By Jonathan Keller
This commandment seems the most prudish of all the commandments to Americans. Sure, don’t kill people, don’t steal things, maybe I shouldn’t be jealous of others, and, sure, I should call my parents every now and then. But why can’t I have a little fun here and there? What’s so bad about listening to my desires?
The Command Behind the Command: Chastity
An old word for sexual restraint, chastity encompasses more than a single person’s responsibility to control themselves prior to marriage. In fact, it points to the high honor of marriage that God baked into the design of creation. Remember that, in Ephesians 5, Paul clearly teaches that the point of marriage isn’t just a relationship between a man and a woman; a marriage is supposed to reflect God’s love for His people, most clearly shown through how Christ loves His church, once to the point of sacrifice, and now as He reigns on His throne. Sexual expression ought to come under this larger call for marriage to reflect God’s covenant with His people. Sex, simply put, ought to reinforce a prior covenantal commitment by showing both spouses their one-flesh bond.
Chastity for both married and single people, then, is not just about abstinence for the latter. Chastity involves safeguarding marriage both generally and specifically. A husband ought to be chaste toward his wife in watching his thoughts toward other women, and he ought to be chaste in nurturing his relationship with his wife through ordinary service toward her. A wife, similarly, expresses chastity in restraining her thoughts toward other men and in tending to her relationship with her husband. A fun date night and a boring day of chores can both express chastity in married people!
American Sexuality: Sex is an Appetite
What have we done as Americans, though? We’ve cast off the imagistic component of marriage and called our sexual expression something like satisfying our hunger. I need sex like I need food and water to live. I am less human, I am deprived if I don’t satisfy my sexual urges.
Reducing our urges this far, though, leaves us confused when casual relationships turn awkward. One person finds themselves attracted where the other person feels nothing. Why? Because God designed the act to confirm the marital union. It makes sense to feel more attracted to a sexual partner because God made it that way. God loves and blesses marriage, and He encourages its continued growth through many means, including intimacy between married couples.
Worse than this, though, is the idea that sex can be used as marketing. Sexually suggestive advertisements are rampant now because of this sexual urge idea. Sex sells, people follow their desires, so marketers plaster it everywhere they can. One of the biggest industries in the world is the adult entertainment industry, and advertisers want to leverage that market share as much as they can.
What hope is there for those who wish to guard their eyes and hearts? Thankfully, the Lord is a fierce husband toward His people, and He gives us His Spirit to arm us with some motivation against our worldly desires to twist sex out of its proper place. He gives great encouragement in His Word for married couples to enjoy their intimacy with each other, and He offers safeguards for our thoughts and hearts to ponder other things over our urges. He draws us toward meditation on peaceable, just, honorable, excellent, praiseworthy, and lovely matters. Our prayer lives can be a battleground to redirect our urges toward God’s work in our country and abroad, all the while exercising chastity by looking away from marketing schemes.
Have you heard of chastity? What do you make of the sexualization common in our culture? How might you keep pure what God calls us to keep pure?