LET’S TALK ABOUT SEX
Brothers and sisters, we found a secret formula for life and we would like to share it with you. Are you ready? Do we have your attention? Are you sure you want to hear this? Here it goes:
The more something is precious to God, the more the devil tries to warp and twist it.
Take baptism. It seems the devil just loves to tempt you shortly afterwards. He always pulls the same tricks – even Jesus had to go into the desert immediately after his baptism for testing
Or take church. The devil just loves to make you see all the worldly flaws others have. Not to mention family and marriage. Also one of his favourite shooting ranges. Or why do you think is love and family often is so difficult when it is supposed to be joyful?
That’s where sex comes in. Sex is most precious creation of God, and yet it is an issue in most of all marriages because your intimacy is the first thing to go when the devil comes in. Not to blame the devil for everything, but he sincerely lusts for the most beautiful things God created: love, marriage, sex, fellowship, parenthood, nature, arts, friendship, music etc. The more potential God gave it, the bigger the attack.
Ever wondered why so many beautiful songs have not only appalling but also stupid lyrics? Or why people throw coke cans down Table Mountain when they stand next to a trash bin? Or why we smash plates and argue over nonsense when we love each other? Or most shockingly, why sex is sold in bulk next to chicken feet in your local supermarket when it is supposed to be good and precious?
For centuries it was preached that sex is only for our multiplication to fill the earth as God commanded us to. Again the devil was at work to make sex “dirty” and therefore a sinful temptation. It was banned and therefore helpful to control all who felt guilty.
It begs the question, what was Gods real intention?
Genesis 2,24-25: “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.
Can it be more clear? Two people in love, always naked, holding fast and commanded to be one flesh? The Garden of Eden was truly a paradise. The point is that they were one flesh, naked AND completely innocent and that’s where the snaky gatecrasher took advantage.
I write this to you not because of the great sex in our marriage. Thanks for asking. Truth is: All of Gods gifts are an issue in any marriage: Kids, communication, ministry, love, work, money, sex, health. Only Jesus Christ can improve, heal, and make grow and prosper what no man (or woman) can change for the better.
I write to you about sex because I gave a short speech on intimacy recently for the hostel kids here in the village. I told them that we are good as we are created, loved, set free by Jesus Christ, and that our bodies are temples not to be touched and harmed by anyone. It was an absolutely “A” rated speech much needed because the deceiver attacks these and all kids in two angles:
Firstly through their families and environment. Many kids nowadays are molested and abused or simply hurt by the sexual confusion of their relatives.
Secondly he attacks them with guilt in their puberty. In their awakening of their sexual awareness he makes them painfully attracted to all harmless and dangerous nonsense the world has to offer.
My speech on God’s creation and holiness of our bodies sparked several interesting Question and Answer sessions with the 13 year old boys I chat with once a week. I was so naïve thinking they are still in a mental kids zone and was surprised how many of them have seen and experienced things some grown men do not even know or dare to ask.
The access to porn and other cheap illusions is so incredibly easy nowadays your child in the backseat might be trading Romanian sex slaves while you think he is on Mix It. You are laughing? Go and see what they are up to!
God loves children because they are still so much His original creation. They often do not know the difference between good and bad and the deceiver floods them with scum. I remember myself laughing about the silly things adults do in the porn magazines my stepfather hid in his closet. Very interesting and I wanted more!
Now these boys I know, some naïve and protected, others exposed to the worst, where absolutely flabbergasted when they heard about Gods original intention for sexuality. Sex, I told them, was created for a married man and women in love who become one flesh and to be a unit. No exceptions.
You should have seen their faces. Some laughed as if I was cracking a weird joke. Others just stared at me. One even ran away to hide behind the janitor’s office. This revelation was just too shocking.
We all know this and yet ignore what God wrote on believers and unbelievers hearts alike. Like children we sense sex is something very beautiful and fragile, has to do with love and joy and excitement and that it is definitely heavenly. But the devil continuously whispers: “Come on, sex is fun, and it’s for free and for everyone! Try it and your eyes will be opened. Ok, sign here, and here. And here to accept terms and conditions.
Almost all boys and men nowadays do sign what seems to be divine freedom and in the end just warps all understanding of real intimacy.
I grew up during the Sexual Revolution and found the new freedom most exciting, till I got lost. No life came from it, just confusion. What was true and what false? Why were love and sexuality not as easy at they seemed? How do you know to do it right?
