PURITY WORKBOOK II Chapter 5 ‘God’s Gift of Marital Oneness’
Objectives:
To understand that the marriage bed was given to us by God in a moral context of covenant, spiritual union, fidelity, and oneness.
To realize that when one of God’s good gifts are taken out of their moral context, they becomes destructive idols which enslave us.
To grasp the fact that in our spiritual warfare against lust, we need to incorporate the battle strategy of ‘out-truthing the lie’—of beating the lie with the truth.
To learn how important it is that the excellent things in creation (male, female, marital oneness) are ‘glory pointers’—they should direct us to the goodness of our Creator and His plan.
Mid-chapter questions:
- Why is there a link between modesty in dress and the sacredness of marriage? a.) because clothing fashions should communicate that a woman is married and has settled down, and is not into partying. b.) because how we clothe our bodies says that God is watching. c.) because a Christian single woman wants to properly cover her body from lustful gazes, knowing her body is reserved for her future husband. (Answer: “c”)
- The truth taught in Ephesians 5 is that a husband is a ‘type of Christ’—that means: a.) that the husband, like Christ who loves the church, loves his wife sacrificially . b.) that the husband is a picture of male chivalry in action. c.) that the wife is won by the husband’s romantic pursuits. (Answer: “a”)
- Victory over lust and porn use in part involves a strategy of: a.) buying the most expensive filter for the internet. b.) getting into high accountability friendships with others struggling with porn use. c.) ‘reconstructing’ God’s glorious vision for marital oneness in a society that has ‘deconstructed’ that vision. (Answer: “c”)
End of chapter questions:
We live in a society that idolized sexual relations. Explain why it is so important to study God’s plan for marital oneness.
If we allow mass culture’s idolatrous definition of sexuality to dominate our minds, we will be more subject to its deconstructing lies. What is our most important strategy against this problem?
Why is the act of marriage infinitely more than merely a physical act?
Explain what the Apostle Paul means when he says in 1 Corinthians chapter eleven that “woman is the glory of man.”
End of chapter ‘take away’ ideas:
Think upon these things:
Porn use is a lying worldview about sexual oneness; about the body; and about the image of God.
God has built into the creation the principle of delayed gratification. When pleasure is pursued directly for self, it is very often sin, lust, and sensuality.
The longing to be one flesh with the opposite sex is a God-given desire when it is not turned into lustful activity. When we give that desire to God to allow Him to fulfill it in marriage, we are ‘redeeming our sexuality’.
Heterosexual marriage is a powerful ‘culture-making force’ because it demands that a man develop the character necessary to be a faithful father and a devoted husband.
Glossary:
Transcendent character of sexual oneness: sexual oneness is marriage has covenantal and spiritual dimensions. In that sense it transcends, or goes beyond merely the physical.
Sexual license: that attitude that anything goes—sex without consequences.
Reductionist view of sexuality: the view that sexuality is nothing more than a physical act.
Procreational: one of the God-given purposes for marriage—to procreate children.
False integration point: another word for an idol. To take something from the creation and then attempt to make it supply unity (integration), fulfillment, and purpose in one’s life.
Perversion of a virtue: to pervert one of God’s good gifts, such as marital oneness. The gift is perverted by taking it out of the moral context in which God gave it—so that it is changed and perverted. Sexual oneness is a great gift—fornication and adultery are distortions or perversions of that gift.
Antithesis: to stress the opposite or contrast between truth and error.