Big idea for our message today. In God's design, sex is a physical expression of what it means to be one. Today, we're talking all about the idea of oneness.
Okay. What does it mean to combine our whole life? It's it's not just the physical act of sex. It's actually everything else that goes in. When we think about combining bodies, it's also thinking about combining souls.
There's a mingling that is happening when two people come together. The Book of Genesis says it like this: A man would leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife. All right, that the two would become one flesh. There is something that is very Mysterious that happens when two people get married, they practice one flesh physically, but it is a combination of all of this idea of oneness.
Now, in a church like ours, at our campuses as well, y'all, there are so many problems in areas like this, and I would just tell you, like we we've got to realize there are sexless marriages, there are marriages with no passion, there are people that are single. That are doing destructive things behaviorally, playing house instead of building a house.
Okay, they're doing things destructive, destructively now that are going to have ramifications on that sexual relationship later. Like we got all that going on, and the aim today is to hold up God's design so well that it makes us want to run to that design and repent and confess, and that strongholds would be torn down today. All right, that's kind of where we're going now. The idea. Physical oneness is is both is important.
Okay, it is both like a thermometer and like a thermostat.
Okay, when you think of physically the sexual act in marriage, I've got both actually here. I've become a prop preacher now.
Okay, this one, this one is a thermostat. This is literally the thermostat that we use every every Thanksgiving. I appreciate the church praying for me and Pastor Bobby because every year we're trying not to blow our eyebrows off frying a turkey.
Okay, and we haven't for 15 years in a row.
Now we've had some fires, all right, but we've never blown our eyebrows off. But this is the thermostat that, or thermometer, sorry, that we. Use for that now. What does this do? All this can do is tell you what there is.
Tell you what it is. It doesn't. Change the temperature in any way. It can just tell you what the temperature is. Hey, sex is that way.
In some ways, it's like man. If somebody says to me, "We have an incredible marriage relationship. It's growing. We're closer than we've ever been." But there's no physical intimacy going on. I would really question that.
I'd be like, "Man, I'm not. I'm not real sure that's exactly how it works." So we need to maybe think about the sexual relationship as a thermometer. It sort of shows us what's going on on the face of it, and helps us to see some other things that might be a little bit deeper into into the to the marriage. It's also a thermostat, okay? A thermostat.
What does it do? It actually changes the temperature up or down. Sex is a little bit like both of these things. Whenever the temperature needs to be turned up because there is coldness. Sex is not just a fruit; it's also a pathway.
All right, and it can actually help us to remember what God has done for us and and what the what the physical oneness is supposed to be.
So today in Song of Solomon, what we're going to look at is just simple wisdom from the Lord around the idea of oneness and and a mingling of souls. And and and you guys remember this is part two of last week's sermon, which was part one.
So we're going to jump right in. Let me do a little bit of a recap here, and then we'll get into our exposition for today. This this is the scripture that we're going to be talking about, though.
So let me read it. Awake, O North Wind. This is Song of Solomon, chapter four, verse. And come, O south wind, blow upon my garden, let its spices flow. Let my beloved come to his garden and eat its choicest fruits.
I came to my garden, my sister, my bride. I gathered my myrrh with my spice. I ate my honeycomb with my honey. I drank my wine with my milk.
Now these are the friends speaking in. Eat, friends, drink, and be drunk with love.
Now, very, very, very high level. Verse sixteen, chapter four, verse one, chapter five. This is the moment. It's the moment we've all been waiting for.
Okay, they're finally coming together here. All right, it's been a build-up for four chapters, and it'll sort of be pointing back to this for another few chapters. But this is the moment. This is the consummation of the marriage. And in so doing, what I want to show you is this: Hey, this idea.
Come to the garden, get all you want. He goes to the garden, he gets all he wants, and the community says, "Man, we're affirming that. We're looking in on this and saying, 'Eat, drink, be drunk with love.'" Now, this is where we got to talk about last week's sermon. If you weren't here, I'm going to try to give you like a three minute recap.
Okay, this moment. Of beauty, of sex inside of marriage, of physical oneness, of what Paul would say in Ephesians five mirrors the gospel.
