“I have the right to do anything,” you say—but not everything is beneficial. (1 Corinthians 6:12a)
SELFISH SEX. Some Christians thought they were free to have sex as they wished. Our culture is even more intensely committed to personal freedom in sex. “What I do in the privacy of my bedroom is my business” is nearly a national motto! But Paul says sex must be beneficial, a word that means to build up others and especially to seek the common good (cf. 1 Corinthians 12:7).98 Wendell Berry argues that communities can only happen when people bind themselves to each other, voluntarily giving up much freedom. He says sex is a “nurturing discipline” or glue that binds two people together to provide long-term stability in a relationship that not only helps children to thrive, but also affects the larger community’s need for families. So our use of sex is other people’s business. We can use it to create community or simply for self-fulfillment.99
Reflection: Think of all the ways that how you have sex does in fact have an effect on the society in which you live, and therefore is not strictly your business alone.
Prayer: Lord, I thank you for this reminder that I should not be thinking about sex preoccupied with my needs and what brings me pleasure, but how our love-making can build up my spouse. If you give us both this same mind, how our marriage will sing! Amen.