Latest / The Daily Word / March 22 – Love That Honors and Serves
Transcript
- Cory Barnes: Well, good morning, everyone. This is Gale Dearman. I'm the senior pastor here at Lakeshore. And once again, I'm welcoming you to the Daily Word podcast. Every day, myself and the other pastors are just taking a little time to share something that stood out to us from our daily Bible reading. At Lakeshore, we're using the Life Journal. And here on the Daily Word podcast, we're focusing on the New Testament portion of the reading schedule. So today, that highlights 1 Corinthians chapter 7. and what stood out to me was verses three through five. But before I share what I got, I would like to give you a little background so you know what was going through my heart and my mind as I read this morning. It really started in 1 Corinthians chapter 7 verse 1 where Paul opens up with, now concerning the things of which you wrote to me, it's good for a man not to touch a woman. And that phrase, not to touch a woman, is a euphemism for sexual intimacy, which is important to understand because even though Paul's going to broadly cover a lot of kingdom ethics between a man and a woman at various and numerous relational stages in this chapter, the primary underlying challenge he's addressing is sexual intimacy. But by the way, for the rest of the podcast, I'm just going to use the term intimacy in case you've got littles in the background. But the reason that Paul wanted to address this is because while the Church of Corinth was arguably the most spiritually vibrant in the New Testament, the city of Corinth was infamous for its sensuality and ritualistic prostitution. In fact, the chief deity of the city was Aphrodite, the goddess of licentious love. And there was a thousand professional prostitutes that were constantly ⁓ ⁓ demonstrating and dedicated to ⁓ her worship in the temple. In fact, this practice was so ingrained into the Corinthian lifestyle that it became a notorious proverb. In other words, to say that someone had been Corinthianized meant that they were living a life of licentious ⁓ activity or a life of prostitution. So this is what Paul was dealing with. Even though these believers had been born again authentically and were vibrantly filled with the Spirit, there were still fragments of this corrupt system, this corrupt ⁓ ideology from Corinth that lingered in their thinking. And that's what necessitated Paul to address the issue of intimacy for this group of Christ followers. Okay, so that leads you up to my particular verses. I'm in 1 Corinthians chapter 7, and the verses that I chose were verses 3 through 5, and this is from the New King James Version Bible. It says this, Let the husband render to his wife the affection due her, and likewise also the wife to her husband." And that word, affections, talk about intimacy. The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. And likewise, the husband does not have authority over his body, but the wife does. Verse five, do not deprive one another, except with consent for a time that you may give yourself to fasting and prayer, Come together again so that Satan does not tempt you because of your lack of self-control Well, here's my observation When Paul writes these words he's painting a picture of a marriage that is supposed to reflect the heart and the health and the healing of Jesus Remember he wrote about this in Ephesians chapter 5 that a marriage is reflective of Christ and his bride And that's a relationship that's shaped by mutual honor by self-giving, by safety. And so it's important as we read these verses, because these verses were never intended to be used as weapons to demand something from a spouse, nor on the other side, to silence or manipulate a partner into a certain behavior or a certain thing that someone desires. Instead, they're supposed to be reminders of God's design for a restorative, a reassuring, and a refreshing connection. that's warm and voluntary and tender and rooted in this mutual love and this mutual care. In other words, the area of intimacy that Paul is calling a husband and wife to is to put the needs of their spouse first, not like, I feel like it? Am I into it? Or, but put the needs of your spouse for us to give, not to negotiate, to bless, not to dominate, to serve them, not to pressure them, to love them, not to manipulate them. And I know that for those that have walked through unhealthy or abusive relationships, these can be really painful verses or very confusing verses. But I want you to know whenever the scripture is misused or ⁓ abused to elicit or excuse control or entitlement or ⁓ domination or coercion, it violates the heart of God and it wounds people really deeply. God never forces us to do anything that we don't want to do and he'll never bless any form of abuse, of behavior, of that kind of coercive behavior in any relationship towards another person. Instead, God's design for intimacy is His gift. It's supposed to heal and it's supposed to restore, but it only flourishes where trust and safety are present. In fact, that really focuses verse number five. It tells us that that kind of intimacy is so vital. to the life of a marriage that the only time Paul encourages abstinence is for a temporary and listen, an agreed upon time. And that's to seek God in prayer and lean into him for particular thing. And even then, a couple's exhorted to come back together quickly so that Satan does not tempt either person because of their lack of self-control. By the way, that term self-control in the Greek literally means a struggle. to manage the internal desire. But Paul's not just talking to the human desire for physical connection, but he's talking about in this context, the deep desire for true intimacy, the desire to be seen, to be heard, to be valued, to be accepted, to be appreciated, to be cared for. Every human's wired for that. And that's that heartbeat, that core of what marriage is supposed to be about. Well, here's my application then as a pastor. I've come across a lot of marriages where intimacy has devalued to a negotiation or it's neglected or in some marriages, hard to believe it's just non-existent. And some of them are the result of betrayal and abuse. And I'm very sensitive to that. Others have just kind of taken the twisted ideology of the self-absorbed or self-serving culture where women can manipulate men or men can pressure and try to, you know, coerce women and That was never the heart of God. Paul wrote these verses under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit to help this group of Corinthian people who again came out of a philosophy where the use, the abuse, the selling, the solicitation of intimacy, these were normalized in ways that were core to their religion and to the culture. This is how they negotiated favor. This is how they achieved control and domination. This is how they satisfied their own wicked desires. But God never designed a system like that. And he doesn't approve of anyone living in a system like that. Instead, God designed intimacy for mutual benefit, not one-sided. There's no spouse that has a right to demand intimacy, but no spouse is ever required to give themselves under duress or in ways that violate their safety and conscience. And no spouse is ever allowed to neglect. to hold back that. That's not how God designed it. Intimacy instead requires that both spouses communicate and lean into one another with honesty and gentleness and respect. That's the kind of exchange that will protect and will feed and nurture the heart of a relationship. And if there's any hidden disappointments or pressures, that'll come to the surface. And anything that, less than that, It needs some attention. You've got to lean into that. Sometimes you might need the support of a pastor or a counselor or a trusted friend. And if that's the case, man, my recommendation is get it. Reach out and get it. Also, intimacy always lets love guide every choice. Wherever Christ's love leads, manipulation just loses its power. God never sanctions a relationship that includes patterns of neglect or control or domination or harm. That was never the Lord. And finally, if abuse or coercion has been part of your story, listen to me, God does not expect you to pretend. He doesn't expect you to minimize or marginalize that, that hurt or to endure your pain in silence. I encourage you reach out to a pastor, reach out to a counselor, find a trusted friend. Don't stay silent in that. But God wants to help and restore you. Well, that brings me to my prayer. And as always, I just like to broaden it so that if some of this might have resonated with you, you can just pray right along. And so here's my prayer. Holy Spirit, thank you so much that your love is so gentle and honoring and healing and it's safe. And teach us to love each other that way, especially our spouses, those that you've connected us to for life at the core. I pray that you'd heal the bruised and broken places in all of our lives. especially those where manipulation, fear, or abuse has left a mark. And Lord, protect every marriage from selfishness and control, restore unity, restore the love of Christ to us wherever it can be restored, and bring healing wherever it's needed so that we can live the life that you have planned for us. We ask this and we thank you for it in Jesus' name, Amen.