Seventh Commandment: Keep Marriage Holy – Part 1

Hi, I'm Robert Jeffress, and I'm glad to serve as your Bible teacher every day on this great radio station.

On today's edition of Pathway to Victory. You shall not commit adultery. Adultery is to break a covenant, a promise you've made to your wife or to your husband, and more importantly to God himself. And when you commit adultery, you are breaking that covenant. That's why God says you are not to commit adultery. Welcome to Pathway to Victory with author and pastor Dr. Robert Jeffress. You know, most of us can imagine the devastating risks and consequences that come with committing adultery.

Yet despite these warning signs, men and women continue to step outside the limits of their marriage covenant. Today on Pathway to Victory, Dr. Robert Jeffress shares what we can do to resist the temptations of adultery. Now here's our Bible teacher to introduce today's message.

Dr. Jeffress? Thanks, David, and welcome to this Friday edition of Pathway to Victory. While you have some extra time this weekend, why not take a few moments and check out the upcoming Pathway to Victory Cruise to Alaska. We'd love to have you join us for this unforgettable vacation experience.

The dates are June 15th through 22nd. And as one of our co-travelers, you'll get to see breathtaking views from the deck of our luxury cruise ship. Each of those spectacular moments will draw you closer to your creator. Along the way, we'll enjoy the Christian music of Rebecca St. James and Michael O'Brien. We'll enjoy the comedy of comedian Dennis Swanberg, and I'll be opening God's Word for our study as well.

So take a look at all the details and make plans to join us by going to ptv.org. Today's the 20th of October, and time is running short to request a copy of my brand new book called The Ten. How to live and love in a world that has lost its way. This book is the one that coincides with our current teaching series on Pathway to Victory.

I believe this is one of, if not the most important book you'll read this entire year. And that's because the Ten Commandments represent a simple code of ethics that will save us from ourselves. Ask for a copy of my new book, The Ten, when you give a generous gift to support the ministry of Pathway to Victory. Few mistakes pose a greater threat to marriage than adultery. So, how can we guard ourselves and our families against the temptation of moral compromise?

Well, I believe the key is found in the seventh commandment. I titled today's message, Keep Marriage Holy. Some time ago, a man from another church came to visit with me and to confess that he was involved in an adulterous relationship. And trying to be pastoral and empathetic, I thought I could maybe vocalize what he was feeling. I said, I'm sure you're overwhelmed by guilt and grief and you've probably never been more miserable in your life than you are right now, but there is a way out. And he looked at me with a perplexed look and said, no, actually, I'm happier than I've ever been before.

I learned right then, don't try to imagine what other people are feeling. The truth is, and you don't hear this often from us preacher types, the truth is sin is very pleasurable. It's enticing.

It's alluring. If it wasn't, nobody would sin. Sin is pleasurable, especially sexual sin for a season, for a season. Solomon, who had his own share of illicit relationships, wrote in Proverbs 9 17, stolen water is sweet and bread eaten in secret is pleasant. But then he goes on to say in verse 18, what was sweet can become sour. What was delicious decays, leading to death. Or listen to Solomon's words again in Proverbs 5 verses 3 and 4, for the lips of an adulterous drip honey and smoother than oil is her speech.

But in the end, she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two edged sword. Sin is pleasurable, but only for a season. And perhaps no sin leaves a wake of destruction behind it, like the sin we're talking about today. It affects not only those involved, but the innocent parties. It can affect generations to come, which is why one of the top 10 on God's list of commandments is the seventh commandment found in Exodus 20 14, you shall not commit adultery.

Now what I want to do today is four things. I want us to talk about the meaning of adultery. We're going to look at the progression of adultery, how it happens. Third, we're going to look at some biblical steps for the avoidance of adultery. And finally, I want to end on a note of hope, talking about the aftermath of adultery. First of all, let's talk about why it is that God talks about adultery and what is it he's exactly talking about. To do this, we need to pull back and get a picture, an overview of the subject of sex. You know, the fact is, contrary to what most people think, God is very pro sex.

Did you know that? He is pro sex. The reason I know that is because he dreamed up the idea of sex.

Have you ever really thought about that? God in heaven thinking up the whole sexual act, designing the equipment we need to enjoy that act? It was all God's idea. And contrary to what the Puritans taught, sex was not primarily given by God for procreation. It was given for pleasure. The first sex act in the Bible was between a man and a woman who were married.

