Promote Purity

Welcome to God's Word for You, a ministry of Sharon R.P. Church in Morning Sun, Iowa. Check us out online at www.sharonrpc.org. We pray that this message will be a blessing to you and that the Lord will use it to transform your faith and your life. Well, you turn over in your Bibles with me to Exodus chapter 20. Exodus chapter 20, as we continue our series, I know you're so happy, we continue our series in Joshua by Exodus. Joshua chapter 20. And today we look at the seventh commandment. Exodus chapter 20, verse 14.

Prayer for Illumination

Hear now God's word. You shall not commit adultery. Let's pray. Oh Father, we thank you that you are a gracious lawgiver. And Father, we pray that your Holy Spirit would teach us, that your Spirit would impress these laws upon our hearts, that we might not just understand them, but we might live them. In Jesus's name, amen.

Sermon

It's interesting to me that one of the best pictures, one of the greatest hopes we have is Jesus coming back. And that when Jesus comes back, the picture is of a wedding. A wedding where there's a huge banquet thrown, where the people, we all sit around the Lord's table, and we get to sit at the wedding feast of the Lamb. and the church is the bride, and the groom is Christ. There's a beauty to weddings. There's a beauty to marriage. And here, there's a foundational commandment for what that looks like in human lives, what it looked like for the lives of Israel, and what it should look like in our lives today. And so the commandment before us in the seventh commandment today is, you shall not commit adultery.

And so I'm going to just go ahead and start in saying, this is an awkward subject for Christians. This is a subject that Christians just kind of don't like to talk about. Yeah, it's railed against in the pulpit. People will talk about sexual immorality and things like that. But we don't actually want to talk about these things.

And this is one of the concerns I have. And so the scriptures, we need to be careful here. We don't want to just be so blatant in our language that we just become like the world because we just want to throw off any restraint. Even scripture shows some restraint. when it speaks about these sensitive issues. And yet at the same time, brothers and sisters, if we cannot talk about these things in the open, within the confines of the church, oh, the world is just screaming and ready and waiting to tell you their sexual ethics. And so as we come to this passage today, it's the Lord who's spoken this word to us, and the Lord says a lot about this. And so as we sit under his teaching this morning, we do look to him, This is the topic that the world is talking about, and it's the topic that the Lord has for us this morning.

And so as we go through this, first we need to see that this is not just this commandment of do not commit adultery. It's not just a physical issue, but it's a heart issue. This is a heart issue. This means it's not just an issue for married folk, but it's for all of us to think about. Jesus said in Matthew chapter 5 verses 27 through 30, we read that earlier, you have heard that it was said to you, you shall not commit adultery, but I say unto you, if a man has even looked at a woman with lust in his eyes, he's already committed adultery in his heart. This is a heart issue. The problem is that the adultery doesn't just happen in the physical aspect, but it starts in the heart. as the desire is put there.

And there's this sense in which, you know, one of our professors at the seminary, people were arguing back and forth, is this a literal commandment or not a literal commandment? When Jesus says, if you lust for a woman with your eye, if your right eye causes you to sin, what are you told to do?

Pluck it out. This is a nice way of literally saying, gouge it out. Pull it out of your head and throw it away from you. Or if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off. And there was this argument, and one of the seminary professors, one of the students was, we literally should do this. And the guy was like, there's probably some well-meaning people in heaven who are going to not have a hand or an eye. And my aunt is one of them. But I don't think that this is to be literal. But this is talking about radical repentance. This is not something we play around with. Jesus is saying that we must radically repent from this.

The word there in Matthew chapter five, when Jesus says, if a man has looked with a woman with lust for her, is the word epithymia, epithymia. And this is an insatiable desire to be with that person, this unbridled sexual passion. And Jesus doesn't play softball with this, does he? We were in Exodus 20. I just want to look at Jesus' words. Here, Jesus is zealous for marriage. Jesus is zealous for marriage. And here, listen to what he says.

