Disclaimer
It’s never fun to start a study with a disclaimer, but in the day and age we live in, it must be said. Sex is a noun, not a verb. It describes one of the two (yes, only two) categories most living things (with the exception of some bacteria etc) are divided on the basis of their reproductive functions. Either a male, or female. A man, or a woman.
But from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female.
Mark 10:6
Mankind, since then, has turned the word “sex” into a verb, meaning to fornicate. To have sexual intercourse. It is in this sense that I will use the word because that is how it is used today. Just as the bible never uses the words “trinity” of “rapture” to describe the “Godhead” and “Catching up,” respectively, and yet we (myself included) use those words because they are generally understood by the masses today.
The bible, denoting what we call “sex” today, uses terminology such as: “Lie with,” “Go in unto,” “Joined with/unto,” and others.
The First Marriage
23 And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.
Genesis 2
24 Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.
As you can see from the above verses from Genesis 2, the first mention of the word “wife” has to do with being “one flesh.” This was obvious to see with the first couple in human history as Eve was created directly from the body of man, while man was created from the dust. It is worth noting that in the eyes of God, BOTH Adam and Eve were called “Adam” by God (Genesis 5:2). It was Adam, after the fall, in Genesis 3, that named his wife Eve.
The Law of First Mention is important when studying the bible. In general, the first time a word is used establishes the use of that word from then on. It is a great study tool to help understand certain places in the bible that uses the word but the context is omitted. Here, the Law of First Mention denotes that “wife” is connected to being “one flesh.” This is reinforced throughout the scriptures in Mark 10:8, Matt. 19:5, 1 Cor. 6:16, Eph. 5:32 (we will discuss these verses below).
New Testament Marriage
When Jesus was on the earth, at his first advent, he dealt a lot with issues of the heart. For instance, in the Old Testament , under the Law given to Moses, God allowed divorces for several reasons. But, as we discover, through Jesus Christ in Matthew 19, God only tolerated this because of the hardness of the hearts of his people.
3 The Pharisees also came unto him, tempting him, and saying unto him, Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause?
Matthew 19
4 And he answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female,
5 And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?
6 Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.
7 They say unto him, Why did Moses then command to give a writing of divorcement, and to put her away?
8 He saith unto them, Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so.
9 And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery.
We see, in verses 5 and 6 a repeat of what we saw in Genesis 2, with Adam and his wife.
Jesus was attempting to prepare his people, the Jewish people to receive the Kingdom of heaven that was promised to them through Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Yes, they were currently under the Law of Moses, but a new dispensation was about to emerge that Jesus was prepping them for. A dispensation not under the law of Moses.
As we know, his people rejected that Kingdom.
**NOTE** Some people will claim that becoming “One Flesh” is simply the physical union of having sex but after sex they are no longer “One Flesh.” But look at what Jesus said is vs 5 and 6 of the above passage:
“5 And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?
6 Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.”
IF the couple were only “One Flesh” while in the act of sex and not afterwards, then how could man “put asunder” what “God hath joined together”? Clearly, Jesus is saying they are one flesh in the eyes of God even after the physical union. Remember, going back to the first marriage, God called both Adam and Eve just “Adam.” He was the man, she was the woman, but they were both Adam because they were one flesh (Genesis 5:2). It was Adam who named Eve after they got booted from the garden.
We can see another example of the act of sex being referred to as a marriage in Genesis 16:3. Here, Sarai (Abram/Abraham’s wife) gives Abram her handmaid Hagar to conceive a child for him and this union is called a marriage, even though in every verse after this Abraham only refers to Hagar as “Sarai’s handmaid.” Even the angel of the Lord (a pre-incarnate Jesus), only a few verses later in Gen. 16:8, refers to Hagar as Sarai’s maid. So what was the marriage of Genesis 16:3? It was the act of intercourse in the next verse (Gen. 16:4).
Sex as a Christian
Let’s look at the relationship we have with Jesus Christ as his church, as the Bride of Christ. If you want to watch a great series on the church’s role as the Bride of Christ, click HERE.
In short, the relationship we have with Christ is one of a marriage. Right now we are betrothed (2 Cor. 11:2) and the marriage takes place later, in heaven (Rev. 19:7). And yet, even though we aren’t married to Jesus yet, we are still considered members of his Body because we have the Holy Spirit inside us (1 Cor.6:19). Look at what Paul writes in the book of Ephesians:
30 For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones.
Ephesians 5
31 For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh.
32 This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church.
Watch now what Paul writes to the Corinthians:
15 Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ? shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of an harlot? God forbid.
1 Corinthians 6
16 What? know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? for two, saith he, shall be one flesh.
17 But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit.
This passage in 1 Cor. 6 should make things very clear on how God views sex and marriage. What does a harlot do? She’s a prostitute, she has sex with men for money. So, as the passage says, if we have sex with a harlot (joined to) we become one flesh with her. That is a marriage in the eyes of God because as we saw earlier, becoming “one flesh” is connected to a husband and wife relationship (everywhere in the bible that mentions becoming “One Flesh” is only a few verses away from a marriage). So… SEX IS MARRIAGE.
Paul warns us against sleeping with harlots because we are members of Christ’s body (Eph. 5:30), and if we “join to an harlot” we pollute God’s temple (1 Cor.6:19) because we are joining something that is filthy in the eyes of God, to the Body of Christ.
When describing a healthy marriage to a woman, in 1 Corinthians 7:39, Paul commands to marry a saved person. So, in short, Christians should marry other Christians, as not to defile the temple of God. However, if you find yourself married to an unsaved person, Paul gives his recommendations on how to behave in 1 Cor. 7:12-16.
Adultery and Divorce
As we saw earlier from the passage in Matthew 19, Jesus preached against divorce. He said the same in Mark 10:
11 And he saith unto them, Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another, committeth adultery against her.
Mark 10
12 And if a woman shall put away her husband, and be married to another, she committeth adultery.
Likewise, Paul, when writing to Timothy in 1 Timothy 3, wrote how a Deacon and a Bishop (Pastor) should be married to only ONE woman (that means no polygamy, no adultery).
However, we do see grounds for divorce as a Christian. One ground for divorce is permanent desertion (1 Cor. 7:15), but only in specific circumstances. The other, more prevalent ground for divorce is adultery.
See what Jesus said in Matthew 19:
9 And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery.
Matthew 19
See how Jesus condemns divorce except in the case of fornication? This is because the spouse who has committed adultery is now “one flesh” with another person. They are no longer married to who they were married to before.
But here we come upon some hard to understand doctrine (even for me). While the spouse that commits adultery is no longer “one flesh” with the other member, the spouse that did not commit adultery is still married to the offender. I will show an example of this in just a little while but for now it is enough to say that if one spouse commits adultery they have sinned greatly against God and their spouse, however, the two can still be reconciled together IF the non offending party and the offending party agree to be reconciled (1 Cor. 7:11). However, if the non offending party wishes for a divorce because of adultery, that divorce will not be a sin.
Lets look at two example to try and further understand how God looks at marriage and adultery.
The first is the simplest, the Samaritan woman at the well. Look at what Jesus said to her:
16 Jesus saith unto her, Go, call thy husband, and come hither.
John 4
17 The woman answered and said, I have no husband. Jesus said unto her, Thou hast well said, I have no husband:
18 For thou hast had five husbands; and he whom thou now hast is not thy husband: in that saidst thou truly.
This woman wasn’t a widow who had five dead husbands. She doesn’t even consider herself to be married, and yet the verse proves that she has been married, five times, in the sight if God. Not only that, but the man she is currently sleeping with is not her husband.
But wait… I thought that if you commit adultery you’re now married to that other person. Like I said, this part is confusing, but also let me iterate that adultery is one of the worst offenses anyone can make in either testament. It is one of the 10 commandments that God gave Moses in Exodus, and also a commandment given by Paul to the church in Romans 13:9. So, it’s best to never even get to this point… but lets continue…
Ok, so the woman at the well was sleeping with someone, but that someone was also married. It seems the man is included as her husband, as one of the five, and yet, not her husband… this is because HE was married to another woman. Or, if the man is not one of the five then he is not considered her husband because he likely had already slept with his actual wife, therefore, severing that marriage with the woman.
Lets look at another example. David and Bathsheba.
In 2 Samuel 12 David is being reprimanded for committing adultery AND murdering Bathsheba’s husband, Uriah the Hittite. David, while Uriah was at war, slept with Bathsheba and impregnated her. Then he had Uriah killed. God then kills David’s first child with Bathsheba. Look at the wording of these two verses form 2 Sam. 12:
15 And Nathan departed unto his house. And the Lord struck the child that Uriah’s wife bare unto David, and it was very sick.
2 Samuel 12
24 And David comforted Bathsheba his wife, and went in unto her, and lay with her: and she bare a son, and he called his name Solomon: and the Lord loved him.
See how in verse 15 Bathsheba was still called “Uriah’s wife” (even after Uriah had died!) and then, later, in verse 24 she’s called David’s wife. That child, born of adultery, had to pay the punishment for their adultery before God considered the marriage clean.
The point of this message? Don’t mess around with adultery.
The reason God gives adultery as a grounds for divorce is because that person has married someone else in the act of sex. However, one of the parties is still married to the other. This gives the ground to a re-coming together (fixing the relationship) OR choosing to divorce. But one a couple is divorced it’s best they stay that way (from each other) if they have re-married after (Deut. 24:4).
Polygamy in the Old Testament
You might be wondering how some of those Old Testament characters we love (like King David and King Solomon) had more than one wife is sex is the act of marrying another person. Well, firstly we’ve covered that it was never meant to be that way. Jesus makes that clear (see the passages linked above). But if a man and woman are married, and then that man marries another woman, the woman of the first married is still married to him. It’s grounds for a divorce but the divorce isn’t settled until that person finds another husband (this is why divorcing someone causes them to commit adultery (Matthew 19:9). But, if there is an agreement between the two, that she shall stay his wife then that man is now married to multiple women. Again, it’s not the way it was supposed to be, but that is how polygamy worked in the old testament.
Marriage Ceremonies
It should be clear by now that sex is marriage, so some of you might be asking, “Why go through the trouble of a marriage ceremony?”
Well, the simple answer is that we do it in “type.” Just as God uses “types” all throughout the scriptures. Just as water baptism is simply a “type” of death and resurrection in Christ, a marriage ceremony is a “type,” or a picture, of us, the church, being engaged to Christ now (2 Cor. 11:2), and then marrying him in heaven (rev 19:7).
And we can see that God does hold engagements as serious business in Matthew 1.
Mary, mother of Jesus, is espoused (engaged) to Joseph, before they came together in marriage (don’t forget, Mary is still a virgin at this point) and yet, in Matthew 1:19 the bible depicts Joseph as her husband and in verse 20, Mary as his wife.
Conclusion
In conclusion:
- Sex is marriage in the sight of the Lord.
- Adultery is the act of marrying yourself to another person through fornication and thus is grounds for divorce in both testaments.
- Even though sex is marriage in the eyes of the Lord, we “get married” in the traditional sense as a type, or picture, of our engagement with Christ today.
- Engagement/Betrothals are sacred in the eyes of the Lord