Sexual Ethics and the Gospel (Part 2)

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the

Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.�

In short, if you like smooth, watered -down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you.

By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the

Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King. Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth.

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry. I�m Mike Abendroth, your host. I think I say that all the time.

That�s all right. I�m sitting here in beautiful downtown West Boylston. I wish we had a downtown, although we just got a

Dairy Queen a while ago, so I�m happy for a new Dairy Queen. There�s an old Dairy Queen down the street, but it�s kind of nasty, but now the new ones are nice and new.

I�m glad for that. So if you�re a Dairy Queen today listening, I�m very glad for that. What else can

I say? Today is day 33 that I�ve had no aspartame in any way, shape, or form.

And so I have had some Diet Hansons with Splenda, as we say in New England, some

Splendor, but I�ve not had a Diet Coke, Diet Mountain Dew. I actually got an email that said that that was a very good thing.

So today we�re continuing the theme of how to deal with sexual temptation.

Now there are a variety of different ways to deal with sexual temptation. And for the most part, if you�re old enough, if you�re past puberty, that�s something you have to deal with.

Now there are some that have no desire at all, and they have the gift of singleness, and they are quite content to be celibate their whole life, but there are few and far between.

I�ve met a few, but maybe not too many. So if you are not celibate and have the gift of singleness, you�re going to struggle in this area.

God has made you a sexual creature by your body style and type. He�s given you hormones, and he has actually invented and created and designed sexual pleasure.

He�s the one that came up with the idea of sex, which is pretty amazing if you think about it. By the way, if you�re listening and you�re covering your kids� ears, you don�t need to cover their ears.

I won�t say anything inappropriate. We need a sex education that God gives, that pastors give, that the

Word of God gives, so fathers can teach their kids and mothers can teach their kids, etc.

As long as you�re within the veil and the cloak of scriptural language, you�re going to be just fine.

God came up with this idea, and of course at the fall when Adam sinned, when Eve first ate, there were no direct comments by God, but after Adam, the covenant head, the federal representative, when he ate, then the weight of God�s chastening wrath falls, mixed in with some kindness and goodness, of course, but it affected sex, and all the horrible sexual sins that have ever been committed can be tied back to our father,

Adam. Of course, people are responsible, but we have a federal head named Adam, and so sin too, something great, something meant to be pure and holy and upright and an act of, if I could say this, an act of worship to God where you could say, �Thank you for my wife.

Thank you for designing this. Thank you for this pleasure. Thank you for your goodness. Thank you for your creative genius.�

You could say all kinds of things before, during, and after sex with a spouse, and it�s all been just, it�s just been ruined.

Now, there are some remnants, of course, of good things within marriage, husband and wife, but we now have sexual sin because of the fall, and we are sinners, and so we have sexual sins.

But that doesn�t make sex bad. It�s like guns, and it�s like alcohol. It�s what the human heart does with it, the human heart.

So today on No Compromise Radio, I�d like to talk about this topic and how to avoid sexual sin, and there are a variety of different ways.

One would be get married, 1 Corinthians 6. Two, live in light of the gospel of who you are, what

God has done, how he�s empowered you via the Spirit. There�s a variety of different ways. But the one that we kind of are almost afraid to say in evangelicalism anymore is you should read your

Bible more. You should soak your mind in Scripture. You should hide God�s Word in your heart so that you do not sin against God.

And we looked at Proverbs 2, excuse me, Proverbs 5, Proverbs 6,

Proverbs 7 last time, all tied together. Keep the words of Solomon, which are now inspired, so keep the word by implication, so that you don�t fall for the forbidden woman.

Now you could go both ways. You could teach these things to young girls so they don�t fall prey to ravenous young men.

And it�s interesting that the battlefield is with words. You have the forbidden women whose mouths drip honey and her speech is smoother than oil,

Proverbs 5. You have the forbidden woman and the adulteress with smooth words in Proverbs 7.

You have the adulteress who has smooth words in Proverbs 2. You have smooth tongue of the adulteress in Proverbs 6.

And you have the uplifting, edifying, authoritative, sufficient,

God -inspired words. See, the battlefield is with words that can help you navigate your life.

And you have words of fidelity found in Scripture and you have words of falsity found through other people who are going to try to convince you in the media, in the world, and in the bedroom to do things that you ought not to do.

And so today let�s look at Proverbs chapter 5, which by the way, this is all very good for the allure of pornography as well, to supersaturate your mind with Scripture and to read

Scripture and to meditate on it and to have it replayed in your mind, getting ready to sin and the verses come popping in your brain.

It all takes input. Of course I know sanctification is both and, but there is a responsibility that you have as a

Christian to saturate your mind with Scripture. That�s why we have imperatives to let the Word of God dwell in you richly, that you�re to pick up and read, that you�re to listen to preaching, etc.

There�s a variety of things. So look at Proverbs chapter 5. It does say, �For the lips of a forbidden woman drip honey and her speech is smoother than oil.�

And so here fathers are giving their sons sex education. By the way dads, if you�ve got young girls and young boys in your house, one day they�re going to be old enough for you to have the talk.

Let me just give you some advice to start on No Compromise Radio. Would you begin to read your Bible regularly, completely, thoroughly, sequentially, verse by versely?

Would you read them the Bible and they�re going to be introduced to many words that will initially just go right by them.

What�s a prostitute? I mean saying something about a prostitute or a whore or an adulteress.

And they won�t say anything because you say a lot of words that they don�t know. They�re three, they�re five, they�re six, etc.

But as time goes on and so -and -so went in space to a tent to be with some woman, you are going to find out very quickly that when kids get older they ask more questions.

And so when they�re little they just listen at family time, family worship time, Bible time around the dinner. And then they begin to ask questions.

So I�ll never forget one time when my son said, �Dad, what is a prostitute ?� Now you have to give age -appropriate answers.

And if he was 17 and asked the question, well, I probably think he lived in a barn. But I�d been regularly reading them the

Scriptures and so those things just come up. And if you just regularly read your kids the Scriptures, they will ask, �What is an adulterer ?�

And you�re going to have to figure out either an answer quickly or you�re going to say, �I don�t know exactly how to explain it right now, but I�ll get back to you.�

And then follow up. Keep your word. But when my son Luke asked me, �What is a prostitute?

What is a whore ?� I had the sense to say, I don�t mean the Spidey sense, the

Holy Spirit sense, but I just thought, �Okay, here�s what I�ll say.� It�s figure of speech. A prostitute, and this is in front of the whole family, we�ve got girls and mom and all that stuff there, no moms, just one mom, it�s not

Utah. And here we go, a prostitute is usually a woman who, for money, will lay in bed with a man who isn�t her husband.

And she�ll have no clothes on and he gets to do whatever he wants to her, including even touching her.

�Oh, Dad, that�s bad, oh, I wish you could see my face right now, I�m imitating what my son did.

Oh, that is the worst, that is so bad, that�s appalling.� And that�s all

I had to say. I didn�t have to get into any kind of graphic details or anything else. I just painted a picture, and of course, in our family, we teach a propriety, and you are not to run around, unless you�re a year old and you rip your diaper off and you run around the house nude, you�re supposed to cover yourself up.

There�s propriety, there�s a private area to your body and there are some things that you ought to cover and some things that you ought not to show.

Why? Because it�s just right and it�s good and it�s healthy to do that. And so, you know, if you�re a kid, you don�t let anybody touch your body and all these kind of things in the wrong places.

So when I said those things about the prostitute, that�s all they needed to know. Man, they thought that woman was horrible, that she would do that.

It�s not even her husband and she doesn�t even have any clothes on. I mean, come on. So here�s my point.

Just begin to teach your kids the Bible and you will have all these other things come up, from fornication to prostitution to adultery, and then just give them as a dad, if you�re a single mom, as a single mom, a good appropriate definition.

And if they�re 17 and you want to get a little more detailed and in a wonderful way you can describe some of these things that they can get,

I mean, in a wonderful way. I mean, in a wonderful way meaning just father and son sitting there. There�s no guile.

There�s no, you know, some kind of making comments, some kind of horrible locker room kind of talk.

It�s just a wonderful way to talk to kids about this topic. My son has said, you know, �Dad, it seems kind of strange talking to you about this, but it�s really not.

It is fairly uncomfortable because it�s that topic of sex. But read

Proverbs, �My son, my son, my son, my son.� Dads, if you have a 13 -year -old kid in your house or 14 -year -old or whatever the magic number is and you haven�t talked to them about these things, you have to sit down and talk with them.

This is the kind of sex education that you as the father, as the dad, must talk to them about.

You need to explain things and you need to explain things that are, you know, I don�t say to my wife, �Well, my wife�s had the talk and I don�t have to.

I am the dad.� And we�ll maybe have the talk together as a family. We�ll have the talk together as, you know, mom and dad and son, mom and dad and daughter.

This is what this is. This is what that is. This is what the scripture teaches. This is what a menstrual cycle is.

And the list goes on and on because it�s the right way to do it. And so I think parents are too afraid.

It�s like in premarital counseling when the topic of sex comes up. It might not be my favorite thing to publicly talk about, but who else is going to do it?

If it�s not me, it�s going to be the nasty, gross, perverted, torqued world.

And I�m not going to let my children be influenced, first of all, by them.

I�m going to say God created this. God created it and it�s all its wonder. And it�s fascinating.