And if your right eye caused you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you, for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish. And this is the severity part of it. than for your whole body to be cast into hell. And just in case it wasn't severe enough the first time, Jesus says it a second time. If your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it away for you, for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish than for your whole body to be cast into hell.

The word there is Gehenna, and Gehenna was this place in the valley, Kidron Valley, just south of the city where they would just burn trash all day long. People took their waste there, people took their trash there, and they would burn it. This was a hot, intense fire.

The kids and I had fun this week. Still actively repenting, I'm not managing my home well. So I'm trying to take care of the parsonage. I'm trying to clean up all my junk from everywhere around. And that means I had lots of extra lumber that was just laying around. And a tree that had been cut down, I just kind of stacked wood. And so we had a huge fire. But we put logs that were the size of Ellie in there.

And they just burned and burned and burned. And at one point, Nathan looked into it and he said, I bet that's what Jesus is talking about. It's so hot that we couldn't come too close to it or else we were worried that our eyebrows were gonna burn off. And Jesus is saying, it's better for you to go by your life name, to lose something than to go into the fire that's not quenched.

See, what happens when we play around with lust, when we play around with these desires in our hearts and we let them start controlling us that that lust ends up pulling you away from your spouse. And as you pull away from your spouse emotionally, and you start to look at somebody else, it pulls away from your marriage. And then as you deal with this guilt in your heart, you end up having this guilt on your shoulders that you've looked at someone you shouldn't have looked at, and you start hiding things, you start becoming secretive, you start compartmentalizing your life, and you start hiding things and putting it away. And there's areas in my life where you're not allowed to be spouse. And it breaks down the walls of trust. It breaks down the foundation of marriage.

What then typically happens is if somebody doesn't repent, especially if they have proclaimed to be a Christian, eventually this becomes a consuming thing for them. When they come into church, I've seen it when I've preached at churches where I know somebody is struggling with a sin like this, and they end up just looking down at their lap the entire time, shaking their head, and eventually they either come to the point of repentance or they end up saying, it's not for me. because they ended up loving their desire more than submitting to the Lord. And I don't say this to be dramatic to you, I'm saying this, this is the path that people have walked time and time again, and eventually they pull away from God.

Douglas Stewart, a commentator on this passage, says it this way. Again, the principle of the law as paradigmatic is essential for appreciating the implications of this command. Reasonable and careful extrapolation from the paradigm of adultery, of the adultery law yields the realization that all sex outside of marriage, whether before, during, or after, or instead of a person's actual legitimate marriage would be a violation of the divine commandment. Meaning, anything done outside of the bounds of monogamous marriage is what this is getting at.

This is not just saying, oh, okay, you know, I used to hear guys on the ship say things like, well, I can look at the menu, I just can't touch the food, and so they're like, No, this is exactly what Jesus is saying. This is exactly what Jesus is saying. No, you got one dish in front of you. The Lord's given you your wife. Be satisfied in your wife. Don't go looking around for appetizers and stuff. No, no, that's not how you are to think about your wife.

But the question is why do Christians take this so seriously? Doesn't it seem like when the world talks, especially now, when the world talks about the churches, often they want to downgrade and denigrate the church's view on sexual ethics. So why do Christians take this so seriously? Well, first, as we just looked at, Jesus says it's that serious. But secondly, I want you to turn over in your Bibles to 1 Corinthians chapter 6. 1 Corinthians chapter 6, and we're going to sit there for a minute and see what that Looks like 1 Corinthians 6, verses 13 through the end of the chapter. Foods for the stomach, that's on page 1016, by the way. Foods for the stomach and the stomach for foods, but God would destroy both it and them.

Now the body, your flesh, your body, is not for sexual immorality, but what is your body for? But your body is for the Lord. Your body is for the Lord and the Lord for your body. And God raised both, and God both raised up the Lord, that being Jesus, and will also raise us up by his power. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a harlot? Certainly not. Or do you not know that he who is joined to a harlot is one body with her? For the two, he says, shall become one flesh.

