September 6, 2015
God’s Gift of Sexuality
- Genesis 1:26
- Rev Ruth Chadwick Moore
This is the last of the summer sermon series we called “You Asked for It.” So someone must have asked Our Head of staff, Teri Thomas, for a sermon on sex. Please notice that Teri is on vacation this Sunday.
When I asked Carol McDonald to help me with worship this morning she asked what the topic and scriptures were going to be. When I told her someone had asked for a sermon on sex she wondered if that was an appropriate topic for a sermon. I asked myself that question as well. I don’t believe the church should be silent on an issue that is so important in many of our relationships, but do we have to discuss it from the pulpit? Maybe not, but today we are going to try.
I don’t know what the person requesting the sermon wanted to hear, but as Christians and as Presbyterians I believe we should be able to talk about sex within the community of faith. It is a vital part of our adult relationships and keeps them healthy and whole. In response to others asking about our beliefs and our sexuality, the PCUSA wrote a curriculum way back 1989 entitled: “God’s Gift of Sexuality.” And although sexual mores and behavior have changed dramatically since then, this curriculum was so well written that it is still a starting point for me when people ask me what the church believes about sexual intimacy. “God’s Gift of Sexuality” is basically a curriculum for teenagers, but it is the title that intrigues me. It is called “God’s Gift of Sexuality” because our sexuality is a good gift from God.
The curriculum – which we have used at Northminster for many years - is based on seven biblical and theological principles that provide guidance and support for the understanding of our sexuality.
- God created us and gave us the gift of our sexuality.
- God created us for life in community.
- Our church is a community of love.
- Our church is a community of responsibility
- Our church is a varied community
- Our church is a community of forgiveness
- God gives us responsibility for our own decisions.
God created us and called us very good. God did not create us as spirits. God did not create us as bodies. Instead, God created us as total persons – body and spirit – and this entire creation God called very good. All that we are – including our bodies, including our sexuality – is God’s gift to us. Sexuality should be a good and positive part of our lives created by God.
Remember my sermon in June – “We Are Still Married?” Well one of the reasons we are still married is because our sexual relationship has been a good and positive part of our marriage.
Our sexuality is our way of being male or female in the world. Our sexuality is basic and affects our thoughts, feelings, and actions. Because our sexuality is called good by God, and because it is God’s gift to us, we can feel good about our sexuality.
But what is basic to our sexuality is that we were created for relationships and to be in community with one another and with God. Above all else, God has loved us, does love us, and will always love us faithfully. In the same way we should love God and one another. And this means that our sexual attitudes and relationships should be motivated by love both for our neighbors and for ourselves. And when our relationships involve physical intimacy we need to ask ourselves what is appropriate and responsible in terms of our commitment and faithful love to the other person.
Our children and youth are not always hearing this message – at least not from their social media and music outlets. When they hear songs by Lady Gaga called “Do What You Want with my Body,” what does that tell them about loving themselves and respecting the gift of their sexuality? Or what do we say to our children when senior boys at a prep school in New Hampshire prey on their undergraduate classmates with a tradition called Senior Salute? How do they know how to express their love to another person when they are constantly being encouraged to participate in casual sex? Since we were created for life in community, and because our church is a community of love and responsibility we should not be silent when it comes to casual sexual hookups, or the devaluing of women and their bodies.
And we adults don’t do a great job with our sexual behavior either – just look at the debacle of the Ashley Madison adultery website. I don’t see a whole lot of appropriate and responsible behavior there do you? Where is the committed and faithful love in those relationships? And yet…before you think I have gotten up on my moral soap box, I do recognize that our sexuality is a complicated issue and I always remember and appreciate that the guiding principles that define the church are love and forgiveness. We are free to use our sexuality and yet we are limited in this freedom because of our commitment to God. We care about the effects of our actions on others as well as ourselves. We know we are living the life God called us to live when we relate lovingly and responsibly in all our relationships. And we forgive one another when we don’t.
Once again the 7 biblical and theological principles from “God’s Gift of Sexuality.” …
- God created us and gave us the gift of our sexuality.
- God created us for life in community.
- Our church is a community of love.
- Our church is a community of responsibility.
- Our church is a varied community.
- Our church is a community of forgiveness.
- God gives us responsibility for our own decisions.
I wanted to give us all a solid biblical and theological background before I started talking about the Song of Solomon passage I read this morning. Kind of like the lecture before we get to the good stuff. And there is some pretty good stuff in these songs in the Old Testament. It is a song of the goodness of nature and the beauty of creation. But the main tune of the Song of Solomon is a song of love – actually the song of two lovers.
The Song of Solomon is a collection of 25 poems written to the glories of eros – human sexual love in all of its fullness. Take some time to read the whole collection, but be prepared that the room you are reading in may get a little steamy – because the Song of Solomon is a clear melody to sexual love that says such love should be sought after and treasured when found. These poems are about two lovers and all that they share – their tenderness, intimacy, longing, mutual esteem of and desire for each other’s bodies. It is a song sung to the goodness of all that is created, as something desirable, in and of itself, and to the goodness of creation and human sexual love.
God knows we know how complicated the good gift of human sexual love is. As a church, as communities of faith, we strive to live with the difficult questions of human sexuality – what does it mean to be faithful? What does it mean to be responsible? How can we educate our children to be intelligent, thoughtful, loving, careful and respectful?
Mark and I have always been pretty open with our children about sex – most of the time it has just embarrassed them. But somehow we wanted them not to feel shame about their bodies and sexual desires, to discover the pleasures of sexual love, and for that to be a positive part of their relationships – we just didn’t want them to do it until they were 30 years old and married.
In a culture that often doesn’t seem to value God’s gift of sexuality and the joy that faithful committed sexual relationships can bring, the church is often reticent to get involved in so complicated – and personal – an issue. But somehow we need to strive to live with the difficult questions this century has introduced – the questions of choice and freedom, and the questions of protection and responsibility. We need to communicate with each other and with our children what that looks like as a community that follows the principles of love, responsibility, obedience, and forgiveness. God knows we know how quickly the power and attraction of human sexuality can be misused and abused and how quickly our longing for intimacy gets confused with our need for release or our own need for security. Our questions and our concerns help us to articulate ethics and guidelines for safety in a world where sex is often a dangerous game. All of our questions, struggles, concerns, guidelines and ethics for behavior as individuals and in community are an essential part of our lives as Christians.
Chapter 2, verses 8-16, of the Song of Solomon is called the Springtime Rhapsody. It talks about flowers and singing birds, and fruit on the trees and blossoms on the vines. The adjectives are lush and fertile with meaning. And on this Labor Day Sunday when the sweetness of summer is almost past, but the harvest is ahead of us, we are called by this text to claim the goodness of all that is created. And that includes God’s gift of the goodness of our sexuality, the beauty of our bodies and the pleasure that the gift of love and loving gives to us. So whether the expression of your gift of sexuality is being anticipated, is a part of your relationship now, or it is something to be remembered and treasured from the past, I encourage you to think of it as a gift. A gift to be enjoyed in love, with responsibility, respect, and forgiveness always being part of the mix. But I also want you to remember the words of the lovers – “my beloved is mine and I am his…for love is strong as death and passion fierce as the grave.” Claim that love and that gift too. Amen.
Resources - Words, lists, sentences and themes freely drawn from:
God’s Gift of Sexuality, Witherspoon Press, PCUSA.
Sermons.com, “Solomon’s Song of Love” by Sue Anne Steffey Morrow.