More Relevant Than Ever

Our present day culture is over-sexed. I don't even know if that's a term, but I think you know what I mean. Pop music incessantly fills our ears with sex and romance, advertisements visually taunt, the substance of many TV shows is silly talk and coarse jesting. That's just the beginning: movies, magazine covers, headlines, games - the list is almost endless. Sex - the pushing of it and the concept of being motivated by it - is everywhere present. Well, maybe not if you are alone in the woods. But even that would depend on who you are. Our minds are inescapable and are highly influenced by our souls. And our souls are impacted by all this stuff around us.

American culture has bought this junk hook, line, and sinker. We have even allowed ourselves to be defined by our sexual behavior. We claim identities like heterosexual, bisexual, homosexual, transgender, yada, yada, yada. I'm sorry, but I think I am much more than my sexual behavior. A whole lot more.

Once upon a time it was simple. So simple that we had only to check one of two boxes: male or female. "That's all." (Think Meryl Streep in Devil Wears Prada for that one...)

I am best with simple things. I do simple best. I need simple. Get the message? So when emotions are pushed and pulled, appealed to and manipulated, then stirred up to the point of desiring action, I pull back and reach for the Word of God. I find the simple words of scripture to be a bedrock for my soul which is readily assaulted or set to sea in a windblown craft of frail structure.

For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor,  not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God...1 Thess. 4.3-5

This text is pretty straightforward and simple: abstain from sexual immorality. Possess your vessel (otherwise known as self-control.) Do not act out of passion of lust. And might I add: DO NOT make decisions while in a frenzy of sexual desire, emotion, or romantic soulful responses; and DO NOT look for Godly wisdom that will also embrace these things. It is clear from scripture that pursuit of His will DOES NOT include immorality or passion of lust.

Sights and sounds around you are pushing you, drawing you, enticing you. And what's more, emotionally based pleas to surrender Godly wisdom for carnal wisdom are broadcast, shouted, MEGAPHONED continuously - pleas that would make you feel less than compassionate and caring, pleas that demand personal happiness over sacrificial living and Godliness (not knowing and believing that true Godliness brings deeper happiness.)

We are assaulted with questions and demands concerning acceptance of immoral relationships, definition of marriage, government funded birth control. We find ourselves grappling with questions of where to draw the line with entertainment (we want to be relevant, right?), internet (it CONSTANTLY bombards my view with less than desirable images), music (have you really listened to these lyrics?)

You become like the thing you behold. It happens. How do you think Madison Avenue works? Why do you think we all like the same thing at the same time? You do realize that two decades ago most American homemakers decorated with vintage Victorian and now those same homemakers look to Pottery Barn to set the pace, don't you. Why is that? It's because if we look at something long enough we like it.

So, look at the Word. Look long at the Word. Look honestly at the Word. And pray that the Holy Spirit would make the Word life and healing to your hammered, bruised soul.

Holiness isn't lame, boring, empty and shallow like the Liar would like you to believe. It is wonderful, happy, warm, beautiful, and light.

For God did not call us to uncleanness, but in holiness. Therefore he who rejects this does not reject man, but God, who has also given us His Holy Spirit.   1 Thess. 4.7,8

Let's remember the council at Jerusalem. There were only four things listed: abstain from meat sacrificed to idols, meat strangled, blood, and sexual immorality (Acts 15.29). It is simply obvious that God considered this important.

Sexual immorality is rampant. Our young children are barraged with wrong thinking and unholy ideas about sexuality. They are pushed, pulled, and shoved. It is time to consider long the Word of God.