By Troy Titus 
I am not an appropriate person to advise anyone about sex, I think. Although I was a virgin when I proposed marriage during my first year in law school, I’d used pornography and engaged in masturbation. I’d lusted after women. Although I didn’t believe in divorce, I ended up divorced three times. I thought of myself as a Christian because I believed in God and the Bible, and accepted the Gospel. I prayed. I served in the church as a Sunday School teacher, pianist, choir member, and back-up preacher. I was the worst kind of hypocrite, and not at all Christian, no matter my tithing and charitable works, no matter my good reputation as a nice guy who helped those in need. I was not a Christian. It was wrong that I thought of myself as one.
I was like King Saul, who when confronted by the prophet Samuel about his disobedience to God’s specific command, retorts, “But I did obey. I did all of what the Lord required,” when it was patently obvious that he did not. 1 Samuel 15:16-23.
So I am struck by this passage today in light of our national embrace of the LGBTQ+ agenda, together with the decades-old take-over of our culture by the sexually promiscuous. As America increasingly denies reality when it comes to sexuality, it reminds me of my own denials of the reality of my disobedience as I pursued my own will instead of submitting to God’s will. It reminds me of King Saul’s absurd denial in the face of overwhelming evidence: “But what is that bleating of sheep that I hear?”
The assault on the family through adultery, fornication, and pornography is deeply embedded in our national experience. The systematic attacks on morality have increasingly come from the homosexual community who have gone well beyond gender role-playing into mutilation of their bodies in pursuit of something other than what God has created them to be. The strange and extremely deviant sexual behavior of what used to be a fringe subculture has now been catapulted into the mainstream. We are besieged by forces that pervert what God has created to be good into depravity that is destroying us all.
God’s plan is perfect. “Male and female, He created them. God blessed them and said to them, ‘Be fruitful and increase in numbers, fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over … every living creature ….‘” Genesis 1:27-28. God Almighty, Creator of the Universe and everything in it, determined that “it is not good for man to be alone” so He created for man a “suitable helpmate,” woman. The institution of marriage between a man and a woman was birthed in the Garden of Eden by God Himself. Genesis 2:18.
Jesus Christ teaches us that “a man shall leave his father and mother and cling to his wife, and the two of them shall become one flesh. So they are no longer two, but one.” Matthew 19:5-6. Of this truth, Paul wrote, it “is a profound mystery,” and compared a marriage of a man and woman to the relationship between Christ and the church. Ephesians 5:32. He also wrote that “he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body, for it is said, ‘The two will become one flesh.'” 1 Corinthians 6:16.
Surely, this profound mystery is that sexual intimacy, although physical, is inextricably also spiritual. That is, the physical acts have consequences in the spiritual realm. When a man and his wife share their bodies with each other as required by God, only depriving each other for a time to devote yourselves to prayer (1 Corinthians 7:2-5), good things result both physically and spiritually. When anyone “sins sexually, he sins against his own body” (1 Corinthians 6:18), and people who disobey God’s commands about sex will “receive in themselves the due penalty for their perversion” (Romans 1:27), both physically and spiritually.
Christ tells us that “anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Matthew 5:28. If adultery does not require a physical act, lusting after pornography is no different than having sex with a prostitute. It is both idolatry and fornication. Because of this, I have spent years praying for God’s forgiveness and healing, for full restoration so that all of those images are finally gone from my mind, and the evil of it is gone from my heart.
Proverbs 5 and 7 contain passages that speak of men committing adultery who will die for “lack of discipline” and “great folly,” as they follow “her like an ox led to slaughter.”
“Sexual freedom” is slavery to sin. There is no command in the Word of God that allows for any kind of sex between “consenting adults” who are in a “loving and committed relationship.” Likewise, the Bible clearly condemns homosexuality and gender confusion. Leviticus 18 gives many examples of prohibited sexual activity, including homosexuality and beastiality. Romans 1:26-27 makes it clear as well that it is “shameful,” “unnatural,” and “indecent” to engage in sex with a member of the same gender.