Take a test with any man who has kids. Would he want his son to get some sexual experience before marriage? Most men would say yes. Now ask the same man if he would allow his daughter the same experience? Absolutely no ways, he will shout. I’m gonna kill that guy that touches my girl!
Ask any guy if he ever realized every girl in a porn movie or magazine is a daughter of someone. Ask if he really believes the lies of the old leviathan that girls actually like to be in porn for men. Or in a transparent bikini advertising coarse liver spread.
My wonderful wife just said that I am writing a sermon. But I assure you this is also an adventure in faith because I see my and many other kids exposed to the weirdest lies of the fury stinkball.
I told the boys that men and women are very different and they whistled and yelled. God, I said, created us male and female, so we have good companionship for a lifetime. Now they were baffled.
They just found out how to “dump” their “girlfriends” with an SMS. (Some don’t even know they are girlfriends).
They think its funny and in the same time they know it’s wrong, but guilt just keeps them trapped. Many boys just masturbate more when they feel guilty, tell more dirty jokes and even molest girls and girls just allow more molestation, feeling guilty that they allowed it in the first place. Guilt makes boys hit girls hard, because they are ashamed not to know how to handle their affection and girls, ashamed that they cannot tell them how to do better, often commit the most stupid things. I remember well my school days when a lot of kissing, fumbling and even real sex was happening out of sheer desolation, not having a clue.
Guilt is the barb that keeps a sinner hooked and that is something I encounter everywhere that people stick to sin because they think they are too deep into it and not worthy being rescued. Oh how much Jesus was needed back then and now.
My lecture for the kids has been weeks ago, but the Primary boys, puberty driven like a Maserati with jet fuel, still think that I am pulling their leg: “Oom, Oom, you were joking, right? You were not really serious with the married couple and the love. Sex is for all of us, right?”
It is so incredible they still think this is the prank of the century. So often have they been lied to, been betrayed and deceived, that the truth just sounds too crazy. “No Oom, this cannot be true, because then we all go to hell!!!” they shout again, and again they just cannot take the fact that Jesus has bought them free from condemnation. The news is just too good and they bounce and swing from the trees and run in circles.
Why are we set free from condemnation?, they ask. Why is God not spanking us like a good hostel father?, they want to know.
The answer is love my boys. God wants us to understand the potential of His creation. We miss out in our world of laws and regulations. That is why he set us free.
Now I have to wait till they recover from this exciting news and I pray that among their shouts and cries they will listen and not suffer from sudden nose bleeding when I tell them this:
Sexuality is so precious that the most explicit Songs of Songs of Solomon’s courtship and love is still regarded as the holy of holies among Torah teachers. An intimacy only shared between God and his chosen ones, between Christ and his bride, and between one man and one woman that become one until death parts them.
The ultimate mindboggler, I know.
Keep on Knocking
How does God speak to us? Do you know? In a Steve Martin comedy God speaks to the main character through digital road signs, telling him what to do. In “Bruce Almighty”, God simply appears as Morgan Freeman. But none of that ever worked for me.
Yes, I know, God works in mysterious ways and considering his almighty size we are like potters’ clay, wondering why he has to spin and squeeze us so much all the time.
Often I pray and ask him something and then miss the answer completely. Like Pastor Michael Eaton, who once asked God to make him understand the worries of the average Kenyan to whom he preached. Shortly afterwards, he lost his car, had to commute with taxis and was caught in legal battles. Like so many others in Kenya.
We normally can’t see what God sees, and so we don’t see God’s answer to our prayers. I tell you this, because strange things started to happen at our house.
My desk is right in the enclosed stoep. A few days ago I was looking onto the beautiful dorp straat, just recently tarred, enjoying the view of the mountains and the early clouds forming above them. Then I dropped my eyes to a tender row of poplars - and then a man with a University of Boksburg T-Shirt. He and an elderly woman were looking at me, waiting patiently a few steps from our door while I was typing.
When I stepped outside and asked the man what he wanted, he said his name is Willem and that he had brought his mother. I nodded and the mother nodded as well. Then Willem shook my hand again and showed me a long receipt from Spar which I had to examine. Then he came closer to say that he needed electricity, pointing to his mother.
Well”, I said, “I do not have any electricity for you and your mother unless you bring a plug to get some.” Ag no, I did not say that, but I should have because I realized he had spent his money on drinks.
