7 THINGS ABOUT PURITY

purity

Purity is defined as the condition of being free from anything that contaminates or pollutes. When we say that someone is sexually pure it means that they are unpolluted by sexual immorality.

It is also possible to abstain from sex and be impure. Our thoughts can pollute us, our hearts can be impure.

Purity is more than our bodies participating in sex.

My body is God’s temple.

My view about purity changed when I realized that my body was now God’s temple. It was no longer mine to do whatever I pleased with. I belonged to God.

Do you not know that your bodies are the temple of the HolySpirit who is in you, whom you have received from God? you are not your own you were bought at price. Therefore, honor God with your bodies. 1 Corinthians 6:19-20

You’re no longer your own. God has paid a price for you, He wants your body to be His temple.

I wonder how we would treat our bodies if we knew they were God’s temple.

My purity is for God, it’s not for my marriage.

It’s a great thing for us to be pure for our future marriages, but this cannot be our goal for purity.

Our goal for purity should be to worship God, to worship Him undistracted and wholeheartedly.

If we stay pure for marriage or our future husbands, there is a risk of idolizing sexual purity or sex in marriage. Anytime we make an idol of something we place an expectation on it that it simply cannot deliver.

So we’ll stay pure so God can give us husbands and marriages.

But what happens if we don’t get married? Or we get married and don’t get the marriages we thought we will get? We’ll make God a liar for promises He didn’t give to us.

Staying pure until marriage doesn’t guarantee us husbands or marriages. It doesn’t guarantee us perfect marriages (Sis, there is no such thing). Marriage brings with it unique troubles. ( Paul guarantees us trouble if we’ll get married 1 Corinthians 7:28) and no one is exempt from it.

Because my purity isn’t an idol and I have not attached an expectation to it, whether I get married or not; Whether there is a man or not; whether I get the marriage I was expecting or not I will still be pure because my goal is to worship and serve Him.

Purity is not holiness.

We can be tempted to believe because we aren’t indulging in sexual immorality like the world then we are holy. We can look down on people because we think purity is the standard.

Sis, holiness is the standard, not purity. Yes, God wants us to walk in purity but He has called us to holiness.

For it is written, be holy for I am holy. 1 Peter 1: 16

There are so many things outside of sex that can defile our holiness. Anger, unforgiveness, pride, laziness, covetousness, envy and jealousy, and how we treat others are a few things that can defile our holiness before God.

Our bodies become living sacrifices.

Therefore I urge you brothers and sisters by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice-holy and pleasing to God- this is your true and proper worship. Romans 12:1

Sacrifice denotes death. For us to become living sacrifices we have to die. In the Old Testament when sacrifices were offered, they died once. Because we are living sacrifices we have to die daily. It’s bringing ourselves to the altar and choosing to die every single day. We die to our fleshly desires.

We put ourselves on the altar as holy sacrifices. To be holy means we are consecrated or set apart for God’s s use only. Again, in the Old Testament when something was said to be consecrated, it was separated for the purpose and service of God. It couldn’t be used for anything else otherwise it would be defiled.

It’s the same with us, we become holy living sacrifices for God’s use only. We cannot give our bodies to sexual immorality. We cannot use our bodies for things that defile us.

Purity is a heart issue, not a body issue.

In psalm 19:14 David says, May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight Lord, my Rock, and my Redeemer.

David understood that what he meditated upon influenced his life. He wanted to worship and serve God with his life. He knew he had to guard what was getting into his heart because it would overflow into his life.

What we look at. What we listen to. What is coming out of our mouths has the ability to defile us. If we are feeding on garbage, then we’ll meditate on garbage. If we are feeding on what’s wholesome, then our meditation will be wholesome and pleasing before the Lord.

We cannot walk in purity and indulge in the entertainment of this world.

Some of us are struggling with lust and keep falling into sexual immorality, which is directly tied to our entertainment. What is entertaining us in private is opening a door for lust and immorality in our lives. If we will change what is entertaining us, we will begin to walk in freedom from lust.

Christians love to say, “ but Christians movies are so boring.” Or “I’m watching this garbage because I love the storyline.” Okay then, you can keep your lust and sexual immorality or you can be pure and pleasing before God but you cannot do both.

It’s not easy but we’ll have to decide if being pure is more important or if our entertainment is more important.

Flee sexual immorality.

There is no other sin in the Bible we are told to flee from except this one.

We are going to learn to flee from some rooms and situations. We are going to have to learn to walk out of some conversations. We are going to have to learn to avoid some places (or some people!).

Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body. 1 Corinthians 6:18

Paul was teaching believers who were living in a sexually immoral culture. There was a belief in this culture that sex was just sex. That you could have sex with anybody and just go about your business.

The believers in this culture ( sounds like the world we live in today) were falling into this lie. They were having sex with prostitutes thinking it was okay.

He explains the multi-dimensional aspects of sex, in that our bodies, souls, and spirit participate. It’s more than what we see; something else is taking place in the soul realm.

(I talk about soul ties here). Where two people become one flesh, they are united and bonded in the soul. Because of what sex involves it affects the whole person. There is an exchange that takes place. What’s in the other person’s soul becomes yours and vice versa.

Don’t get into sexual covenants outside of God’s parameters. It will hurt your life. It will affect where you end up. The boundaries God has put for us are for our protection. The only safe place is sex within a marriage covenant. God protects us through someone’s commitment and love for us.

An undefiled marriage bed.

Marriage is to be held in honor among all [that is regarded as something of great value] and the marriage bed undefiled[ by immorality or by any sexual sin] for God will judge the sexually immoral and the adulterous. Hebrews 13: 4

Two people are mentioned here: Fornicators and adulterers.

Fornication is the sin of sex outside of marriage for the unmarried. Adultery is the sin of sex outside the marriage covenant for the married.

We begin to honor the marriage bed long before we get to it. Honor for marriage doesn’t begin at the altar it begins when we are single and walking in purity.

We keep our future marriage undefiled when we are single and when we get married.

If you’re having sex with someone you aren’t married to you are defiling your marriage bed and you’re defiling their future marriage. It’s likely you will not end up with that person.

We also don’t imagine that some things we are doing now when we are young and foolish will follow us into our future. There are things that you are entertaining now, that will bring you a horrible harvest in marriage. Lust, pornography, masturbation, and sexual immorality will affect your marriage in ways you can’t imagine. Ask God to help you heal and walk in purity as you prepare for marriage.

Exhortation:
If you are reading this and struggling with lust or sexual immorality, this isn’t to judge you. It’s to bring you grace and truth so you can make different choices. Remember none of us is holy before God. We all need the blood of Jesus to cleanse us and purify us. Receive God’s grace and mercy to walk into a new life; to walk in the freedom that is yours in Christ Jesus. I love you and I’m praying for you.