Husband & Wife Sexual Responsibility

Today we're going to start a section. Chapter 7 is all about Christian marriage. And actually, you know what's funny is I've listened to others teach this, but always when you have to teach something, you really pay much more attention to it. And there's a lot of really neat things in here. There's a lot of difficult things, but there's a lot of really interesting and things that, through Paul, that are to be communicated to us about Christian marriage and the fact that I'm married and many of you are married.

We've gone through many, many years of marriage. We were born in 72, married in 72. It's been a few years. My memory is getting shaky there too, so that doesn't help. Anyway, it's been great. I'm very thankful for Bonnie. It's wonderful. And there's some really neat things in here. There's some neat things about the sharing in common between a husband and a wife.

So that's really encouraging. And also, I kind of saw in this section the oneness of the marriage in Christ, that we're one flesh. That starts back in Genesis, and that's carried on. Christ mentioned that, that the marriage relationship is a picture of God and the church. So there's just many wonderful things to look at here.

And then what's going to happen is Corinth is a troubled place. There's trouble all over the place and they've apparently written a letter to Paul and he's responding to that. So we're going to see the response to that letter in what we're going to study this morning. He's responding to questions. So it's sort of like you've got to read between the lines. He says, he starts answering the question and you think, well, what was the question? And sometimes it's actually not, you have to infer what the question was. And the Holy Spirit, we have the right amount of scripture, so we trust him that he's given us the right amount of scripture. We're not lacking anything. With that said, I really have been tracking with Macaulay here and his outline.

So his outline, verses 1-7 today are general teaching on marriage, divided into two sections. staying single and getting married are verses 1 and 2. And just as a sidelight, Paul's going to make a strong case, and I would have a hard time doing that, making a strong case for staying single. But he's going to point out at the very last verse that that's perfectly within God's will to be single.

There's nothing in the world wrong with being single, but he does make the caveat that that you need to be able to handle your sexual desires. If you're going to be single, you need to be able to handle your sexual desires. If you cannot, then you probably ought to get married. Otherwise, you're going to sin, basically.

He makes a strong case for it. He's saying, I wish you were like me. Paul is Paul. Pretty amazing. a person that God gave tremendous insight and he makes a strong case for singleness. And then also he points out that being married is also a wonderful gift from God as well. So both singleness and marriage are both gifts from God for a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. So that's really encouraging.

The following weeks, we'll have four weeks in this chapter. The following week we'll cover verses 8 through 16. and they talk about basically direction to the unmarried and to the widow. Typically the unmarried is a male in this situation and the widow is obviously a female and then the virgin is a female. So he kind of addresses the male as the unmarried, widows are widows obviously, females, and then he's going to address the virgin which is a female unmarried. OK, and then the married believers he's going to talk to, and then mixed marriages, where you have a believer and unbeliever involved. He's going to talk about that. And then we're going to talk about the doctrine of the status quo.

And he's going to say, it's interesting, wherever we are in life, and I feel I'm the same way, it always looks rosier on the other side. It's always better over there than it is here. And I think God wants us to see that no matter where we find ourselves, and we're believers in the Lord Jesus, we can accept that's where God wants us. He's not saying you can't change that, but don't think, boy, it's just going to be so much better. I could fulfill God's design for me so much better by changing my situation. Of course, it's all in the context of marriage. Are you married, not married? Maybe you were an unbeliever, and you got a divorce, and now you're a believer, and what should you do now, and so on.

There's just a whole range of questions in that area. And then the last section we'll cover is just other considerations, which there's quite a few, 25 through 40 we'll cover. So that's kind of an outline of where we're going. So could someone read this passage, 1 through 7 in chapter 7?

Now concerning the things of which you wrote to me, it is good for a man not to touch a woman. Nevertheless, because of sexual immorality, Let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband. Let the husband render to his wife the affection due her, and likewise also the wife to her husband. The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does, and likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. Do not deprive one another except with consent for a time, that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer, and come together again, so that Satan does not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. But I say this as a concession, not as a commandment. For I wish that all men were even as I myself, but each one has his own gift from God. One in this manner and another in that. Great. Thanks Cheryl. So you see there's just all these really interesting things we're going to cover. Okay, so let's just start out here.

