Gospel Prism

You Shall Not Commit Adultery
Exodus 20:14

Introduction

Imagine a married man with three children going on a business trip. He is also a strong believer, a person who firmly trusts in Christ and genuinely is trying to live in light of the Gospel. He is in a city for only a few days and on each day, his schedule is packed with meetings. On the last day, he decides to take it easy and skips his final meeting believing it to be unimportant and unnecessary. So instead, he goes to a local pub and sits at the bar. A beautiful woman walks in and sits next to him. She strikes up a light conversation with him, and suddenly he is feeling both the pangs of guilt but also the electricity of excitement. She moves one barstool closer, and he doesn’t pull back. Now, they’re sitting next to each other and their conversation is much more detailed, intimate, and flirtatious. Finally, as the night winds down, she invites him to her room for “just another drink and more jovial conversation.” And despite every warning signal of danger going off in his conscience, he pushes them aside and slowly makes his way to the elevator with her. His life, his family, and his future will never be the same.

This might sound like a staid movie scene to you, but this is an all too-real story in the lives of so many. Is it possible for someone who loves the Lord, loves his family, and loves his children, to turn to another woman or another man? Is it possible for you? The story I told is a real life story as described in the Bible. Just change the business man to the name David and the meeting skipped to a time when kings go to war, and you can see the parallel. Remember, David was a man after God’s own heart. There are very few in church history who was viewed by God in the way David was. If this could happen to David, surely it could happen to anyone. And the consequences of this one sin was absolutely devastating to David’s family.

The seventh commandment deals with this sin, “You shall not commit adultery.” It is a terrible sin and distinct in ways that separate it from other sins. However, even this sin is rooted on the breaking of the first commandment. To break this commandment is to proclaim that satisfaction in the spouse the Lord has given to us is insufficient for us. Or if one is single, the satisfaction of a future spouse, or satisfaction in Himself ultimately for all of us, especially for those who will never marry, is insufficient for us. Once again, we become our own God and God is overthrown in our hearts when we commit adultery. So what makes this commandment and the sin it prohibits so distinct from the others?

Sexual sin is distinct from other sins in that…

First, it perverts the marriage covenant God established before sin ever entered the world. God was the one who brought Eve to Adam and officiated over their wedding. God determined Eve to be Adam’s sole suitable helper. And it was God who decided that these two would be one flesh (Gen 2:24). This is inherent in creation itself. And so when there is sexual sin, there is a rejection of our created nature, what God determined to be very good.

Second, sexual sin is distinct because it affects our spiritual nature because sexuality is ultimately created by God to be spiritual. The church didn’t always teach this to be true. The early church believed sex was so starkly physical that it must be inherently sinful. Origen, an early church father, was so convinced that his sexual, physical nature was evil, distinct from his spiritual nature, that he castrated himself to prove his faithfulness to God. Augustine believed that original sin was transferred through intercourse, probably a reaction against his previous life of sensuality. And Jerome would “throw himself into thorny brambles so that the pain would overwhelm his desire for the female body.” (Dan Allender and Tremper Longman, Intimate Allies, 228) These might seem to be very odd reactions and yet, the church has taken on this mentality when it comes to sexuality. Sex has been taboo in the church primarily because sex has been dichotomized from spirituality. However, this simply is not the biblical record. Sex and sexuality has a clear spiritual component.

If you read the OT, you can find a number of references where God compares His relationship with Israel to the sexual relationship between husband and wife. We see this most often when Israel is compared to an adulteress and God the husband (Jer 3:1-10; Hos 2; Ez 16; Mal 2:10-16), such as this text in Ez 16:8-15: “When I passed by you again and saw you, behold, you were at the age for love, and I spread the corner of my garment over you and covered your nakedness; I made my vow to you and entered into a covenant with you, declares the Lord God, and you became mine. 9 Then I bathed you with water and washed off your blood from you and anointed you with oil… But you trusted in your beauty and played the whore because of your renown and lavished your whorings on any passerby; your beauty became his. 16 You took some of your garments and made for yourself colorful shrines, and on them played the whore.”

