Participants: Stephen Bauer
Series Code: FC
Program Code: FC000382
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00:30 Welcome to the Faith Chapel of
00:31 ministry of 3ABN. I am Pastor Steve Bauer 00:35 from Southern Adventist University 00:37 located in Collegedale, Tennessee. 00:40 Welcome to today's program 00:42 and I thank you for sharing part 00:43 of your day with us. 00:45 The Ten Commandments are under 00:47 much discussion today and today's 00:50 program I'm going to be examining 00:51 the moral character of the Ten Commandments 00:54 focusing on the Seventh Commandment 00:57 which focuses on sexual morality, 01:00 and the sanctity of marriage. 01:02 But before we begin exploring 01:04 that Commandment, I'd like 01:06 to pause for a word of prayer. 01:10 Lord Jesus, I thank you that you've 01:15 made us fearfully and wonderfully 01:16 made I pray that you'll be with us 01:18 today as we explore this very personal, 01:20 intimate and difficult topic. 01:24 And as we explore I pray you will 01:27 give us new insights into how to form our 01:29 characters to be like yours, because 01:33 the Ten Commandments are an expression 01:35 of your character. Help us see 01:37 how this commandment is an expression 01:40 of your character today as we study it. 01:43 I pray this in the name of Jesus, Amen. 01:49 A good number of years ago I was 01:50 a young Pastor in New York City 01:53 in the early to mid 1980s. 01:57 Now New York City many see us kind 01:59 of the modern Sodom and Gomorrah, 02:01 and there was great truth to that. 02:03 Anything goes in New York and anything 02:05 can be found in New York and so I 02:08 was not surprised when some 02:11 pounded came up with a survey that 02:13 in those days you could probably say 02:15 only in New York and the question was, 02:18 would you sleep with someone other than 02:22 your spouse if you got paid a million 02:25 dollars to do so. When I heard this 02:29 on the news I said, Oh, great this 02:32 is New York City, I wonder what the 02:35 results are gonna be. I was pleasantly 02:38 surprised when even for New Yorkers, 02:43 51 percent said, no, they would not sleep 02:47 with someone they were not married 02:49 to like correction, that they were, 02:51 if they were married they would 02:53 not sleep with someone else even 02:55 if they got paid $1millon. 03:01 I thought this was an excellent question 03:04 for exploring this moral issue and of 03:06 course the bad news is 49 percent 03:08 apparently said, yes they would sleep 03:10 with someone else to get the $1 million 03:13 they apparently felt that the risk to 03:15 the marriage was worth getting 03:17 the million dollars. This question that 03:21 they pose serves as an excellent 03:24 tool to serve out or explore the tension 03:26 between personal desire and moral principles. 03:30 Think about it who wouldn't want to get 03:33 $1 million, how much is my marriage worth. 03:40 Is it worth sacrificing my spouses rights 03:43 to my affections, to get $1 million. 03:48 What an excellent question. 03:51 I don't purpose to you that the 03:52 Ten Commandments were written 03:54 to address such tensions. 03:56 The issue of self interest versus 04:00 others interests and the Ten Commandments 04:02 are written to me as a free moral 04:05 agent to get me to subdue and suppress 04:09 my interest in order to put others' 04:12 interest ahead of my own. 04:14 It addresses me as a free moral 04:17 agent and tells me to restrain and 04:20 restrict myself in order to honor 04:23 the other person's rights. 04:25 Now the seventh commandment 04:27 is dealing with the God given right 04:30 to have the exclusive affections 04:33 including sexual affections of another 04:36 person of the opposite gender, 04:39 that's God's design and every human 04:44 who comes into the world possesses 04:47 that God given right. 