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Archive for October 2013
“Teaching” Healthy Sexuality: The Church's Harmful Narratives
by Shea Davis
It is extremely hard not to generalize the past of the
Christian Church and its approach of teaching sexuality. Unfortunately, there
tends to be only one message the Church seems to make very clear in regards to
sexuality: You must wait until marriage to have sex. There are no ifs ands
or buts. And unfortunately this leads to feelings of being lesser or out of God's love for those of us who
have fallen short.
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| In other words, "If you didn't wait, you didn't love." photo credit: juicyecumenism.com |
Some of us have been blessed to hear or experience a more
positive narrative of the blessing that sexuality is. However, some of us have been told that sexuality is something to squelch
instead of foster. We have been told that it is not something beautiful,
and, if not experienced in the confines of marriage, will lead to shame and
guilt.
And don’t get me wrong; I am not saying that some of the
things the Church teaches are incorrect. I fully believe that sex should only
be experienced in marriage. The problem isn’t with the Truth of God’s Holy Word
and what it commands of Christians; it’s the way the Church then takes the Word
and applies it.
The Church has hit the Abstinence message home. I am pretty
certain that most young Christians in the Church have an idea that “sex before
marriage is wrong.” But do they know why
sex within marriage is so good? Why sex before marriage falls so short of
the kind of intimacy and fulfillment sex within marriage can provide? Do we
hear how stewarding our sexuality (not killing it) makes us more human and more
connected to God and others? No. And
why is this? Because the only people who speak on sexuality are either
lecturing us or telling us this deep testimony where they climbed out of the
dark hole of sexual sin and through the blood of Jesus Christ they have been
purified once again. And the church can then grab them by the hand is say, “To
everyone out there, this is an example of why we don’t have sex before marriage.”
Don’t get me wrong, those testimonies are inspiring, and relatable to so many
of us, but there has got to be another message. There has got to be something to look forward to.
We need to create a community where married people and singles can come together and speak truth, encourage, love, and support one another. We
need to be raising and building up sexually healthy Christians — Christians who
aren’t afraid to speak of S-E-X; Christians who know the consequences of sin,
but also know the blessing of living the life they were designed for.
For those of us who have been hurt by the Church or fellow
Christians, we need healing. Some of us have to change the way we look at
ourselves. We are no longer the people we were before Christ entered into our
lives. We became a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17). We are forgiven
(Ephesians 1:7). We have every spiritual blessing (Ephesians 1:3). This list
goes on and on. And though many of us hurt, we no longer need to be bound by
our past, because through Jesus we have freedom.
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Shea Davis
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