Our right to love

An overwhelming distress

What a paradoxical era we live in! Never before people lived so closely together - crowded and jammed as we are - yet never before we suffered so much from loneliness.

The sixteen-year-old lad will look for a girlfriend to save him from his solitude. The married man, who lives with his wife but still feels lonely, will go off for the weekend with his secretary, hoping that she will make him forget his loneliness. The student, feeling very much alone among the ten or twenty thousand young people of his university, will get involved with a female student just as lonely as himself. Thus the longing to escape from our solitude is combined with our sex drive. That is the reason why today's world is so highly conscious of sex.

Where does this distress come from?

This distress arises from the fact that we no longer know the difference between right and wrong. We pretend to have new ideas about morality. But don't forget this: sin is not a myth. Every time I sin, and do something wrong, a weight falls upon my conscience. That is a reality! Unfortunately, we no longer know exactly what is right and what is wrong. Let me ask a few very pointed questions: Is it right or is it wrong to indulge in sexual intercourse before marriage? If your marriage is unhappy, is adultery a need or an evil? And is homosexuality (gayness, lesbianism and also child abuse) sinful or legitimate? Is it right or wrong to masturbate? Or to ask for a divorce?

Who has the right to decide what is good and what is evil? If there is a living God who is the ruler of this world, then it is for Him to decide what is good and what is evil. He also has His say regarding sex. You have to make up your mind. You can push God out of your life. But then you will die according to your own choice. But remember what the Bible says, "Seek the Lord while he may be found."

And I tell you that God does exist, that He is alive! If you ask me how I can say this with such certainty, my answer is, "Because He has revealed Himself in Jesus Christ." Since Jesus has come into our world, all indifference about God is only due to ignorance or to ill will. - And because God exists, it is He who decides what is right and what is wrong. In His word - the Bible - He states it very clearly.

What does God say?

God created us with our sexuality. God created me as a man, and you too, all you male readers. So let's be men - and not mere puppets! And you ladies, He made you women. Be women, then! The desperate efforts of some women to be like men - or of certain men to be like women - are no doubt symptoms of an illness. You can be real men and real women. God meant it to be like that.

But we live in a fallen creation. The world is no longer as it was when it came out of the hands of God. Our sex life, so important and yet so delicate, is particularly threatened. God, therefore, took steps to protect it.

God approves of sex and protects it by marriage. Marriage is not merely a social contract, but an institution of God. According to God's plan, marriage is supposed to deliver you both from solitude.

Some very touching remarks about the passage in Genesis,
"... I will make a helper suitable for him." He said, "Not a despot to rule over him. Nor a slave to fall at his feet. Nor an object that he can put aside. But a helper to lavish her love on him."

Many young people say to me, "I am not considering getting married for the moment. What do you think about it? Can we do whatever we want?" I say this: God wants youth to be pure. A psychiatrist once said to me, "I am sure that deep down in her heart, a young girl can only love once. She gives her love to only one man. If she has had a dozen lovers, she is - like ‘lost' for marriage. She may marry the seventh one, but she will always think of her first love." I replied to him, "Well! What you say is extremely interesting. It is as the Word of God says."

Jesus forgives our sins

Your impure thoughts and all the downfalls are irreparable sins. They will go with you into eternity right up to the judgement-seat of God, unless beforehand you have found Jesus, confessed all your transgressions to Him, and have been pardoned by Him. Jesus is the only one who can grant forgiveness.

So draw near in your mind to the cross of Jesus and say, "I come to lay down all the sins of my youth. I confess to you all my questionable love affairs. I don't want to hide anything from you." Then, lift up your eyes to the cross and say the words of this hymn,

I do believe, I now believe
That Jesus died for me;
That on the cross,
He shed His blood,
I now from sin am free.

"The blood of Jesus, God's Son, purifies us from all sin." (1 John 1:7). What a liberating word!

 Love Bob Archer