Beloved

by Rachel Gardner

  Your sexuality is a gift to you from a loving God who made you to be real. Your desires for connection and intimacy are a gift that you are responsible for. Once we grab hold of this, we can begin to be realistic about our sexuality, and create boundaries and opportunities that enable us to live out our glorious female sexuality for the glory of his name.

  Wonderland

  How do you feel about your female sexuality?

  How do you express yourself sexually? Make a list of ways you: express yourself creatively

  demonstrate your emotions

  communicate with others

  respond to intimate situations.

  What aspects of being sexual are you enjoying right now, and what are you struggling with?

  Sometimes naming our struggles can be our incentive to seek the help we need. What could your next step be in finding your way through these struggles to a deeper love of God and the freedom he gives?

  Where do you feel you need to be taking more responsibility for your sexuality?

  Bathsheba and Mary present very different stories about women’s sexuality. Who are the women in your life who express to you a God-honouring sexuality that you want to emulate?

  Could you arrange to spend some time chatting with them about some of the choices, mistakes and blessings they’re experiencing as sexual beings?

  My sanctuary

  Go outside and find a leaf. Choose the first one that appeals to you. Then find a quiet spot and study it. Really look at it. Let your eyes wander over its shape and structure, taking in all the tiny details you don’t normally notice.

  It’s brilliant, isn’t it? And it’s just a leaf!

  Do you ever contemplate your body like this? You might scrutinize yourself fully clothed, checking that your outfit and image are how you want them to be. But how about naked? Do you ever look at yourself and take in the brilliance of your female body? Presenting our bodies as temples of God’s Spirit and not lust objects starts with us choosing to see what God sees, and love what God loves. When you feel brave enough, start naming the different parts of your body, and thank God for them.

  ‘This is my... created by God. I’m grateful for it and want to love and respect it.’

  This is going to feel like an odd thing to do! But if you can, persevere. It will have a positive impact on how you feel about yourself. When we appreciate and value our bodies, especially our private, sexual parts, we are more empowered in valuing and respecting ourselves in our relationships.

  Read these ancient verses and circle words that grab you. As you read over the passage a few times, allow the truth of these words to settle within you.

  You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body

  and knit me together in my mother’s womb.

  Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex!

  Your workmanship is marvellous – how well I know it.

  You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion,

  as I was woven together in the dark of the womb.

  You saw me before I was born.

  Every day of my life was recorded in your book.

  Every moment was laid out

  before a single day had passed.

  (Psalm 139:13–16 NLT)

  The other day, I scrolled my way through thousands of online images of cats. There was a very good reason for this, but I haven’t got time to go into details now. You’ll just have to take my word for it.

  Anyway.

  To begin with, the photos were quite cute: fluffy kitten sitting in a flowery mug; two fluffy kittens sitting in a flowery mug; three fluffy kittens – you get the idea. But then, as I immersed myself more and more in the world of people who take photos of their cats and post them online, I began to come across mini horrors. Not-so-fluffy kitten with bloodshot eyes eating flowery mug. Even more ugly kitten throttling another kitten in a flowery mug. The more I looked, the less I liked what I saw (and to be honest, the more nervous I felt about cat lovers!).

  But cats aside, there’s a word in Christian discipleship that can start sounding nice to begin with, and end up taking us to weird places in our heads. And that word is ‘purity’.

  What comes to mind when you think of purity?

  Fluffy kittens in cups?

  Someone who doesn’t have sex?

  Someone who doesn’t want to have sex, ever?

  Someone who no-one else wants to have sex with?

  Isn’t it interesting that the moment we hear the word ‘purity’, we think of sex? A pure life is about more than how we use our bodies sexually, but it’s unsurprising that we tend to think about sex first, because we’re surrounded by impure messages about sex all the time. Stories of famous men abusing children, sex scandals in churches, more porn sites clogging up the internet, people sold as sex slaves – all evidence that when we misuse sex, we misuse ourselves and others.

  Wild

  I remember spending a day with a boyfriend, hiking in the mountains. The weather was brutal: wild, wet, windy. Within seconds of leaving our car, we were soaked through. The further we walked, the wetter we got, and the less we cared. We threw our heads back and roared at the elements. We laughed like hyenas, knowing that no-one could hear us, as no-one else was nuts enough to be on the mountain in such bad weather. We felt alone in our universe, wide awake and fearless.

  Sometimes sex might offer this kind of intimacy: two people locked together in a love-flood. Secure, ecstatic, fulfilled.

  Then we turned a corner, and the wind that was whistling off the mountain took a nasty turn. It caught me up for a brief moment before knocking me back to the ground. It was all so fast that I didn’t really know what had happened until I was lying on the shingle, bruised and very cold.

  Sometimes sex might offer something painful: hurt from an encounter that knocks people off track and leaves them with a deeper sense of being alone.

