2. Love Dating Marriage Singleness Sexuality Purity

10. 1. IT IS GOD’ ’ S IDEA

11. Genesis 2:18-25 18 The L ORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.” 20 But for Adam no suitable helper was found. 21 So the L ORD God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep…

12. Genesis 2:18-25 …and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and then closed up the place with flesh. 22 Then the L ORD God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.

13. Genesis 2:18-25 23 The man said, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman,’ for she was taken out of man.” 24 That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.

14. Genesis 2:18-25 25 Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.

15. 2. IT IS A DEEP, DEEP

16. Genesis 15:8-21 8 But Abram said, “Sovereign L ORD, how can I know that I will gain possession of it?” 9 So the L ORD said to him, “Bring me a heifer, a goat and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon.”

17. Genesis 15:8-21 10 Abram brought all these to him, cut them in two and arranged the halves opposite each other; the birds, however, he did not cut in half. 11 Then birds of prey came down on the carcasses, but Abram drove them away.

18. Genesis 15:8-21 12 As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him. 13 Then the L ORD said to him, “Know for certain that for four hundred years your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own…

19. Genesis 15:8-21 …and that they will be enslaved and mistreated there. 14 But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves, and afterward they will come out with great possessions. 15 You, however, will go to your ancestors in peace and be buried at a good old age.

20. Genesis 15:8-21 16 In the fourth generation your descendants will come back here, for the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure.” 17 When the sun had set and darkness had fallen, a smoking firepot with a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces.

21. Genesis 15:8-21 18 On that day the L ORD made a covenant with Abram and said, “To your descendants I give this land, from the Wadi of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates— 19 the land of the Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites, 20 Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaites, 21 Amorites, Canaanites [etc.]

22. Sexual immorality (Matt 5:32) Abandonment (1 Cor 7:15) Death (1 Cor 7:39) Abuse Neglect “I hate divorce.” (Mal 2:16)

23. 3. IT IS A PICTURE OF CHRIST ’ S LOVE

24. Ephesians 5:22-32 22 Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Saviour.

25. Ephesians 5:22-32 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. 25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her…

26. Ephesians 5:22-32 26 …to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, 27 and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.

27. Ephesians 5:22-32 28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church...

28. Ephesians 5:22-32 30 …for we are members of his body. 31 “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” 32 This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church.

29. 4. IT IS A GIFT TO MAKE US LIKE JESUS

30. 1 Corinthians 7:1-7 1 Now for the matters you wrote about: “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.” 2 But since sexual immorality is occurring, each man should have sexual relations with his own wife, and each woman with her own husband…

31. 1 Corinthians 7:1-7 7 I wish that all of you were as I am. But each of you has your own gift from God; one has this gift, another has that.