Okay, that it's like two people being joined together, just like we're joined with Christ. All the beauty in that—it doesn't pop up out of nowhere. This was the sermon last week. There is an environment that creates this, and that environment is really fueled by a pledge on the front end to captivation, the affirmation of words, and the pledge of exclusivity.
Okay, and that stuff happens on the front end, not on the back end. This is one of those things that our culture gets exactly the wrong way. Culture wants to tell all the young people, college students, the culture says, "Hey, man, what you need to do is try it before you buy it." I mean, I've literally heard guys say about living with a girl or having sex with a girl before they get married. Like, oh, hey, you wouldn't, you know, you wouldn't, you wouldn't buy a car before test driving it, right? Really?
That's the analogy we're using. It sort of shows what's happening, don't it? It shows how dehumanizing all of this is, right? We're not trying before you buy. We're not trying this.
This, this is supposed to flow out of an exclusive. Affirmed, captivating relationship that is affirmed on the front end. That's what creates the freedom in all of this. You could say it like this: Freedom and intimacy comes from the environment of permanence and acceptance. For four chapter, or for you know, multiple chapters.
In chapter four, you have this man who keeps communicating to his future wife: "I'm captivated by you. I'm affirming you with my words, and I am exclude. I'm exclu Expecting you to be, and I am going to be exclusively yours. That that's that's what creates the freedom for us to be able to grow in intimacy with one another. Think about the gospel; it's the exact same way.
How many of us are really glad that God didn't say, "Hey, man, why don't you go try to live like a Christian?" And if you can do it pretty well, then I'll let you be one. If that was my, if that was me, it would be I would have been sunk. What about you? Same way, right? It's not.
Hey, go live like it, and if you can, and it works out, I'll let you be one. The reason that you and I are able to flourish in our intimacy with God is because on the front end, He pledged an environment by which we could grow. He says, "You are mine. You are joined with Christ. If you have admitted your sin, believed in what Jesus did on the cross, confessed Him as the Lord of your life, then you are now part of the family and the safety of that.
So, not worried about getting kicked out." The safety of that creates an environment where we can grow. It's the same in marriage, all right. When when people are like, when people are like, man, we're gonna kind of live together and and see if this is really working out. It's like you're always auditioning for each other, you know. You're always trying to figure out, did I do enough today to kind of stay in the good graces here?
And that's the opposite of what God wants in our our married lives. It's supposed to be a pledged commitment to one another that creates all the freedom. You know, I I um whenever I do. Weddings. I don't do a ton of weddings anymore, but when I do a wedding, I always tell people the last vow that you do to each other.
When I do the wedding, is you're going to look at the other person, you're going to say, "I promise I will never divorce you," and people's eyes get a little bit big. They're a little bit well. That's they're like well. That's kind of prickly. I'm like well.
What did you think we were coming to do? What's a wedding? Like I thought that's the whole point of a wedding. It's like we're pledging to each other.
Well, there's going to be people in the in the state you know in the crowd that are that were divorced. They may not feel that and they may feel this. And my answer to that is well, boohoo.
Okay, because if you want me to do the wedding, we're gonna we'll say all the flowery stuff. I'll do all the stuff.
Okay, you know all this. But at the end of the day. We're going to say what it is. I will not divorce you, and you will not divorce me. That pledge on the front end is what creates that intimacy environment that we're going to now start to exposit.
Okay, I would just say like this, guys. Are we not just guys? I mean, all of us. Are we continuing to grow the environment that we committed to in marriage? Continuing to grow it.
It's it's not like oh it was back there. It's like what are we doing now to continue an environment that that that makes that freedom and intimacy very possible and very attractive. Guys, Anna texted me this week on a Tuesday, and she said, "I don't I don't think you realize this, but your tone's been sharp the last two days." And she was right. I didn't realize it, but it was. I hate that text message.
I don't know about you guys. When you get one like that from your spouse, that's what I have to say.
Well, hey, we need. I said, man, we need to talk. There's some things going on with me. But at the same time, I'm sorry. That's not right.
I don't want to talking talking in a sharp way. Why? That doesn't create the environment for intimacy to grow. You know, we need. My point is this.
Last week's sermon is you pledge this stuff on the front end, and then you grow in it all the days of your life.
