Participants:
Series Code: RQRA
Program Code: RQRA000016A
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00:01 I don't understand.
00:04 Why did this have to happen to me? 00:08 I feel like I just can't make sense of things. 00:12 I need answers. 00:15 Where is God? 00:21 Hello and welcome to Raw Questions Relevant Answers, 00:24 a program where we, as young people, 00:26 wrestle with issues that young people wrestle with 00:29 and we find answers in the scriptures, 00:31 that's our burden. 00:33 Today's topic is a heavy one, it's on sexuality. 00:36 And so I've got two great friends 00:38 with me here as co-hosts, 00:40 I've got Michelle Doucoumes and Mark Paden, 00:42 and I guess let's just go ahead and do what we can 00:45 with what we've got here. 00:46 So the first question is, 00:49 "How can we maintain a heart 00:50 and mind of purity in a society 00:53 that seems to glorify instant gratification 00:55 and 'do what feels good' 00:57 when it comes to relationships and sexuality choices?" 01:00 It's from a female in Washington. 01:02 How do we maintain a heart and mind of purity in a society 01:05 that says, "That's nonsense, 01:08 do what you want and do it now." 01:10 Job 14:4. Ooh. 01:13 "Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean one? 01:17 No one." 01:19 You know, what we put in ourselves is what comes out. 01:23 I think that's one of the reasons 01:24 why sexuality is such a hard struggle. 01:26 It's not just the innate hormones 01:30 and other things inside of us. 01:32 It's also that we live in 01:34 an extremely sexualized culture today. 01:37 And I think the person asking this question realizes this. 01:40 Yes. It's everywhere. 01:42 It's in your movies. 01:44 It's in the music we listen to. 01:46 It's in the social media. 01:48 Just on Instagram today, we were talking about this. 01:51 Go to a little search button, 01:52 there's all this junk that comes up. 01:54 And so what do we do with that? 01:57 You know, the first thing I would say is 01:59 we do need to watch 02:00 what we're putting in, it's going to change us. 02:03 We don't think it will, but imperceptibly, 02:06 our views of sexuality become more and more corrupted 02:10 but God wants to restore that. 02:12 That's another thing that I've seen that's beautiful, 02:14 and this is in 2 Corinthians 11:2. 02:18 Christ is talking about how he views us as his people. 02:22 He says, "I am jealous for you with godly jealousy, " 02:25 that's Paul speaking on behalf of God, 02:28 "For I have betrothed you to one husband, 02:31 that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ." 02:36 He wants us to be a chaste virgin onto him. 02:38 Now that might not seem possible. 02:40 For some watching here like, 02:42 "I've already kind of messed up my life in sexuality, 02:45 and it's already pretty corrupt." 02:47 But also remember 02:48 that God doesn't ask us for things 02:50 that he is not gonna enable us to do. 02:52 Amen. 02:54 That he is not gonna say, 02:55 "I wanna present you as a chaste virgin," 02:56 if He doesn't have the ability to cleanse our minds 02:59 and rewrite some of this nasty stuff 03:01 that goes into our sexuality, from our backgrounds, 03:04 from the world around us. 03:06 Yeah, 100%. 03:07 You know, there's another verse in Psalm 101:3, 03:12 "I will set no wicked thing before mine eyes." 03:16 I think this honestly 03:18 is where the rubber meets the road. 03:20 We don't come out of the womb thinking of all the ways 03:25 that we can, you know, mess up in a sexual way. 03:29 We come out of the womb pure-ish. 03:31 But then when, I mean, we're still fallen, 03:34 but what we really gives us the idea for temptation 03:38 is what we put in front of us. 03:40 And so I think the biggest thing 03:43 that we can do for ourselves 03:44 is guard well the avenues of the soul, you know? 03:48 Stay away from the things 03:50 that are gonna suggest temptation. 03:52 Yeah. 03:54 You know, and like for me, it's... 03:57 I had to do certain things like, 03:58 on Instagram, I don't follow people 04:00 that post certain things, you know? 04:01 Like I can't have mercy, right? 