So now concerning the things about which you wrote. So first of all, he makes a reference to a document which we do not have. It's not in the body of scripture. So he's referencing this document. And the things seem to be, are not necessarily totally defined either, but by looking at all of chapter seven, it seems to be the things about, the questions about marriage, mixed marriage, singleness, being married, all the whole issues. So the things seem to be the things about marriage.

And then one, one note here, and I want to cover this phraseology now concerning So let's just look at, we see 7.1 he uses that phrase. So let's just quickly go through. Let's go to 7.25. And could someone read 7.25? You're going to see the phraseology now concerning. But it's just kind of, this is like, this is a set of things that kind of make up his answers. This is the topics he's going to cover in the following, actually the rest of 1 Corinthians. So could someone read 7.25 then?

Now concerning virgins, I have no commandment of the Lord, yet I give my judgment as one that has obtained mercy of the Lord, to be faithful. Right, okay. And then if you look at, so he's going to talk about virgins, basically unmarried women. And then in 8.1, he's going to talk about now concerning the things sacrificed to idols.

We'd have to turn to all the rest of these. But he's going to consider different topics. He's right now going to consider the things in 7.1. Now we're going to see concerning virgins. Then in 8.1, now concerning the things sacrificed to idols. We're going to talk about that. And then in 12.1, now concerning spiritual gifts. He's going to talk about that. He's going to answer the questions about that.

Then in 16.1, now concerning the collection for the saints, the gathering money for the saints. And then lastly, in 1612, it's now concerning Apollos, our brother. So he had a variety of topics. He started off when he says, now concerning, now concerning. So he wanted to delineate an answer to each of those questions that come up. So we're covering the first one today. And then also, the last part of the verse It is good for a man not to touch a woman.

It's as if... Have you ever... And respond, this is maybe more in the work situation. you get an email or maybe you get a letter or whatever and someone asks you a question so you start out and you put your question there and then you answer the question. I've done that many times in the work situation. If there are five things I want to talk about I'll say, here's the first question, I'll put the title.

So it looks like the last half of this verse is actually something they said. And it seems like, and a lot of this is not firmly nailed down, but it seems like the Corinthians, because of the immorality of their society, They kind of got in their heads that it's so immoral here that I'm going to take the high road in their mind. I'm going to get married, but we're going to abstain from sexual relationships. Well, that just doesn't make any sense. God says, be fruitful and multiply. That's the whole reason. So they're missing the boat here.

He puts in their question at the top. It is good. He says, OK, here's the topic. And then verse 2, he's going to get more specific about that. So he puts it in at the very beginning. It is good for a man not to touch a woman. So he's going to talk about that topic. So let's just look at that a little bit more. Appears to be a quote from this letter to Paul. And let's look at the idea. So what does it mean? There's different phraseology today. What does touching a woman mean? What does that mean?

Can you tell me from scripture what it means? Not from scripture, except you've already got the quote. Well, I have the quote there. I'm going to show you what I believe it says. But something else that kind of occurs to you that in reading scripture that you've Have you seen that phrase before?

I have to back off because this is more from life experience. I didn't really wish it upon myself. My dad just told me while mom was in the nursing home that the beds were separate. He wanted the beds linked together because he wanted to touch mom. That's really good, Tom. I like that. You could take that. If I went and gave Cheryl a hug, I've done it many times, and I'm going to do it again. I'm going to hug other people. You care about them, you give them a hug, and how's it going? But in this context, I think it means something different, and that's what I want to show you. So let's look at Genesis 20, verses 1-6. Could someone read that passage, Genesis 20, verses 1-6?

