Bill Fitzhenry's Thoughts For Today…

Reading through the 31 chapters of Proverbs each month can give us an understanding of how to serve God.

Proverbs 5:15-20; I Cor. 7:1-9C ESV

15 Drink water from your own cistern,
flowing water from your own well.
16 Should your springs be scattered abroad,
streams of water in the streets?
17 Let them be for yourself alone,
and not for strangers with you.
18 Let your fountain be blessed,
and rejoice in the wife of your youth,
19 a lovely deer, a graceful doe.
Let her breasts fill you at all times with delight;
be intoxicated always in her love.
20 Why should you be intoxicated, my son, with a forbidden woman
and embrace the bosom of an adulteress?

I Corinthians 7:

1 Now concerning the matters about which you wrote: "It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman."

2 But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.

3 The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband.

4 For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does.

5 Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.

6 Now as a concession, not a command, I say this.

7 I wish that all were as I myself am. But each has his own gift from God, one of one kind and one of another.

8 To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is good for them to remain single as I am.

9 But if they cannot exercise self-control, they should marry. For it is better to marry than to burn with passion.

The Biblical description of the intimacy in marriage is often graphic, but it is never vulgar.

I Corinthians 7:9C is in the immediate context of 7:1-9 and in the larger context of I Corinthians 5:1. As Paul having previously condemned the adultery of Corinthian church members - not forgetting that - speaks to the issue raised in 7:1. He clearly states the provision made to satisfy human sexual needs, both male and female. This is the provision of marriage.

We can learn from two truths in the Corinthians context.

1. The single provision for human sexual desire is marriage.

2. This provision being true, marriage is not solely for reproduction. But this is not a denial of any other Biblical truths about marriage and the physical sexual relationship which is a vital part of it.

Proverbs 5:15-20 and the Song of Solomon describe marriage and sexual intimacy as being both desirable and beautiful. Sexual intimacy in marriage, portrayed as unnecessary and sinful separate from reproduction, as some religions teach, is both sinfully criminal and morally dangerous.

There are five evident truths in Proverbs 5:15-20.

1. This is a singular interest. Vs 15

2. In breaking this relationship there is a loss of privacy along with the loss of the honor that comes with covenant faithfulness. Vss 16-17

3. There is a blessing which accompanies this relationship kept within the proper bounds.

4. It is here that desire and love are united. Vs 19

5. Outside the bounds of marriage, sexual intimacy falls under the condemnation of the seventh commandment. "You shall not commit adultery.”