  That experience round the lake taught me something about hiking and purity! If you don’t want to get knocked off your feet, get behind a tree (or get heavier!).

  Love purity

  Choosing sexual purity is a way of loving God and valuing his gift of sex.

  If we could boil down what the Bible says about sex, it would be: when you are sexually intimate, you lose your old self and find your new self as one with someone else. It’s an act of creation in and of itself. Sex is about two people becoming one, and forming the strongest bond outside of God’s bond with us. It’s a sign to a society saturated by stories of sexual disorder of what being one with God is like.

  Jesus spoke in no uncertain terms about why sex God’s way was the best way.

  ‘Haven’t you read,’ he replied, ‘that at the beginning the Creator “made them male and female,” and said, “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh”? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.’

  (Matthew 19:4–6 NIV)

  The sex act is part of the journey of becoming one that a man and a woman embark on when they choose before God to spend the rest of their lives together. There is something profoundly binding about the sex act: the Greek has ‘one flesh’, which means to be glued or fused into one being.

  One being.

  But it’s not just the act of sex that produces this oneness. It’s the blessing of God over a man and a woman who covenant themselves before him, exclusively and for life, that unites. What God joins together, no-one is to separate.

  More

  Purity is not just about saving sexual intimacy for marriage; it’s a way to face your whole life. Purity is a way of travelling, not a destination, and on the journey we face lots of obstacles.

  Take Lucy, for example. She’s bisexual, and she loves Jesus. From time to time, she watches gay porn. Because she loves Jesus, she wants to get a handle on the sexual temptations and addictions that she struggles with. She wants to be sexually pure: clean, f
ree, not confused or overwhelmed with guilt any more. So she buys a ring and calls it her purity ring. She decides to wear it on her wedding finger until it’s replaced by the real deal when the man of her dreams does the swap.

  I know Lucy. She doesn’t feel that she can sort herself out, but she’s not sure if she trusts God to sort things out either. So what’s the role of the purity ring in all of this?

  Take Vicky. She’s dating James, and they both love Jesus. From time to time they struggle to stick to their ‘no-sex-before-marriage’ choice. It tends to be when they’re in an empty house, or it’s late, or one of them has shared something personal, or they’ve been praying together. Their relationship is healthy: they communicate well and care deeply for each other. Even their mums get along! But they feel like their relationship is on a roller coaster of success and failure. Why is the intimacy that feels so good so wrong?

  Take Val. She watches porn, and she loves Jesus. She hasn’t told anyone because it feels too shameful. Although she vowed to keep her knickers on when fooling around with her first boyfriend, her resolve dissolved more times that she would like to remember. She’s never sought God as much as she has these past few months, so why is this happening?

  Each one of these women is experiencing a hunger for purity, but each one is convinced that they don’t make the grade. They’re confusing purity with inexperience. Sexual purity is a positive choice that we make. In fact, the more we face up to our sexual desires, temptations and experiences, the more we realize what a great and much-needed gift the choice of sexual purity is. Instead of being defined by our experiences, we can allow them to remind us of how much we need God’s Spirit to make us sexually strong.

  You can choose purity, even if you have already had sexual experiences or are finding your sexuality difficult to understand.

  Chase chastity

  Another term used to describe a life of sexual purity is ‘chastity’. Put simply, it means not being sexually active (if single), and not being unfaithful (if married). But it’s so much more than just that. Chastity is about love. It’s about loving as many people as deeply as possible. Just without sex.

  This might sound a little odd, and even impossible! We live in such a sexually disorientated society that the thought even of loving someone deeply sounds like code for something sexual.

  But as a chaste married woman, I can build deep and safe relationships with male and female friends, because I won’t be seeking to become sexually intimate with them. I’m still tuned into my weaknesses, and I make sure I’m wise with how much time I spend alone with someone, or how much of my intimate self I share. But choosing chastity has freed me to be me. In the words of theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, ‘The essence of chastity is not the suppression of lust, but the total orientation of one’s life towards a goal.’13

  That goal is love.

  This understanding of sexual purity changes everything. It’s the difference between:

  ‘I’m chaste because I don’t believe in sex before marriage.’

  And . . .

  ‘I’m chaste because my life’s goal is to love everyone.’

  Share the love

  I believe God desires for you to be chaste if you’re not married, and faithful in your marriage if you are, because he wants you to be free to love as deeply and as freely as possible.

  Darcey sat with her friends at college as, one by one, everybody shared their ‘when-I-lost-my-virginity’ story. She didn’t have one, so she said nothing. Later she told me how weird she found it: ‘We’ve all been friends since we were twelve, and I couldn’t help sitting there thinking, “Aww, they’re growing up.” Then I thought, “Wait a minute. If they’re growing up, then I’m missing out!” And I know I’m not, but it feels like my life is beginning to head off in a different direction because of sex, which is weird!’

