SEXUAL IMMORALITY:
HOMOSEXUALITY, ADULTERY AND PORNOGRAPHY
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By: Dr. Jimmy Lowery
If we look back 50 to 60 years their can be seen many changes in the social outlook concerning sex. Since the early 1980’s sex and violence have taken over the movies and television production in America and other countries. However, America was probably the slowest to change its censorship. What has happened to America’s moral standards in the last several years that would blatantly corrupt the screen? Sexual Immorality along with Pornography has filtered its way into the lives and homes of many. What this article will attempt to do is discuss the sexual immorality in the world, and the different levels of pornography with the main concentration focusing on what the Bible says concerning the two subjects and its diversity of affects on people.
I would like to stress that this is not a hate article towards any group or persons. The Bible does not teach us to hate, in fact, it teaches the very opposite, which is love. Jesus was constantly telling the disciples to teach about His love for us and for us to love one another, which was mentioned many times throughout the New Testament. (Matthew 5:43-48, John 13:34-35, 15:12,17, Romans 13:18, 1 Thes. 4:9, 1 Peter 1:22, 1 John 3:11, 4:7,11-12) However, it does teach us principles to adhere to concerning healthy morals; one of which deals with sex. It is this authors intentions to convey to the reader that there are many who commits sin, but that does not mean we, as Christians are to hate those people. In fact, Jesus stated to the angry mob of people, who were about to stone a women to death for committing adultery, let him that is without sin cast the first stone. (John 8:7) This judgment and punishment for adultery in this time era was appropriate, but Jesus came to change this. The people dropped their stones and left. So to cast judgment on others and/or maliciously physically attack those who are doing sexual immoral activities such as gays, and lesbians are wrong and really a much heinous sin. This also goes for those who work at abortion clinics or perform abortion. It is God’s place to judge, condemn, and punish NOT mankind. (This is not telling you to go and break the law, which is man’s laws. If you do you will be judged by man and punished!) As a Christian we are to lead others who are astray to Christ and that is through LOVE NOT HATRED.
While reading this think about why God was punishing and pouring out his wrath upon the nations thousands of years ago. When reading your Bible you will find out that it was for their wicked ways. Where are we headed today?
How is sexual immorality defined today? In today’s society sexual immorality consist mainly of incest, indecent exposure, sex with a minor, date rape, and rape. It has become accepted as a norm for people to be homosexual, trans-sexual or transvestites, bestiality, and bondage or S&M sexual preferences. The diagnostic manual for disorders list these type of sexual orientation behaviors as a disorder only if it cause the person mental distress. However, if one were to look back several years ago it would be learned that all of the above were considered a mental disorder. What changed the way our society looked at sexual preferences? It can be summed up in one word, “SATAN”. Satan has deceived the minds of nearly the entire world into thinking that this type of behavior is okay.
In the rest of the article we will examine a few areas that the Bible considers to be immoral activities such as Homosexuality, Adultery, and Pornography. I hope to expose the deception of Satan’s cover-up of sexual immorality and open some eyes as to what is happening to America.
Homosexuality
There is much debate and controversy that surrounds the delicate issue homosexuality today and their rights. Many gay/lesbian activists have sought out the religious community to side with there sinful lifestyle. Some of the religious denominations have approved of homosexuality as a normal lifestyle. As I stated earlier, this is not a hate document. I do not hate those that have chosen to live a homosexual lifestyle. No, in fact, I feel sorry for them because they just do not realize what they are doing by living this type of life. I would never tell them that they couldn’t come to my church, in fact that is where they need to be so that maybe the Lord will change their hearts and lead them away from this standard of living. But for a church, or a pastor to condone homosexuality is wrong and goes against what the Bible teaches. And there are many who are doing this. I pray that they will see that they are misleading people; otherwise, they will be held accountable by the Lord for what they are doing.
Homosexuality is a sin and many are trying to convince the world that it is a normal healthy lifestyle. But they are far from being right.