Now Abraham journeyed from there toward the land of the naked. and settled between Kadesh and Shur. Then he sojourned to Gerar. Abraham sent Seraph his wife. She is my sister. So Abimelech, king of Gerar, sent and took Seraph. But God came to Abimelech in the dream of the night and said to him, Behold, you are a dead man because of the woman whom you have taken, for she is married. Now Abimelech had not come near her. And he said, Lord, will you slay a nation even though blameless?

Did he not himself say to me, she is my sister? And she herself said, he is my brother. In the integrity of my heart, in the innocence of my hands, I have done this. And God said to him in the dream, yes, I know that in the integrity of your heart you have done this. And I also kept you from sinning against me. Therefore, I did not let you touch her. Okay. So from that context, what would you say touch her means in that context? Sexually. Exactly. Exactly. It's a euphemism. or it's another phraseology for sexual relationships. And that's exactly what, in this case, the Lord prevented Abimelech from having any sexual contact with Sarah.

And that's about one of the dumbest things he had ever done. I guess in his mind he was trying to protect himself and his sister, but that was pretty dumb. In those days when women were taken in, unmarried women were taken in, and he had multiple wives. It wasn't a very smart thing.

That's a whole different story. But anyway, so in this context, to touch a woman means to have sexual relationships. So that's a pretty astounding statement. It is good for a man not to touch a woman. So you think, well, boy, that seems kind of... And good in this case, it's actually advantageous, profitable, expeditious.

But in Genesis 2.18, I referred to this earlier, One of the reasons for a man and a woman to be together is to be fruitful and multiply. And he says to Adam, it's not good for a man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.

So we have kind of conflicting situations. Paul's going to resolve this, I believe, later on. But initially, you're kind of perplexed. You think, well, he's saying it's not good. And I think, once again, he's quoting what they said. He's advocating that, obviously, outside of marriage. If they're not married, then you shouldn't be having sexual contact. But in the context of marriage, you should be to fulfill what God has for the marriage relationship.

And then Paul's going to talk about this a little bit later on in 25 through 28. We read part of that already. But let's just go back there just for a second. It gives a little insight. Paul is going to agree in a limited sense that not having sexual contact might be good, or basically staying single. He also can take that in a way of maintaining singleness. Not touching a woman would be maintaining singleness. That's also going to be taken in that context too.

Could someone read, we already read part of it already, 1 Corinthians Now concerning virgins, I have no command of the Lord, but I give an opinion as one who by the mercy of the Lord is trustworthy. I think then that this is good in view of the present distress, that it is good for man to remain as he is. Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be released. Are you released from a wife? Do not seek a wife. But if you marry, you have not sinned. And if a virgin marries, she has not sinned yet.

Such will have trouble in this life, and I am trying to spare you. I think 28 is probably the most instructive part of that here. He makes the case for staying in the condition you're in. But he says, you haven't sinned if you, in 28, you haven't sinned if you should marry. and if a virgin should marry, that's fine. But he's referring apparently to some situation. The very last part of 28 says, yet such will have trouble in this life, and I'm trying to spare you.

So it seems like he was concerned about You think in a situation of war, and many times prior to a war, couples will get married, and the man will go off and he'll be killed in battle, and they've only had maybe a few weeks or less to know each other, and then she's a widow almost immediately. It would probably have been better if they hadn't gotten married. It seems like he's referring to situations when it would be wise not to remain single. So that's part of Paul's thinking, it seems like, in this.

So we're going to move on to the next verse, unless you have other questions about this verse. So now he's going to explain a little bit more. He's going to say, but because of immorality, each man is to have his own wife, and each woman is to have her own husband. So we're going to see in verses 2, 3, and 4, he's going to talk about both the husband and the wife, and he's going to talk about that they both equally share in these aspects of marriage.

It's interesting if you look, you know, if you remind yourself about like in Ephesians, where it talks about the husband as the head of the wife, as Christ as the head of the church. So there's a hierarchy in terms of leadership and the functioning of the marriage. The husband is the head of the wife, and the wife is subject to the husband. She aligns herself under the husband, not because he's smarter, he may not be smarter, but because that's the order that God has put in place.