  We began to chat about how Darcey’s choice of chastity didn’t mean she now had nothing to say or share with her friends. Quite the opposite, in fact. As we chatted more, it became clear that Darcey felt a really deep love for her friends. She was beginning to see that the sex they laughed about was not offering the kind of intimate experiences they were hoping for. Instead of wearing her sexual purity as a badge of honour to alienate her from her friends, Darcey began to live out her chastity, and sought to be as supportive and loving to her friends as possible.

  I know that her chastity will speak louder to her friends than her words ever could.

  Pure power

  As well as being free from the need to clock up sexual experience, sexual purity is also about being free from believing the sexual distortions that we see around us in our culture. Sexually pure people are able to see the damaging and empty sexual encounters in novels, films and music for what they really are. They’re not fooled by sham romance, or easily persuaded that men who say, ‘I love you’, and then hit you, are worth sticking with. They are able to understand the impact of what they see and hear, so because they care about their sexuality honouring God, they sometimes switch off, change the topic or walk away.

  But as well as all of this, being sexually pure has another dimension that we sometimes overlook, and that’s being free from being (or becoming) obsessed about relationships. Sometimes it’s really easy to get locked into unhealthy habits, like imagining each worship leader is a potential husband, or thinking you have to rework everything about yourself to be the ultimate girlfriend. Society offers you countless reasons to dislike yourself for being single. There’s a never-ending supply of ‘perfect’ relationships to drool over. By contrast, sexually pure young women know that who they are is who God says that they are, whether they are single, dating, engaged, heartbroken, married, hopeful or despairing. Paul’s letter to the Galatians has a lot to say about the freedom we enjoy as Christians: ‘Christ has set us free to live a free life. So take your stand! Never again let anyone put a harness of slavery on you’ (Galatians 5:1 MSG).

  This isn’t easy. It requires us to be radical in our lifestyle, to be a sign of God wherever he has placed us. It is shown through:

  the woman who doesn’t use social media to elicit sexual approval from other people

  the friends who agree to hold each other accountable for the way they dress, so that they are always presenting the truth about who they are and what they are about

  the couple who agree to protect the unique personal bond that sexual union creates, by setting limits on how, where and when they touch and hold each other

  the woman who is real about her longing for marriage, but chooses to get to know men as friends first so that she doesn’t rush into a damaging relationship just to avoid being alone

  the student who listens with nothing but loving compassion to housemates who have been hurt by casual sex and don’t seem able to stop having one-night stands

  the woman struggling with a personal sexual issue who brings it to her loving heavenly Father, knowing that nothing can separate her from his unconditional love.

  We lay the foundations for lives of sexual purity when we’re not in any relationship. Purity takes practice. Chastity takes courage. And the secret is not to wait until you are in a relationship before you start practising faithfulness.

  My husband Jason will never cheat on me.

  Now, I know what you’re thinking: ‘How can she possibly know that?’; ‘Maybe he has already done so, but she doesn’t know about it!’; ‘No-one knows what might happen in the future – if she thinks it could never happen to her, she’s deluding herself!’

  Of course, that kind of statement provokes all sorts of responses, because absolutely no relationship is perfect. So what I’m about to tell you is not an attempt to put my marriage on a pedestal.

  Last week I asked Jason whether he would ever cheat on me. Now, I know it’s an odd question, but stick with me for a moment, because what he said got me thinking.

  ‘If I found someone really attractive, I’d run a mile to get away!’

  And do you kn
ow what? I believe him. Not just because he’s my husband, but because I’ve seen him run – from me!

  When we were dating, we wanted to rip each other’s clothes off (in private, not public!), but more than that, we wanted to give ourselves fully only to the person we were going to marry. We talked loads about our vision for our sex lives, and agreed that as passionate as we got, we wanted to rein in our sexual exploration until God had made us one. It didn’t make dating easier, but it meant that we had some clear boundaries to help us stick to our vision – keep clothed, don’t sleep in the same bed and so on.

  There were many times when it became really difficult to hold back, and do you know who was the one who walked away to help us stay true to ourselves? Jason. He ran away from situations that would have broken both our hearts in the long run. It was one of the most powerful gifts he gave us as a dating couple – and it made me feel so valued.

  I remember during one particularly passionate session, he suddenly got up, grabbed his coat and with a watery smile headed for the door: ‘I’ve got to get out of here, babes.’ To his credit, he managed to leave even while I was trying to get him to stay! But as he walked out of the room, I can honestly say that I fell a little deeper in love with him. In that moment I saw his strength, and determined that I would match his courage with mine. From then on, we were both committed to be vigilant for our own chastity.

  Going through these experiences together before we even got engaged gives me great confidence that if he needed to do so now, he would run from someone else rather than be unfaithful to me. When he vowed to remain faithful to me ‘for as long as we both shall live’, he was already practised at faithfulness.