Now. Here we go. All right, verse sixteen. I want to show you guys the garden. I want to talk about.
Let's just talk about the garden first.
Okay, here's what it says in chapter four, verse sixteen. Awake, O North Wind, and come, O South Wind. Blow upon my garden and let its spices flow. Let my beloved come to his garden and eat its choicest fruits. All right.
Now, what we're going to talk about here is the garden. Then we're going to talk about oneness, and then we're going to talk about friends.
Okay. So those three things: garden, oneness, friends. She says here, "Blow upon my garden." Now, your Bible may make a distinction. You got to make a decision of who's talking in this verse. All right.
Some Bibles say, "Well, he's talking." Some Bibles say, "Well, she's talking." We got to make a decision. The NIV and the CSB kind of put more of a header, like she's the one talking here. I think that's right. Chapter four makes the most sense to me if he is pursuing her for the whole chapter, and then at the end of the chapter, she turns in response. And that's what I think is happening here.
And what's her response? Blow upon my garden, let its spices flow. Let my beloved come to his garden and eat its choicest fruits. Now, what's the garden? I think we know.
Okay, and we're going to leave the innuendo in because that's you know that's what the Bible does. It speaks an innuendo, which is which is fine. But we all sort of understand what's going on here, right? It's like pursuit has led to an openness, and now she is saying to him, "Come to the garden." Garden now and get all you want. Basically, I mean, this is this is the marriage bed is being pictured as the garden, and that is so important for Christians because we understand some things that the church that the culture sort of grasps, but really ain't got.
And I want to try to explain it to you. You know, the garden of Eden always has in our culture a bit of a sexualized undertone to it, doesn't it? The forbidden fruit, you know, the idea of Some tropical island, you know, and it's that's you kind of get these Eden like, you know, ideas where they even even name some of the stuff Eden like things. You guys understand what I'm getting at? There's kind of this connection in our culture with it, you know.
So, like one of our one of our guys was driving down the road. His grandmother was in the car, and they're they're driving on 85, and they see you've seen the super the huge signs, Adam and Eve Superstore. Granny says, "Look, a Christian bookstore." He's like, "Granny, do not go into that Christian bookstore." Okay, we understand that there is this connection between the garden and sort of this sexualized kind of thing, but you and I, as believers, understand the actual connection because the actual connection is very deep theologically. What was the Garden of Eden? A place.
Of rest and security, a place where people could be known and loved by God so much so that they would be known and loved by each other. They would be naked and unashamed. What what is all that? That that that that idea of the Garden of Eden, the paradise that God has for us. You get a picture of that in marriage and the marriage bed.
There's a taste of it. Man, we're we're known and loved. We're pledging ourselves to each other. It's the you know the heights physically of relationship. All these things, and it does echo back to that garden of of Eden.
You know where God would say, "Hey, even what was lost can be restored." What happened in the garden? Sin happened in the garden. We got kicked out of the garden. But what happens in the gospel? In the gospel, we get to come back into relationship with God, and there's there's just there's this kind of connection that you see between the Garden of Eden and between the marriage bed.
Understanding there is sort of restoration here. There's there's oneness here. There's all these different things. Married couples end up with that picture in their mind, and it's very it's very theological. I tell couples, I'm like, hey, this is not like a macho.
But it's like Christian couples that you may never image the restoration and the relationship that you have with God more than in the marriage bed with one another. I mean, that's not even me really saying that. That's what Paul says in Ephesians five. He he likens the gospel itself being joined with Christ. To two people being joined with each other physically, and the first point that I want to make with all this talking about Eden and the marriage bed, and I want to heighten our value around the whole thing.
Young people see how different it is what I'm talking about versus like hookup culture on a college campus. I mean, just think about it. What we're talking about is so valuable. And what that is is the opposite. It's like what that is is like cheap pleasure, evolutionary urge, shame afterwards.
Think about the freedom that we're talking about here versus the shame that comes when people are looking at pornography or can't get free from some kind of sexual thing or whatever. It's just totally worlds apart, right? What the world views in this area and what the church has and what Christianity says about it could not be more different. At some point, we've got to make a decision about what we think, all right, and which way we're going to go.