Even the secular world believed that sexuality and spirituality were intricately linked. Cult or shrine prostitutes often lined the pagan temples. These were men or women would have sex with worshippers of a pagan god as means of the worshippers personal worship. And even in our day, the power, allure, and seduction of sex is used in every marketing scheme there is, from chewing gum to cars to girls sewing machines. I’ll talk more about sex and marketing later, but the point is, sex is powerful because sex is spiritual, as God made it to be for our ultimate joy used in the covenant of marriage.

Third, sexual sin is distinct because it is uniquely a direct offense against each person of the Trinity: God the Father (Gen 2), God the Son (1 Cor 6:13, 15), and God the Spirit (1 Cor 6:18-20). Paul tells the Corinthians in 1 Cor 6:13-15: “The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. 14 And God raised the Lord and will also raise us up by his power. 15 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never!” Clearly here, sexual sin is against Jesus Himself. And in verses 18-20, Paul adds: “Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body. 19 Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God?” This sin is also an offense against the HS.

Fourth, sexual is distinct because its consequences are terrifying (Prov 6:25-27; 1 Cor 6:9-10; Heb 13:4). Listen to the wise father’s warnings to his son concerning adultery in Prov 6:25-32: “Do not desire her beauty in your heart, and do not let her capture you with her eyelashes; 26 for the price of a prostitute is only a loaf of bread, but a married woman hunts down a precious life. 27 Can a man carry fire next to his chest and his clothes not be burned? 28 Or can one walk on hot coals and his feet not be scorched? 29 So is he who goes in to his neighbor’s wife; none who touches her will go unpunished…He who commits adultery lacks sense; he who does it destroys himself.” Adultery destroys lives. If I were to commit adultery, it would not only impact me and Shua, but also my children and their children. And then think of my parents and the shame they would feel. But also, this church would be devastated. Thus, Hebrews 13:4 makes it clear when he writes: “Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous.”

Different Ways People Break the 7th Commandment

So clearly, sexual sin is unique in its impact, its consequences, its object, and its breadth. But some of you might be thinking, “I’m not married, how can I commit adultery.” Or perhaps you’re thinking, “I’ve never had sex with anyone other than my spouse. Surely, this commandment is not referring to me.” Like all of the commandments, Jesus does not see sin in light of one’s actions alone. But rather, he views these commandments as commandments of the heart as he says in Matthew 5:27-28: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ 28 But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” And Jesus leaves no room at all for any person to believe that keeping the 7th commandment is merely to remain physically faithful to one’s spouse. Here are different ways people break this commandment in light of Jesus’ words in Matthew.

First, there is physical adultery, which is what most think of when it comes to adultery. This is physical sexuality, and not just intercourse, with a married person. I use that caveat because many might believe physical adultery solely refers to intercourse. But the 7th commandment prohibits us to find any form of sexual pleasure in even the simplest forms of touch, from a hug to a kiss on the cheek to a stroke of the hand to the smell of the hair of a married person.

Second, there is emotional adultery and I think this is perhaps something many have not ventured to think is truly adultery. When we read Paul beautiful picture of marriage, a wife joyously submitting to a husband, a husband loving his wife sacrificially as Jesus loved the church, you can infer that this rules out giving ones affections and emotions to another. By emotional adultery, I mean seeking one’s primary emotional support from someone other than one’s spouse. And my friends, this can happen at work, on the web in chat rooms, and even at church. My dear sisters, I want to remind you that this can very easily happen to you in particular because so many of you want this type of camaraderie with your husbands. Imagine your husband is at work constantly working late nights (of course, this is a message that should be also a reminder to husbands to love their wives uniquely). He is traveling extensively. You’re with your kids with no one to talk to who can speak her language. Suddenly, an old male friend calls out of the blue asking how you are doing. And you begin to “share” with him about your loneliness, your struggles, your joys. You begin to realize that having someone to emotionally lean on feels really good, as if someone is really caring for you. Oh, the dangers of such a situation but how easily this can happen. I know of a person whose affair began because he was simply caring for another woman out of what he believed was his care for a sister in Christ. But the lines between emotional comfort and care to physical intimacy is quite thin. If you are finding your comfort and conversation solely from another person other than your spouse, you are in incredible danger and need to see this as a breaking of the 7th commandment.

