Words of Jesus Podcast - Sex Talk

Episode Date: June 17, 2022

There are many problems that are uncomfortable to discuss, as a result, they are often avoided. Jesus did not back-down from embarrassing topics. Jesus opened the commandments, examined the hearts of men (and women) and gave advice and instructions to achieve a good life. It is not possible to find a way to "sin and get-by". There are always consequences for our actions and behaviors. ***Chapter 19: The Sermon on the Mount...You have heard that it was said to them of old time, You will not commit adultery: But I say unto you, that whoever looks on a woman to lust after her has committed adultery with her already in his heart. And if your right eye offend you, pluck it out, and cast it from you: for it is profitable for you that one of your members should perish, and not that your whole body should be cast into hell. And if your right hand offend you, cut it off, and cast it from you: for it is profitable for you that one of your members should perish, and not that your whole body should be cast into hell. It has been said, Whoever will put away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorce: But I say unto you that whoever will put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causes her to commit adultery: and whoever will marry her that is divorced commits adultery. Again, you have heard that it was said to them of old time, You will not perjure yourself, but will perform unto the Lord your oaths: But I say unto you, swear not at all; neither by heaven; for it is God's throne: Nor by the earth; for it is his footstool: neither by Jerusalem; for it is the city of the great King. Neither will you swear by your head, because you can not make one hair white or black. But let your communication be, Yea, yea; nay, nay: for whatsoever is more than these comes from evil. You have heard that it has been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth: But I say unto you, That you repay not evil: but whoever will smite you on your right cheek, turn to him and offer the other also. And if any man will sue you at the law, and take away your coat forbid him not, let him have your shirt also. And whoever will compel you to go a mile, go with him two miles. Give to every man that asks of you, and from him that would borrow of you, turn not away. And of him that takes away your goods ask them not again. You have heard that it has been said, You will love your neighbor, and hate your enemy. But I say unto you which hear, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; That you may be the children of your Father who is in heaven: for he makes his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. For if you love them which love you, what reward have you, what thank have you? Do not even the publicans the same, for sinners also love those that love them? And if you salute your brethren only, if you do good to them which do good to you, what thank have you, what do you more than others? Do not even the publicans and sinners so? If you lend to them of whom you hope to receive, what thank have you? For sinners also lend to sinners, to receive as much again. But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again and your reward will be great, and you will be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil. Be therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful. Be therefore perfect, even as your Father who is in heaven is perfect. Take heed that you do not your charity before men, to be seen of them: otherwise you have no reward of your Father which is in heaven. Therefore when you do your charity, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. But

Think Red Ink Ministries presents The Words of Jesus series. Don Harris here, your host, and we're going to continue reading what Jesus had to say. In this particular case, he's talking about the commandments and opening them to us so that we can understand them better. Now he continues here saying that you have heard that it has been said to them by them of old time, thou shalt not commit adultery. But I say unto you that whoso looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed

adultery with her already in his heart. And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out and cast it from thee. For it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body be cast into hell. If thy right hand offend thee, cut it off and cast it from thee, for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. Now, let me talk about this just a moment.

This is a very difficult thing to talk about for a couple of reasons. One of them is the divorce aspect of this. Divorce has always been anathema in the church. I can remember men saying that I would be in better standing with my church had I murdered my wife instead of divorced her. And unfortunately that's true. We can forgive people a murder, but divorce? Come on. Well, I think you need to understand that the Jews of this day and perhaps today,

I don't know many Jews today, but history tells us that they're absolutely, history as in the Talmud and the writings of the Sanhedrin, that they are absolutely obsessed with weird ideas about sex. And sorry, my Jewish friends, but if you were versed in the Talmud, you'd know exactly what I'm talking about. If you are versed in the Talmud, you're

thinking, oh my God, what is he about to say? Because you know that the book is absolutely pornographic in some areas and gives permissions to people to do things that are absolutely heinous in those areas. And I'm not making any apologies for you. There's none to be made. But the Jews also had this fascination for an ability to sin and get by. They would constantly take the scriptures and twist them and bend them

so that we can continue to do what we always wanted to do. I think of some of the Jewish nidda laws that talk about you shouldn't be anywhere near a woman during this time of menstruation and these kind of things. Well, it's understood that that's exactly what it means. However, Jews are very fond of saying, yeah, it talks about her that you're supposed to avoid her. I think it's, I forget what the scripture says, during the day or during the night, but they're saying that, you know, it's one

and not the other. Oh, okay. So what you're going to do is you're going to take what is the obvious understanding of the scripture, and you're going to nitpick it so that you can do whatever you want to do well don that's just so anti-semitic oh really you don't know christians that do this really you don't know christians that take little verses and and pull little words out and say this means this and this means this and it doesn't mean that the bible doesn't say anything about snorting cocaine you know or whatever other silly thing people want to do that they're under conviction about doing, so they're going to change what they call the Word of God.