Okay. Gardens, man. Let's talk a little bit about oneness here. What it means to have what's mine is yours and yours is mine.
Now, he says in chapter five, he says, "I came to verse one. I came to my garden, my sister, my bride. I gathered my myrrh with my spice. I ate my honeycomb with my honey." I drank my wine with my milk.
Now, I've interpreted this to mean, man. She says, "Come to the garden." He goes to the garden and he gets all that he wants, all that he can, until he is totally satisfied. And the implication there being, she is as well. This is what I want you to see. It's very interesting to me.
In chapter four, verse sixteen, we said this is her speaking, right? This is her responding, and she says, "Blow upon my garden, let its spices flow." Chapter five, verse one. He says, "This I came to my garden." Now let this sink in. Whose garden is it? What does she say?
She said, "Blow upon my garden." He said, "I came to my garden." Now before we start yelling patriarchy here, okay? He's taking something. Look what she actually says in chapter four, verse sixteen as well. First, she says, "Blow upon my garden." Then she says, "Let my beloved come to his garden." Are you getting the picture? It's not taking something from her.
She's given herself away, and he is as well. This is what Christian marriage is. What's mine is yours, and what's yours is mine. What's mine is yours, and what's yours is mine. There is not going to be this whole kind of mine and yours anymore.
Even to the point of your body and who has authority over it. There is now a oneness that must be considered. It's not my life and your life; it's our life in one flesh. Can I read to you maybe one of the most countercultural verses I could think of right now in our day and age? Because we live in such a modern, worshiping autonomy type of culture.
Everything is about my authority over my own body. I mean, everything is about that, right? And and listen to what Paul says. You want to you want to talk about kind of taking air out of a room? You stand.
In a super secular environment, read this verse: The husband should give to his wife his her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband. 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. That is the opposite of the world when it comes to marriage. People get married out of a contract of like, "Hey, I am gonna be with you until you stop making me happy.
You keep your end of the bargain. Up, we'll be together." But it's really my life. I'm just kind of doing this because it's it's my thing and and makes me happier. And Paul is like, oh no, nobody forced you to get married. All right, especially in our society, you didn't have to.
You got married. You made a decision, and that decision means you are no longer your own. He is no longer. She is no longer. The funny thing is, the countercultural part of this verse two thousand years ago would be that she has authority over his body.
Right, because that would have been just crazy. But the Bible is making this point: he doesn't own her; she doesn't own him. They are just one now. It's it's a deep theological thing. It's like they're one, and they have to work that out.
Now, what I see in marriages, from doing this for twenty years and pastoring thousands of people and counseling, can't can't tell you how many marriages and all that. What I see is this as a problem: people want to be one physically, but stay separate spiritually. And what they think is, we're not going to combine all of life, but we really like that fun part of combining bodies. And what they can't understand is like, hey. The Bible and God have put this thing together, where the body combination happens on the back of the full combination.
You don't get a little bit over here and leave the rest of this stuff out. Instead, it's all encompassing this idea of oneness. What did he say? I came to my garden, but it's her garden exactly. All right, it's there's one kind of flesh that's about to happen here.
What's mine is mine. What's mine is yours, and what's yours is mine. Now, I'm going to give you three very quick areas where I see Christians misstep in this. All right, where they have something going on that stays separate, and they can't figure out why there's problems in the bedroom. All right, number one, finances.
I'll just be straight up. People want to keep two bank accounts, keep everything separate. You know, they want to say, "Ma'am." We're going to do everything separate. You know, like you're going to do what you want to with your money. I'm going to do what I want to with my money.
There's going to be wildly different numbers at the end of the day for retirement accounts. I mean, people just they want to keep this stuff separate. Then they can't figure out why they're having intimacy problems.
Well, let me just kind of clue you in. When you separate out major parts of your life like that, especially around money, you are communicating all day, every day to your partner. I got a backup plan. If this don't work out, I got a backup plan. Right, so I'm I'm here, but just know I have not like burned the ships on this whole thing.
You know, I'm not all the way in. That's what you're communicating. Then we can't figure out why we got problems in the bedroom. Secondly, I'll tell you this: people want to be one physically, but they're separate in their faith journey. I'm not saying you're not both Christians, but what I am saying is that you got this thing going where it's like one of us is like fired up about serving, wants to be at church, attend one, serve one.