But he who is joined to the Lord, that is Jesus, but he who is joined to Jesus is one spirit with him. flee, verse 18, flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body.

Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price. Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's. Our bodies aren't our own. Our bodies aren't our own, our bodies are the Lord's. Now this, maybe some of you have been sitting in church for far too long and you don't realize what a radical statement that is. Your body is not your own.

The Lord knit you together in your mother's womb. You were fearfully and wonderfully made. God has made you for his own glory. We live in a culture that's just consumed with this idea of bodily autonomy, that my body is mine and I can do whatever I want with my body, whatever pleases me. And 1 Corinthians says, nobody, no, if you're in Christ, you're Christ's. You're part of His body. You're one of His. God has created your body. You are joined to Christ's body, verses 15 through 17. And the reality of why this is such a serious sin is what verse 18 points out. Look with me at verse, specifically verse 18.

Flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body. When we sin in this way, with sexual immorality, we're sinning against our own bodies. It's not like murder, you know, when you're murdering, you're hurting someone else, you're ruining someone else, you're destroying someone else. Yeah, it has implications for you, but the harm is primarily outward. But when you commit sexual immorality, you also hurt yourself, your own body. And it's interesting here, there's so many hosts of sins where God talks about, we need to slay this sin, we need to mortify this sin, we need to fight against this sin.

But you want to know one of the, the only time God says you need to run away from something, This one right here. Flee sexual immorality. Solomon warns his son about this. When he's writing to his son in the Proverbs, he says, greater men than you have gone by her door and have fallen. Don't even go near there. Don't even go near the adulteress's door. Son, I'm telling you, I'm telling you, you're not strong enough. Just stay away. Flee away from there. Go far away. Stay away from that.

Young men, I'm trying to tell you, some of you are going to be tempted with things in your life that you just need to get away from. Young ladies, I'm telling you, there are certain people and certain things in your life that you just need to make sure you don't go near that area. Don't go to those websites. Isn't this one of the things we see when we look at Joseph's life? Do you remember that story in the book of Genesis?

Joseph who's sold into slavery, his brothers hate him, he becomes the chief servant in Potiphar's house. And there he's working and he's diligent and he's put in charge of everything. Potiphar doesn't even watch after him anymore. This is like... a franchise owner's dream. You know, a general manager that you can just say, you got it, I'm going on vacation, I'll see you later.

And that's what he does with Joseph, and Joseph is managing everything, but Potiphar's wife has eyes for Joseph. And what does Joseph do? She comes to him time and time and time again, trying to seduce him, and he says, no, no, no, no, no. Finally, he says, how can I sin against my master and against God? And she grabs him by the cloak, and what does he do? He hightails it out of there. He gets out of there.

Sometimes with sexual immorality, we just kind of skirt around like we could just keep it on the fringes. Just get out of there. I don't know which one of you in the congregation needs to hear that today, but just get out. Don't play around with this. Just leave. Just go. I don't care if it means taking a baseball bat to your computer or throwing your phone into the bridge. Get out of there. Just get out of there.

You were redeemed. I love this in verse 20. Verse 19 and 20, or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price. Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's. You're not gonna do this, you're not going to do this just because it's a commandment.

The commandment convicts us of sin, but without knowledge of Christ, you're never gonna be able to do this out of a heart of gratitude. God loved you so much that he paid the price of your redemption with the blood of his own son. He bought you. Even though you were far from Him, God demonstrated His own love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. If He has lavished you, part of His bride, with His love, glorify Him with your body, love Him.

So a few lessons on marriage, a few things to think about with marriage. First a few things about what happens as an effect of adultery. A few things that happen as an effect of adultery. When this commandment is violated, the marriage bed is violated.

