December 18, 2011: True Fear Waits

In her book "Making Chastity Sexy: The Rhetoric of Evangelical Abstinence Campaigns," Wheaton College Communications professor Christine Gardner maintains that True Love Waits and similar evangelical abstinence programs "are using the very thing they are prohibiting to admonish young people to wait. They are saying, 'If you are abstinent now, you will have amazing sex when you are married.'"

Gardner has a point. I imagine that some abstinence campaigners might object to her blunt summary of their rhetoric, but she backs up her claim with research. To be fair to all, it is not a bad thing to make known the data that indicate that, generally, the people who are happiest sexually are those who didn't sleep around before marriage and who are faithful within it. Just as long as everyone keeps in mind that "statistically favorable" does not mean "divinely certain," and that individual results may vary. Some fornicators are very happy, and some godly people chafe under perceived crosses of abstinence and faithfulness.

But there is one thing that evangelicals never talk about as a motivation for pre-marital chastity - at least in my limited experience and observation. We don't talk about being afraid of God. We don't even talk about righteous fear when speaking to ourselves in church environments where we don't need to worry much about offending outsiders. Fear as a motive for obedience is the great taboo.

I take that back - I do know two preachers who regularly mention fear as a motivator in their sermons, but only to condemn it as something that should not move us to obey. These preachers like to couple pride with fear and denounce both as reasons for submitting to the will of God. As one said recently, "Pride and fear will always hinder you from being filled with the Spirit, and will always hinder you from doing the work of God...The gospel cancels out the pride and fear that fills the hearts of men and women."

When I hear pride - a damnable motivator for obedience - linked so fatuously with fear - a godly and biblical one - I feel despair, and lament the sad state of preaching in our churches. I also want to give these preachers a homework assignment: go look up occurrences of phobos, phobeomai ("fear" as noun and verb) in your Greek Bible and read them in context. Then repent of your homiletic sin, and confess to your congregations that you have misled them week after week in sermon after sermon.

A good place to start when exhorting Christians to sexual purity is Hebrews 13:4: "Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure." Why? Why should I maintain my purity? Because if I do I will be happier sexually in the long run? Even if that is true, it is an argument the Bible never makes. What the Bible says instead - read the rest of the verse! - is, "For God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral." Now there's motivation for you. God judges immoral people. If you are immoral (or contemplating immorality), you should be afraid of God's judgment.

The Bible teaches what many preachers today refuse to acknowledge and never tell their congregations - perhaps (ghastly thought!) because they do not really believe it themselves: sexual immorality is one of those sins that provoke the wrath of God. Colossians 3:5-6 says, "Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming."

The wrath of God referred to here is not manifested in merely temporary things like unfulfilled sex lives or broken relationships or sexually transmitted diseases. It is much more serious than that. God's anger, when brought to bear on an individual, means banishment from his presence. It means being shut out of his realm, or kingdom. Ephesians 5:5-6 says that no immoral person has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ, and that because of such sin, "God's wrath comes on those who are disobedient." 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 and Galatians 5:9-10 likewise say that immoral people will not inherit the kingdom of God. And Revelation 21:8 specifies that fornicators are among those whose "place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur."

If you do not fear the fiery lake of burning sulfur and the God who can throw you there, then I'm afraid you are too much of a fool for the Word to benefit you. You must start fearing God. The Bible says, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom" (Psalm 111:10; Proverbs 1:7, 9:10). It may not be the end of wisdom, but it sure as hell is the beginning of it. Preachers who reject fear as a motivation undermine a crucial support that helps bear the weight of godliness. Like blind Samson they push against a strong pillar, and they should not be surprised when the roof collapses around them and leaves a vast wreckage of sexual immorality. By telling sinners not to be afraid they are actually encouraging them to disobey a command of Christ: "Fear him who, after your body has been killed, has authority to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him." (Luke 12:5).

That commandment, and others like it, have been sapped of their power by some teachers who like to maintain that "fear" does not really mean "fear": it just means "respect," or "revere," or "honor." But these softer translations do not withstand scrutiny of the words in the original languages. "Fear" was the right word in the first place. For example, in many passages the Greek word for fear is coupled with physical trembling (see literal translations of 1 Corinthians 2:3; 2 Corinthians 7:15; Ephesians 6:5; Philippians 2:12). In the passage above where Jesus commands his disciples to fear God, he tells them, "Do not fear those who can merely kill the body." Jesus is not telling his disciples "Don't respect or honor authorities who can kill the body": far be it from Jesus to counsel disrespect of worldly authorities! (See 1 Timothy 2:1-3; Romans 13:1-7; 1 Peter 2:13-17.) No, he meant literally "Do not be afraid of them." They're not the ones who should make you tremble and shake: God is.

So to make this practical:

The next time your boyfriend or girlfriend or date wants to sleep with you without marrying you, say to him or her, "No. I've repented of that. I can't do that any more." And if you are asked why, say, "Because I'm afraid of God sending me to hell."