04:49 But there is a problem if we try to 04:54 give those affections without a legal 04:57 foundation then we have not established 05:01 the permanency necessary to create 05:04 exclusivity. You see if you don't 05:08 have a legal foundation of the 05:10 marriage and we just give each other 05:13 these affections without that foundation 05:16 we have no guarantee of true 05:18 exclusivity because there is no guarantee 05:21 of permanency but when we established 05:24 a legal foundation through a marriage 05:27 ceremony with a marriage license and 05:30 a marriage certificate. We now have a 05:33 legal claim to permanency that grounds 05:37 the right of exclusivity in this area, 05:41 exclusive commitment and exclusive affection 05:45 one unto the other and to commit adultery 05:50 is a fundamental violation of that 05:54 right, but I would suggest that even 05:57 premarital sex is a violation of the other 06:02 person's right to an exclusive permanent 06:05 relationship with these kind of benefits 06:08 and affections in them. 06:11 This commandment then mirrors 06:13 the first commandment in that it deals 06:16 with exclusive claims. In the first commandment 06:20 God has exclusive claims over us 06:24 that we are to honor and in the 06:26 Bible very often the writers and 06:29 prophets treat our violation of God's 06:33 exclusive claims to sovereignty and 06:36 supremacy in our life and exclusive 06:40 claims to love and affection to God 06:42 are treated like adultery in marriage 06:46 and the metaphor of adultery carries 06:48 over to our relationship with God, 06:50 so these two commandments are very 06:52 intimately related and that both 06:54 are dealing with the exclusive claim 06:57 of another on us. Now it's very 07:01 interesting today that these claims 07:04 are coming under fire in a number 07:06 of ways and we cannot deal with 07:09 them all here. But I would like to 07:11 focus in the traditional marriage 07:15 relationship on both premarital fidelity 07:18 and on marital fidelity within that 07:23 relationship because many marriages 07:26 are ending in divorce today. 07:29 They are losing that permanency that 07:31 is supposed to be the ground 07:33 of that affection and I would 07:36 suggest that maybe one cause 07:40 is that at least one if not both partners 07:43 in the marriage begin to put 07:45 themselves first. And they want 07:48 to force the other to honor their rights 07:52 and their commitments until it turns 07:54 into a power struggle and they 07:56 can't get along with each other. 07:59 You see a funny thing happens 08:01 when we get married, we're in love, 08:05 and we're filled with emotions and we 08:08 can go for a number of years like this 08:10 but then we have that first child 08:13 and that adds financial stress and 08:15 you don't have as much time to devote 08:19 to each other because now there's 08:20 a baby in the mix. And you can't go 08:23 do those spontaneous things anymore. 08:25 And besides now that you've been 08:27 living together for 5 or 6 or 7 years 08:30 you've discovered that, that perfect spouse 08:33 isn't quite so perfect anymore. 08:37 There are some rough edges that come on. 08:41 And we start to get irritated, 08:44 furthermore we have the second child 08:45 and boredom sets in and things like this 08:49 and pretty soon those little arguments 08:52 turn into raw spots that irritate us 08:57 more and more and more and more 09:00 and I just wish he stop nagging me or 09:02 I wish he wouldn't be married to his work, 09:04 you get the idea. This can cause an 09:09 alienation of affection to begin to happen 09:15 and that exclusivity becomes weakened 09:18 as the strength of our affections get 09:22 weakened by anger and these raw spots 09:27 and interruptions and pressures of life. 09:32 Now let's make us a stereotypical scenario. 09:36 We often blame the man as the one 09:38 who goes out and has the affair though 09:40 it happens either way. Suppose he feels 09:46 like his wife complains too much, 09:48 she is the stereotypical nag. 09:50 He is tired of getting nagged, 09:52 she never approves of anything I do. 09:54 She never appreciates my efforts 09:57 in her behalf to provide or rarely does 10:00 and he is feeling henpecked and his 10:03 affection begins to shrink, and then one 10:09 day in the cubicles that work you know, 10:11 we're in the Dilbert office here, 10:12 a new person arrives who happens 10:16 to be a female and as they get acquainted 10:20 she says something nice you know 10:22 you have a nice tie or you know, 10:25 you look nice or you did a nice job 10:27 on that project or something like that 10:29 and he is just starving for that kind 10:32 of comment at home. And so when it comes 10:34 from this other woman, this affirming 10:38 comment he will tend to react with 10:42 a sense of attraction to her, oh, 10:45 I wish she could be my wife instead 10:47 of my wife because she does not nag me. 10:51 And then another comment, and 10:53 another comment and more and more 10:55 this attraction grows toward this other 10:58 woman because she is doing things 11:00 that his wife isn't doing. 