There is no hint that there was any child that came from that first act. It was given to seal the emotional, physical, and spiritual unity of two people. It's amazing that there are really very few instructions in the Bible about sex. Basically, God said, enjoy it all you want and all you can. I'm only going to give you one restriction for sex, and that is it needs to be within a marriage relationship. That's really the only instruction and restriction. It needs to be within marriage.

But that says a lot to us today. Sex is not for single people. For single people to have sex before marriage is what the Bible calls fornication. Sex is not for people of the same sex. Oh, I know, some people say, well, what if they're married? Trust me, they're not married. No gay person has ever been married.

It's impossible. God has defined marriage, Jesus did in Matthew 19, as between one man and one woman. That's the only kind of marriage God recognizes. So let's not try to be smarter than God about that. For two people of the same sex to have sex is immorality.

But a married person who has sex outside the marriage, that is what adultery is. And God had a very direct word about his attitude toward adultery. Found in Malachi chapter two, verses 13 and 14. The Israelites were whining about why God didn't answer their prayers. And so God said, you want to know the reason?

Here it is. You cover the altar of the Lord with tears, with weeping, with groaning, because he no longer regards the offering or accepts it with favor from your hand. Yet you say, for what reason? Why is God angry?

Because the Lord has been a witness between you and the life of your youth. Against whom you have dealt treacherously, though she is your companion and your wife, by covenant. Adultery is to break a covenant, a promise you've made to your wife or to your husband.

And more importantly, to God himself. And when you commit adultery, you are breaking that covenant. That's why God says you are not to commit adultery. A further explanation of adultery is found in 1 Corinthians 7, verse 2. Paul writes, because of immoralities, each man is to have, underline that, his own wife, and each woman is to have, underline it again, her own husband.

That Greek word have, echo, in non-biblical literature was used in Greek to refer to have somebody sexually. The idea is to, each man is to have his own wife, each woman her own husband. Not somebody else's wife or somebody else's husband. You know, to go outside of marriage and have sex with somebody else. The Bible says it's like a rich man who steals from a poor man, not because he needs it, but just for the thrill of it. If you have your own mate, you don't need another mate. By the way, that's exactly the metaphor that Nathan the prophet used when he accused David of adultery.

He used the story of a rich man who had plenty of lambs, but he decided to steal the lamb, the little you lamb, of a poor man, and God condemned him for that. That's what it is to have sex with somebody who is not our mate. Well, how does it happen? How does adultery happen? It doesn't just come out of nowhere. The progression of adultery, and for that matter every sin, is found in James chapter 1 beginning with verse 13.

We're going to look at James later this year. But notice this progression of sin in verses 13 through 15. Adultery first of all begins in the mind, mental adultery. Look at verse 13 of James 1. Let no one say when he is tempted, I am being tempted by God. For God cannot be tempted by evil, and he himself does not tempt anyone. James was saying there are people who right before they plunged into temptation, they said, well, this must be God's will because he allowed it. No, don't let anybody say that. God does not tempt any of us.

Would you say that with me? God does not tempt any of us. Satan is the one who tempts us to destroy our faith. God tests us to strengthen our faith. Temptation is an enticement to evil.

Testing is an enticement to good. God doesn't tempt us, Satan does to destroy us. So then how does sin come into our life if God's not doing the tempting?

Look at the equation for sin in verse 14. But each person is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. That word translated carried away, elkomai, means to be drawn with an inward power.

The first ingredient of sin is that strong inward draw we all are born with toward it. But then he said each man is carried away and enticed. That Greek word enticed is a fishing term. It means to hook. It's the process by which a fisherman catches a fish. The fish is drawn by its hunger, its inward power. The fisherman knows if he's good exactly when to drop the bait and what kind of bait to use. And that fish so blinded by its inward hunger bites at that bait, not knowing there's a hook in it that will destroy it.

And that's how it works with us. It's our own inward power drive toward sin coupled with an external temptation. Satan is the master fisherman.

He knows exactly what bait to use and when to use it. And when inward lust meets outward temptation, the result is sin. By the way, James is using a sexual metaphor here.

He's saying just like the egg and the sperm come together at just the right time to produce life. So lust and temptation come exactly together at the wrong time to produce death. That's what he's talking about here, that inward lust. In Matthew 5, 28, Jesus said, But I say to you that everybody who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. What does he mean by that?