Third, there is what I’ll call mental adultery. By this, I mean sex with one’s mind, fantasizing, lustful thoughts, and this is the primary way in which we break the 7th commandment. Let me give you some specific examples on how this occurs:

Reading: Recently, I have stopped reading Foxnews.com. Now you’re thinking, “What? Isn’t that a bit extreme? It’s just news.” Well, I stopped reading Foxnews because every time I went to the site, I hated the fact that the main front cover articles that dealt with sex were usually in bold. And, when I see bolded articles, I want to read the story thinking they’re the most important. But I’m sorry but I do not believe the most pressing news of the day is a teacher having sex with a student. But my flesh wants to read those stories and imagine. Reading romance novels can be as sexually exhilarating as looking at porn. Some things on the web to be read are only gateways to view pictures and to fantasize.

Fashion and Celebrities: I believe women lust and struggle with fantasizing as much as men do, though in different ways. Most men do not read Elle or Vogue Magazine. But I have been in hair salons waiting for my haircut where the only thing to read is such magazines. And yes, I have picked those magazines up and have really regretted having done so. The clothing that the women I those magazines are wearing are meant for one thing, to appeal to the eyes of men. For women also, watching celebrities, dreaming to be them, to live their lifestyle, to be as glamorous and as sexy as the women in those celebrity shows, to have the good-looking man grab you and hold you and kiss you, is lust. I have been at grocery checkout lines where I have had to fight for purity while waiting to pay for my ice cream bars with my kids next to me. Many of the fitness magazines will have one cover article that will deal with sex and though we might be saying, “I just want to learn how to exercise,” we are struggling with lust as we read.

Advertisements: Most of us view advertisements as relatively harmless. But there are very few ads these days that do not include sex. Billboards have sexual images. Newspapers and news magazines can cause one to lust, especially when the ads are for lingerie. How many of you get Victoria Secret catalogues delivered to your home? Wives, you might leave it around the house thinking that your husband doesn’t look at such things, but I figure if David could sleep with Bathsheba as a man after God’s own heart, then no man is strong enough to withstand such sin.

Movies and TV: If your mind and eyes are filled with scenes from TV and movies of men and women rolling around in bed together continually, where naked bodies are flashing before you, and you think that you can withstand such images, then I would say that you are really unaware of your own sinfulness. C. J. Mahaney talks about active TV watching, where he has a remote control in hand ready to fast forward anything that would compromise his heart before his God and his wife. So during the Super Bowl, he would fast forward those commercials that would give such messages. This doesn’t mean you can’t watch the Super Bowl but it must mean that as one who is honoring God and spouse or future spouse, you are actively fighting lust and the temptations to lust.

Music with Lust: When I was growing up, sex and music went hand in hand. I used to sing a song by J. Giels Band called “Angels in the Centerfold” and I didn’t even really know what I was singing. I’m not as up to date with today’s music so I thought I’d take a look. The Top 10 songs today, from Shop Boy’s “Party Like a Rockstar” to Justin Timberlake’s “Summer Love” all are about sex. Music makes a lasting impact. It affects one’s soul and how one view’s life. And yes, music affects the spirit. Try watching a drama without music and you will find the music undramatic. And when music is sexual, it makes one have longing for the things of sex.

Places: There are certain places where one will be inundated with lust. Go to any health club, any beach, and the malls and you will find that unless you are actively veering away, or looking at the ground, you will be tempted to lust. And yes, sometimes for your own joy and your own fight to be faithful to your God and to your spouse, you might need to decide to say that you would rather not work out at the gym than go there.

Clothing: Another place we are tempted to lust is any place where people dress alluringly and seductively. Stephen Arterburn and Fred Stoeker write in their book Every Man’s Battle that one of their greatest points of weakness in the struggle against lust is when women wear low-cut blouses. And if men are honest with themselves, they would say that they are right. When a woman with a low cut shirt leans over without discretion, every ounce of a man’s flesh wants to glare and lust. And how many men here in this room have lusted in this way and committed adultery in doing so? All of us at some time?

Porn on the Web and Cable TV: Of course, adultery is committed by looking at porn. And as we all know, you need not any longer go to a seedy convenience store to look at porn today. It’s available any time you want, usually unbeknownst to anyone. Just some stats to note about porn. About 40-50% of all rapists use porn to arouse themselves before they commit a rape. 12% of all websites are porn-related. There are 72 million worldwide visitors to porn sites annually. The average age of a first exposure to internet porn is 11 years old. 47% of Christians say that porn is a problem in their family. And when Promise Keepers was in their heyday, 53% of these men said they visited a porn site within the week. And I know in this very room, mental adultery by lust through the web is also existent.