You see, often in... Sex is just too cavalier in our culture. And I hate to keep bringing this up, but this is just the atmosphere we breathe. Where you can just turn on Sex and the City, you can just turn on TV and there's just shows all over the place. It's just a cavalier thing. It's just something you do for fun. It's just a one night stand. It's just something that happens. But that's not what the marriage bed is supposed to be.

What the marriage bed is supposed to be is supposed to be that your hearts are knit together, that God has joined you together, that the emotional intimacy is there, the intellectual intimacy is there, the spiritual intimacy is there, and it is culminated and it is sealed by that moment of a man and woman coming together and becoming one flesh. But what happens when that trust is violated Jesus says it's so serious that it's the only grounds for divorce that he speaks about in the Gospels. In Matthew chapter 19 verses 4 through 6 he says, Have you not read that he who made them at the beginning made them male and female and said for this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife and the two shall become one flesh so then they that are no longer so they are no longer one flesh but two flesh but one therefore what god has joined together let no man separate the only caveat he gives to that is sexual immorality the one fleshness that's shown in marital intimacy is shown Not just in physical intimacy, but mental, emotional, and spiritual intimacy. And when it is broken, that intimacy is broken in every level. The pieces are left laying on the floor.

And this is one of the things that some people just need to learn. Intimacy doesn't start below the waist. Marital intimacy starts here, here, and here. Let me say that again. Marital intimacy does not start below the waist, but it starts in your mind, in your mouth, and in your heart, how you think about the other person and how you want to get to know the other person, how you communicate with that other person, and how you cultivate a heart of love for that person. Sexual intimacy is nothing more than the culmination of where that intimacy is meant to actually reside. Intimacy is not meant to be about unbridled passion, but bringing glory to God for joining a husband and wife together. It is a sharing of the most intimate bond imaginable.

But when adultery enters the picture, this whole picture falls apart. When sexual immorality comes in, the bond of trust is broken. The foundation of marriage erodes under our feet. But what leads people down this path? What makes people go down this path where they eventually become dissatisfied in their spouse or for some reason go and have an affair or commit adultery against their spouse? I'd like to just propose to you a few here.

I hate the internet, just gonna say that because you can find people spewing all sorts of things. If you wanna have your opinions stoked and your back patted and be reassured that whatever you believe is true, somebody on the internet will try to tell you what you're believing is true. And this goes no different than, I won't say where I read this, but it was in full knowledge of my wife researching this, hearing from people who have committed adultery why they did it. And this is some of the reasons why they said, I'm gonna break these up into two different categories, the first physical and the second emotional. And by no means am I giving credence that this is a reason to commit adultery against your spouse. I just want you to be aware of these.

First Point

First, physical.

People say they were just taken over by passion. Kind of sounds like Jesus is saying not to let your heart do. Some of them, physical, they want to say it was just the thrill of the chase. Some of them they say they just wanted something new or some of them said that they weren't being satisfied by their spouse in bed. Physical aspects that led them to this. Emotional aspects, the second category. A desire for affection, their spouse was not showing them the affection that they needed.

Some of them said that they just walked into it by friendship. They just became friends with someone, and as they got to be friends with someone else, they fell in love, quote, unquote, fell in love. You know, they cultivated that relationship with another person and let it get to that place.

Some of them became dissatisfied with their spouse emotionally. They emotionally separated from their spouse, or their spouse emotionally separated from them. Some of them thought their spouse just outright ignored them. They're too busy about work, they're too busy about their hobbies, they're too busy about all their other stuff to actually give careful attention to their spouse.

Some of them said, I just want to be happy. It was interesting as I was reading all these comments and I was greatly distressed and To be honest with you, I was praying for all of you because I was, from my own marriage, I was thinking how deceitful these lies are that could seep into our minds because of just the culture we live in. None of these are things I have not seen on pop television, by the way. It doesn't have to just be in these dark corners of the internet where people are openly talking about their own lives, but we see it all the time. But when Olivia and I were wedding photographers, there's a reason why we loved being wedding photographers, this was the best day in people's lives. And it was meant to be this picture of the gospel.