04:04 And are they things like that, stay away from the shows, 04:07 the music that's suggesting sexual things 04:10 and just really be cognizant about that 04:12 and know that whatever you consistently view, 04:16 that's what you're gonna be. 04:18 You develop an appetite 04:19 for the things that you consume, right? 04:21 They may be, you know, offend to you initially, 04:23 but then you kind of grow a comfort. 04:24 In 1 Corinthians 6:9 and10, 04:29 Paul kind of lays out this stuff, 04:30 he says, verse nine, 04:32 "Do you not know that the unrighteous 04:33 will not inherit the kingdom of God?" 04:35 Then he says, "Do not be deceived." 04:36 And he starts listing a bunch of stuff 04:37 that's gonna disqualify people 04:39 for the kingdom of heaven, right? 04:40 "Fornicators, idolaters, adulterers," in other things, 04:44 when he says, what I love is in verse 11. 04:47 He says, "But such were some of you, 04:50 but you were washed, 04:51 but you were sanctified, 04:52 but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus 04:54 and by the Spirit of our God." 04:56 And I love this because some of these things 04:58 are listed to disqualify people from heaven. 05:01 When they encounter the gospel of Jesus Christ, 05:03 they can be qualified for the kingdom of heaven. 05:05 He can wash them. He can regenerate them. 05:07 So even if you have a brain that's just depraved 05:10 and you feel like an animal, 05:11 there's a God in heaven 05:13 who can rewire our circuitry. 05:15 But our responsibility is to disassociate ourselves 05:18 from things that are bridges to a place 05:20 that we don't need to be anymore. 05:21 Yeah. 05:22 And only we know what those boundaries are. 05:24 If you need to shut down social media, 05:25 if you need to stop watching this 05:26 or stop listening to that, 05:28 then follow the prompting of God, 05:29 the conviction of God, and do so. 05:32 Never put yourself in a situation, 05:33 it says in 1 Corinthians 10 that, 05:35 "Let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall." 05:38 Yeah. Yes. 05:39 But what I love he says that, 05:42 "No temptation is overtaking you 05:43 except such as is common to man, 05:45 but God is faithful, 05:46 who will not allow you to be tempted 05:48 beyond what you are able. 05:49 But with the temptation, 05:50 we will also make a way of escape." 05:52 That means that first of all, 05:53 you are not a loser for thinking these thoughts, 05:55 other people wrestled with it. 05:56 Don't think you are too big for your bridges 05:57 and you will never fall, it's another thing. 05:59 But thirdly, the other point that's made in this text 06:01 is that every single time that you are tempted, 06:03 there's a fork on the road 06:05 and God is offering another direction 06:06 to go when tempted. 06:08 And that we can respond to the spirits 06:10 prompting in that moment and move the other direction. 06:12 May I say something about temptation that has helped me? 06:15 Yes. 06:16 You know, we have desires in us. 06:20 Well, how can I help it that I have sexual desires? 06:23 We are made with these. 06:25 Well, James chapter 1 has helped me. 06:26 Verse 14 it says, "But each one is tempted 06:28 when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. 06:31 When desire conceived, 06:33 it gives brings forth sin, 06:34 and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death." 06:36 We don't want that. 06:37 But then verse 16, 06:38 "Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren, 06:41 every good gift and every perfect gift 06:43 is from above and comes down from the Father of lights, 06:45 with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning." 06:49 It's really interesting. 06:50 After this whole thing about desire and temptation, 06:53 James says don't be deceived, the good things are from God. 06:57 Think about it this way. 06:58 Does Satan have creative power? 07:01 Right. No. 07:02 He doesn't. Yeah. 07:03 The only thing he has power to do 07:05 is pervert and counterfeit. 07:07 God has given sexual desire and it's a good thing. 