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Honorable Sexuality
Thursday after Ash Wednesday
2 March 2017
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One of the battles fought by church leaders trying to teach Christian people about holy marriage is to convince Christian young people of the blessings of marriage and faithful sexuality. The young people we teach have been bombarded by thousands of sex acts in movies and on television of which only a small percentage are loving sexual encounters between a man and a woman married to each other. Most sex acts portrayed by the visual media are stolen and illicit sexual acts.
The result of such instruction is that young people have already had their minds bent away from seeing sexuality as a gift from God and toward seeing sexuality as fulfilling only when it is a form of perversity. The church is fighting an uphill battle against the suggestive and powerful images spewed forth by the visual media and flooding the lives our young people with sexual sewage.
The first line of defense is our own families. Our children will honor marriage if we honor our own marriage and the spouse God has given us. Sexuality will be seen as a good gift of God where sexuality is spoken of as a blessing of love between husband and wife. We must explain to young people that sexuality is a self-giving that is shaped by the life of Christ and His love for His bride, the Church. Where there is fidelity to marriage then the sexual love that husband and wife share in the chastity of marriage will be revered and honored. Then Christ will be glorified and the church built up.
Rev. Dr. Scott R. Murray
Memorial Lutheran Church
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Martin Luther
"Inasmuch as the sixth commandment is concerned specifically with the estate of marriage and gives occasion to speak of it, let us carefully note, first, how highly God honors and glorifies the married life, endorsing and protecting it by His commandment. He sanctioned it in the fourth commandment, '
You shall honor father and mother;
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but here, as I said, he has secured it and protected it.
Therefore he also wishes us to honor, maintain, and cherish it as a divine and blessed estate. Significantly, He established it as the first of all institutions, and he created man and woman differently (as is evident) not for lewdness but to be true to each other, be fruitful, beget children, and support and bring them up to the glory of God.
"God has therefore most richly blessed this estate above all others and, in addition, has supplied and endowed it with everything in the world in order that this estate might be provided for richly and adequately. Married life is no matter for jesting or mere idle curiosity, but it is a glorious institution and an object of God's serious concern. For it is of the highest importance to him that persons be brought up to serve the world, promote knowledge of God, godly living, and all virtues, and fight against wickedness and the devil.
"Therefore I have always taught that we should not despise or disparage marriage, as the blind world and the false clergy do, but view it in the light of God's Word, by which it is adorned and sanctified. It is not an estate to be placed on a level with others. It precedes and surpasses them all, whether those of emperor, princes, bishops, or anyone else. As important as the spiritual and civil estates are, these must humble themselves and allow all people to enter the estate of marriage, as we shall hear. It is not an exceptional estate, but the most universal and the noblest, pervading all Christendom and even extending throughout the world."
Martin Luther, Large Catechism, 1.206-210
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2 Timothy 2:21-26
Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, he will be a vessel for honorable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work.
So flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart. Have nothing to do with foolish, ignorant controversies; you know that they breed quarrels. And the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, and they may escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will.
(ESV)
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Prayer
Lord Jesus Christ, as the Word of the Father You joined our first parents and extolled marriage by saying, "Be fruitful and multiply." Keep us faithful to Your institution, lead us also to extol marriage and treat sexuality as a gift from You. Amen.
For all catechumens as they prepare themselves for the Lenten discipline of repentance and instruction, that they might be brought into the death and life of Christ
For President Dale Meyer and the faculty and staff of Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, that they might continue to deliver the faith once delivered to the saints
For Scott Murray, who is returning from Nigeria to Houston, that his travels would be safe and his homecoming joyful
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Art: GRÜNEWALD, Matthias
Isenheim Altarpiece (c. 1515)
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