But now in these verses, he's going to talk about an equalness between the husband and the wife. And that they don't really only own themselves, which is pretty interesting. And actually I think it fits in well with the fact that the husband and wife are one flesh. So if you're one flesh, who owns the flesh? You can't say that's my flesh today. I get the one flesh today and you've got to sit in the sidelines. You can't do that.

He's going to delineate. He's going to talk about, first in terms of immorality or fornication, he's going to talk about each man has his own wife, and that's pretty important too, and each woman has her own husband. He's going to define the parameters of marriage.

Immorality, as I mentioned before, is basically porneia or fornication. It actually can be broadened into a term of eludeness or sexual sins. And we kind of covered that earlier in 1 Corinthians 5. It talked about that there was immorality. Report among you that someone has his father's wife. And then in 1618 it talked about fleeing immorality. So Paul's kind of focused in on sexual sins.

And so he's going to point out that the best situation is when a man has his own wife and a woman has their own husband. And it's interesting that he, once again, it's a mutual thing. And then actually here's the Amplified Bible, because of the temptation to impurity and to avoid morality, Each man is to have his own wife and the same for the wife's own husband.

So the verb here, we're going to see that as we go through here, the same verb tense is going to appear multiple times. It's going to be a command. That's the imperative mood. It's going to be in the present tense, which means it's an ongoing. So God's desire is that a man and a woman have an ongoing relationship, if they're married, with their wife or with their husband. That's to be ongoing. It's a continual relationship. And then also, it's his or hers in the third person pronoun. This isn't my observation. I'm not quite that clever. I don't know the Greek quite that well. But it's basically of himself. So it's of himself or of herself. this wife or this husband is their own.

It's part of them. It's a one flesh idea. They own them in the sense that that's there. That's that relationship. It's a permanent relationship. So it really nails down the parameters of marriage. It's not that you I'll be married to this guy this week, and the next I'll get to marry this guy. It talks about permanency. It's an ongoing, permanent relationship. And they are your own. They're part of you. In my mind, it's the idea of one flesh. And that was God's desire from the beginning.

McCauley says, Let have is a present tense imperative verb pointing to a continuous action and continuing obligation. And he renders it, let us each go on having our own husband, our own wife. So we're going to see this in other areas too. This is in terms of to prevent fornication or immorality. This is the operating scheme or the operating principle of how he wants a marriage to operate.

I think this is pretty cool. When you start digging in here and you start seeing this, you say, wow, God has really nailed things down, how he wants things to operate. It's not questionable. It's really very solid. So, questions or thoughts? This is the first one, then verse three will be the second one, and then verse four will be the third one.

All talking about the sexual relationships within marriage and how you're really not, this is a one flesh idea, I'll call it. And since it's one flesh, you don't really own, you're not your own. And you're not your own in terms of being saved, you've been bought with a price, you're not your own in marriage.

Your wife owns you and you own your wife. So it's two ways, she says, oh great, I get to own my wife, I get to do whatever I want. Well, she gets to own you, okay. As much as you think that's a for a guy, oh this is just wonderful, she owes you just as much. So it's a two-way street.

I thought that was kind of cool. And it helps. And we're going to see that he's going to talk about, you know, there may come a time when, maybe for whatever reason, maybe illness or whatever, or something happens, maybe you want to not have sexual contact. And that's okay. But he points out that you want to come back to that because that's God's plan. That's part of God's operating scheme for a marriage. And he says, and there's danger if you don't. OK, I'm kind of getting a little bit ahead of myself here. OK, so that's verse two. So now the second point.

The husband must fulfill his duty to the wife, likewise the wife to her husband. So once again, we're going to see this mutual situation where they're each mutually serving one another. The husband must fulfill his duty to the wife. So fulfill or must fulfill is to give or to do something necessary in fulfillment of obligation or expectation.