He's telling us something very important. He's saying if you think about something long enough, you'll end up doing it. And that's what lust is. It's not just glancing at somebody.

It is staring at somebody. It involves a mental undressing of that person, an imaginary sexual encounter with that person. And when you nurse that experience in your mind over and over again, we're all programmed in such a way that what we think about often enough, we end up doing. And that leads to the next step in the progression of adultery. It goes from mental adultery to physical adultery. Verse 15, Then when lust has conceived, there's that analogy, that metaphor, it is conceived, it gives birth, not to life, but to sin. And when sin is accomplished, that is fully developed, it brings forth death. In James 29, verse 33, God says those who commit adultery commit villainy. In other words, it's something wicked, even something criminal. Have you heard that, oh, there's nothing wrong with sex? It's a victimless crime.

Not at all. There are many victims, especially in adultery. And look at the victims that the Bible talks about. Adultery is, first of all, a crime against our own mate. When we give to somebody else outside the marriage what belongs to our mate, it's stealing from them.

My friend Derek Jeter has written about that. He says, sexual intercourse is not merely the joining of two bodies for the duration of the sex act. It entails the whole person, body, soul, and spirit.

It's an investment of emotions and wills. Sex is the most intimate experience two people can engage in with one another. In that way, he says, adultery is a form of theft, stealing from their spouses to whom a spouse's body belongs. Not only is it a crime against our mate, adultery is a crime against our God. Remember when Joseph was alone with Potiphar's wife and Mrs. Potiphar started to make the moves on him?

What was his response? He said, how could I do such an evil thing and sin against God? If he had succumbed to that temptation, it would have been a sin against Mrs. Potiphar, against Potiphar himself, but ultimately he said it would be a sin against God. David said, after he confessed his sin with Bathsheba, Psalm 51 verse 4, against you God and you only have I sinned.

This wasn't discounting the fact he had sinned against Bathsheba and Uriah, but again, all sin is ultimately against God. In 1 Corinthians 6, 19 and 20, Paul drives that point home when he says, Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price, therefore glorify God in your body.

Think about this. If you're a Christian, indwelt by the Holy Spirit of God, when you have sex with somebody who is not your mate, you're inviting the Holy Spirit of God to participate in that sin with you because you're indwelt with the Holy Spirit. Should the Holy Spirit participate in adultery or immorality?

Paul said in verse 15, may goneto, may it never be. Such a thought is unthinkable, and yet that's what we do when we sin. And finally, adultery is a crime against ourselves.

We think we're the victor if we're involved in an adulterous relationship, but we are a victim. Listen to verse 18 of 1 Corinthians 6, Flee immorality, for every other sin that a man commits is outside the body. But the immoral man sins against his own body. What does that mean? In what sense are you sinning against your own body?

Again, my friend Derek Jeter gives some great insight. He said, no sin is as directly destructive to the sinner as is the sin of sexual immorality. Illicit sexual contact involves the body as the instrument of sin and cannot be undone. Other sins, such as gluttony and drunkenness, encompass morally neutral things, such as food or drink. There's nothing righteous or unrighteous about food or drink in which the body participates and, though destructive, can be corrected through abstinence.

Now get this. However, a touch can never be untouched. A kiss can never be unkissed.

An embrace can never be unembraced. In this sense, all other sins are outside the body, while sexual sin is against the body, a body that has become the temple of the Holy Spirit. I might add, and it's obvious, when we commit adultery, we're also sinning against our sexual partner.

We're forcing them to become an accomplice to every crime we just talked about. They're sinning against themselves, against their God, and against their mate if they're married. It starts with mental adultery, then there is physical adultery, and finally, James says in verse 15, there is death. When sin is accomplished, it brings forth death. What does he mean death? Well, there's a general sense in which all sin ends up in physical death.

The reason we die is because we've inherited the sin virus, but I think he's talking about something more here. Sin destroys everything important to us, and I can see from my own experience as a pastor how adultery can destroy a marriage. It destroys a family. It destroys a career. It destroys a reputation. It can destroy your ministry. It destroys everything that is valuable to us, and that's why there are so many warnings about adultery. Solomon, he experienced the effects of adultery with his dad, King David, and the heartache it brought to David. He experienced it in his own life as well.

Just listen to some of these warnings. Proverbs 6, verses 25 and 26. Do not desire her beauty in your heart, nor let her capture you with her eyelids, for on account of a harlot one is reduced to a loaf of bread and an adulterous hunts for the precious life.