It�s fun. It feels good. It does all these things. This is how God has designed it, to show off the greatness of God, the grandeur of God, the marvelous, wonderful God who creates and He�s created sex too to be enjoyed thoroughly and always in marriage alone.

Always alone. I know that�s redundancy, but that�s how you�ll remember it. So this is Mike Ebenroth. It�s No Compromise Radio.

And I�m going through the Proverbs to show you what Proverbs 5, 6, and 7 specifically say about guarding your heart, your mind, your body from sexual sin.

And Proverbs 5, Solomon just says, �But in the end, this adulterous person is as bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two -edged sword.�

In the Bible, regularly, you see wisdom. Lady Wisdom says this, there�s going to be an afterword.

Lady Wisdom says, �I have to think through of the consequences of my behavior because there is going to be a later.�

Lady Wisdom says, �I better kind of count my costs now because there�s going to be an accounting later.�

Foolish Wisdom, you know what that Dame Wisdom says, that kind of slutty,

Dame Wisdom, the foolish, Dame Fool. The fool says, �Pleasure now, no afterwards.�

Don�t get caught up in all the later stuff. Let�s go for it now. Wisdom says, �We�ve got to think about it later.�

And here, Solomon says, �There�s going to be an afterwards.�

Her feet go down to death. Her steps follow the path of the Sheol. She does not ponder the path of life.

Her ways wander and she does not know it. Prostitutes, adulterers, fornicators, even the

World Wide Web when it comes to pornography, it�s like walking on wet ice.

You ought to say to yourself, if I walk out on that pond with all that ice on top,

I might fall through. If I don�t walk out there, I�m never going to fall through. How can you guarantee that you never fall through ice and drown, fall through ice and have hypothermia?

You just don�t walk out there. I�m not going to do it. There could be an afterwards. There is going to be an afterwards if you enter into this course of sin and indulge your pleasures and your lust right now.

So stop it. Go back to the path of life, Solomon says. And now, he says,

O sons, this is a dad talking to sons about, yes, say it, sex.

But it�s all in a language that�s proper. It�s all cloaked in right kind of talking. Do not depart from the words of my mouth.

Keep your way far from her. Do not go near the door of her house.

Listen to me. Don�t listen to her. Listen to my words. Don�t listen to her words. Listen to my mouth.

Stay away from her mouth. What she says, it�s dangerous. Keep clear.

Steer clear. By the way, this could include smashing your computer.

This could include changing your job, getting some new friends, losing some old friends. Stay away.

This is Joseph fleeing from Potiphar�s wife when she said, �Lie with me.� And he left his garments in her hand and fled and went outside when she saw that he had left his garment in her hand and fled outside.

You know, there was the fury and the wrath of this immoral woman. Second Timothy 2,

Paul says to Timothy, �Flee from youthful lusts.� You know, there�s going to be an afterwards.

Wisdom says, �Think about the later.� Here�s the later, Proverbs 5, 9, �Lest you give your honor to others and your ears to the merciless.�

Maybe it could be a blackmailer he�s talking about. It could cost you money too. �Lest strangers take their fill of your strength and your labors go to the house of a foreigner.�

You have to pay off the husband. You have to pay off the prostitute. You have to buy the hotel.

You have to pay for child support. The list goes on and on. Could cost you your health too. �At the end of your life, you groan when your flesh and body are consumed.�

This is the kind of the animal cry, the yelp, the whelp of the sexual sinner.

Flesh and body is wasted away. And you�ve got venereal disease, and of course back in those days, there was no hope once you got venereal disease because there was really no medicine.

Some kind of witch doctor kind of medicine almost, but your body could just waste away.

You could get AIDS. You could get other venereal diseases. Sex, sin harms your body.

That's why 1 Corinthians 6, it says, �Flee immorality.� And you know, if you don't want to plan ahead, you're going to have some if -onlys.

It's going to be too late for you to get out of it because it will already have been over.

It says in verse 12, and you say, �How I hated discipline and my heart despised reproof.

I did not listen to the voice of my teachers or incline my ear to my instructions. I listened to her.

I listened to my own heart.� She didn't make you do it. She just put some kerosene on the fire of your own heart.

You're responsible, and now your conscience is condemning you. This is what you want.

This is what you've got. When you're old, you're going to say, �If I only could have gone back and relived those days.�

He says in verse 14, �I am at the brink of utter ruin in the assembled congregation.�

Public ruin, loss of community, respect. So if you're listening today on No Compromise Radio, A, you can write us at info at nocompromiseradio .com.

B, we're glad to be on WVNE 760 here in Worcester. You can also get us on Facebook, No Compromise Radio.

You can get us at, maybe there's some tweet stuff you can sign up for. You can go to nocompromiseradio .com

and find all the podcasts. Jonathan and Tim are doing a great job keeping that thing updated.

And so what we're talking about today is how to avoid sexual sin, and we're looking at the

Proverbs. And of course, we need to be New Testament Christians. We're a part of the church, and we need to think about Christ and his work and the gospel and how this applies to the gospel itself in light of what

God has done. �I am going to yawn again today.� Wow, that's what happens when you have friends flying in from across the world and you have to get up early.

You need instruction. So today in Proverbs 5, we've looked at that and we've seen that there's two ways to go about this.

There's God's way, the righteous way, and there's the foolish way. And the foolish way always says, �I just want pleasure right now.�

And you can almost think about kids. When kids are little, it's hard if you were to say, �Do you want a piece of candy right now or would you like $20 to save towards your college education ?�

I mean, they just don't grasp it. I mean, teenagers don't grasp it either. But maturity says, wisdom says, �You know,

I have to live in light of there's going to be a later.� And so when it comes to sexual sin and pornography, there's going to be a later.

How about being a deacon or an elder? And we have interviews, the elders interviewed potential deacons and potential elders at Bethlehem Bible Church.

And so I asked them, �Please explain redemption. Please explain propitiation. Please explain ransom.

Please explain hypostatic union. There's a variety of questions. Are you a Mason? What's your view of eschatology ?�

We ask a lot of questions. And you know one of the questions I have to ask people now, sadly, but I always ask it to potential leaders, to potential deacons, to potential elders, �Do you look at pornography?

Are you enslaved to pornography? Do you view pornography them from being in such a leadership position, but I have to ask that.

So you get all enslaved to pornography and you get enslaved to sex, sin, and fornication, and adultery, and then you get asked the question, �When you want to be an elder, are you enslaved to pornography ?�

There's going to be a later. That's just sad. I'd just like to have no answer to that question. No ministry opportunities as a leader because you're just enslaved to something like that.

Or if you're going to get married one day and there's going to be a later, and here's the later, while you're single now and you think none of this stuff really matters and then you'll get married, and then you get asked by the pastor, �Have you been pure ?�

�Has your relationship been pure ?� And you say, �No, you know, I've led my fianc�e down the wrong path and we've been sleeping together.�

And then you're found out because you're going to tell the truth to the pastor, at least most people do, and there's an afterwards.

And so when it comes to sexual sin, I want you to think this way, God, sex isn't bad.

It's what the human heart does with it. And so God has created something that's wonderful and marvelous, and then he has given us the right parameters and the fence that we must stay in is marriage.

And then whatever you'd like to do in marriage, then that's fine and it's pleasing to God and you can read

Song of Solomon to see God's belief on that topic. And you can read the rest of Proverbs 5, matter of fact.

Proverbs 5 goes on to talk about, you know, one of the ways to stop sexual immorality but enjoy the morality that God has given you within the context of marriage.

So if you're listening today, I want you to remember fleeting pleasures, this kind of microwave society, we want everything now and fast and 30 -second drive -through.

I saw the other day at a drugstore, 15 -minute max wait for your prescriptions. I want you to remember that in the desire to have everything now, you will have an afterwards.

And if you're an unbeliever, the afterwards is going to be judgment for all these sex sins. And I want you not to have to do that.

I want you to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and ultimately realize as a Lord and Savior and great God, He's got all kinds of things figured out.

The Creator knew what He was doing. He always knows what He's doing. So I didn't get very far today. I'm only up to chapter 5 and we've got chapter 6 and 7 for next week, the same bat time, same bat channel, when it comes to sexual ethics and the

Christian. Remember, for Christianity, it's not, no, you can't. For Christianity is, no, you can't while you're single, but you can while you're married.

It's not no, it's yes in this environment. In the covenantal commitment found in a marriage, you can just go for it.

That's basically Proverbs 5, 15 and following. Just enjoy your spouse. God's given you your spouse to enjoy.

And there are other benefits to marriage and there are fellowship and camaraderie and somebody with unconditional love and self -sacrificial commitment.

There's procreation, but certainly the enjoyment of a husband and wife in marriage with this

God -designed thing called sex is fully appropriate. There's nothing dirty about it in marriage and there's everything dirty about it out of marriage.

And so whether it's fornication, prostitution, adultery, homosexuality, it doesn't matter. God says flee from it.

And 1 Thessalonians 4 says, it is the will of God that is your sexual sanctification.

And so my name is Mike Abendroth, No Compromise Radio. This is part two on sexual ethics and the gospel, making sure you heed the word of God and imbibe the word of God so that you don't fall prey to the words of the adulterous.

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life -transforming power of God's word through verse -by -verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on Route 110 in West Boylston.

You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff or management.