Business Travel: I don’t want to create paranoia here, but as I said earlier, if David can commit adultery, so can any man or woman in this room. And business travel is one sure temptation to do so. When you travel alone you strike up conversations with someone at bars, restaurants, hotel fitness centers, it is far too easy to let one’s thoughts go to places of lust. And then there is of course the night alone with a TV and a remote control, where late night porn comes on TV and no one will ever know.

Children’s Dress: I add this last one because how we dress our kids is also how they will dress themselves one day. The LA Times has an article entitled, “No Escaping Sexualization of Young Girls.” This is a secular new source noting that today’s girls are becoming more and more sexualized by mothers and fathers. The Times notes:

In a two-part series on pedophilia, the newspaper reported that many pedophiles now use Internet support groups to swap how-to tips on getting jobs as camp counselors and teachers. Increasingly, The Times said, “pedophiles view themselves as the vanguard of a nascent movement seeking legalization of child pornography and the loosening of age-of-consent laws. They portray themselves as battling for children’s rights to engage in sex with adults….

These pedophiles are thinking this way, the legalization of sex with minors because they are thinking that since parents are dressing their kids in sexual ways, low midriffs, super-high skirts, the parents are accepting of sex with children. Limited Too sells thongs for 7 year olds. MSNBC in a report entitled, “Are Bratz Dolls Too Sexy?” notes: “The Bratz Web site is rife with examples that seem to play to that point. While waiting for the transition from one screen to another, the message flashes “Please wait … it takes time to look this good.” And included in the “profiles” of the dolls is each one’s “favorite body part.” The Courier Mail, a newspaper in Australia, comments: “It’s an intelligent parent’s nightmare – and a pervert’s dream. Bratz are childlike dolls – all big eyes and big heads – packaged as hookers. They have pouting lips, bare midriffs, plunging tops, tiny skirts and skimpy lingerie in black and pink.” My dear friends, how you dress your daughters matters to them. It will shape their thinking to believe that their bodies are to be used to look sexy. Charisa asked Shua very recently what ‘sexy’ means because she has been hearing the word. Well, I’ve been thinking of how to respond to her. But sexy means to be sexually appealing to someone else and I am afraid as we struggle with mental adultery, we are not struggling enough to save our children’s purity and fighting for their sexuality.

Sex Redeemed

This is not God’s intention for sex. Philip Ryken observes: “When used properly, intercourse seals the bond of matrimony. It is the glue—‘the covenant cement’ that holds the marriage secure.” (Philip Ryken, Written in Stone, 155) Sex was created by God for His glory and to be used as a means of worshipping Him and honoring one another within the covenant of marriage. When Paul was speaking to Timothy about those who forbade marriage because they probably deemed sex to be evil, Paul writes: “For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, 5 for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer.” And then he tells the Corinthians in 1 Cor 10:31: “So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.” The 7th commandment is a commandment that upholds the goodness of God’s grace to men and women who long to honor Him in marriage. And His promise is that when we trust that He is the only God by guarding our minds, our eyes, and our marriage bed, the joy and satisfaction that He gives in this is far greater than any amount of sexual relationships we could have and any amount of porn we could view.

And like you, if I continue to reflect on the ways I have failed to uphold this commandment, there would seem to be no hope. But once again, I must remind you that Jesus bore the lust, the adultery, and the punishment that was justly due to you and me. If you have committed adultery in any of these ways and feel the crushing weight of guilt, can you believe that He bore your griefs, your sorrows, and was punished by God so that we would be healed as Isaiah tells us in Isaiah 53:4-5? How sweet are these words from Martyn Lloyd-Jones:

Even adultery is not the unforgivable sin. It is a terrible sin, but God forbid that there should be anyone who feels that he or she has sinned himself or herself outside the love of God or outside His kingdom because of adultery. No; if you truly repent and realize the enormity of your sin and cast yourself upon the boundless love and mercy and grace of God, you can be forgiven and I assure you of pardon…But hear the words of our blessed Lord: ‘God, and sin no more.’