11:02 Now what he is forgetting is that 11:04 he seeing this woman in a professional 11:06 setting, he's not seeing her whole 11:08 person. He's being attracted to one trait, 11:14 and if he would identify the fact 11:16 that he is really not attracted to her, 11:19 he's attracted to this trait that his 11:22 wife seems to be deficient in, 11:24 it would health cut that sense of 11:27 attraction and temptation to the 11:30 other person, but suppose he doesn't 11:32 make that distinction and he tries 11:36 to resist his attraction but they 11:38 continue talk and of course he makes 11:40 reciprocal comments you know you look 11:43 nice and you did a nice job and so 11:45 forth and maybe she's feeling 11:47 neglected at home that her husband 11:49 doesn't pay attention to her, 11:51 doesn't appreciate her mind, you know, etc. 11:54 And here's a man now who is affirming 11:56 her in these areas professionally 11:59 but she doesn't confuse that and 12:02 she responds with attraction to him 12:04 but they resist in work. We're not going 12:06 to get into any kind of inappropriate 12:08 relationship and on it goes but pretty 12:11 soon they start confiding more and 12:13 more in each other and what's happening 12:16 is not only has affection alienated 12:20 at home or is in the process but now 12:23 they're starting to redirected it toward 12:26 this third party outside the marriage. 12:29 And they start to invest more and 12:32 more emotionally into this person 12:35 and confide more and we're gonna 12:38 be like a brother and sister and it 12:40 goes from there and suddenly they 12:42 end up in bed when they never intended to. 12:48 Now what happens? It usually end 12:52 up with a divorce. So there are a number 12:55 of ways that this can happen where 12:57 we lose track of those exclusive claims 13:00 and one thing that's been helpful 13:03 to me is that when I feel that sense 13:06 of attraction for someone, a woman 13:07 not my wife is because I can identify 13:11 I can identify the issue that I need 13:12 to go talk to my wife about it. 13:13 Honey, we got a problem here, 13:16 I am frustrated we need to talk 13:18 about this. That's what saves marriage 13:23 and helps us honor our commitments 13:26 before God to that spouse. 13:30 Now Jesus spoke about this issue 13:33 in Matthew 19 on divorce, you 13:36 see the religious leaders of his day 13:38 came to him and they were trying 13:41 to trap him and his answer to them 13:45 is quite interesting dealing with the 13:48 permanency of marriage. He comes on 13:50 them in Matthew 19 and I believe we're 13:52 starting in verse 3, And the Pharisees 13:55 came up to him and tested him by asking, 13:57 Is it lawful to divorce one's wife for 13:59 any cause? He answered, have you not 14:02 read that he who made them from 14:04 the beginning made them male and 14:05 female, and said, For this reason, 14:09 he is quoting Genesis chapter 2 here, 14:10 For this reason a man shall leave his 14:13 father and mother and be joined 14:15 to his wife, and the two shall become 14:18 one flesh? So they are no longer 14:21 two but one flesh. What therefore 14:24 God has joined together, let no man 14:28 put asunder. They said to him, 14:31 why then did Moses command one 14:33 to give a certificate of divorce, 14:35 and put her away? He said to them, 14:38 Because of the Hardness of your heart 14:40 Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, 14:44 but from the beginning it was 14:46 not so. And I say to you: whoever 14:49 divorces his wife, except for unchastity, 14:53 and marries another, commits adultery. 14:59 You see the Pharisees were 15:02 approaching the problem how can I 15:04 I get out of my marriage, they were 15:06 looking for the loophole to get out 15:08 of those challenges and problems that 15:10 would free them to go to greener 15:12 pastures, but Jesus called them 15:15 to God's fundamental design and 15:18 claim for marriage that this was 15:20 to be a permanent relationship, 15:22 what God has joined together let know 15:25 man put asunder. And the only ground 15:30 that Jesus gives is sexual unfaithfulness 15:34 which is the ultimate violation of that 15:37 intimate exclusivity that the other 15:41 has a right too. It is interesting today 15:49 that people view sexual expression 15:52 as a means of demonstrating their 15:55 self ownership and when I own myself 15:58 I can sleep with whomever, whatever 16:01 gender, whenever I want. It is an 16:04 expression of self expression of myself 16:08 it is not an expression of an exclusive 16:12 commitment to each other. Paul expressed 16:16 that in the opposite of that in First 16:19 Corinthians chapter 6, and I think 16:22 he was way ahead of his time in 16:24 recognizing the thigh of sexual expression 16:27 to self ownership. First Corinthians 6 16:31 verse 18, Shun immorality is dealing 16:34 with sexual immorality. The context is that 16:37 we shouldn't be visiting prostitutes. 