Man, we want a tithe. We want to be. We want our kids to be very involved. The other one is like cool on all that stuff. Man, the church is taking too much.
We don't want to do this. I don't really want to be up there. You got one parent who is trying to build a disciple in their home. You got another parent who is trying to build a draft pick in their home. And it's like those visions are just going wildly like this.
And when you are living with different visions, then you know, yeah, I am sure when you are young and and just married and fun, that's fine. Like you can overcome some of those things. The physical part can still be fine. You give that some time. And you're going to realize, like, the more you're going like this, the more it begins to show up in the physical relationship.
And I'll give you a third one.
Okay, the third one is this idea of living secretly in separation, like, like having open secrets. I would say, meaning like this. Yes, we want to be one physically, but like, no, you're not going to have the password to my phone. You know you're you're not you're not going to be able to know who I'm dealing with at work and who my friends are and yeah I'm going out after work I'm not you don't that no this is my life I don't you don't need to know who who I'm with all the time you don't need to be able to get all my email whenever you want or or whatever just to keep open and we and we're living sort of two separate lives and then we can't figure out why when we come together physically it's not what it should be or what we want it to be it's really not that difficult it's really not rocket science it's like the physical part comes on the backs of the combination Of everything else, you probably know this about me. Just if you've ever been around me or even listened me preach, not a real big fan of the surveillance state that we're living in right now.
Okay, just not man. I don't do. I don't love the stuff. There will never be an Alexa in my house. I'll just tell you that.
All of the stuff, you know, with with you know the the cameras and all that kind of stuff. I didn't even want a cell phone. I don't. My wife, you know, she—they made me get on Life 360.
Okay, you guys ever done? You know, you know what I'm talking about. And I can't stand it, man. I can't stand people knowing. I can't stand there being a record of where I am and all this kind of stuff.
I hate Life 360. I'm going to tell you the one person on planet Earth that loves Life 360 more than anybody else. Her name is Anna Hopper. I don't know why. I but I'm going to tell you what the woman loves knowing where I'm at.
I mean, she wants to know. She wants to. She likes the kids, all this stuff. I never look at the things she looks at. It.
I'll be pulling up somewhere. Oh, what are you doing there? I'm like, okay, I'm gonna, I'm, I'm submitting to it. I'm living. I'm living.
I want to. I want to make sure that this is part of that whole honoring her thing, right? My point is this: even to the point of something silly like Life 360. I'm like, you know what? If that put, if that, if she likes knowing where I'm at, it puts her at ease.
Let's do it. Let's just do that. I'll just do. I'll just do it. I'm still going to turn it off anytime I walk into a gun store.
Okay, I can't have the government having records around that stuff. But you know what I'm saying? For her, if that helps her a little bit, then I'm going to be fine. I want to create that environment. Hey, are we doing a good job of saying?
You know what? The physical part is going to come on the back of the spiritual part. And finally, thirdly, I want to read chapter five, verse one.
Okay, so we've talked about the garden. We've talked about oneness. It's mine, as yours. Yours, mine. Talk about friendship.
Eat friends, drink, and be drunk with love. Eat friends, drink, and be drunk with love. I made this point earlier in the series, but I can't say it enough, y'all. We live in such a modern, hyper individualistic society. We think we can do marriage alone because we think we can do Christian life alone.
Some people are like, "Oh, my church is going and sitting in a deer stand in the woods. That ain't a church." Some people are like, "Oh, my my church is you know back porch, a little bit of coffee, Kay Love, and a and my my favorite celebrity YouTube preacher." Not a church, man. That's the problem. You're calling it a church, it ain't one. Church has authority and community.
All right.
So if you're like, "That's my church," what pastors are you submitting to? That dude on YouTube don't even know who you are. Promise you that. Right, so it's like it doesn't. Who are you actually submitting your life to?
Because that's what we're called to do: is to be in submission to the elders of the church, community, have people that are watching our back and to be watching their back. This is what we need, and this is what this passage points us to. Five, chapter five, verse one: Eat, friends, drink, be drunk with love. There is a community in the book of Song of Solomon that is cheering on the marriage, cheering on the couple. And I'm gonna ask you very directly: Do you have friends in your life that push you back to your marriage, that push you back to working things out, that push you back to physical intimacy, that will ask you the hard questions?