Once again, it's a command, imperative mood. It's present tense, continual action. He must be continually fulfilling his duty. This is not just, well, I feel like it today, tomorrow, not so much. A duty is a duty. You do this and you do this out of love. And the verse I want to show you here in a second is in the next little section here. It's really cool. And the motivation is love. The motivation is God working in both of you to make this a marriage, a one-flesh marriage.

So let's look at Matthew 22, 21. So could someone actually read Matthew 22, 19 through 21? And this is a little conversation with Jesus here. Matthew 22, it starts in verse 19. We could go back to 18 where it says Jesus perceived their malice. If you want to start there Tom, that would be great. But Jesus perceived their wickedness, and said, Why tempt ye me, ye hypocrites?

Show me the tribute money. And they brought unto him a penny, and he said unto and said unto them, Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's. When he had heard these words, he marveled, and left them, and went their own way. Great. Thanks, Tom.

So, in verse 21 there, Christ says, Render to Caesar, and the word render is our word, same word here, must fulfill, render, so, in that culture they needed to pay their taxes, they needed to render to Caesar his due, and by implication they need to render to God his due. It's the same kind of situation here.

The husband is to render to his wife what his doer, what marriage is all about. Marriage is not about absence. He's trying to answer that question. Somehow they got off on this crazy idea that absence could be a part of a Christian marriage. He's telling them that no, that's not it at all.

There's a duty involved in marriage and there's an obligation involved in marriage. to live out the life that God wants for us involves sexual relationships, having children, and the whole picture is all in view there. So the direct object here is duty, his duty, that which is owed him. So let's read Romans.

In Romans 13.7 we're going to see both must fulfill in his duty. So it's a husband must fulfill his duty to his wife.

Romans 13.7 is going to have the same two words in a little different context here.

So let's read Romans 13.7.

Render therefore to all their dues, tribute to whom tribute is due, custom to whom custom, fear to whom fear, honor to whom honor. So where it says render, that's a word for must fulfill. And then it says, what is due is this word, his duty. So render to all what is due. So basically in this context, husband must fulfill his duty. So that's the same idea. And there are four things listed in there below that, as she read. Render all what is due, honor to whom honor is due, and so on. So that's a debt which is involved. There's a debt involved in marriage, an expectation on the part of the wife and part of the husband. And the Amplified Bible tries to bring that across.

And I like the part in parentheses. I'll just read the whole thing. The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, goodwill, kindness, what is doer as his wife. And God values highly the marriage of a Christian man and a Christian woman. Because that represents a picture of Christ in his church. So that's a very honored situation.

And it's not just all about sex. There's a lot more involved. I think Amplified tries to bring that across. Even though it's centered about that, that certainly is an expression of that, but it's more than that. It's a total relationship and the kindness and love which a husband and wife have for one another. And then Macaulay says, the word fulfill in the Greek, the word fulfill is a Greek word that means to pay a bill or a debt. In the present tense, meaning that the obligation is continuous, and thus constantly being fulfilled. And that's back up to where it has the present tense, that's ongoing continual action. So this is the second one of these things.

The first we had, because of immorality, we're to have our own wife and have our own husband. And now it's, we must fulfill our duty to our wife and the wife to her husband. And likewise, or in life manner, also the wife to her husband. It's been pointed out that the likewise is kind of like an equal sign. It means that the wife and husband have equal responsibilities for their actions. This is the second one. The third one is going to talk about a continuation of this idea. Here's a pretty remarkable thing. This is the one I was talking about. It seems great. I got charge of my wife's body. Wonderful. She had charge of your body.

It's both ways. So if she says no and you say yes, who wins? Hopefully you work it out. Not that we all haven't been there. But that's what love and consideration and care for one another is all about. Both ways. Because this is no great thing. Men and women think differently. Feel differently. So hopefully we learn that during marriage. I've learned a little bit. A tiny little bit in my 30 or so years of marriage. So anyway, that's kind of a sidelight there. The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. Authority is from exousia, to exercise power in the sense of permitting, meaning that the one has no separate power or liberty over his own body, to use it as he will.