They're going to change what they call the Word of God so that they can do it, you know, without compunction and certainly without any kind of disciplinary action in their future. And so the Jews, because they want to, essentially they want to please God, but they also have these other desires that are driving them out of their minds, just way too obsessed with these kind of things as far as I'm concerned. They would say, now, let's see, how is it that I can get

old Susie Q in bed with me and me married and her married? That would be adultery. Can't do that. I know what we could do. We could write up bills of divorcement. As soon as she's divorced from her husband, or I'm divorced from my wife, and I'm divorced from my wife, or whatever, then it's legal. It's not adultery. You know what? He's absolutely right. It's not adultery.

Because adultery is, you know, illicit perhaps immoral sex between a man and a woman who are bound somehow by marriage. Well, the divorce decree fixes that. So I can divorce my wife, sure, or she divorce her husband. Maybe there's only one marriage involved, I don't know. But all we've got to do is write a bill of divorcement and it's not sin. Isn't that great? Well, Jesus

is sitting there saying, you might think it's not sin, but it is. Let's go on and read what he says afterwards. Whosoever shall put away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorcement. But I say unto you that whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causes her to commit adultery. And whosoever shall marry her that is divorced commits adultery. And he's saying, no, no, sorry guys. You can't do that.

You can't just go write this up. What do we think we are, Catholics with indulgences here? No, you can't do that. It's still adultery. Well, they really, that really aggravated it. As a matter of fact, there was a time when a bunch of pharisees got together and went to jesus and said hey this adultery there this um i'm sorry this this divorce thing can a man put away his wife for any cause you hear that this is this is their practice this is what they were doing can a man put away his wife for any cause? Because there was one school of thought that said, yeah, sure he can. And there's another school of thought that says, no, he can't do that. It has to be according to, as Jesus says, except it be for fornication.

Now, do you know the difference? I don't like talking about these things, but they have to be talked about. So, do you know the difference between fornication and adultery? Adultery is that illicit sexual union between people where there are marriages involved. This is the breaking of a marriage vow. This is a violation of a vow of marriage between people, whether it's those two people

or these two people or one of the couples or whatever else it is. That's what adultery is. Well, what's fornication? Eh, fornication is that thing that seems to occupy a lot of people's time and day. It's very much sometimes done in innocence, sometimes done in foolishness, sometimes done for love or whatever else their reasons are. But you ought not be involved in it.

It's just nothing but trouble. As a matter of fact, the Bible says that, I think it was Paul that said, a man that commits fornication sins against his own flesh and what does that mean well what it means is is that you're creating certain appetites and stuff that now you've got something else to control without the benefit of marriage so you know don't do that remember I was telling you there's some things that are sins against God and some things that are just stupid behavior? There's no commandment that says thou shalt not commit fornication.

The marriage is protected in the commandments, not necessarily, you know, the stoppage of all sexual activity. I happen to believe that the seventh commandment that talks about adultery, I think that it would be, should be, could be better written that we should be sexually pure. Because I think it takes in every area of it. And as Moses went to explain to the people all the different circumstances behind all those things,

don't have sex with your aunt or with your mother-in-law or with your sister or with your horse or any of the rest of these things. Don't do that. I think they all fall into that category of being sexually pure my opinion can't say the bible says so but that's the way i live my life and i and i think that it works very very well now jesus says except it be for fornication you can't divorce your your wife there are many people who take this to mean that,

except it be for adultery. You can't divorce. And so there are women, I know this sounds nuts, but we are nuts. There are women who are actually waiting for their husband that they have other grievances with but they're waiting for their husband to commit adultery so that they can divorce them under you know i guess the you know the smiling eye of god i don't know what they're thinking

but that's what they're thinking and that that if their girlfriend comes to them and says, well, you know, me and Bob, we divorced. Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. Well, you know, there was adultery. Well, what? That's supposed to make it okay? Because there was an adulterous affair involved? No, sister, you're supposed to forgive him for that. There's no

provision in the Bible that says, well, if he commits adultery, why? That's different. No, it's not. It's not different at all. You're supposed to forgive him for that and move on. And you, sir, are supposed to forgive her for that and move on. But the commandment is protecting a marriage. It's not just trying to keep us all, what do they call that, celibate. That's not what it's teaching at all.

