“Finally, then, brothers, we ask and urge you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God, just as you are doing, that you do so more and more. 2 For you know what instructions we gave you through the Lord Jesus. 3 For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality;” (1 Thessalonians 4:1–3 (ESV)
The following article is by Dr. John Piper. Dr. Piper is a pastor, theologian, author and Bible conference speaker. The following excerpted message is from 2002 and is entitled This Is the Will of God for You; That You Abstain from Sexual Immorality. The featured text is I Thessalonians 4:1-3.
I want to call us this morning to personal holiness, especially in our sexual lives. We like our sex just fine. So, let’s go first to this text and simply make as clear as we can; what the Bible means by sexual purity. Then we will look at why it’s important.
What Does the Bible Mean by “Sexual Purity”?
Verse 3 gets to the point: “For this is the will of God, your sanctification [or your holiness], that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality.” This phrase, “sexual immorality,” (porneia), means mainly fornication — that is, two people acting as if they are married when they are not married. Touching each other and sleeping together in a way God designed only for a man and a woman married to each other. God said this close physical relationship is for married people only. “A man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh” (Genesis 2:24; 1 Corinthians 7:2; Exodus 20:14). So “sexual immorality” includes sexual relations before marriage and wrong sexual relations among married people.
Verse 6 also has fornication and adultery in view, because it says “and that no man transgress and defraud his brother in the matter.” This means that another Christian’s wife or daughter is in view and the sin in view is mainly sexual relations with a woman that is not your wife, but belongs to another man. You would sin against her and him.
But let’s not think that the only sexual sin in view here is the behavior of sleeping with a woman not your wife — or a man not your husband. Paul refers in verse 5a to “lustful passion.” “Possess your own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in lustful passion.” The issue here is not just behavior but also sexual desires that dominate your life in ways they should not. For our day I think we could include here desires that lead to the use of pornography, and desires that lead to a fantasy life and masturbation that is so often embedded in it — for men and women.
I have reports on all hands that this issue is huge, and that the easy access to internet pornography and cable TV is capturing many men and women and making slaves out of them. The positive alternative to this is described in verses 1, 3, and 7. Verse 1: “How you ought to walk and please God.” Verse 3: “This is the will of God, your sanctification [or holiness].” Verse 7: “God has not called us for the purpose of impurity, but in sanctification [or holiness].”
When God calls you to himself, he justifies you freely by faith in Christ on the basis of Christ’s blood and righteousness, and he calls you to a life of holiness, which in this context refers explicitly to sexual purity. This is the practical fruit of justification by faith.
Why Should We Be Concerned with Our Sexual Purity?
Now the why. I’m going to deal with this quickly because I really want to move to the “how” — which unpacks the practical effects of the “why.” Why should we be concerned with our sexual purity? The text mentions at least five incentives to fight this battle.
1. The incentive of pleasing God. Verse 1b: Paul exhorts us “how you ought to walk and please God.” Sexual purity pleases God.
2. The incentive of doing the will of God. Verse 3: “This is the will of God, your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality.” Sexual purity is God’s will, and Christians love the will of God. Christlikeness means that we delight to do God’s will (Psalm 40:8; Hebrews 10:7).
3. The incentive of honor. Controlling your body in purity is a matter of honor — either being honored by the community or showing honor to your wife and other women, or to your husband and other men. Verse 4: “That each of you know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor.” Sexual purity is the honorable thing to do.
4. The incentive of Christian love that seeks the good of others. Sexual purity is the loving way to treat others. Verse 6: “That no man transgress and defraud his brother in the matter.” When we sin sexually, we are not seeking the highest good of others, neither the woman or the man we sin with, nor the person we fantasize about nor the person in the pornography, nor the spouse or parent of any of these. It is not Christian love that moves us in any of this. It is simply selfish desire. But Christians are people deeply moved by love for others. Christians love people; they don’t use them.
5. The incentive of God’s vengeance. Verse 6b: “because the Lord is the avenger in all these things, just as we also told you before and solemnly warned you.” If you turn from the Lord as your treasure and your all-satisfying pleasure, and make a master out of sex, sooner or later you will meet the wrath of God.
Far more could be said about the what of sexual purity and the why of sexual purity, but most urgent is the how of sexual purity. I turn to that now, and it will be plain that the what and the why are all woven into the how.
May the Lord’s truth and grace be found here. Have a holy and God pleasing day today.
Soli deo Gloria!
His Word Today 