16:39 Every other sin which a man commits 16:42 is outside the body; but the immoral 16:46 man sins against his own body. 16:48 Do you not know that your body 16:50 is a temple of the Holy Spirit 16:52 within you, which you have from God? 16:54 You are not your own; you were bought 16:58 with a price. So glorify God in your 17:02 body. It is very interesting that Paul 17:05 says we should not be sexually unfaithful 17:09 to God's standards and the precise 17:11 reason is we don't own ourselves. 17:15 God own us because Christ brought 17:19 us on Calvary, and when we render to God, 17:24 honor to those exclusive claims 17:27 of his ownership of us, we cannot 17:30 do so while sleeping around and 17:33 violating the rights of others to that 17:36 exclusive relationship. 17:39 Adultery then is a fundamental violation 17:42 of that relationship and of that right, 17:47 of the other person to the exclusivity. 17:51 You first of all violate your spouse's 17:54 right, but the person you have the affair 17:57 with their right is also violated because 18:00 affairs are never permanent. 18:03 They always come to an end. 18:06 And so you violate the lover's rights 18:09 and your spouse's rights when you 18:12 have those affairs and commit adultery 18:17 and by the way most affairs last 18:21 no more than two years. They run on emotion, 18:25 the Gary Chapman from Moody 18:27 calls the tingles and when the tingles 18:29 run out the affair runs out. 18:32 And the tingles usually last on 18:34 average around 18 months, 18:37 rarely more than 24, and then the 18:40 affair comes to the end. 18:41 And so you by having an affair violating 18:45 not only your spouse but you violate 18:47 the person that you enter the affair 18:51 with because neither is permanent 18:55 and exclusive. Now the sexual drive and 18:59 sexual desires are one of the most primitive 19:03 fundamental instincts in our nature, 19:08 and God says, he wants you and he 19:12 wants me to surrender and suppress 19:15 those drives enough that we do 19:18 not violate the rights of others in this area. 19:27 Now the other point I want to make 19:31 is that most affairs are based on an unmet 19:36 need in the marriage, which I've already 19:40 illustrated and they confuse those needs 19:44 with attraction to the person, therefore, 19:47 if we can name the issue it gives us 19:51 what to focus on in building our marriage 19:56 with our spouse. I'd like to move to 19:59 another angle where we can violate 20:01 others people rights with this 20:03 commandment that is the issue of pornography. 20:07 Yes, in pornography I'm not touching 20:09 the other person and I'm not getting 20:12 into bed with them but I am still 20:14 perusing illicit material that should be 20:23 reserved for that exclusive permanent 20:26 relationship with the woman or 20:29 man that I'm viewing and I cannot 20:31 have that. Pornography by its very 20:33 nature violates that, first of all you 20:36 as the consumer, violate your spouse 20:38 or your future spouse and then you 20:41 violate the porn star, so either way 20:45 you cut it. This is a very sensitive and 20:48 personal area and God calls us to put 20:52 their right first and even if I want 20:54 to look at the porn star, at least 20:56 I should respect her rights enough 21:00 not to violate her by getting involved 21:03 in that viewing of it. I should restrain 21:06 myself that way. But this also calls 21:11 to people who are still single. You see, 21:15 you have a God given right to an 21:18 exclusive commitment of affection including 21:23 the sexual dimension from someone 21:25 of the opposite gender and the people 21:28 you date likewise have that same right 21:33 so why wait for marriage? You see if 21:39 we do not respect each others rights 21:41 prior to the marriage we weaken the 21:45 ground of expectation that those rights 21:47 will be honored in the marriage. 21:55 When we sleep and touch and so forth 21:59 prior to marriage, we are De Facto 22:02 saying that these items are no 22:04 longer reserved for the marriage. 22:08 Now I admit that there's more than one 22:10 way to kiss someone or hug someone. 