Has it ever occurred to you that when you engage in sexual intercourse, you give the most precious part of yourself away? You need to know that the person you are engaging in it with will respect, love, and look after you, so you won’t be hurt. Marriage allows you to give to each other with freedom and joy. If you have sex with someone else, you are stealing that freedom from yourself, from your partner, and the spouses, you both might have in the future.
The single person’s sexuality is expressed in learning to accept and control his or her sexual feelings. Donald Goergen has noted that,
“feelings are meant to be felt, and sexual feelings are no exception. But to accept these feelings does not mean to act on them. Sexual feelings are not to control us, we are to control them. It is an illusion to think that sexual desires are uncontrollable.”
As a good initial principle here, we should affirm that sex in itself (and sexual activity in general) is not inherently negative or sinful. On the contrary, in the proper context, it is a kind and good gift of God. God instituted sex within marriage as part of His design of the family (Gen 1:28). In 1 Corinthians 7:3 and following, Paul says once we are married, our bodies belong to our spouses; he also instructs spouses to meet one another’s sexual needs and to be together regularly to protect ourselves from falling into ungodly lust and extramarital sexual activity. So, marriage is a unique relationship, and the good gift of sex is not only allowed but commanded within that relationship. How then are we to relate to everyone else (especially believers), and how does that question inform the topic of premarital sexual activity?
The simple answer is that every believer to whom I am not married is my brother or sister in Christ, and I am to act accordingly to this understanding. 1 Timothy 5:1-2 reiterates the “family” metaphor among believers and instructs us about how we are to treat our fellow members of the body of Christ. It reads,
Do not rebuke an older man harshly, but exhort him as if he were your father. Treat younger men as brothers, older women as mothers, and younger women as sisters, with absolute purity (emphasis mine).
This scriptural passage generally instructs us about how to relate to other “family members” among God’s people. Except for husbands and wives, there is no sexual dimension to “familial” relationships. Also, look at that phrase about how younger women should be treated – with absolute purity. It’s the strongest possible language Paul could employ in his letter to his protégé, Timothy.