It's a pretty impressive statement about this, how your partner owns your body, and you own her body. It's pretty impressive because it talks about, you have the control over your spouse's body, which is a pretty incredible statement. You think, my body is my own, but in Christian marriage it's not, not in terms of the sexual relationship. That's actually a pretty profound statement. You think, well God has a pretty high view of this, if he gives the rights to my body to my spouse.

That's a pretty amazing statement. But I think it points back to that we're one in the Lord, one flesh in the Lord. Because oneness doesn't disagree. Not that humanly we can't disagree. I mean, that's always there. But in terms of what God has for us, it's pretty amazing.

And likewise, also the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. The obligation of marriage, the obligations of marriage are mutual. is conveyed by the likewise, which links the husband and the wife together in their duties. So we've had three statements here so far about the man and the wife owning their spouse's body. We've had the idea about them, because of immorality, they must fulfill their duties in terms of sexual relationship. And now we have this idea about the authority over their own body. It might be good just to remind ourselves, I've been talking about the one flesh idea, just for a second, just to kind of go back. Let's just go back here. I'll read this. Look in Genesis. It starts in Genesis and then goes into Matthew, referred to in Matthew. Genesis 2, chapter 2. God's designed for a man and a woman and their relationship. In Genesis chapter 2, I'm going to read 24 and 25.

It says, very familiar verses, for this cause, a man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and the wife were both naked and were not ashamed. So that's kind of carried over, and then we look in Matthew 19, and it's repeated again, or referred to again I should say. Matthew 19, 5 and 6. And for this cause, a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.

Consequently, they are no longer two, but one flesh. What God therefore has joined together, let no man separate. So I kind of think that what we see in these three verses here is kind of the details of that one flesh. How does that work out? And how does that work out practically in the relationship of a husband and wife. That one flesh idea is kind of carried through these three verses. Can I interject? Sure, go ahead.

Getting back to that timeline, I'll give you a quick aside about mom and dad being in a nursing home. I was the legally appointed by Kansas guardian and conservator at the time and I wanted to make sure that though I needed to be away from them so they wouldn't be unduly tempted I wanted to make sure that they would be properly cared for. In that one instance, that was an example. Another instance, and I'll try to be brief, was, let's see, Ted wanted mom to be basically under his thumbs to an unnecessary extreme. They were in the same room and all that, but they were in the private room.

But I told him she can go whenever she likes to go to the smoking room and smoke. She can go whenever she likes to go have a time out there with the rest of the residents under nursing supervision like to. Let's say going to the picnic or watch the fireworks or stuff like that. There's nothing wrong with that and she's under control and it's all good.

So I just had to lay the law out. I wanted to make sure that in all respects that she and he would be properly dealt with in the legal sense and not anything more or less. So it was kind of a learning experience for all of us but at some time I had to put my foot down and say this is a little bit out of line, you need to honor her as well as she is trying to honor you.

Okay, that's good. Well thanks Tom. Okay, so let's move on to verse 5. So now we're going to see a situation, it's like he's maybe answered the first question, which it's good for, the first question was sort of, it's good for a man not to touch a woman. And he's kind of, and that was kind of there, and he's kind of answered part of that.

Now he's going to talk about another thing that seems to be a problem, about depriving one another. So he starts off. Stop depriving one another except by agreement for a time so that you may devote yourself to prayer and come together so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. So the first part that I want to talk about is stop depriving one another except by agreement for a time. So this assumes that there's something already going on here. And actually, it's kind of picked up by the fact that it's a present tense imperative mood again, ongoing action.

So they are depriving one another. And it seems like that's that whole mindset about, well, it may be more spiritual if we're married, but we don't touch each other. We don't have any sexual relationships. And Paul's telling him that is not what God has in mind. Just the opposite of that. So he's very blunt about this. And this is a command. He says, stop depriving. Don't go down that path.

And let's see the verses I had for that. Let's look at, actually I didn't double check these. Let's look at Mark 10 19 just real quickly here. So probably, actually what I typically do, I try to find another occurrence of that same verb there. So could someone read Mark 10 19? You know the commandments. Do not murder. Do not commit adultery. Do not steal. Do not bear false witness. Do not defraud. Honor your father and mother.