Because if we don't, man, we're headed for trouble. You know, I love this. Our directional elders, three laymen, man, guys in our church, been married for decades. They're grandfathers. They love you.
They love our church. They feel a high responsibility among the highest decisions that we make as a church. But you know what? When I sit down with them over lunch or something, their first question to me is never about the finances of the church. It's never about the growth of the church.
The first thing they want to know is how is Anna. How is your marriage? How how are those things going? They're pushing me back. Parents, what kind of relationships are we putting our kids in?
Friendships, are they going to build the types of friendships that will sustain college students? Are you guys and young professionals? Are you building relationships right now that one day will be the type of people who would point you back, just like chapter five, verse one, eat friends. Be drunk, yeah. Drink.
Be filled. Be be drunk with love. Push you back to your marriage. If you if you're around people all the time that are critical spirit, tearing their husband down, tearing their wife down, and you start doing it, do not ask why or how it happened. It's super simple, man.
You put your life filled with those type of people, and you went in that direction. We need people who will point things out to us and point us in the right direction. But you know, you know what it's like. the The funniest thing going on in my house right now. I don't know how this happened to me.
My kids make fun of me about it. It's funny for them. It's not funny for me. About eighteen months ago, the best we can, the best we can put the timeline back together. I picked up a bad habit.
You guys seen the the commercial where you are becoming your parents? Have you seen that commercial?
Okay, this is happening to me in real time. All right, I have no idea how this happened. I picked up a dad stance. And I know that you're like, what is that? I didn't know what it was either.
Okay, I my whole life, I just I'm in 43. My whole life up until 41 and a half years old, I just stood, I would stand like a normal person, like a normal man. You know, I'm at a ball game, I'm in line at Chick fil A, I'm just just kind of standing. Right, we're 18 months ago. I'm in a Chick fil A, and my son AP looks at me.
He says, "What are you doing?" And I was like, "What?" And he said, "Why are you standing like that?" And I was like, "What?" I looked down. I, out of nowhere, I was standing like this. I was just standing there like that. I have no idea why. I was horrified, just like he was.
Okay, and and and now that now the big joke with them is they just take pictures of me and post it on stuff.
Okay, so. But the funny thing is, and this is this is actually pretty good, you know. Like my kids, this is the phrase they use. I mean, they they literally did it this weekend to me.
Okay, they'll say this is they all say it. They'll say, "Dad, you're doing it again." Dad, you're doing it again. I didn't know I had done it the first time. You're doing it again. Here's the thing, man.
Do you have people in your life that, when it comes to your marriage, Are like, hey man, you're doing it again. You know that that thing. Hey, the way you spoke about her, the sharpness in your tone, man, the way that you're kind of cutting a little bit with your words, God. Hey, you're doing it again. You know, or even positive things.
Hey man, the way that you're talking about her, the way that you're talking about your kids, the way that you're praying for her, like you're doing it again, man. You're doing the thing. We need people in our life to say, hey, you're doing it again. Because you don't know you're doing it, and so I would push us to say, "Hey, we need the community around us. Go to it.
All right.
Get into a community group if you're not. That'll happen in January. And if you are, man, let's go all the way to the bottom for the next three weeks. Here's the application point: be one spiritually and physically. Be one spiritually and physically.
I want to push you today. This is my prayer. You got to understand. We listen. We are not.
This series don't go on and on and on.
Okay, there's only one more sermon left in this series, and that one ain't. It's not really focused on believers getting healthier. It's focused on non-believers coming to Christ.
So my point is this: if you got a stronghold in your life, if there's some unrepentant stuff going on, if if you you and your spouse have got some things that need to be talked about, like now is the time. It's don't. We're not waiting till next week. There may not be a next week. Right now is the time to try to get this stuff kind of figured out, and ultimately it comes down to one question: Do I trust that God has what is best for me in mind?
Do I trust in my sexual, you know, relationship with my wife, husband, or eventual one if you're single, that God has what's best for me in mind? This is the core question. I mean, this question goes all the way back to the Garden of Eden again. What did the serpent say? Did God really say that?
