[This post continues a series of posts entitled 'A Biblical Catechism on Sex and Marriage'. The intention is to provide basic material for further instruction by a trusted teacher of God's Word in a church that is committed to Biblical authority. The Church’s mission is to invite all people to live under God’s righteous rule.]
Question 3. What sexual sins are mentioned in the Bible?
Question 3. What sexual sins are mentioned in the Bible?
Answer: Any sex outside of marriage between a man and a woman is sin.
Comment 1: The following sexual sins can be found in the Bible:
[Previous Posts on this question: Adultery, Sexual Immorality, Bestiality, Homosexuality, Transgenderism, Prostitution, Temple Prostitution, Orgies, Incest, Premarital Sex]
Pornography, Lust, Licentiousness,
Sinful Desire (the sinful heart and desire, not just actions)
Scripture does not only see sin
in terms of acts or behaviours. Sin is a
condition of the heart—a disposition or orientation beginning with wrongful
desires. Sexual sins, by the same token,
are not limited to acts but also have to do with the heart and sinful
desire. This is why God’s salvation is
not only forgiving grace but also transforming grace (cf. Rom. 1:24-28 and
12:1-2). Following are a few of the
verses that point to sin as a problem of what is within a person and not simply
their behaviour, including sexual sins of lust of the heart and the eyes,
licentiousness (a term meaning lack of restraint that would include both sexual
sin in the heart and actions), and sinful desires.
Genesis
6:5 The
LORD saw that the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth, and that
every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually.
Job
31:1
"I have made a covenant with my eyes; how then could I gaze at a virgin?
Proverbs
6:25 Do
not desire her [the prostitute’s] beauty in your heart, and do not let her
capture you with her eyelashes….
Habakkuk
2:15 (NIV) "Woe to him who gives drink to his neighbors,
pouring it from the wineskin till they are drunk, so that he can gaze on their
naked bodies.
Mark
7:21-22 For
it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come:
fornication, theft, murder, 22
adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride,
folly.
Matthew 5:27-30 "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall not
commit adultery.' 28 But I
say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already
committed adultery with her in his heart.
29 If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw
it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole
body be thrown into hell. 30
And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it
is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into
hell.
Matthew
18:9 And
if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for
you to enter life with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into the hell of
fire.
Matthew 6:13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
Matthew 6:13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
Galatians
5:19-21 Now
the works of the flesh are obvious: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmities,
strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, 21 envy, drunkenness,
carousing, and things like these. I am warning you, as I warned you before:
those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
1
Thessalonians 4:3-7 (ESV) For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you
abstain from sexual immorality; 4
that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness
and honor, 5 not in the
passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God; 6 that no one transgress and wrong
his brother in this matter, because the Lord is an avenger in all these things,
as we told you beforehand and solemnly warned you. 7 For God has not called us for
impurity, but in holiness.
Romans
13:13 … let us live honorably as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not
in debauchery and licentiousness, not in quarreling and jealousy.
2
Corinthians 12:21 … I may have to mourn over many who previously sinned and have not repented
of the impurity, sexual immorality, and licentiousness that they have
practiced.
Ephesians
4:18-24 They
are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of
the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. 19 They have become callous and
have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of
impurity. 20 But that is not
the way you learned Christ!- 21
assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is
in Jesus, 22 to put off your
old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through
deceitful desires, 23 and to
be renewed in the spirit of your minds, 24
and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true
righteousness and holiness.
1
Peter 4:3-5 You
have already spent enough time in doing what the Gentiles like to do, living in
licentiousness, passions, drunkenness, revels, carousing, and lawless
idolatry. 4 They are
surprised that you no longer join them in the same excesses of dissipation, and
so they blaspheme. 5 But they
will have to give an accounting to him who stands ready to judge the living and
the dead.
Jude
1:4 For
certain intruders have stolen in among you, people who long ago were designated
for this condemnation as ungodly, who pervert the grace of our God into licentiousness
and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ. (Cf. 2 Peter 2:7).
Vulgar Talk
Ephesians
5:4 Entirely
out of place is obscene, silly, and vulgar talk; but instead, let there be
thanksgiving.
James
1:26 If
any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their
hearts, their religion is worthless. [This verse is broadly stated and would
cover any disconnection between the heart and outward behaviour, such as
speech.]
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