Okay, now I'm wondering. At the moment, I don't see exactly what... Well, it could be... I think it might be defraud. It might be defraud, possibly. Yeah, I think that's it. And then the other one is in 1 Corinthians 6, 7 and 8. Could someone read that? Actually then it is already a defeat for you that you have lawsuits with one another. Is that what you want? Yes, okay.

It's going to be the word defrauded. Keep going. Why not rather be wrong? Why not rather be defrauded? On the contrary, you yourself are wrong indeed. On the contrary, you yourself wrong and defraud. You do this even to your brethren. Right, so that's the word defraud.

It's the idea of stop depriving them. And maybe it's not real helpful, so we'll just kind of leave it there. What I try to do is find verses that kind of use the same word and may be helpful. You know, it's a question more that helps a whole lot. So, he's telling them to stop depriving. except by agreement for a time. Agreement is a word for the word symphony. Our word for symphony means harmonious. So he's opening the door.

He's saying, God's best is to have a continual sexual involvement with your spouse, but there may be times that you may want to suspend that. And he's saying, but he's going to say, and that's a good thing. You can do that and you should do that for a time. But knowing man's nature, he says, that can give opportunity to Satan to draw you away and cause you to sin. And he doesn't want that to happen. For a time, a temporary abstinence, but not permanent. Macaulay has, the following context will show that time must be short in order to avoid temptations. that the continual absence might be present.

I'm not sure I totally agree with this. It may be that it could go on for a long time period. If you love your wife, you'll understand. If she loves you, it'll work out. I wouldn't be too hung up on, he says for a time, It implies a short time, but short is relative, right? Anyway, I hate to nail it down, say, okay, it's been, okay, it says right here and that's been not long enough. Okay, my wife says this, we got, you know, that's not being concerned for your wife or vice versa. Look at the clock, not to say that, you know, that there isn't, you know, tension there possibly.

Okay, so the last half of the verse, so that you may devote yourself to prayer and come together again, so that Satan will not tempt you because of lack of self-control." So, as I mentioned before, if you're a Bible student, whenever you see so that, it introduces what's called a purpose clause many times, with a purpose that. So, this so that, you may devote yourself to prayer. And what's interesting is, And I didn't actually see this myself, I picked this up from Macaulay.

The definite article is there, so it's actually the prayer. So the question is, what's the prayer? It seems to be singularly focused. So in this context, what do you think the prayer would be about? I mean, I don't think it's real hard, but go ahead, Tom. It's a wife and husband praying together unto the Lord, according to their mutual needs. be determined. So it seems like the prayer is going to be about the situation.

They've agreed to an absence for a while. So it's in that light. Or maybe there's a reason for that. Maybe it's an illness. So maybe you're praying about, Lord show us how to go through this illness. Whatever it might be, you're praying about that. So you suspended it for a reason. And that's what the prayer is about. And hence, that's why it's not just, I'm going to go off and pray. I'm going to be a monk. I'm going to go off and pray in the corner here. It's not that prayer is focused on what the situation is about or what the issue is about.

And come together again, but afterwards resume marital relations so that another purpose, so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. So before we look at the last little part here, which is the Wyss translation of that, this is the idea that Satan may tempt you. And it's kind of good to remind ourselves, this is a whole study unto itself, but Satan, whenever you see the idea of Satan involved in tempting, that temptation never is positive, it's always negative. When Satan is tempting someone, Nothing good is going to come out of that. He tempted the Lord Jesus, right? He said, I'll give you all the kingdoms of the world. The Lord had fasted for 40 days. And so he tempted him with all kinds of things. So Satan, by his very nature, is going to tempt us with things that are not good for us. Whereas God will never tempt us. He will test us, but he will not tempt us.

