Today’s Scripture Reading (January 8, 2018): 1 Corinthians 7
Johnny Carson once joked “I know a man who
gave up smoking, drinking, sex, and rich food. He was healthy right up to the
day he killed himself.” Some things make
life worth living. Sometimes I wonder, as I sit in the doctor’s office
answering his questions if I need to pick
up a few more vices. I don’t smoke or drink alcohol. I exercise regularly,
setting a goal of 10,000 steps a day as measured by my step counter. I am
starting a weightlifting regimen. But,
there is always a but, I do like my Diet Coke (although not to the extent that
President Trump apparently likes his – we can always
find someone who is worse at our vices than we are), and the selfish part of me
argues that I need to be allowed a few vices.
So maybe if I told my Doctor that I drank and smoked, my caffeine intake wouldn’t
look like such a problem.
I understand the Carson joke, but one element
of it seems to stand out of place. My doctor talks to be about the dangers of
smoking, drinking, rich food (a big risk
at Christmas) and caffeine intake (which didn’t make Carson’s list of vices),
but why did Carson decide to include sex. We are sexual beings, and we absolutely need touch. Maybe we need to be
reminded of the dangers of promiscuity to our physical, social and spiritual
health, but abstaining from sex and affection for our significant others, as
well as simple non-sexual touch, is not healthy. We need it.
Paul talks to married couples, and his
message is clear. Do not deprive each other, except by mutual consent and for a
short period, of sexual contact. If sex is
impossible, then find ways to express affection and romance to each other
within a monogamous relationship. We need this to exist in health. Science
reminds us of the fact that healthy
sexual contact is one element in living a healthy and long life. Sex,
especially within a committed marital relationship, should never be considered
a vice. It is an element of healthy living.
Paul’s only exception when he speaks of our
need for sexual contact is the few who
are gifted to be able to do without sex, of which he considers himself one. And
this exception has created a puzzle for those of us reading his writing. One
possibility might be that Paul was same-sex attracted, and given the moral
beliefs of the day, that kind of a relationship was impossible for Paul to act on. And so he is left without the affection and
sexual contact that was both healthy and necessary for most of the people with
whom Paul was dealing. This might have
been Paul’s “thorn in the flesh” which God refused to remove. Of course, this
is just conjecture. But whatever the reason, Paul stood outside the rest of
humanity in that he could exist without the sexual contact that was normal and
healthy for the rest of us. But his plea, in
spite of his personal situation, was to remind all the married couples who
would read his words that sex was both healthy and necessary. He hoped that
they would not deprive each other of an element of life that could bring
satisfaction and happiness, and serve as a way to defeat the sexual temptations
that exist all around us.
Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: 1 Corinthians 8 & 9
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