When the phrase “saving sex for marriage” is said, what happens? It’s usually followed by a sigh and the realization that it’s an out-of-date concept that doesn’t make sense in today’s culture, right? It’s understandable, because we’re being told to say no to something delicious, but we’ve never been told why! I’m not referring to the explanations we’re taught in health class, because those just seem good enough until approximately freshman year of high school. Nobody ever taught us that saving sex for marriage meant saying “no” now in exchange for a bigger “YES” later, since conserving sex for marriage meant saying yes to LOVE and everything it entails. It’s easy to see how our culture has been plagued by relationship problems and an enormous number of unhappy marriages, many of which end in divorce. We’ve been taught to give in to all of our desires, which eventually leads to a life where our desires dominate us rather than the other way around.
As though a shark were chumming. A shark will not save any for his wife; instead, he will devour the entire meal without hesitation. We were not created to be enslaved to our desires like animals. Don’t get me wrong: giving in to our emotions and impulses is far simpler than controlling them, but we were made for so much more. We were made to be in love. Let me now pose a question to you:
Do you think a man who can’t control his impulses and lives a life chained to his passions while single–sleeping around, watching porn–will be able to overcome those temptations in marriage? NO! Because marriage is all he’s ever known, this man, who has given in to all of his wishes throughout his life, will continue to do so in marriage. He has no idea how to appropriately organize his desires. According to statistics, he may quickly lose interest in his wife and seek fulfillment outside of his marriage to sate his wants that have been running amok his entire life.
Let me share a few more facts with you if you’re still not convinced. Unfortunately, after we say “I do,” there isn’t a magical switch that turns temptations off. We must begin now to be the sort of man or woman we want to be in the future, the kind of husband or wife we want to be. It is a cost to save sex for marriage. If two people aren’t willing to sacrifice for each other outside of marriage, they won’t be willing to sacrifice for each other in marriage.