If you ever talk to anybody having to pay alimony or child support or having to divide their household, they'll tell you what it means to be reduced to a loaf of bread. Proverbs 6, verses 27 to 29. Can a man take fire to his bosom and his clothes not be burned? This is something you can't play around with.

Can a man walk on hot coals and his feet not be scorched? So is the one who goes into his neighbor's wife. Whoever touches her will not go unpunished. Or here's one that's just as blunt as you can get, Proverbs 6, 32. The one who commits adultery has no sense. He who would destroy himself does it.

Disgraces his lot and his shame will never be wiped away. One more warning and a note of hope. Ecclesiastes 7, 26. I discovered more bitter than death is the adulterous woman whose heart is snared and is nets and whose hands are chains. But one who is pleasing to God will escape from her, but the sinner will be captured by her. If you're a believer, adultery isn't inevitable. There is a way to escape from that sin, but you have to be intentional to do so.

How do you avoid the devastating sin of adultery? Solomon said the key is Proverbs 4, 23. He wrote, watch over your heart with all diligence, for out of your heart flow the issues, the springs of life. You have to understand, in the Hebrew mind, the heart was not the center of emotion. You know, today we think of hearts, Valentine's Day.

You probably got some hearts if you were a mom today from your children or grandchildren. It's a feeling that you have. But that wasn't the way the Hebrews thought of it. To the Hebrews, the seed of emotion wasn't the heart, but the bowels, the intestines. That's where you felt things deeply. The heart was the center of thought. It was the mind. That's why Proverbs says, as a man thinks in his what? Heart. That's what we think with our heart.

So is he. So when Solomon says, watch over your heart, he's not just talking about your affections. He's talking about your mind. That's where it all starts. I want to suggest today there are five centuries, five soldiers that you ought to employ to guard your heart, your mind, to protect you from adultery.

First of all, your eyes. Make a covenant with your eyes. Job said in Job 31, verse 1, I made a covenant with my eyes not to look lustfully at a woman. There's more I need to share with you on this sensitive topic. So please be sure to join me for part two of my message, Keep Marriage Holy. In the meantime, I'm inviting you to reach out to Pathway to Victory so that I can send you a copy of my brand-new book called The Ten, How to Live and Love in a World That Has Lost Its Way. This is the book I wrote while preparing The Ten Messages for this teaching series.

I believe the biblical teaching in my book, When Applied, has the power to radically transform your outlook on life. The Ten Commandments are designed to keep you safe and to bless you. Plus, by adhering to the Ten Commandments, our entire community and even our country benefits as well. In addition to my book and when you respond today, I'll be sure to include ten exclusive encouragement cards.

Each card features one of the Ten Commandments so that you can carry a reminder of the simple truths in your coat pocket or handbag. Well, at Pathway to Victory, we want to see men and women across our country, as well as around the world, align their values with the Ten Commandments and the whole counsel of God's Word, from Genesis to Revelation. You probably know of couples in your sphere of influence that need solid Bible teaching to help them cultivate a healthy marriage relationship. All to say, when you give generously, you're providing the timeless wisdom of the Bible to families all across our country. So, thank you for partnering with us. Together, God is using our collective gifts to pierce the darkness with the light of God's Word.

David? Thanks, Dr. Jeffress. When you invest in the ministry of Pathway to Victory by giving a generous gift, we'll say thanks by sending you the brand-new book by Dr. Jeffress titled The Ten, How to Live and Love in a World That Has Lost Its Way. Plus, as an added bonus, we'll also include a set of ten encouragement cards. Call 866-999-2965 or visit our website. That's at ptv.org. Now, when your gift is $100 or more, we'll also send you the complete collection of audio and video discs for The Ten Teaching Series.

Plus, you'll also receive a study guide to use on your own or with a small group. One more time, call 866-999-2965 or go to ptv.org. You could write to us if you'd like. Here's that mailing address. P.O. Box 223609, Dallas, Texas, 75222. Again, that's P.O. Box 223609, Dallas, Texas, 75222. I'm David J. Mullins. Wishing you a great weekend, then join us again next week when our study of the Ten Commandments continues. That's Monday, here on Pathway to Victory. Pathway to Victory with Dr. Robert Jeffress comes from the pulpit of the First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas.