I've been reading through the book of Ezekiel and there is a lot of stuff in it that reminds me of what's in the book of Jeremiah, Isaiah, etc. That's not a bad thing, it just keeps me on my toes to make sure I don't miss anything "new." Yesterday, I read Ezekiel chapter 16 and discovered something that really grabbed my attention.
The whole of Ezekiel 16 is a parable of God and His adulterous wife. Of course, God isn't married in the sense that we know marriage but in a spiritual sense Israel was His bride. He cared for Israel, nurtured and provided for Israel, and was incredibly patient with her. But Israel spent many centuries spurning God's love and basically committing adultery against God. The picture God paints of Israel's unfaithfulness is that of her being not only an adulteress but a prostitute, giving herself away to strange men for pleasure.
It strikes me that when God wanted to describe the devastating sin of Israel He used a reference to sexual immorality to do so. Not murder or stealing or coveting, but lust and adultery and fornication. When God wished to relay the depth of Israel's sin He did so by comparing it to an institution that He established from the very beginning of mankind that man in turn has tainted and perverted beyond belief.
Sex was created by God and it has always been designed for the confines of marriage. Yet for thousands of years now sex has been sold, bought, put on public display, and has manipulated, warped, maimed, and humiliated millions upon millions of people. Pornography is big business and almost every week we hear of another high profile leader who has fallen to adultery or some other sexual sin. In short, we have made ugly what God intended to be beautiful.
This warped view of sex is everywhere. Marriages are being destroyed by adultery and pornography, premarital relationships are being rocked and destroyed by premarital sex, children are being preyed upon by pedophiles with twisted minds, and even the most devout men and women can't turn in any direction without being inundated with some sort of sexual image. The message of sex is so powerful that it can sell almost anything.
As I teach my students and my own children what God's truth says about sex, I do so with great urgency. We do not belong to ourselves; we belong to God (1 Corinthians 6:12-20). Sex is not some toy or possession to be given away. Too often young men and women use it as a means of expressing what they believe is love, but what they really are doing is giving away what they can't possible gain back. When these couples break up, the result of what they've sacrificed for each other makes it even more devastating.
Sex is a beautiful gift from God. When we see it from God's perspective then it's not dirty or perverted. We must all fight back when our culture and our world tries to convince us that sex is casual and dispensable. May we all seek the Lord's strength and wisdom as we not only strive for our own personal purity but as we teach these same principles to our children.
No comments:
Post a Comment