22:12 I don't hug my sister the way I hug my wife. 22:19 So there is appropriate familial 22:22 type touch that can be similar to the touch 22:25 we have with the spouse and yet 22:27 different and we instinctively know 22:29 that difference. The point is that when we 22:32 go pass that familial touch to marital type 22:35 touch we are violating the rights of our 22:40 date if we have not established the grounds 22:44 of a permanent relationship with them. 22:47 Let me illustrated this way, let's turn 22:52 to Genesis chapter 39, in Genesis chapter 39, 22:57 we have the story of Joseph and 22:58 Mrs. Potiphar which illustrates the 23:01 principle I've just been showing you. 23:04 At the very end of verse 6, it says now 23:07 Joseph was handsome and good-looking. 23:10 When you get that phrase in the Bible 23:12 that someone is handsome or beautiful 23:13 you know trouble is coming. 23:15 We continue now on verse 7, And 23:18 after a time his master's wife cast 23:20 her eyes upon Joseph, and said, 23:22 "Lie with me." But he refused and 23:26 said to his master's wife, "Lo, 23:28 having me my master has no concern about 23:31 anything in the house, and he has put 23:34 everything he has in my hand. 23:39 And Joseph understands that Mrs. Potiphar 23:43 is trying to ask him to do something 23:45 very inappropriate. She wants to play 23:48 with him for the stimulation and fun 23:51 and games, not as the exclusive 23:55 expression of love to someone she loves. 23:58 And so Joseph has a very, 24:02 very interesting response to her. 24:05 We go to the end of the verse 8 on 24:09 in the verse 10, He says to her, 24:12 "Lo, having me my master has no 24:16 concern about anything in the house, 24:18 he has put everything he has in my hand. 24:21 He is not greater in this house than I am, 24:24 nor has he kept back anything from me." 24:28 You see Joseph understood that there 24:31 was more at stake then fun and games. 24:35 He understood that Potiphar had trusted 24:37 him with certain things. In fact, 24:41 he put Joseph in-charge of everything 24:43 in the home. Joseph was his hired slave, 24:47 but there was one thing that he didn't 24:49 give Joseph access to and that was 24:53 Mrs. Potiphar. And Joseph argues that 24:57 exclusivity. He has trusted everything 25:00 into my hand except you Mrs. Potiphar, 25:06 and then he says, how can I conduct 25:09 this great sin against and what are 25:12 you expecting? I would be expecting 25:15 Potiphar, right. He's framed the discussion 25:18 in terms of Potiphar. Potiphar has given 25:20 me this great trust, the only thing he has 25:22 kept back for me is privileges with you, 25:24 how could I violate Potiphar that will be 25:29 good argument won't it. Now Joseph instead 25:35 though suddenly shifts to God. 25:38 How could I sin, do this great sin against, 25:42 not just Potiphar but God. You see it 25:48 violates God given rights and therefore 25:52 it violates God's right of authority. 25:58 And Joseph says no. I was talking 26:02 to a student after class one day 26:07 and I showed her this passage in Genesis 39, 26:11 and we talked about exclusive rights but 26:14 she was very resistant. If I really love my 26:17 boyfriend why can't we do it now, 26:19 why wait for marriage? And she 26:23 was a tough cookie and I couldn't get 26:26 through to her and I was praying to 26:28 the Holy Spirit to give me a way to get 26:31 to her heart and finally he gave me 26:34 a series of questions. I said to her, 26:40 are you dating? Well, she had just broken 26:43 up so she is not dating anyone. And I said, 26:46 do you hope to get married some day? Oh! 26:48 Yes, she planned to get married some day. 26:51 Do you know who you are going to 26:52 get marry to? No, I don't know who I'm 26:55 going to get married to. But you want 26:59 to get married? Yeah. I asked her 27:02 another question, I said, when you get 27:04 married, do you want you are marriage 27:07 to end in divorce? Oh! No, she was 27:11 down right offended at that one. 27:12 If I get married I want it to last forever. 27:15 I don't want it to end in divorce. 27:17 I said, very good I comment your desire. 27:19 I have one more question for you. 27:24 What will it do for your marriage if 27:27 you can say to your spouse I loved you 27:31 enough before I knew who you were 27:34 to be faithful to you. She was dead silent 27:41 and I repeated my question again, 27:43 what will it do for your spouse if you can 27:47 say to them I love them enough to 27:50 do be faithful to you before I married you. |
Revised 2014-12-17