Clarification

Yesterday I was sitting in Starbuck's, drinking coffee with a young twenty-something friend. I mentioned that I had started a blog. He asked what he had to do to have access to it. I told him the way to open the blog. My friend said that people who did not know me might think I was saying things I really wasn't saying. He was referring to the piece I wrote about wondering why sexual behaviors stirred so much emotional fervor in us. I thought about what my friend said, and decided he might well be correct. While most of you who read what I write know me, there may be some who do not. So, let me clarify some things.

First, there are sexual behaviors which I consider wrong. I am against all kinds of abuse and/or abusive behavior whether physical, emotional, and/or sexual. Thus, I am against things like pedophilia, and rape.

Second, even within marriage, not all sexual behaviors are appropriate, right, or justifiable. One can commit adultery without every having a sexual relationship with anyone, other than one's spouse. Even within marriage, there can be adultery, and I am not talking about one's mind. Any time one party in the marriage forces a behavior, sexual or otherwise, on their marriage partner, it is adulterous. Why? Because it breaks the vow of faithfulness to treat the other person as a person of dignity and worth, deserving of respect. Any time one uses one's partner to simply satisfy their sexual desires, without respect to the wants, needs, and desires of their partner, they are treating them as an object, not as an equal partner, and it is adulterous. Adultery is not so much a sexual behavior as it is a breaking of a covenant relationship, thus in the Old Testament the people are sometimes called an adulterous generation. It was not because they were "bed hopping." It was because they had broken covenant with the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and went chasing after other gods.

So much for this time.