Christian Pure

Sex Within Marriage: What the Bible Says About God’s Good Gift

Christian Pure Team

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Summary

  • The Bible calls sex in marriage good: God made husband and wife to become “one flesh,” to have children and to delight in each other.
  • Scripture speaks openly of married pleasure, telling a husband to “rejoice with the wife of thy youth” and giving a whole book, the Song of Solomon, to married love.
  • The Bible sets no number for how often a couple should have sex, but Paul asks spouses not to withhold themselves except by agreement, for a short time of prayer.
  • Belonging to each other works both ways, a pause needs consent, and Focus on the Family, an evangelical ministry, says both spouses are “always free to say no.”
  • The Bible keeps sex for marriage alone, and Jesus taught that looking on a woman to lust after her is adultery in the heart.
  • Churches differ on particular acts and on birth control: many evangelicals leave them to the couple, while the Catholic Church allows only natural methods of spacing children.

The Bible calls sex in marriage good. God made husband and wife to become “one flesh” (Genesis 2:24), to have children and to delight in each other, and Scripture keeps sex for marriage alone. Paul asks spouses not to withhold themselves from each other, except by agreement and for a short time of prayer (1 Corinthians 7:5). The story begins in a garden. When God brought the first man and woman together, “they were both naked, the man and his…

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Bibliography (Click to show)
  • Scripture is quoted from the King James Version: Genesis 1:27–28, 2:24–25, 3:8–10 and 26:8–9; Deuteronomy 24:5; Psalm 127:3; Proverbs 5:18–19; Song of Solomon 1:2, 4:16 and 8:6–7; Matthew 5:28 and 19:4–6; 1 Corinthians 7:2–5, 7:9 and 13:5; Ephesians 5:25–32; 1 Thessalonians 4:3; 1 Timothy 4:3–4; Hebrews 13:4; 1 Peter 3:7 (BibleGateway, KJV).
  • Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraphs 2362, 2363, 2366 and 2370 (vatican.va).
  • The Westminster Confession of Faith (1646), chapter 24, “Of Marriage and Divorce” (Orthodox Presbyterian Church).
  • Southern Baptist Convention, The Baptist Faith and Message 2000, article XVIII, “The Family” (bfm.sbc.net).
  • Holy Synod of the Orthodox Church in America, “Synodal Affirmations on Marriage, Family, Sexuality, and the Sanctity of Life” (1992) (oca.org).
  • Focus on the Family, “Oral and Anal Sex: Biblical Guidelines for Intimacy in Marriage” (focusonthefamily.com).
  • GotQuestions.org, “What does the Bible say about birth control? Should Christians use birth control?” (gotquestions.org).

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