So when Jesus says, except it be for fornication, he was referring to the law in the Old Testament that says that a man has a right to believe his wife when she tells him that she was indeed a maid, she was virginal or whatever when they got married, and he finds out different. He has the right to annul that marriage. That's all it was saying.'s all jesus was saying there's no there's no adultery clause in um in uh divorce so forget that quit

talking that way all right so he's talking about um this about this sexual impurity that manifests itself in different ways for different people. And he's saying that if you're involved in this kind of perversion in one way or another, it doesn't matter what the perversion is, you can know you can run off and hate homosexuals if you want to but what they're doing is no different than what some guy is doing to a woman that's not his wife sorry but it's it's still sexual impurity and so you know one's just as guilty as the other you'd rather rather not have heard that? Sorry, but you're not going to find anything different in the scriptures. Now, let's talk about something that is the second part I was telling you.

This is a very difficult thing to talk about, but it needs to be talked about because most of the preachers won't do it. And that is when Jesus says, if you find yourself lusting after a woman, that you've committed adultery with her already in your heart. Now, I know that some of the evangelistic, the more evangelistic among us, they'd like to go out on the street

and ask people if they're a sinner, and they say no, or they say yeah, or whatever. They start going through the list of the commandments, and somebody says, you know, I'm a good man. I don't do anything wrong. Have you ever lusted after a woman? What's the answer to that question? Of course I have.

Well, Jesus says that you've committed adultery that guy, whoever said that I could tell you who but that guy, he's totally he's a theological idiot he's a social idiot if he thinks that committing adultery with a woman in your mind is the very same thing as doing it do you know how many people have gone ahead with their idea because of your stupid idea preacher you told him that he's already committed adultery with

her in her heart well then what the heck well how's it going to make it worse if I actually do? You don't have an answer for him. You see, you shouldn't have told him that to begin with. Jesus wasn't saying that at all. He was talking about sexual impurity, and he was talking about how the mind is the playground for these kinds of things. And you need to take this in hand. Now, you need to stop this right away. Because if you don't, it'll eventually turn into that. Just like hating your brother. It will eventually, can eventually, has the potential, the seeds, to turn into murder.

And these are problems. This is what the rich young ruler was so concerned about. When came to jesus and said what must i do to inherit eternal life jesus said keep the commandments he says i'm doing that oh good this do and thou shalt live did you know jesus said that this do now shalt live but the rich ruler at this particular point in his life was asking Jesus not about the commandments. I don't think he realized that the commandments were going to bring him into eternal life. Jesus said that they would. And he said, you know what, that's really not enough. What do I lack yet?

I know something's lacking because even though i don't commit adultery i want to even though i don't murder my brother i want to even though i don't steal and violate the commandment of god i want to i don't want to want to anymore. Jesus says, what you're looking for is perfection. King James translates perfection as completeness. You want to be complete. You want to be whole. You know what you want? You want to be regenerated. That's why I'm here. If Moses' law could fix this, it would have fixed this. It can't. It won't. I can fix it. You can be regenerated. You can have your mind renewed. But it's going to take some discipline on your part. One of them is, as he was saying a while ago, you need to treat your brother better. You don't know how to treat your brother? Treat him like you treat yourself. How about that?

You don't mind spending ungodly amounts of money on yourself? How about doing that for your brother? Whoops. See, here we go. It gets difficult if we're not careful. Now, what about this adultery thing? If a man looks at a woman to lust after her. Here's what I want you to notice in the scriptures. He doesn't say if a man looks at a woman and lusts after her. Like it's a subsequent value that appears in his mind after he has seen. It's not just like the next stage of having seen. Guys will tell you it's almost instantaneous. But it's when you look at a woman

and lust after her is not what Jesus is talking about. That happens all the time. And it can happen less and less if you will take his advice and become regenerate within yourself. Paul gives us a great piece of advice. He says, treat younger women like they're your sister. Treat older women like they're your sister. Treat older women like they're your mother. And, you know, I extend that to treat, you know, young girls like they're my daughter

and girls my own age like they're my sister. And some women are older than I am, and they're still attractive. And so the idea is treat them like they're your mother. Well, you talk about powerful, that's powerful in a man's mind to help him deal with these kind of things. But I still want you to know that because these thoughts pass through your head does not necessarily mean that you have committed adultery or that you have something to repent about. You have something to be sorry for, but that's not repentance.

There's hardly anything you can do to undo adultery or undo the thought of it. You know, that's why some of the laws in the Old Testament were punishable by death and some were punishable by remuneration or restitution. Some things can be because you have stolen you can make restitution for that sin by paying four times or seven times, depends on whatever the thing was. And restitution can be made and things can be

paid for, but some things can't. You know, you kill a man. You make a widow out of his wife. You make an orphan out of his children. You cut off income to this family. You take a life from the earth. Well, what's the punishment for that? It's death. There's no restitution to be made. Restitution can't be made.

