Dr. Wise has Bachelors in English, a Masters in Counseling, a Juris Doctorate in Law, a Masters in Biblical Studies, and a Doctorate of Ministry in Pastoral Counseling. He has studied a lot and has learned a lot about relationships both as a counselor and also as an attorney.<\/span><\/p>\n Dr. Wise began by addressing that he knows how sexual morality is a sensitive subject and that he wishes to handle it in a sensitive manner. But above all, the most important thing about Dr. Wise is his conviction and love for God\u2019s Word.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cI believe the Bible is true,\u201d he said. \u201cI believe it\u2019s absolutely true. When I\u2019m looking for something to base my life on\u2014a standard to make decisions about my life, that\u2019s the first place I go. Even when it\u2019s a question that the Bible doesn\u2019t answer directly, it gives us a framework to make decisions.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n While some questions are directly addressed in the Bible, other questions require that we look at the principals of the Bible to help us in making the right choices. In the general Christian life, there are several timeless principles that we can always refer back to:<\/span><\/p>\n 1. God is Sovereign.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n God is the ruler of the world. He is always in control, and He is not asleep.<\/span><\/p>\n 2. His word is true and unchanging.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n The morals of our culture change, but God\u2019s Word never changes. As our culture\u2019s morals change and our morals don\u2019t, we begin to find ourselves in a difficult position between going along with culture and standing firm in God\u2019s laws.<\/span><\/p>\n 3. God\u2019s rules are for our good and for His glory.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n The Bible is God\u2019s \u201cOwner\u2019s Manual\u201d for our lives. He, being the manufacturer, knows His product better than anyone. God\u2019s glory is His character. He is loving, just, perfect, all-powerful, forgiving, compassionate, full of grace, and full of truth. Everything that God does projects these attributes to the world so that everyone will know these things about Him and He has given us His rules so that we can know what He is like.<\/span><\/p>\n 4. People who are not born of the Spirit do not understand Spiritual things. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n We cannot expect people who don\u2019t know Jesus to understand the things of the Bible. The Bible tells us that we only understand God\u2019s truth if we know God. The wisdom of the world is foolishness to God, and the wisdom of God is foolishness to the world. Someone who is not a follower of God would think that some of the things God says are stupid. It doesn\u2019t make sense. However, we who believe in Him know that God\u2019s truth has never been proven to be wrong.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n With these principles in mind, we can move on to some truths about God, people and sex:<\/span><\/p>\n 1. God created us as sexual beings. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and he created man, male and female. Male<\/em> and female<\/em> He created them. Right from the very beginning, God created us as sexual beings. Sex is not a punishment for original sin. Sex is not bad. Sex is a wonderful gift that God designed for us from the very start.<\/span><\/p>\n However, all of God\u2019s designs have guidelines, and so sex has guidelines. In God\u2019s order of things, He gives us good gifts, and He gives us ways to enjoy those gifts. But a gift, when misused, can be bad. And we see the results of sex being misused all over our world.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n So here are some of God\u2019s guidelines concerning sex:<\/span><\/p>\n Purity<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n One of God\u2019s biggest principles for the Christian life is to remain pure. In the sexual realm, purity includes not having sex before marriage, and once married, to only have sex with your spouse. Our hearts are full of sin, and that is why we must guard our hearts. God is a loving God and wants us to treat each other with love, respect, and purity.<\/span><\/p>\n Modesty<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n Modesty is cultural. What is modest in one culture may not be modest in another culture. However, God is clear about wanting us to be modest. He does not want us walking around naked. The minute that man sinned and shame became present, the first thing God did was to clothe him.<\/span><\/p>\n No sex outside of marriage<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n In Exodus 20:14, one of the Ten Commandments is \u201cDo not commit adultery.\u201d God is serious about it. But not having sex outside of marriage is not just about adultery; it is also about premarital sex. Any<\/em> sexual activity outside of marriage is wrong. Many people then begin to question, \u201cWhat is<\/em> sex?\u201d Does it refer only to sexual intercourse? Dr. Wise\u2019s usual response is, \u201cIf it\u2019s got the word sex in it, then it\u2019s sex.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Marriage is between one man and one woman, for life.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n There are many ways we can mess that up, but this is God\u2019s standard. This does not mean that anyone who has had a divorce is not a believer. God forgives all sin. There is not one sin that is worse than another. However, God\u2019s design for marriage was and still is this: One man and one woman, for life.<\/span><\/p>\n 2. Human sexuality has a Kingdom purpose.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Ephesians 5:22-33 is basically a job description for a husband and wife in a Biblical marriage. The wife is supposed to submit to the husband because the husband is the head as Christ is the head of the church.<\/span><\/p>\n The marriage relationship is an example of Christ\u2019s relationship to the church. God intends for marriage to glorify Him. Marriage is a symbolic recreation between Christ and the church. The husband, being the head, is to love his wife the way Christ loves the church and gave Himself up for her. The way a man loves his wife ought to be a reflection of how much Christ loves the church. Marriage is very important to God, and that\u2019s why God talks so much about it in His word.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 3. All people are sinful. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Genesis 6:5 says that \u201cthe very desires of our heart are only evil all the time.\u201d Paul writes in Romans 1:21 that \u201calthough they knew God, they neither glorified Him as God nor gave thanks to Him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened,\u201d and in Romans 3:23, he says \u201cfor all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n If we\u2019re going to start looking at people and say that they are sinners because of their sexuality, then you have to be ready to recognize that you have sin too. Any response that we have to other human beings needs to take into account that we are no different. Only Jesus was different. He\u2019s the only one who lived a completely sinless life. While we may be upset about other people\u2019s decisions to engage in sexual sins, it does not give us any reason to hate them.<\/span><\/p>\n 4. We do<\/em> have a choice. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n We are not ruled by our bodies or our desires. Trying to justify sexual immorality by saying \u201cI was born this way,\u201d or \u201cI cannot control my desires,\u201d is not true of a believer because we have the Holy Spirit in us and the Fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control <\/em>(Galatians 5:22-23).<\/span><\/p>\n It is not true that we cannot control ourselves. We are all born with sinful desires. All of us want things that\u00a0we\u2019re not supposed to have. From the time we were little babies, till now, and until the day we die, we\u2019re going to want things that God does not want us to have. They are not good for us and<\/em> they destroy His character because everything is for His good and for His glory.<\/span><\/p>\n 5. Man questions God. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Right from the very beginning in the Garden of Eden, man has questioned God. Adam watched as Eve ate the fruit and saw that she didn\u2019t die, and so he decided to eat it too. Eve may not have died\u00a0that minute, but from that moment onward, she started dying. Sometimes, we think that something is not true because we do not understand the way<\/em> that it is true. Eve needed to listen to God\u2019s command that \u201cYou will surely die\u201d by faith, but she listened to the serpent who said, \u201cSurely, you will not die.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n We want to be in control. We don\u2019t like it that God is in control and has rules and we often try to rationalize our sins to justify them. However, we need to choose between serving the devil or serving the Lord.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 6. God loves.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n In the process of all this, we need to remember that God loves. And God forgives. Whatever has happened in your life or in your friend\u2019s life, God can forgive it. Whenever we\u2019re talking to somebody or we\u2019re trying to figure things out for ourselves, we must never forget that our God is a God of love and forgiveness.<\/span><\/p>\n His rules are designed to bring us back to Him. He wants you to be in a close and loving relationship with Him. However, there is one more important thing that we cannot neglect to recognize.<\/span><\/p>\n 7. Forgiveness requires a new direction. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n 1 John 1:9 says, \u201cIf we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.\u201d This is an \u201cif\u201d sentence\u2014if we confess our sins. To confess means to agree with God and to change our behavior.<\/span><\/p>\n To have a new direction is what repentance means\u2014to literally turn around and go the other way. You are forgiven by God when you repent. You cannot be in the middle of wrong behavior, decide that you\u2019re going to continue in wrong behavior, and just think, \u201cGod\u2019s gonna forgive me.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n In response to these seven truths from God\u2019s Word, we need to ask ourselves these questions:<\/span><\/p>\n What do I do?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n 1. Obey.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Whatever you\u2019ve done in the past, stop<\/em>. And start obeying. If you have done things sexually that you should not have done\u2014that were not pure, stop now and start obeying. The Bible is clear about sexual purity (Bible verses provided at the end of the article).<\/span><\/p>\n 2. Trust. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Trust that what God tells us through His Word is right and true and good. Trust Him.<\/span><\/p>\n 3. Pray. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Whether it is deciding about going on to the next step in a relationship with a person or dealing with sexual thoughts, commit it to the Lord. Pray. Commit yourself today to Biblical purity, which means no sex outside of marriage, and marriage is only<\/em> between one man and one woman, forever.<\/span><\/p>\n 4. Examine your heart. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Are you meeting God\u2019s standards? Jesus said to His disciples: If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself<\/strong>, and take up his cross daily and follow Me (Luke 9:23). That means that there are things we are not allowed to do, and we will<\/em> want to do some of them.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n How should we respond to others? <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n 1. Love.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Love should always be the rule. But with love comes the truth. The Bible says in Ephesians 4:15 that we are to speak the truth in love. It is not loving to not<\/em> tell someone the truth.<\/span><\/p>\n 2. Humility. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n We all sin. Sin is a part of all our lives, To think that your sin is not as bad as someone else\u2019s sin is wrong, because your sin is bad too. Sin hurts you, and it hurts your relationship with the Lord.<\/span><\/p>\n 3. Compassion. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Many Christians tend to speak out in very judgmental and harsh tones. That is not compassionate, that is not loving, and that is not part of the character of God. That is them putting themselves up while putting others down and thinking that they are better, and that is not what God wants from us. Our job is to present truth in a loving way and wait for the Holy Spirit to convict them.<\/span><\/p>\n![\"Ref:](\"http:\/\/www.spirit1059.com\/pics\/Feeds\/Articles\/2015212\/94546\/Bible.jpg\")
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