The response to sex among Christians is usually predictable: embarrassment, hushed tones, guarded. Looks that say, “don’t talk about that here.”

In fact, one guy told me as I’m preaching through the Song of Solomon at my church that he’s surprised it is in the Bible. Another called it biblical porn. 

I looked at a popular pastor’s website out of curiosity. This is a pastor that preaches through books of the Bible. In his ministry career, he has preached through every book of the Bible, except one.

The Song of Solomon.

Why?

The Song of Solomon is just as inspired as the book of Romans!

By and large, Christians don’t know how to enjoy sex in the way God created it.

We know how to corrupt it, we know how the culture thinks about it and so we either run the other direction (don’t enjoy it, don’t explore with your spouse, never talk about it with your kids) or we simply give in to the culture and live like them (adultery, sleeping around, porn, selfishness, sex as a weapon).

Neither one of those is a good option or even a biblical one.

The Song of Solomon to me is one of the most relevant books of the bible for our culture. For this reason, it shows us what marriage is supposed to be like. Spouses who adore each other, pursue each other, serve each other, seek to please and pleasure each other, all for the good of their marriage. Spouses who complement each other, knows what the other likes and dislikes and then uses that information to make the other happy.

Our culture from broken homes, divorce, adultery, porn, has no idea what sex is supposed to be like. Sex is seen as a weapon to get your way so women wield it with power in their relationships. Many wives operate from the perspective of: I’ll give you my body, but only as I manipulate you to do what I want.

One of the other struggles our culture has is that our sexual identity has become the trump card and the most important thing about who we are, it is who we are. That is not what the Bible teaches and when we make that the trump card, we limit ourselves to simply who we are sexually and what we do sexually. We then have a broken image of ourselves and see our value only through the lens of sex. Which isn’t surprising when we think about how prevalent porn is.

The Bible, particularly the Song of Solomon, show us that sex within marriage is not only to be celebrated, enjoyed, gratifying but it is also an act of worship to God.

The reason Christians often take the stance they do on sex within marriage (seeing it as dirty, a chore or are prudish about it) is that is the easy stance to take. To have a healthy view of sexuality will often mean dealing with past addictions, past hurts, past abuse, dealing with body image issues and all of those are in places we push down, pretend are not there and try to move forward from without dealing with them.

Sex, intimacy, and affection are the barometer of your marriage.

If you want to know the health of your marriage, where you are in dealing with past hurts, how you and your spouse are pursuing each other, simply look at your view of sex, how often you have sex, how intimate you are (sharing your hurts, dreams, joys and secrets; how open your are) and your affection and that will tell you everything you need to know about the health of your marriage.

The reason I know this to be true is who argues with that statement.

If God is good, and if God created all things (including you and your body), and God created you to enjoy his creation, God also created marriage and sex.

See where I’m going?

Then sex, as created by God to be enjoyed within marriage is something that should be seen as a good gift from a good God used to glorify Him and for your enjoyment.