No matter what you call it, having an affair, gaining experience, shacking-up, doing sex – it all amounts to one and the same thing to a believer. It’s a three way hurt to avoid at all costs.
The real answer is conviction. The word conviction means to “bind”. This is where we get the term “convict”. The wise man said. “My son, hear the instruction of your father and forsake not the law of your mother; for they shall be an ornament of grace about your head and chains about your neck” (Proverbs 1:8-9). Truth that controls our heart and mind is thee glue that binds and the chains that hold. Conviction is faith in power, faith in action.
We live in a day where most everything seems to be coming apart. We are losing our gluing power, the conviction of morals that are definitely right and wrong. Fornication is a three way hurt.
The word ‘fornicate’ originally meant to write or draw pornography. Later, under the Old Testament it became an umbrella type word that included INCEST, ADULTERY, HOMOSEXUALITY, AND BESTIALITY. All were considered an abomination to Jehovah. Sexual intercourse between a man and a woman outside of the marriage bond was summarily condemned.
FORNICATION IS A SIN AGAINST GOD. It was Jehovah who gave Moses the command, “Thou shall not commit adultery.” Under the law, those who did were put to death by stoning. The entire congregation had a part in the execution. The Bible says, “Marriage is honorable in all and the bed undefiled, but whoremongers (sellers of self and others) and adulterers God will judge” (Hebrews 13:4).
King David committed this sin and lived to regret this one pitiful page in his life. His confession, recorded in Psalms 51, speaks of the sin in this way. “Against thee, (God) and thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight; that you may be justified when you speak and clear when you judge” (Psalms 51:4). We may forget and time may dull the effect of this sin. No question that to a believer’s heart, God will forgive this or any other sin, but God does not promise to remove the consequences of the wrongs we do.
FORNICATION IS A SIN AGAINST OTHERS. Fornication is illicit sexual intercourse (the ‘F’ word) on the part of an unmarried person. Yet this sin always involves others. Regardless of price, both pay. Regardless of whether it is consensual, both will reap the inevitable consequences. “Be sure your sins will find you out” is not just a prediction but is a judgment (Numbers 32:23).
The innocent game is no longer innocent. The chance meeting is no longer by chance. The little deception has grown into a monster. The stained heart will never be the same. The crumbling relationship with husband and wife, the falling virtue, the failing strength, all are the results of careless infidelity.
What will you do when your virginity (either male or female) is surrendered and given without a thought of the consequences? What will happen when your home is destroyed; husband, wife, sons, daughters? Fornication is not subjective – it involves the life and bodies of others. Can you rebuild your life? Can you repair the damage that is done? Paul wrote, “Be not deceived, God is not mocked; for whatsoever a man sows that shall he also reap” (Galatians 6:7).
FORNICATION IS A SIN AGAINST SELF. Paul writes, “Flee fornication. Every sin that a man does is without the body; but he that commits fornication sins against his own body” (I Corinthians 6:18). The term “flee” means to run away from, now, pronto, without delay. “The body of a believer is not for fornication, but for the Lord; Don’t you know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, which is in you, which you have of God, and you are not your own. For we are bought with a price, therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit which are God’s” (I Corinthians 6, 18-20).
I have counseled with literally thousands of persons during the past 60 years, yet I cannot remember any one sin that is repeatedly mentioned as the UNFORGETABLE SIN — FORNICATION!! The one who commits this sin, sins against himself in a way that is not easily forgiven or forgotten.
Fornication is a three way sin. It is a sin against God, against others and against self. It destroys lives, wrecks homes, ruins families, and breaks the very heart of the nation. “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people” (Proverbs 14:34). To a believer it is forever burned into the heart as a sin that “should never once be named among you as becomes saints” (Ephesians 5:3).
To keep your self pure is not easy in this day and time. To the believer it pays great dividends. To delay your passions with strong convictions takes away any threat of the 25 various sexual diseases that plagues the nation and destroy individuals.
And the day will not be long or far away.
When you say to your husband, it’s been a great day,
And you two will start out like together, pure and clean,
And never regret the wait – that others cannot know;
But you will know the happy life it was meant to always be.
