68. How do we fear and love God in keeping the Sixth Commandment?
We fear and love God by living as men and women who respect God's purposes for marriage. We do so by
A. treating our bodies as holy--set apart for the purposes for which God created us as male and female--and not as objects that serve our selfish desires.
1 Thessalonians 4:3-5 For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God.1 Corinthians 6:9-11 Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
Read Genesis 1:26-28; Matthew 5:27-28; and 1 Corinthians 6:13-18.
Note: Human beings often violate God's purposes for them as male and female by engaging in sexual sins. This includes consensual sins such as fornication, pornography, and homosexual behavior. It also includes coercive sexual sins such as rape, incest, sexual child abuse, and other sexual assaults (which also violate the Fifth Commandment).
B. speaking and acting to one another as male and female in ways that build up rather than tear down (such as crude talk, derogatory comments about appearances, or immodest dress);
Ephesians 5:4 Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving.Read also Philippians 4:8 and 1 Timothy 2:9.
C. reserving sexual intercourse for marriage rather than before or outside of marriage;
Hebrews 13:4 Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous.Read the narrative of Joseph in Genesis 39:6-10. See also 1 Corinthians 6:9, 18-20.
D. refraining from lustful desire or activity of any kind, whether heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, or otherwise;
Proverbs 11:6 The righteousness of the upright delivers them, but the treacherous are taken captive by their lust.Matthew 5:28 But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
Colossians 3:5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.
E. treasuring our husband or wife as a gift of God and loving him or her sacrificially.
Ephesians 5:33 However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.Note: In marriage vows, a husband and wife promise to love each other "for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health" until death separates them.
Read Genesis 2:23; 1 Corinthians 7:1-11; Ephesians 5:21-33; and Titus 2:11-14.
Eventual commentary
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