There are several scriptures in the Old and New Testament that tell us that it is wrong and that we should not practice homosexual activities. Here are just a few (Note all of these are taken from the NIV Bible):
Leviticus 18:22
22 ”‘Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable. 23 ”‘Do not have sexual relations with an animal and defile yourself with it. A woman must not present herself to an animal to have sexual relations with it; that is a perversion. 24 ”‘Do not defile yourselves in any of these ways, because this is how the nations that I am going to drive out before you became defiled. 25 Even the land was defiled; so I punished it for its sin, and the land vomited out its inhabitants. 26 But you must keep my decrees and my laws. The native-born and the aliens living among you must not do any of these detestable things, 27 for all these things were done by the people who lived in the land before you, and the land became defiled. 28 And if you defile the land, it will vomit you out as it vomited out the nations that were before you.
Romans 1:24-27
24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen. 26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.
1 Corinthians 6:9-11
9 Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders 10 nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. (NIV)
No matter how you look at these scriptures it all says the same thing, homosexuality is a sin and is immoral in God’s eyes. Sex or lust is a very powerful tool that Satan has used to destroy the lives, not to mention the souls, of many people. Several scientist and doctors would have you believe that it is all right to experiment with homosexual tendencies. They have even tried to sway society into believing that some people are just born a homosexual, that it is genetic. Hear is what the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH) has to say, whose goal is to help those distressed by homosexuality and wanting to change:
“Many laymen now believe that homosexuality is part of who a person really is from the moment of conception. The "genetic and unchangeable" theory has been actively promoted by gay activists and the popular media. Is homosexuality really an inborn and normal variant of human nature? No. There is no evidence that shows that homosexuality is genetic. And none of the research claims there is. Only the press and certain researchers do, when speaking in sound bites to the public.”( http://www.narth.com/docs/istheregene.html) NARTH has much information that proves without a doubt that people who turn to a homosexual lifestyle have had one or more combinations of environment or psychological influences that made the person turn to homosexuality. None of the research that has been conducted to prove that homosexuality is a result from biological circumstance has proven as such; on the contrary, it proves otherwise that it is from environment and/or psychological influences. I urge you to read more concerning this topic at their site http://www.narth.com/docs/bioresearch.html, it has a wealth of knowledge from reputable doctors, psychologists, and scientists.
It is neither the church nor the pastor who we have to face, but God when He judges us. Even though there are many out there who are trying to defend this type of lifestyle it is still and will always be a sin in the eyes of God. This does not mean that God hates the homosexuals; on the contrary, He loves all of mankind. All he asks is for us to obey his commandments and to love Him with all our heart and all our soul, and to love one another. So do not hate these individuals, love them and try to help them overcome this affliction that Satan has oppressed them with. They are hurt, confused and scared. As many individuals will tell you that have turned their life over to Christ and turned away from homosexuality, it is very hard to change. However, when you have Christ in your life anything is possible to overcome, especially when it comes to defeating Satan’s oppressions.
Adultery
In the last decade the rise of divorce has skyrocketed to unbelievable heights. There are several reasons as to why couples divorce. A major reason is due to one or both spouses committing adultery. I remember seeing a survey several years ago concerning couples and on it was the question “Have you ever had an affair on you spouse?”. The number of people that have cheated on their spouse was unremarkable; it was something like 70 to 75 percent had answered yes. Even though surveys are sometimes somewhat skewed and/or biased, it shows that people have no regard for the sanctity of marriage. They risk their family splitting up and sometimes their life now that AIDS is so rampant in the world and for what? Simply for the lust of sexual pleasure that was put into their minds from Satan, which some perceive as love. Someone was told me that it was all right to get divorced because people just fall out of love, plus it was easy to do since divorce can be done for a cheap price. It is cheaper to get divorced than to get married in simple cases.