Oh, it's he just doesn't want you to be like him, knowing good and evil. Like he's holding out on you. There's something good that God doesn't want you to have. This lie is the one that is sown deepest in the hearts of every single human. And you, and at our campuses, you have to decide today.
Do I believe in God's design for what He has called us to? In last week, creating the environment of marriage. And this week, engaging in physical oneness, just like a thermostat, at times it helps us turn the dial up. And remember, just like a thermometer, at times where it kind of helps us to see where things are. Are we going to believe in His way?
I think about that Forrest Frank song that everybody was doing for so long. I searched the world till my head hurt just to find out Your way is better. Do we believe that God's way is better? We should. And here is why.
You know, you and I, in sin, we were kicked out of the Garden of Eden along with Adam and Eve. That was just part of the deal. They sin. They sin for all humanity. I mean, we've all followed their their their footsteps anyway.
So we get kicked out of the garden. Jesus Christ comes back to Earth. He ends up in a garden. You remember Garden of Gethsemane, where he's sweating blood, and he says, "Father, your will, not mine, be done." We get kicked out of a garden. Jesus ends up in a garden.
Jesus ends up going to the cross. Jesus ends up dying a sinner's death, even though he wasn't a sinner. Jesus ends up resurrecting and giving us the opportunity to walk in the newness of life. I want you to think about this for a second. Why can we trust God with our sexual lives?
It's because we believe that He is taking us to the Garden 2.0, okay, the new heavens and the new earth. He's taken us to the Garden. If we can trust that He's taking us there through the gospel, then why would we not? Be a people who would trust him with that little foretaste or echo of it right now. You know, I think about it like this: Jesus went to the garden for us so that we could come to the garden with him.
the The new heavens and the new earth, that garden. You know, and so I would just say, we can trust him. We trust him with that part of our life. Let's trust him with this part of our life. And so, what I want to do now is we close because I just want to push for a minute.
And say, hey, where is the area of your life, the stronghold that needs to come down? Where is the therm? Where is the thermometer just blinking, saying, "Man, things are not right." You know, it's just like a little bit of like a car light when it comes on, and it's saying, "Hey, something's wrong with the engine." It's like you can just stick something over that, you can turn the light off, or you can try to do a little bit of of deep work and figure out what is producing the lack of intimacy in our marriage right now. Your elders want to help you with this, by the way. Right, you got problems in these areas, or you got things that you're trying to wrestle through, guys.
If you are in a community group at Mercy Hill, I know it's a big church, and you're coming from the outside. You might, oh, big church, it's impersonal. Amen. If you are in a group, you are literally one phone call away from an elder at all times. One phone call.
All you need to do is get in touch with your community group leader, who has the cell phone number of their elder, who is over their group. Groups of four or five, you know, groups. Elders have four to six groups, and if you need help, that's what they're there to do, man. They want you to come to them. We live in a modern kind of therapeutic society.
People want to jump pastors and go straight to psychotherapists. I'm going to tell you, sometimes that's fine.
Sometimes that is incredibly destructive, right? If you're if you're if you're part of the people of God, and you're a sheep under the care of shepherds, like come to the shepherd, man. We're we're here for that. That's what we want to do. But we can't.
We don't know if the sheep don't come and let us know what's going on in their life.
So hey, if there's sin in your life in this area, if the marriage is on the rocks, you know, single people, my my my wonder is, could you? Are you going to be one who maybe maybe praise and commit some things to the Lord today about what you want your future marriage to be like? You know. Maybe this year hasn't been good. Maybe maybe there's been some sexual sin or whatever.
The great news is in the gospel, you are new creation, and so today you can make some commitments today and walk out of here free from the shame and the guilt that you're carrying. Man, I hope you'll do that. Let's pray. Father, come before you. We ask right now, Lord, that we would have a great time.
All of our campuses of response. Lord, I pray there would be confession, repentance. Lord, I pray there would be people who are praying for one another, praying for adult children and their marriages. God, I pray that there are things that are hidden; they would come to light. Lord, I pray that our hearts would value more and more and more deeply what you've done in giving the gift of sex within marriage in Christ.
Then we pray, Amen.