07:10 We shouldn't be ashamed of it. 07:11 I think sometimes we become ashamed of it 07:13 and make the whole thing dirty, it's not. 07:16 But when we experience a desire that's not for something good, 07:20 think about what is the devil perverting 07:22 that God really wants to give me. 07:24 And go to God for the true thing 07:26 instead of a counterfeit. 07:28 It's just a counterfeit of something 07:30 that is real and good. 07:32 I think it's a beautiful point 07:33 that sexuality is not a bad thing, 07:35 it's the corruption of sexuality that is. 07:38 When we were talking about temptation, 07:39 it reminded of Charles Spurgeon, He said, 07:40 "You can't stop the birds from flying over your head, 07:42 but you can stop them 07:44 from building a nest in your hair." 07:45 Right? 07:46 To be tempted is one thing, 07:48 to play with the temptation or run with it 07:49 is a totally different one. 07:51 Jesus himself was tempted and never sinned. 07:53 It's what we do 07:54 with the temptation at the moment, 07:56 and yeah, it's a great point. 07:57 You have one more thing? 07:58 Yeah, one other point really quick to just to 08:00 'cause I think sometimes 08:02 we get in this cultural slumber of saying, 08:07 "You know, as long as I not do anything, 08:11 I can just look, right?" 08:13 Window shopping, huh? Yeah, exactly. 08:16 And even I think we do it in ways 08:18 that we don't realize as much like 08:21 swooning over some actors or something, right? 08:25 But I want to bring our attention 08:27 to this verse in Matthew 5:27, 08:30 "You have heard that it was said 08:32 by them of old time, 08:33 'You shall not commit adultery.' " 08:35 And this is Christ saying, "But I say unto you 08:37 that whoever looks on a woman to lust after her 08:40 has committed adultery with her already in his heart." 08:42 Wow. 08:44 So the God's law really gets down 08:47 to even our thoughts 08:49 and what we're thinking about when we look at somebody. 08:52 Yeah, it's true. 08:53 This is our second question here, 08:56 and this is from a female in Tennessee. 08:58 "Is divorce really only sanctioned 09:00 for cases of sexual immorality?" 09:02 And then it kind of put examples of that unfaithfulness 09:04 or rape or etcetera, 09:06 is divorce only sanctioned for cases 09:08 such as sexual immorality? 09:12 Definitely a big one. Yeah. 09:14 You want to go on this one? 09:15 Well, I'll just go to the simple answer first. 09:18 In Matthew 19, Jesus spoke about this. 09:21 He was asked about 09:22 basically this very question when is divorce appropriate, 09:26 when is divorce not appropriate. 09:28 In verse 8, after the Jews asked him, he said, 09:32 "Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts, 09:34 permitted you to divorce your wives, 09:36 but from the beginning it was not so. 09:39 And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, 09:41 except for sexual immorality, and marries another, 09:43 commits adultery. 09:45 And whoever marries her 09:47 who is divorced commits adultery." 09:49 Now it's an interesting context in Jesus' day, 09:52 divorce had become a lot more common apparently, 09:55 and they were doing this for a lot of different reasons. 09:58 And Jesus said it was never meant for this. 10:02 The two were meant to become one flesh. 10:05 It's not meant to just get ripped apart. 10:07 "And what God has joined together, 10:08 let man not separate." 10:10 Right. Right. 10:11 And the other thing too 10:12 is that we have to look into the rationale behind this, 10:14 like God isn't just up there in heaven and be like, 10:15 "Oh, I just want to torment somebody 10:17 by letting them only have one person in life." 10:21 The reason that God has put this in place 10:23 is that he knows that that is a very fabric of society. 10:27 I mean, the family is the most elemental grouping 10:32 in society that we have, 10:33 and it's from the strength of the family 10:36 that the nation, that the world finds strength. 