Don’t Bash What You Hate, Promote What You Love.
This simple slogan is how we put Philippians 4:8 into action.
“…whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or praiseworthy – think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me – put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.”
This simple slogan is how we can put 2 Corinthians 10:5 into practice.
“We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”
These two verses were life altering when I began my journey toward understanding the many dimensions of sexual intimacy. I had to quit bashing sexual intimacy as something I hated. I had to quit RSVPing to the husband bashing parties.
In this day of ‘if it bleeds, it leads,’ kind of news reporting, we’re used to everything being awful, it’s almost uncomfortable to hear genuine positives. The positives we often hear are marketing strategies to sell insanely fabulous items that fall very short of amazingness. So, we get used to praise being not just meaningless but outright deception.
Misery loves company, right? That’s what the prince of this world would have you believe (2 Cor. 4:4). He’s a liar (John 8:44).
I think it’s easier to talk about our misery because we live in a world where everything is tinged with negativity and fear.
Fear has kept Christian sexual intimacy in the closet. Many spouses would love to celebrate the gift God has given to marriage. However, fear keeps us from frank, tactful discussions and therefore some marriages are dying.
Through the next month, I’ll be promoting what I genuinely, authentically love about my journey toward understanding sexual intimacy from the viewpoint of independent thinker who happens to be Christian and suffers from low-libido.
Promoting What I Love About Finding Sexual Intimacy
I Love Sexual Intimacy Brings New Life
I Love We Fill Each Other’s Gaps
I Love Filtering Out Satan’s Signals about Sex
I Love These Books to Help Grow Libido
I Love God’s Glory in the Bedroom
I Love New Positions (you’ll be surprised what this is about.)
I Love Learning to Pray for Sexual Intimacy
Love is Blind. Friendship closes its eyes.
I Love Laugher Leads to Sexual Desire
I Love Starting the Sex Conversation
I Love Gently Blunt Sex Converasations
I Love Knowing When Sex is Going to Happen
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This is a much needed idea in our present culture! It is not only a successful strategy to focus on the positive, but it is also a directly offensive move against the kingdom of darkness (which I personally, LOVE) it is a win/win proposition!
Thanks for the great idea!
You’re welcome. Please come join the fun with your own, “Promote what you love,” post!!
One of the biggest struggles I faced becoming a young adult was the lack of discussion in the church surrounding it. We are so shut off that it creates double standards, and then often wonder why our youth are struggling so much.
The church, I feel, has become so obsessed with purity culture that they’ve forgotten that there is also a purity in our sexuality, and when it’s not taught and talked about, it can set us up for failure and destruction.
One of my biggest struggles with sexual intimacy came from that. We wouldn’t talk about it as youth, except to be told that we must remain pure, virgins, sex is bad, God won’t love us. As a young adult, the message I was being given by guys was that sex was all I was worth. I couldn’t talk to other Christians about it, because it was still the SEX IS EVIL GOD WON’T love you message, and so I struggled alone. Confused, and with no foundation, I ended up in relationships where I was sexually manipulated, and left even more confused.
When I got married, I was suddenly expected to be able to love sexual intimacy, but all those years of being discouraged and being told how wrong it was, how wrong it was to feel sexual feelings at all, or any of that, I couldn’t turn it off. I cried every time we were intimate because I felt dirty, gross and sinful.
The more women my age and younger that I’ve spoken to, the more have similar stories.
We live in such a different world now than even 20 years ago, and if we don’t speak about it with everyone in our church — not just our youth, but our adults as well — and have open discussion, we’re opening the doors for more destruction, and struggles.
*sigh* Sorry for the long comment… this is just a topic that really gets me going.
Tabitha, yes, it’s going to take a village of sex-positive voices to change the church culture. Sex is not in the off position until marriage then suddenly in the on position. There is a group of us who are speaking out regarding godly sexual intimacy. It’s NOT evil, because God created it. Sex is good and positive. It’s just a very fragile element of human life that is super important to God.
Thank you for your comment and support that sexuality needs to be addressed better to singles and marrieds within the church.
I want to say the same thing as Robyn. This discussion needs to happen in the church. Otherwise mouths and hearts are silent, and Satan can get in there with his darkness and confusion.
Yes, I agree completely. Thank you, Jennie.