided a way of escape and sometimes that way of escape is literally an off button a doorknob or literally a window that you need to climb out of and get out of that situation studies have been done that show that people who live together before marriage actually have far higher divorce rates than people that don't so you think oh yeah we're practicing we're you know checking it out no actually what you're doing you're sabotaging that's what you're doing so I'm going to move into this house but before I do I'm going to take you know a backhoe and tear the foundation apart as I'm living in it yeah that's a way to ruin your marriage in the future not to set the stage for a successful marriage and you know sex is a wonderful part of marriage but that's not what marriage is all about and there's a lot more to it it's really for you know as time passes and we've been married well over 40 years Kathy and I you know we we've come to value each other so much as not you know husband and wife yes but as just friends the closest friends too and in partners in every way and and it's so wonderful I must say as we look back in our life when we have memories going back decades remember this time remember that and and watching our children grow watching our grandchildren grow all of this blessedness that comes from honoring the word of God pastor Greg Laurie speaking with his associate pastors Jason Powell and Jonathan Laurie about God's plan for sex within marriage an important addition of a new beginning today one of our top 10 most requested messages of the year and our series of best of messages will extend into the new year you know pastor Greg evangelism is our heartbeat here at harvest ministries it pervades all we do and we're making available a great resource that undergirds our evangelism efforts season one of the chosen on DVD yes how can we use this as an evangelism tool especially with those who just you know just don't go to church yeah that's a great question because we're dealing with the generation now that has been born with screens they've never known a life without an iphone or a tablet device or or a big screen in front of them somewhere so this is how many of them process information now of course we would like them to become more literate and read more but hey let's meet people where they are and so that one of the best ways you can come to them is through cinema through film through dramatizing something and telling a true story but in a way that connects to them culturally and I can't think of anyone who's done a better job of this than director Dallas Jenkins in this series called the chosen the chosen is a dramatic depiction of the life and ministry of Jesus and it's done in a way like I've never seen before these apostles come to life these bible stories just jump out at you in a way like you've never seen before and I'm very excited to announce that we are offering season one of the chosen to you this month for your gift of any size and what a great time to sit down and watch these stories with your family I have to tell you the episode where Jesus encounters Nicodemus is one of the most moving things I've ever seen in fact I've been speaking with actor Jonathan Rumi who plays the role of Jesus and told him how powerful his portrayal of Christ was in those scenes of the chosen what have you come here to show us a kingdom that is what our rulers are worried about not that kind then what a sort of kingdom that a person cannot see unless he is born again born again yes you mean a new creature a conversion from gentile to jewish no no that's not what I'm talking about then what is born again I hope you don't mean return to the womb because that would be a problem for me my mother and she rest in peace is dead truly I say to you unless one is born of water in the spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God that which is born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of the spirit is spirit that part of you that is what must be reborn to new life so we're going to send this to you for your gift of any size whatever you send to help us financially to continue on teaching the word of God and preaching the gospel will be greatly appreciated and we will rush you your copy of season one of the chosen so you can sit down with your family and start enjoying it together but it's not just entertainment you're going to be moved spiritually and it's going to make you want to open up your bible and read the stories as given to us in the gospel so don't delay order your copy of season one of the chosen for your gift of any size to harvest ministries yes the perfect time to have a dvd that tells the real story of Jesus it would make for good quality time with your kids or grandkids as pastor Greg said we'll send it to you to thank you for your investment in this ministry and the lives that will be touched in the coming year and doesn't our culture need a touch from the Lord right about now so thanks for your investment today and we'll say thanks tangibly with season one of the tv series called the chosen and today is our last opportunity to mention this so get in touch right away you can donate securely online at harvest.org or write us at a new beginning box 4000 riverside california 92514 or call us anytime 24 7 at 1-800-821-3300 that's 1-800-821-3300 well next time pastor Greg has more counsel from this top 10 message called god's plan for sex and marriage good insights on helping our marriages go the distance join us here on a new beginning with pastor and bible teacher Greg Laurie a new beginning is a podcast made possible by harvest partners helping people everywhere know god if this show has impacted your life share your story leave a review on your favorite podcast app and help others find hope