The village is a peculiar place. Some people walking by pretend not to see me, because they are not supposed to. Others wave and some stare because we have John 14:27 written in big green letters on our wall. Or they have never seen a writer at work. I tell you the truth, some people think books are completely made in factories (our own kids once believed that).
But besides the usual jobseekers that knock as gently as they keep on knocking, others kept on asking. The next time I looked up from Twitter pretending to work, an elderly, unshaved man and a young tall man in a yellow T-Shirt were waiting outside. The old man handed me his ID and some bankcards he urgently wanted me to look at and then to keep in my house. As you can guess, I told him that I already had an ID and even if I hadn’t, I could never have looked like him. But he insisted. “Ask the Madam!” he shouted, “Ask the Madam!” He obviously had no idea what Madame Elke thought of weird old men who wanted R20 deposit in exchange for their IDs.
Yes, I felt sorry. And no, I had no R20. Not even R10. “Ask Madam!” he said angrily but then left. Relieved, I turned around but the young man in the yellow T-Shirt was next in the queue and asked for bread.
No bread, sorry.” I replied honestly. “I am Bantu!” he insisted. “Really, nothing to chew on except onions and dry pasta. I am serious.” He just smiled and pointed to his stomach. “Ek es baie hunger,” he tried in Afrikaans.
What can I do?” I asked my wife. “I can’t even work with him standing there. How am I able to ever concentrate with all these people?!” Finally, I found a carrot and half a slice of old toast, and luckily he was happy with that and left. “What is going on here?” I looked at my wife because either she knew or God preferred her for some wisdom, as usual. “Maybe it’s your board.
My board?” We have some boards with scripture Elke had made. The only one I ever made was Luke 11:9-10, white paint on old chipboard. I went back to my desk and there it was. But it did not face me to remind me of what I had to learn in my relationship with God. My son had turned it towards the street for everyone to read.
Keep on asking and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will opened.
Strong in our Weakness
The other day we had lunch with our dear friend. We met for a sandwich for no longer than 15 minutes. But we had to sit in a dark corner, hidden behind the counter, because he was worried that someone would see him having lunch in the middle of the day, sitting down, at a place that was not his working place, chatting to people that were not his clients. How dare he!
I have never met a person who works harder than he does. He actually has two jobs, both with a huge amount of responsibility. The weight on his shoulders is enormous - too much to bear for him, too big to just hand over to Jesus who said “Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest”.
No rest for him. His eyes are red and swollen from too little sleep, surrounded by dark circles. His skin is white like bread. This has been going on for years. Now his wife wants to divorce him. He said he feels suicidal at least once a month, and I wanted to tell him what I always want to say: “Quit! Run! Now!”
He said he knows that God wants him in this position. He has placed him there and as long as he doesn’t hear clearly from Him to leave, he has to stay. He said “Maybe I have to get better organized. There is so much to do that I never find time to finish anything.”
Sven said “How can you be better organized when you don’t have time? And how do you think God will speak to you? He is speaking right now through me: Quit, leave, do what you always dreamt of. Take your wife on a holiday. There is no joy, no peace, no love in your life.
He said “No, I have to learn to have more faith”.
We prayed for him and we still do every day. It gave us a lot to think and to talk about. What is obedience? How does God tell us to leave, to move on, what does He want from us? I know that obedience is key, but I also know that God is not interested in our performance, on how hard we can work, on how much we can endure. He wants to see us grow in our character. What I still want to ask my friend is this: “Is your heart growing? Because God is only interested in our hearts.”
He told me that once, to my surprise, and I had to learn it the hard way too. I think there is no other way. The tougher we are, the more we are willing to take on, the longer it will take. God doesn’t put more and more load on us to see how much we can carry, how long we will be able to stand. He wants us on our knees, crying out to Him.
I thought “What could he learn, being immensely clever, successful and a hard worker? To learn more, work harder, succeed? To become stronger in his strength?”
What a challenge it would be to admit that this is too much for him. To tell God that he can’t take it anymore. To “fail” in the task he thinks He had ordained him to. To be a failure in the worlds eyes. Wouldn’t this be the most humiliating experience he could imagine? To lose everything he has built up to and is holding on to?
Paul says that in our weakness He is strong. This is the place where God wants us, admitting that there is nothing we can do in our own strength and maybe this is what He wants from our friend. Not to get better in what he is already good at, but to do what he fears most. Not to endure, but to give up.
But what do I know!
Sometimes when you give up it is not because you are weak but because you strong enough to let go.” Anton
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