The judicial system has made it very convenient for couples to get divorced for whatever reason. The Bible teaches us that the only reason that is justified for divorce is that of adultery. But Satan has twisted the minds of society into using marriage like that of buying and selling of a car. Get married and in 3 or 4 years if you do not like it then get a divorce and find another partner. This is sort of to the extreme but it is what it seems that society is thinking concerning marriage. This in turn seems to justify why people commit adultery. Jesus stated this in the book of Matthew Chapter 19 concerning divorce:
“ 9 I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, and marries another woman commits adultery.” (NIV)
Not to mention that it is one of the Ten Commandments that God gave to Moses:
“Thou shall not commit adultery.” (Ex. 20:14, NIV)
The bible is full of verses where the Lord condemns adultery as a sin. Some of these verses are Lev. 20:10, Dt. 5:18, Prov. 6:32, Matt. 5:27-32, 15:19, 19:9,18, Mark 7:21, 10:11-12,19. There are many others but just from these few you will find that it is a sin and not permissible. Although, it is a forgivable sin that we can be forgiven for by the grace of God. Jesus forgave the adulteress, as we find in John 8:1,
“3 The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group 4 and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. 5 In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” 6 They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him. But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. 7 When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8 Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground. 9 At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. 10 Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” 11 “No one, sir,” she said. “Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.” ” (NIV)
In verse 11 Jesus forgives the woman, this goes for us today too. But society today just casually sees it as something that just happens for one reason or another. This is what Satan wants people to do, just casually think this way concerning lust and relationships. Satan and his demons are liars, cheats, lustful, immoral, murderous, angry, and vile entities that plant all sort of sinful thoughts into mankind’s mind and heart.
In some religions a couple must attend several counseling sessions before the pastor will conduct the ceremony. This has perhaps helped some couples but not enough. Many still end up in divorce even after counseling. If God is not in the marriage then it is at great risk of being destroyed. Until we get right with God then Satan is going to continue to pollute the minds of people and cause the split-up of families. And his strongest weapon against mankind is sexual pleasures of the mind and flesh, as we will examine further.
Pornography
Since the inception of the Internet, pornography has taken a different level of distribution. It is out there for many to get their eyes full of whatever suits their disturbing pleasure. The majority of the sites are not accessible unless you purchase the site through a credit card but what is to stop a young person from getting someone’s card and using it. All the information they need is right their on the card. If that isn’t feasible then they can access pornographic pictures and some videos through newsgroups. There are not any current restrictions to these newsgroups, which is sort of e-mail message board. Anyone can get access to them by setting them up. So parents beware and make sure that you monitor what your child is doing when on the Internet. You can set up security measures to keep young curious minds on the straight and narrow path to health moral Internet surfing. Because of the type of pornography that is available it is very disturbing and not mentally healthy for anyone.
Types of pornography that can be found are the typical pictures of women that you would see in magazines such as “Playboy”. However, there are much more disturbing pictures that we as a society should be alarmed about. One such type of pornography is that of “RAPE”. It boggles the mind as to how we as a people let this kind of garbage be available on the Internet. These sites give very graphic pictures of women being raped, some very brutally. Most of them are scenes from pornographic movies, but some of it makes you wonder where they came from. Why would anyone find a thrill out of seeing a woman being attack and forced to have sex? What kind of message does it send?
“According to a study published by the National Victim Center and the Center for Crime Victims Treatment and Research (1992), approximately 683,000 American women were forcibly raped in 1990. Averaged over time, this comes to 1.3 rapes each minute; 78 each hour; 1,871 each day; 56,916 each month; and 683,000 each year. When the number of female children and males assaulted during that same period are added, it is likely that well over twice that many Americans were sexually assaulted.” (http://www.ncasa.org) What if you were a victim of rape, would you want sites on the Internet that feed the frenzy of a rapist or to be rapist? It is unconceivable as to why? There is still much left to do to police the Internet and the government is trying to tackle many issues surrounding it.