10:39 So if, I mean, we see the pain and heartache, 10:43 just the bad stuff that happens when families get ripped apart, 10:47 I mean, especially young people 10:49 go through a tremendous amount of heartache and pain in that. 10:52 And God's prohibition on this 10:54 is in one sense 10:58 to give us a lot more caution going into a marriage 11:02 that we need to be very careful 11:05 what we are getting ourselves into 11:07 'cause God doesn't want us to get into a marriage 11:09 just thinking like, 11:12 "If I'm buying something, 11:13 oh, you know, I can get rid of it in a little bit 11:15 if it doesn't work out." 11:17 Return policy. Right, exactly. 11:18 We can't do that with a marriage. 11:20 And that's I think a big reason why God instituted this 11:22 is that he doesn't want a society 11:25 that is constantly getting ripped apart 11:26 at its most elemental level. 11:28 Yeah. 11:29 And I think that the purpose, when these two become one, 11:31 there is this sensitive, 11:33 the physical act of the two becoming one, 11:34 this is meant to kind of bond them, 11:36 and there's even science that proves this 11:37 is it bonds you psychologically, emotionally, 11:39 and physically, and otherwise. 11:41 And this is what God intended to kind of seal this union 11:44 between two people whom he was leading together. 11:47 So I think before one is married, 11:48 this is something we need to think very clearly 11:50 and strongly and deeply and prayerfully 11:53 about seeking much counsel 11:55 because this isn't just a light thing, right? 11:57 Marriage is a really big deal. 11:59 It's a blessing. 12:00 It's one of the things that God gave to man 12:01 in its unfallen state 12:03 that's still available to us and is a privilege. 12:06 Now there is a disclaimer we need to make 12:07 or at least something we need to kind of address 12:09 that what about situations 12:11 where someone is in an abusive environment? 12:13 So let's say, that's all well and good beforehand, 12:15 but I'm in a marriage... 12:16 And maybe there wasn't any adultery or something. 12:18 Right. 12:19 But I'm in a situation now where I'm being hurt, 12:21 my children are being hurt. 12:23 It's an unsafe environment. 12:24 We don't have a lot of time. 12:26 But one of the things we have to counsel 12:27 is we are not saying 12:29 when we are talking about divorce not being as ideal. 12:31 We are not saying that someone should stay in a home, 12:34 physically staying in a home, where abuse is happening. 12:37 Our counsel to you 12:39 with as much sincerity as we can muster 12:40 is get out immediately, 12:42 find a form of a structured separation, 12:44 and then begin the process of seeking a professional help 12:47 and intervention immediately. 12:48 You and the children get out of that environment 12:51 and seek professional help immediately. 12:54 And in those situations, 12:56 what would prompt something like that, abuse, 12:59 very unhelpful addictive behaviors 13:02 and violence, things like these and adultery, 13:05 those are things where it's wise to separate, 13:07 seek intervention and begin the process 13:09 of seeking professional help 13:10 to know how to work through this. 13:12 Yeah. 13:13 And I think, biblically speaking, 13:15 this is very logical. 13:16 God would not want us to be in constant fear for lives. 13:20 That's not good. Yeah. Right. 13:22 And if we are in a situation 13:23 where somebody is really getting hurt, 13:26 it's good to get some distance. 13:27 Yeah, 100%, that's reasonable. 13:29 And it's also because 13:30 Jesus doesn't give the admonition 13:32 though that it still gives us the freedom to just remarry, 13:36 to do some of these things, 13:37 and I know this is a hard thing 13:39 and that's why we want to think carefully 13:41 about who we marry and how we do that. 13:44 But I'm glad you mentioned that, 13:45 especially for other women out there, 13:47 I know there are people 13:49 who are afraid to take the step 13:51 to step out and to get help, and that's needed. 13:54 It's the right thing to do, and it's the best thing to do 13:56 particularly when children 13:58 are involved in any situation, period. 14:00 That's all the time we have for today unfortunately. 14:02 But again, thank you for joining us on 14:03 Raw Questions Relevant Answers. 14:05 You could submit your questions to RQRA3ABN on Facebook.com, 14:10 or just Facebook.com/RQRA3ABN. 14:14 Look forward to seeing you next time. |
Revised 2018-09-10