(Ryken, 167)

These are precious words for us. And this must be our greatest impetus of all to give up such things, to not look at my list of mental adultery and say, “You’re asking for too much,” but rather, I want freedom and joy in Christ and the promise of this joy even if it means giving up certain things I feel entitled to. So what can must we do to worship Him in light of this commandment?

1. Acknowledge lust as adultery and grieve, mourn, then repent

Like MLJ said, you must be willing to repent and realize the enormity of your sin. If you’re sitting here defensive and saying, “You’re just asking for too much,” then you probably don’t understand just how terrible this sin is. Repentance means grieving and mourning over how you have turned away from God Himself. When Potiphar’s wife asked Joseph to “lie with her” for favors, Joseph responded: “Behold, because of me my master has no concern about anything in the house, and he has put everything that he has in my charge. 9 He is not greater in this house than I am, nor has he kept back anything from me except yourself, because you are his wife. How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?” Joseph saw adultery as a direct sin against God. We have to see this sin this way. And then we see this sin against our spouse or future spouse. And we should mourn and grieve over this sin.

2. Soak yourself in the finished work of Christ

But we don’t just grieve and wallow in self-pity. Again, as RM McCheyne said, for every sin we have 10 looks at the cross. We remember Romans 3:21-26 and Romans 5:8 and Isaiah 53 and preach the Gospel to our soul. Christ died for our rightness before God so that sin would never rule and reign over us as it did before Christ (Romans 6). Unless this is deep in your soul, you cannot go on to number 3 or numbers 3-7 will only be a work of legalism to you with no real power at all.

3. Locate your lust triggers

So out of this understanding of God’s great grace, we respond with action. Our works flow out of our thankfulness and worship of Him in light of the cross. And we begin to examine in what ways we break the 7th commandment. Josh Harris calls these ways our lust triggers. (Josh Harris, Not Even a Hint, 64) I gave you a list of different ways we commit mental adultery. Use that list in your life and see if there are ways there that you sin by breaking the 7th commandment. But you must be dreadfully honest with yourself. Write them down specifically in a journal and examine them in your heart.

4. Develop an action plan to deal with those triggers

But just pointing them out to yourself isn’t enough. You need to act upon them. Follow your conscience. If going to the mall affects your soul and your lusting, then maybe making less trips to the mall might be better for you. Maybe moms and dads, you haven’t been so discerning about how your kids dress and you want them to fight for their sexuality one day. So maybe changing their wardrobe and explaining what you want for them might be in order. Maybe going out and buying a porn filter for your computer or getting a group of guys to join net accountability is what you need. In other words, turn your knowledge into action.

5. Read and memorize Gospel texts that will keep you from such lust (Psalm 119:9-11)

I know I have said this before. But if I gave you something so new and different to keep you in Christ, then you should really question whether or not I’m preaching heresy. When my uncle’s kidneys were failing, he had to get a dialysis. It essentially takes out the bad fluid and replaces it with the good fluid. Well, reading, memorizing and, meditating on Scripture is spiritual dialysis. Our minds and hearts are filled with lust and all sorts of sin. When we read Scripture, we essentially put into our minds the things of the Lord and push out the things of the flesh. Without God’s Word, you will fall to lust indiscriminately. Psalm 119:9 says: “How can a young man keep his way pure? By guarding it according to your word.”

6. Enlist your Gospel community for support and accountability (Heb 3:12-14)

You need a Gospel Community that knows and is willing to speak the truth in love to you. Without the church, you will be overwhelmed by lust and every sin. I strongly exhort you to find a few members of the church who are of the same sex who are willing to fight alongside you in this fight for your God, your marriage, and your sexuality. I also want to extend an open invitation for you men, if you are struggling at all with adultery of any kind, my door is open to you and I would love to walk with you in this fight. We fight this fight together and that is the power of the church.

In Psalm 51, David understood very well what he had done with Bathsheba. This is why he cries out to God: “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. 11 Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me. 12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit.” Did God forgive David of this dreadful sin? Read Matthew 1 and see for yourself. God the Son was born into the world as a son of David. And who was Jesus’ ancestor? Solomon, David’s son born of Bathsheba, was also in the line of the King of kings. Through this very Son and His work, God redeems us. And His work can even free you from your adultery as well. But repent and believe and then live in His joy.