You can't fix that. Trouble is that with adultery, it's in that same category. The Bible says that if you commit adultery with a man's wife wife he will never be satisfied though thou bringest many gifts you can't fix this you can't that's why you shouldn't get involved in it i know i know what you're thinking i won't get caught. Jesus is saying, yeah, you're going to get caught. You need to be careful.

And he's going to deliver you to the judge, and the judge is going to deliver you to the divorce lawyer. Things can get bad. They can get real bad, and you caused it. And there's not a thing you can do about it. That's why the penalty for adultery is death. It's just that simple. There's no other way to pay. Now, let me talk about it. That's why the penalty for adultery is death. It's just that simple. There's no other way to pay. Now let me talk about something. This is getting...you think that

was uncomfortable? Here we go. Jesus didn't say that if a man commits adultery if a man looks at a woman and lusts after her he says if a man looks at a woman and lusts after her, he says if a man looks at a woman to lust after her. You want to let that soak a little while? Is there a guy in the room with you? Is he nodding his head? Does he know what I'm talking about?

He knows exactly what I'm talking about. Friend, if this is not a biblical portrayal of pornography, I have never seen it. This is the idea of voyeurism, pornography, looking at a woman for the express purpose of lusting after her. That is the purpose in what you're doing with pornography invariably comes masturbation there's something we don't talk about in church but it needs to be talked about did jesus talk about that sure he did as a matter of fact he talked about it right after he said don't look at women to lust after them. If your eye offends you,

here we go. You would do better to pull it out of your head than to entertain that thought. To play with that idea and that image in your head. You'd be better off to gouge your eye out. Well, what's that got to do with masturbation? He continues, if you're right-hand offending, cut it off and cast it from me. Look, are you offended by what I'm saying?

Look, I'm sorry. Run to the kitchen, make yourself a sandwich or something, but I'm going to tell you something. There's a whole lot of guys out there that need to hear what I'm saying right now. Because this is throughout, I mean, it would just be almost, it would be almost just desserts to say this doesn't affect the body of Christ. Yeah, it does. Preachers are involved in this, and the deacon board, and all the guys that are dressed up

in nice sharkskin suits. They don't wear sharkskin anymore. Man, I'm a dinosaur. The guys are all dressed up, going to church, got the nice hairdo and the gold rimmed glasses. They got problems. They got problems. They got problems.

And nobody's talking about this. Nobody wants to talk about this. Jesus wants to talk about it. This is a very dangerous lifestyle. Go to the world about it. And you know what they say? It's healthy. It's good for you.

All right. Jesus is not saying that at all if you know perhaps you know i don't i don't know anything about what physical uh benefits it may have if any but here's what here's what i've found it is always tied always tied to illegitimate illegal immoral sex and frankly i think that you're getting so close to violating the seventh commandment here that you need to run the other way like joseph did run the other way the apostle saw says you involve yourself in this you're sinning against your own flesh is that the dumbest thing anybody could do you don't have enough trouble in life trying to control yourself and control your thoughts control your habits that you're going to add to it this

sexual appetite if i'm talking to young people right now you add to it this sexual appetite? If I'm talking to young people right now, you need to know this will almost ensure you're going to marry the wrong person for the wrong reasons. If you're married, this is almost ensuring that your marriage is on its way down, not up. We need to avoid these kinds of things like the plague and

frankly i'm kind of glad my lord mentioned these things nobody else is doing it so uh you know the internet is known worldwide the united states is known worldwide. The United States is known worldwide for being the largest purveyors of pornography on the internet. And pornography is a serious problem because it plays on a human characteristic, just like a hungry man seeing a picture of a steak and potatoes dinner. And everybody knows that. And somebody found out that they will pay you to put those pictures in front of their face. And then it just took off from there. You can find the Hugh Hefner types that talk about what a beautiful thing the woman's body is

or whatever else. Eh, pshaw. We all know what this is all about. Let's just be honest with one another. Your grandma and grandpa probably had the right idea. All right, time is the science for us to go now. Hey, will you do something? I'd love to hear from you about these things. Don at thinkredding.com is all you need to do to write me an email.

And tell me who you are, where you are, and how you're listening to the broadcast. I'd love to know those kind of things. If you'd like, you can also write to us at Think Ready Ministries, P.O. Box 718, Pytown, New Mexico, 87827. Got to go for now. Think Ready, friends. We'll see you next time.

Bye-bye. you've been listening to don c harris of think red ink ministries ThinkRedInc.com. That's ThinkRedInc.com. Join us again for the next episode in the Words of Jesus series. you