Honor God with Your Body

There is no question that the world is trying to move to a complete abandonment of God’s Word. Part of this mindset is the desire to do whatever we want regardless of what God says. We want to do our own thing, and we saw this attitude first in Adam and Eve. It is rooted in a desire to escape God’s judgment about the wrong things we take pleasure in doing. The truth is that God is our Creator, and He tells us what is right and what is wrong. He sanctifies us and makes us holy through His Word and being sanctified and holy is the only way we can have fellowship with God. It’s the only way to enjoy the rich and satisfying blessings that are the rewards of pleasing Him.

We are washed in the blood of the lamb and become sanctified by it when we make Jesus Christ Lord over our lives. After this sanctification, this washing of the blood of Christ, our bodies are fit to become a temple that houses the Holy Spirit of God. Our Heavenly Father is perfect and pure. He is holy, and His Spirit cannot dwell in an unclean place. Because of what God accomplished for us through the sacrifice and resurrection of Christ, we are made clean, and this is what our Heavenly Father wanted. He wanted holy, pure, and perfect fellowship with us. He wanted to dwell in us so we could be close to Him, and He did all this through Christ.

As we continue to journey forward in our new birth reality in Christ, it is our responsibility to preserve our temples. 1Corinthians 6:19-20(NLT) tells us, “19 Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, 20 for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body.” God has commanded us to abstain from having sexual intimacy outside of marriage because doing so defiles our temples. He forgives us when we sin if we seek His forgiveness. God is merciful and full of grace. He grants us forgiveness when we ask for it, and this restores our fellowship with Him, but we must remember that for every action there is a consequence. His forgiveness does not mean that we escape the consequences of the sinful action we’ve committed.

Some of us have joined our flesh together with many men, and it has had a severe impact on our desire and plans for marriage. This is not stated to condemn, because condemnation keeps us from accepting the truth. It keeps us from repenting from our sin and moving forward and higher in Christ. To condemn is to make useless or unusable. Think of a building with the windows and doors nailed shut and with massive yellow tape labeled “Do Not Enter” wrapped around it. This building has been condemned and everyone knows that you should not enter a condemned building because it is no longer usable.

Romans 8:1(NLT) tells us, “So now there is no condemnation for those who belong to Christ Jesus.” God doesn’t want us walking around beating ourselves up for our sin. He wants us to repent from it. Repentance means to have a change of mind and a change of heart. It is to refuse to do the sinful thing we did before. This is true repentance, and we should bless the Lord continually for giving us this way to get right with Him.

The consequence of joining ourselves with men other than our husbands is what many women are experiencing today. They have never repented for this sin and do not intend to. A woman of God that has been single a long time said to me, “I need to know if we’re sexually compatible before we get married – waiting is not for me.” I shared 1Corinthians 6:19-20 with her and told her that our bodies don’t belong to us, they belong to God. She abruptly ended the conversation.

When we refuse to follow God’s standard, we get ourselves in disastrous situations. Like all God’s covenants, the one He created for men and women is marriage, and it is not to be violated. Jesus Christ said in Matthew 19:4-5 The Message (MSG), “Haven’t you read in your Bible that the Creator originally made man and woman for each other, male and female? And because of this, a man leaves father and mother and is firmly bonded to his wife, becoming one flesh—no longer two bodies but one.” God reserved sexual intimacy for marriage because it binds a man and a woman into one unit in the eyesight of God. When they are married, they no longer function as two, but as one. This is according to God’s divine plan. When we’ve become one with several men through sexual intimacy, it violates the sanctity of the covenant God established. No one should ever want to do this. When we know better, we should do better.

In Isaiah 3:16-17,24(AMP), God said about the Daughters of Zion, the women of His people, “16 Because the daughters of Zion are proud and walk with outstretched necks and seductive (flirtatious, alluring) eyes, and trip along with mincing steps and an affected gait and walk with jingling anklets on their feet, 17 Therefore the Lord will afflict the crown of the head of the daughters of Zion with scabs [making them bald], 24 Now it will come to pass that instead of the sweet fragrance of spices there will be [the stench of] rottenness.” This was the curse that the devil was allowed to land because the women refused to listen to God.

We can’t be free by believing a lie. We must know the truth so that we understand God’s requirements, reroute ourselves to follow them, and receive the blessings He wants to give us. Many are praying to cross paths with their future husbands, but they should be praying to get right with God. He requires that our strongest desire is to please Him. So, don’t allow the weight of unrepented sin and the refusal to obey God to continue to keep you out of fellowship with Him. Be transformed by the renewing of your mind to God’s Word, have a repenting and humble heart, and be committed to keep your temple holy. ■

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.