Like King Saul, and like myself, “they claimed to be wise but became fools” and “God gave them over to a depraved mind to do what ought not be done.” Romans 1:28. There is no such thing as a wife who is male. There is no such thing as a husband who is female. There is no such thing as a homosexual couple who are married. There is no such thing as a man becoming (or identifying as) a woman. There is no such thing as a woman becoming (or identifying as) a man, and therefore “men” cannot get pregnant. God chooses our gender. Not us.
About 4200 years ago, ” … all of the men from every part of the city of Sodom surrounded Lot’s house. They called to him, ‘Where are the two men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us so that we can have sex with them.” Genesis 19:4-5. God responded to this kind of depravity by destroying everyone.
I live in a federal prison and have been incarcerated since June of 2009. The prisons are filled with sex offenders–some are rapists, others have molested children, but most of them are men who have viewed illegal online porn, nearly all of which is hosted by sites owned by the FBI.
All three prisons where I’ve been housed over the years are full of homosexual activity. Much of it by men who claim to be (only) “gay for the stay,” planning to return to an exclusively heterosexual lifestyle upon their release. But there are increasing numbers of men embracing homosexuality (and bi-sexuality) permanently, and this is exacerbated by our federal government housing “trans-” male inmates in men’s prisons. That is, we are forced to live with men who have female-looking breast implants wearing bras and panties supplied by the Bureau of Prisons, using cosmetics sold to them by our government, and who are prescribed “transition” hormones at taxpayers’ expense. Prison staff tell us that we must refer to these men by their false female names and female pronouns. I have refused to do so.
First Thessalonians 4 tells us to “control your body to be holy and honorable, not in passionate lust like the heathen.” 1 Corinthians 6 says, “flee from sexual immorality,” and “your body was not made for sexual immorality, but for the Lord.” Galatians 5 admonishes that those who lust will not inherit the Kingdom of God. Colossians 3 teaches that we are to put to death our earthly nature. After all, our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit, are they not?
Painting of Sodom
In 1 Corinthians 9:24-27, Paul tells us how he beat his body into submission so that he himself would not, after preaching the Gospel to so many, be disqualified for entry into Heaven. To the church in Rome, he wrote: “offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God–this is your spiritual act of worship.” We are to not even allow “a hint of sexual immorality or any kind of impurity” in our lives. Ephesians 5:3. Drag Queen story hours, contests, and shows, whether for children or adults, are wrong. Allowing sinners to proclaim lies about their gender or what kind of sexual activity is good is wrong. Mutilating our bodies is wrong. Infusing our bodies with unnatural hormones is wrong. Allowing any kind of lust in our lives is wrong.
“See to it that the light in you is not actually darkness,” Christ says in Luke 11:35. “Not everyone who says ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the Kingdom of Heaven,” He tells us in Matthew 7:21. Like King Saul, and like me, we’d said, “I know him,” but when we do not do what He commands, we are a “liar, and the truth is not in us.” We do not know him after all. I John 2:4.
God made us male and female. He created marriage, the family, the building block of society and government. Ephesians 5:22-33 and Hebrews 13:4. He commands sexual activity be reserved for a male husband with his female wife. Everyone knows this to be true no matter their protestations to the contrary. For “they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing ….” Romans 2:15
Finally, look at the church in Corinth. Paul had to confront it because of the “sexual immorality” within it. He was indignant about it: “and you are proud!” He wrote, “expel the sinner from among you.” 1 Corinthians 5. Thankfully, this excommunication was carried out, the sinner repented, and Paul had to tell the church to allow the man back into fellowship. We’ve all seen sexual sin carried on publicly by members of churches, often unaddressed. Surely, judgment begins in the House of the Lord, and before we call out the speck in another’s eye, let us first remove the log in our own.