And there's different words in the Greek that go through that. That's pretty cool to do. So I like what the What Wyss did here, he basically kind of delineated the idea of the temptation. Satan may not solicit you to sin. And that's actually what that word means, a solicitation to sin. There's a certain Greek word, parasmos, that is what that word is. Solicitation to sin because of your lack of self-control. So Paul's, his mindset here is that that people are struggling with self-control, and he's trying to show them that the Lord understands that, and that they can be tempted.

And that's the reason for not allowing this to go on for, you know, okay, we're finished with that part of our life. It's gone. And in some situations, in some illnesses, that may be the case. I mean, you don't know. But many times, if it's something that can be resolved, then he wants them to go back and have normal relationships. And normal relationships in a marriage is that there are sexual relationships. Okay.

And now he's going to kind of qualify this, but I say this by way of concession, not of command. So he's going to say that he's not commanding this. So this seems to be referring to back to verse five about the separation for a time. Concession is an allowance, is translated permission. So, he's saying that this idea of an agreement to not fulfill your sexual responsibilities in marriage is something that he's not commanding that they do that, but he thinks that's a reasonable thing to do.

Paul did not command the separation, but allowed it for a time period to address a problem that was ongoing. And so then the constable says, Paul's concession was allowing temporary abstinence from sex. The concession was not having sex. He viewed regular marital relationships as the norm. And that's what scripture talks about. That's a regular situation in marriage.

But Paul says there are situations, and he talks about why He's able to do this, that he's a faithful servant of the Lord. He gives his credentials, if you will, why he's able to say that. And this might happen if you were to ask another brother or sister in the Lord, you might ask, what's your opinion about this? And they'll say, well, I don't have a verse I can turn to, but it's just because this seems to be what I understand. And this is sort of in that context.

So if Paul is saying it, and this is recorded in the pages of Scripture, it's pretty good stuff, so to speak. But it's not a command, and he says, I do that because it may be best for the situation. Now, the last verse is, Paul says, Yet I wish that all men were even as I myself. However, each man has his own gift from God, one in this manner and another that. So, he's talking about a wish, this is He makes his case for being single. He says there can be real advantageous to you. You have more time. You don't have to be concerned about taking care of your wife and your family. You have more time for the Lord. He's going to talk about that more later in chapter 7.

This is the part here. However, each man has his own gift. What's interesting is, The word gift here is charis or grace. So this is a grace gift. So just like we're going to study later on the gifts of the church. There's a gift of helps, there's a gift of teaching, there's a gift of whatever. This is a gift that's kind of overlooked and most people probably wouldn't sign up for this gift. They'll say, well, but there's a gift involved in singleness and there's a gift involved in marriage. And it's kind of conferred or kind of pointed out by one in this manner and one in another. I take that to mean the following statement.

Being single is a gift from God. Maintaining a single life. Being able to control your sexual desires, that's a gift from God. And being married is a gift from God. Being able to handle the pressures of marriage and be able to please your spouse and to love your spouse and to walk with the Lord, that's a gift too. gifts in different directions. One for singleness and one for married.

And then actually, you know, I'm thinking that as we grow, you know, some situations, you know, our wife goes home to be with the Lord and now we're back and we're back to singleness again. So we actually may experience both those. And many people do. Many wives live, in fact that's more of the case, they live beyond their husband. many, many years back, and many husbands later in their lives. So a believer may go from one to the other, but it's good to remember that God will provide for both those situations. I found this section really, even though it's kind of challenging and hard, I found it really interesting and really encouraging. So that's about it. Any other thoughts or questions? Okay, well let's close then.

Dear Father, we thank you so much, Lord. We thank you for the blessings we have in our Savior, Lord. Lord, just for your plans and your purposes in marriage, thank you so much that you want us to focus on the oneness we have in Christ, the oneness we have in our marriage, Lord. We thank you for that and also you want to encourage us that at some points we may be in a single life, a single situation, maybe not married or maybe having our spouse having gone home but wherever we find ourselves Lord we know that you provided for that and that's your desire is us to walk by faith in what you've provided for us. In Christ's name, Amen.