But this issue is just not on the Internet, it is on the theater screens as well as noted from this web site, “Interestingly, an earlier piece in the editorial commentary section of the issue says: "A disturbing new trend in Hollywood has moviegoers retching in their popcorn: rape as a plot device to spice up tawdry old melodramas. Major-studio releases such as Rob Roy, Showgirls, Strange Days, and Leaving Las Vegas have all featured gratuitous scenes of forced boning." These are references to male/female assaults. “. (http://www.vix.com/pub/men/abuse/commentary) Advertising or having this type of violence in a magazine, movie, or Internet site is doing nothing but feeding all the rape/sexual assault offenders out there; not to mention the potential rapist who may have some fantasy about it. The only way to get rid of it is for the American people to speak out against it and maybe something will be done. This is the most severe type of pornographic material out there on the Internet; however, there are others that make your skin crawl with disgust.
Pornographic pictures of all types of sodomy, homosexuality, bestiality, and sick fetishes have flooded the Internet. Although better security measures have been taken to ensure that people are of age through some services whether they are pay or free sites. The job of these age services is exactly just that, they have the ability to check out your age. But this type of material is still inappropriate and corruptible to the mind no matter what the age of the person. This is not to mention what can happen to a person’s intimate relationships with their partners and marriages.
Some men have admitted that pornography was an addiction; this is to say that it controlled their lives. In a recent television show some people that were addicted to pornography came out and discussed their illness. Most spoke of broken marriages and financial difficulties that were a direct result of pornography.
Closure: As you can see there is certainly a problem out there on the Internet that needs to be addressed. The devil wants people to feed off of sexual garbage that is lude and crude and corrupt minds. For centuries God has punished powerful nations for their wickedness, even his own chosen people. What do you think is about to happen to us in the world now? Are we not just as wicked? God will not let it go on for much longer before He dishes out His wrath? Sex was intended to be a union of marriage between a man and women, which makes them one. Jesus stated in Matthew Chapter 19:4-6,
“4 “Haven’t you read,” he replied, “that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’ 5 and said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’? 6 So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate.”” (NIV)
God did not intend for it to be an abomination of disgust. Sexual Immorality is Satan’s way of taking something beautiful and turning it into something disgusting and ugly. Anyone that is involved in sexual immorality is playing right along with Satan. The apostle Paul stated in the book of Ephesians this:
“3 But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God’s holy people. 4 Nor should there be obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking, which are out of place, but rather thanksgiving. 5 For of this you can be sure: No immoral, impure or greedy person—such a man is an idolater—has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. 6 Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of such things God’s wrath comes on those who are disobedient. 7 Therefore do not be partners with them.” (NIV)
This is but one of many verses that speak out against sexual immorality in the Bible, but just from this one you notice that it is an abomination in the sight of God and should not be practiced. Do not be deceived to the lure that pornography is an expression of free speech or of art. It is not nor will it ever be in the sight of God. This goes right along with all other sexual perversions that the devil wants you to think. Homosexuality is not genetic; God did not make anyone that way. On the contrary God speaks against such sexual participation and is included as sexual immorality. God is not going to contradict himself, as this would divide His kingdom. But neither is Satan, he will make people think everything opposite of God as not to contradict and divide his kingdom as well. So Satan uses the many scientist and doctors to try and convince society that all of this is normal and is a result of being born that way. How cleaver is Satan that he can fool people into thinking such things. This does not mean that anyone should hate people who are homosexual. On the contrary they should be loved and helped to understand what they are practicing is wrong and that it is Satan that is oppressing them with this type of behavior. There have been many homosexuals that have been changed through the salvation of Jesus Christ and delivered from their lifestyle. This goes for prostitutes, adulterers, addicts of pornography, etc… God loves all of us and wants us all to follow his commandments. All a person has to do is to accept Jesus Christ as their Savior and ask for forgiveness of their sins. No matter what you have done, God will forgive you. If you do not know Jesus Christ as your Savior please do it now because you never know when your time will be up and God calls you before the judgment throne.