Positional Statement Series Part 1: Concerning Sexual Immorality.

Concerning Sexual Immorality, I have fallen into that trap and have gotten out of the trap by the grace and mercy of God. I have worked to improve this because I realized that I am being two-faced which is not a good characteristic of being a Christian. Some issues have to unfortunately be black and white. God has freed me from this bondage of sexual immorality.

Sexual Immorality is a black and white issue. With this, we have seen the secularization of the Christian faith over this issue. It has been reported that over 90 percent of the Church members across the United States struggle with Pornography. This is a mind-numbing statistic. When did it become normalized to engage in sexual immorality as a believer in Jesus Christ? According to numerous passages in the Scripture, God calls us to flee sexual immorality. He even goes a step further and says that Sexual Immorality is a sin against your own body and defiles the local church (See 1 Corinthians 5:1-13 for more clarity on this subject). This hurts me to know that I have defiled the local church by my sexual immorality that wage war in my soul. I am guilty of sexual immorality. And since this revelation, I have taken practical steps to avoid sexual immorality sin. For instance, Generation Z has more access to vehicles that drive us down the dangerous path of sexual immorality—Snapchat, Instagram, TikTok, and even the Videos on Facebook.

Here is a little information about the Corinthians in Corinth, the place that Paul is talking about. So, there is a god, Aphrodite. Aphrodite is a god of sexuality. Aphrodite is a fake god that is probably most likely a name of a demon. Anyways, she wages war in the cultures trying to get people to worship her by practicing sexual immorality.

One author puts it in this way. Jonathan Cahn is talking about the sexual revolution and how it was caused by the devil’s henchmen, demons. Demons are also known as “fallen angels.” He, referring to Jonathan Cahn, states,

“What would this mean for America and the West? If America’s turning from God began to manifest in the early 1960s and, with it, the entrance of Baal, we would then expect this to followed by the entrance of Ashtoreth, or Ishtar. And what would then happen in the wake of that entrance? We would expect a transformation to begin that would alter the realm of sexuality. With the goddess’s entrance we would expect biblical standards and ethics surrounding sexuality and marriage to begin to erode. We would expect the moral foundations and values that had undergirded Western civilization for nearly two thousand years to begin overturning. In short, we would expect there to be a revolution in the realm of sexuality—a sexual revolution.” (Jonathan Cahn, Return of the Gods, p. 78).

This sexual revolution is causing people to worship the false gods instead of the one true God. Jonathan Cahn continues on,

“The Sexual revolution was another dimension of the paganization of America and Western civilization. The values it represented were pagan values, and the sexuality was pagan sexuality. What was branded as the ‘new morality’ was in actuality an old morality, an ancient morality, the morality of the gods. The reappearance of that morality was a sign that the departed spirits had return to the house” (Jonathan Cahn, Return of the Gods, p. 79).

This causes concern to our own spiritual life; and this causes issue with True God—Yahweh Elohim, The Lord God Almighty. Since God is a Jealous God, he does not like us to do this and defiles his kingdom. This is why we can have syncretic religion. Syncretic religion is a religion where you pick and choose what you believe. You basically “workshop” your beliefs. This is sinful practice because you are not truly believing in the way of the one True King, the Lord Jesus Christ. Look at the first word “syncretic.” It has “syn” in the name. It is a sin to mix religions up and not follow the one true God—Yahweh, Jehovah, the Lord God Almighty. Therefore, I believe we should not seek out to mix religion up with sexual immorality because with performing sexual immoral acts, we are defiling the kingdom of God and are committing idolatry to God. We are leaving God for a fake sensation—or in other terms a momentary sensation that comes and goes in an instant.

I hold to a strict literal grammatical and historical approach. In this approach, I have read 1 Corinthians 5:9-13 and have concluded the following statement regarding sexual immorality concerning believers. If you are an unbeliever and struggle with sexual immorality, you are more than welcome to join on a Sunday morning. However, if you are a believer and struggle with sexual immorality, you are more than welcome to come to our church when you have conquered your sexual immorality or are willing to work on solving your sexual immorality with a counselor. How many of us are brutally honest with ourselves and say “we struggle with sexual immorality?” If all of us struggle with sexual immorality, it doesn’t mean it should be normalized in our churches. Churches are not actively engaging against the rise of the sexual revolution. They are also dismissing the fact that over 90 percent of the local church members are engaging in sexual immorality. That is mind-boggling. We should listen to Paul’s letter to the Church of Corinth.

Here is the background of the man. 1 Corinthians 5:1-2. 1 Corinthians 5:1-2 (ESV) states,

“It is actually reported that there is a sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that is not tolerated even among pagans, for a man has his father’s wife. And you are arrogant! Ought you not rather to mourn? Let him who has done this be removed from among you.”