One of the traditions we loved was they would ask the couples, all the couples get on the floor. And all the couples would start dancing on the floor, and there would be some slow song. And they would say, if you've been married for less than five minutes, get off the dance floor. And the bride and groom would leave. And then they start going up. If you've been married less than five years, please leave the dance floor. If you've been married less than 15 years, and the crowd of people dancing would get smaller and smaller and smaller, and people would kind of make a ring around the dance floor as it got to the longest couples who were married.

And so one of the things I love that DJs would do is they would go up to those couples and they would ask them to give the bride and groom advice for how to have a long marriage. And I was shocked as I was reading this list of reasons why people committed affairs on their spouses, how the opposite mirror was the advice these people were giving.

Never stop dating your spouse. Never grow disinterested in your spouse. Never stop chasing your spouse. Never go to bed angry with your wife. Just be humble with one another. Be satisfied and just make a promise you're always going to love her no matter what.

It was like all these emotional things and all these physical things. These couples who had been married for 30, 40, 50, 60, I think the oldest we ever saw was like 65 years. It was a sweet thing. The husband was being pushed around by his bride as he was in his wheelchair. She was dancing him in his wheelchair.

And all of them had the similar advice. Love one another. Don't become emotionally detached from one another. Be satisfied in one another. But that's all great advice, but one of the things that we have found time and time again in counseling people as we talk to people who walk this road of adultery, what we find is that they walked away from Christ first. Their mooring, the anchor for their soul had been picked up. And they started to drift away.

The foundation of your marriage must be upon Christ. Your body's not your own because it's joined to Christ. Your marriage is not your own because it was joined together by God himself. Your identity is not in your spouse, but your identity is in Christ. Your identity is not in your sexuality, but your identity as a Christian must be in Christ. It is Christ who never changes. It's in Christ's love as the bridegroom that never changes. It is in Jesus Christ that we can have security.

And so some lessons, just some things I want to have you walk away with is one, control your passions. One of the things we have to tell our kids, and this is things I, man, I feel like such a like, our culture is so bad, they just say all this stuff, but we just live in a culture that says stuff that are just like, are you kidding me? We were watching a TV show with our kids the other day, I was telling a couple about this, and on the TV show, the guys, it's two detectives, and they're working with each other, and the guy looks over and he says, here can be wrong, here is never wrong. No, here is wrong all the time.

Your heart is deceitfully wicked above all else. You cannot let your emotions control you, but you need to bridle your own heart. You need to bring your own heart under the subjection of God and follow His path. If we follow our hearts, if we follow our uncontrolled passions, we're going to end up in heartache and pain. So lesson one, control your passions. Lesson two, chase after your own spouse.

Talk with them, date them, do things you enjoy with them. Don't get bored, enjoy the small things about them. This one I'm not going to spend a lot of time on, but I'm actually going to say just read the next chapter in 1 Corinthians. 1 Corinthians chapter seven.

Maintain a regular activity in your own bedroom with your spouse. Actively talk to them about sex in your marriage. Number four, pay attention to your spouse. Pay attention to your spouse, lean in, listen to them, be patient with them, serve them, love them. Be about each other's happiness, not about your own happiness or ease.

We're gonna talk about some more things during Chalk and Talk, but I wanna leave us with Proverbs chapter five. Proverbs chapter five, Solomon is writing to his son. Proverbs chapter five, this could be maybe some of you are old and you need to listen, maybe some of you children need to listen.

I know that this is helpful for me. This was preached to me just a few weeks ago at the conference Olivia and I were at in Atlanta, an old pastor in his late 70s who'd been pastoring for over 50 years. He says, I'm not your dad, but I'm going to talk to you like a spiritual father here. Boys, listen up. My son, pay attention to my wisdom. Lend your ear to my understanding, that you may preserve discretion, and your lips may know knowledge.