With 1 Corinthians 5:1-2, we see that God does not want a sexual immorality among the church members who are actual born-again believers. Paul even to went further to say, “You are to deliver this man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord” (1 Corinthians 5:5). Ouch! That is terrible. “Deliver him to Satan.” Wow! This is a very pronounced judgment against a church member in the Church of Corinth.

Now, Paul gives an application to be applied to all churches today here in America and abroad. 1 Corinthians 5:9-13 (ESV) states

“I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people—not at all meaning the sexually immoral of this world, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world .But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler—not even to eat with such a one. For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? God judges those outside. Purge the evil person from among you.”

Later he explains in the next chapter to flee. No wonder Paul stated to flee when he pronounced Judgment on the man who was indulging in sexual immorality. Paul states, “Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body. Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought at a price. So, glorify God in your body.” Since we were bought with a price, “What was that price?” Jesus Christ death was that price. He was the substitutionary atonement that could only come from God because he is fully man (Hebrews 4:15) and he is fully God (Hebrews 9:22b). He was a man also like we are man. He felt emotion but he knew no sin (2 Corinthians 5:22). So, since he willingly sacrificed his life on his own accord (John 10), we should glorify God with our bodies and that means not committing sexual immorality.

This is one church discipline policy that is very difficult to practice. If over 90 percent of church members engage in sexual immorality, that means that 10% are not engaging in sexual immorality. However, how many of the 90% church attendees are actual members of the local church? How do we lovingly cut off a member when they are performing sexual immoral acts?

These are important questions, and the answer on how we can lovingly cut off a born again believer who is indulging in sexual immorality is found in Hebrews 12:5-10. Hebrews 12:5-10 states, “And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons? ‘My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves and chastises every son whom he receives.’ It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness.” This passage is twofold. First, it tackles the question, “How is God both loving and just?” This is seen through his discipline among his adopted sons and daughters. Just like our earthly fathers carries just punishment when we disobey to show love, God carries just punishment when we disobey against him to show love. He is lovingly correcting our behavior by showing us love.

It is like a Church leader lovingly correcting them by showing them tough love of cutting them off from being a church member and taking them out of church leadership roles. It is sad but needed. It hurts my heart to see that 90% of church members struggle with pornography. Pornography devastates the church and that is why sexual immorality defiles the church and defiles our body. It affects the vertical aspect of our faith and the horizontal aspect of our faith.

Just like a father lovingly disciplines his child, we too need to be disciplined by God and sometimes we have to lovingly make the right choice and cut the sexual immoral believers off of being members until they are redeemed out of their sexual immoral conduct.

Sexual Immorality is a terrible sin and should not be practiced. Sexual sins include Masturbation, pornography, sex outside of marriage, looking at a girl lustfully, and other sexual sins. The passages of Scriptures that shows us that God does not condone sexual immorality are the following:

1 Corinthians 6:18; 1 Corinthians 7:2; 1 Corinthians 5:1; Ephesians 5:3; 1 Corinthians 6:13; 1 Thessalonians 4:3; Ezekiel 16:26; Matthew 19:9; 1 Corinthians 6:9; 1 Corinthians 10:8; Galatians 5:19; Jude 1:7; Revelation 2:14; 1 Corinthians 5:11; Revelation 9:21; Matthew 5:32; Revelation 2:21; Numbers 25:1; Mark 7:21; Acts 15:20; 2 Corinthians 12:21; Matthew 15:19; 1 Corinthians 5:10; 1 Corinthians 7:1; Galatians 5:21; 1 Corinthians 5:9; Ephesians 4:19; Acts 15:29; Acts 21:25; Colossians 3:5; Hebrews 12:16; Hebrews 13:4; 1 Timothy 1:10; Revelation 22:15; Leviticus 18:6.

So, as you can see by this verse list, God does not condone sexual immorality. When a church or an individual engages in sexual sins, it hurts God and defiles the church. I am primarily talking to the believers in this instance. Believers should not engage in sexual immorality because it affects the neurons in our body to make it more likely to do it again. Like Paul says to the Church of Corinth, we need to flee sexual immorality. Like Paul says to the Church of Ephesus, we need to not even have a hint of sexual immorality.

Therefore, if you want to pursue membership at Church you need to be free from sexual immorality. If you want to teach at church, you need to be free from the bondage of sexual immorality. I would love for you to attend but if you are a believer, I have to urge you to seek out counseling and flee from sexual immorality. This is my position statement concerning sexual immorality.