For the lips of an immoral woman drip honey, and her mouth is smoother than oil. But in the end, she is as bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword." What's he saying there? It's gonna be enticing, it's going to look good, but it's going to lead to death. That's what Jesus was getting at in Matthew chapter five. Her feet go down to death, her steps lay hold of hell, lest you ponder her path of life. Her ways are unstable.

You do not know them. Don't think that you can mess around with this sin. Don't think that you can play around with that flirt you have at work. No, no, don't go that way. Therefore, hear me now, my children. This is him saying, listen in. Tune in. Don't zone out here. I've only just begun. Listen up. Therefore, hear me now, my children, and do not depart from the words of my mouth.

Remove your way from her and do not go near the door of her house, lest you give your honor to others and your years to the cruel one. And this is the sad part. Lest aliens be filled with your wealth and your labors go to the house of a foreigner. How many marriages are ruined, financial security gone? How many marriages do husbands live in a different house from their spouse and their children because they've given their wealth and their best of years to someone else because they made a bad decision to go chase after their lust? lest aliens be filled with your wealth and your labors go to the house of a foreigner and you mourn at last when your flesh and your body are consumed and say, how I have hated instruction and my heart despised correction.

I have not obeyed the voice of my teachers nor inclined my ear to those who instructed me. Children, I am begging you. I am begging you to hear me today. Do not leave this instruction. It will hurt your souls. It'll bring pain to your families if you go the way that the world tries to snatch your hearts. Do not leave or depart from this instruction. It will hurt. I was on the verge of total ruin in the midst of the assembly and congregation, and then positive instruction.

Drink water from your own cistern and running water from your own well. Should your fountains be dispersed abroad, streams of water in the streets, let them be only your own and not for strangers with you. Let your fountain be blessed and rejoice in the wife of your youth as a loving dear and a graceful doe. Let her breast satisfy you at all times and always be enraptured in her love. Wives, go home to your husband. Husbands, go home to your wives. Be satisfied in your spouse and the spouse of your youth. Go there, don't give your best elsewhere. For why should you, my son, be enraptured by an immoral woman and be embraced in the arms of a seductress? Just so that we know what Jesus was saying wasn't something new.

Verse 21 through 23. For the ways of a man are before the eyes of the Lord, and he ponders all his paths. His own iniquities entrap the wicked man, and he is caught in the cords of his sin. He shall die for lack of instruction, and in the greatness of his folly he shall go astray.

There is a promise of blessing. that you can be satisfied in your marriage, that you can love your spouse, that you can bring glory to God who has redeemed your body, who has created you for his glory, who has knit you together and you are not his own. He loves you, he loves your marriage, he wants what is best for you, but just know that if you doubt that and you decide to go another way, there's no place in this world, in the dark places of our homes, or in the recesses of our hearts, that the Lord does not see. If you have lusted with somebody, you've already committed adultery in your heart. Brothers and sisters, let us be those who would radically repent. cut off our right hand, gouge out our right eyes, flee from sexual immorality, not just flee to nothing, but flee to joy. That when we follow God's ways, there is joy. It is the hard path. It is the narrow path. It is the path less taken. But it is the path that leads to God's glory.

Closing Prayer

And what is to God's glory is for our good. Let's follow after him. by the power of his spirit. Let's pray. Father, we do thank you for the indwelling of your Holy Spirit, that you don't just leave us to ourselves to keep this, but Father, you care for us. Lord, I pray that you would make us sensitive to this sin and that you would give us sense to run away from this sin. Lord, I pray that you would work in our hearts and let us promote purity and modesty to love you and follow your ways.

Thanks for listening to this week's message from God's Word for You, a ministry of Sharon R.P. Church in rural southeast Iowa. We pray that the message would be used by God to transform your faith in your life this week. If you'd like to get more information about us, feel free to go to the website, SharonRPC.org. We'd love to invite you to worship with us. Our worship time is 10 a.m. every Sunday at 25204 160th Avenue, Morning Sun, Iowa, 52640. May God richly bless you this week.