Humans, as are all animals, are born with the instinct to reproduce. In fact, one of the many purposes for which God created both male and female, was to multiply.
The Animals:
Genesis 1:21 "And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good. 22 And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth."
Humankind:
Genesis 1:27 "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. 28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth."This designed into mankind's instinct is the biological part. He created male and female to increase mankind. In order to do that, he gave each essential and opposite physical tools. The genitalia and reproductive organs were designed by God to foster conception, growth, and production. In order to power the tools, so to speak, God instilled in each of us, a different kind of drive. Mankind calls that erotic "love" (eros; Greek). This nature which mankind has is called libido in psychiatry, being a biological instinct.. Scripture, more accurately, refers to it as lust, since it is not dependent on love.
Romans 6:12 "Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. 13 Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin..."Who created the libido? God did. However, like anything in the world, it can be put to use or misuse. Those biological feelings are wrong if misused. They are to be used in marriage only:
1 Corinthians 7:9 "But if they cannot contain, let them marry: for it is better to marry than to burn."The inability to contain is unbridled lust. Sexual arousal - the libido is of God since it is biological for reproduction, but the lack of self-restraint is of Satan who takes God's things and misuses them, as I will soon make the case.
Burning is being enflamed with sexual desire. Ironically, or is it? Lack of self-constraint can lead to eternal "burning" as well because lust is the stronghold of most people! The world keeps that fire burning with provocative fuel. Most single people have that fire burning inside; the erotic, and marriage is supposed to put it out, as two become one. Adultery is when a third person stokes the fire even after marriage.
Sexuality is and should be emotional. That portion is the mental aspects of enjoying the sexual act. If it's a good experience, it is pleasurable, and if not, painful. Sexual intercourse without emotion is mechanical, and there is no pairing. At best, it's prostitution, and at its worst - rape. Marriage is based on an emotional attachment as two come together in unity as "one flesh" (Genesis 2:24) - the emotional and the spiritual.
The emotional part of sexuality is friendship.
Genesis 2:18 "And the Lord God said, “It is not good that man should be alone..."All the animals were created for Adam to keep him company, but they were made in pairs. That is God's will, that each animal be paired with another. The biological part of that is that all animals have the tools to reproduce. That is the natural and biological design of the entire animal kingdom. Anything less than that is evil!
Although each animal was paired to another by gender, Adam had no one. God, using his Holy Spirit, took a part of Adam to make Eve. As such, Adam and Eve - male and female were children of God, and of the same spiritual substance - but Adam of the dust, and Eve of Adam, and yet the same!
Marriage is leaving everyone else out, including Mom and Dad, and being one with the intention of friendship and child-bearing. Sexual relationships without these two aspects are unspiritual because sex for these purposes was obviously God's intent. We were biologically and spiritually designed to be friends and to reproduce! The libido is merely to complement the latter, but after Satan tampered with mankind, satisfaction of the libido became paramount!
The social aspect of sexuality is well-known. Of course, with our mate, sexuality has a special social aspect since it is a divinely instilled desire to be one with our help-mate - which the female is designed to be. Then, Satan gave his new children another social aspect - although male and female were to be one, even leaving the parents, triangulation occurred; not with Adam and Eve but with their seed. Now the motto of some are: "Variety is the spice of life," and "Do what thou wilt." It was never intended that mankind fornicate with others, and after fornicating against God with other gods, that became part of human "nature". Of course, one mate is truly natural, and more than one - unnatural.
Let's look for a moment at original sin:
Genesis 3:6 "So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate. 7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings."What were the temptations of the tree? 1) good for food, 2) pleasant to the eyes, 3) and desired to make one wise. Eve desired those three things. She could have walked away and thought no more about them - that is self-restraint. The same restraint mentioned in 1 Corinthians 7:9 above. Eve was to "reign in her mortal body" as Paul admonished (Romans 6:12 above). Eve exercised her own free will. Eve stood there and desired but could have chose not to! She looked at the fruit, and lusted after them. She voluntarily entered into temptation, and that allowed her to sin.
Romans 6:12 "Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its lusts."Sin is obedience to lust and lust to temptation. There is a chain reaction! Of course, lusts are not all sexual in nature. Food, pleasant things, and wisdom are not inherently bad, but with the knowledge after eating of the tree, what God made could be used for either good or evil. The qualities of the fruit were in the mind of Eve after she ate. She misused the fruits because, after she ate, she went from innocence to discernment. It is implied that because she sinned, her eyes were opened to the evil aspects of what she had gullibly eaten.
Right now, although there were three temptations, just as there always are; and by the way - Jesus had the same types of three; let is focus on the temptation of pleasure. Of course, even food and wisdom can be pleasurable, but it seems that since they are mentioned separately, perhaps the ultimate pleasure is what Eve wanted. I'm referring to sexual satisfaction!
If you recall, Adam's purpose was to tend the Garden. If this is taken in the spiritual sense, Adam was to ensure that all the "trees" do God's will - his own, Eve's, and his offspring. Adam was created to befriend God, and to serve Him. On the other hand, Eve was to serve God under the auspices of Adam since he was to have dominion. Eve's job assignment was to bear offspring and nourish them. Nowhere in scripture did God indicate that copulation was for mankind's enjoyment but only to reproduce. Pleasure was intended as a feeling to make that possible with the way our tools are designed.
My contention, as some of the church fathers, is that there was a huge sexual aspect of eating of the forbidden tree. Why so? "They sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings," realizing that they were naked. They tried to cover their own "shame" but it was ineffective. Sexuality is more than the genitals (the physical); it has components of emotion, the biological, and even the spiritual, along with the others. Eve could cover her tools, but they weren't the guilty party. She was! All those desires within her, are what scripture calls "the flesh".
Because Adam and Eve could not effectively cover their sin, God did. He shed blood for the first time, and covered in His divine manner their sexuality - all those components of sexuality. Because the genitalia were covered, it seems reasonable that there was a sexual component of original sin, especially because Adam and Eve "fornicated" with other gods - namely each other! How could have they have done that? By misappropriating the intent of sexuality - by having sexual pleasure without the intention of reproducing.
David alluded to that himself:
Psalm 51:5 "Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, And in sin my mother conceived me."David recognized the erotic part of conception. It is supposed that he was conceived in the heat of the moment, not just to be conceived. The sinful aspect of reproduction is validated by the birth of Jesus. He was born of a virgin, because she was pure - not having ever given into lust or been sexual. Because Jesus was born in purity, conceived by God Himself, then it is obvious that God wanted no part of lust when he created Jesus with his own Holy Spirit.
My Dad once told me that sex is only to have a family. I replied, "When did you decide that; after you got old?" Now I too am old, but like Dad, I got my idea from God. Sexuality is not a willful sin. It is a remnant, in my humble opinion, of original sin. There is nothing we can do about it, other than contain it. The method God chose for containment was marriage. Husband and wife have a spiritual relationship, and by triangulation with another, sin rents the one back into two.
Should we feel guilty because we have desires, and consummate them with our spouse? Not at all! It's not our fault. That urge is now biological, and is beyond what is expected of us. However, to be set apart wholly for God's use, celibacy is a choice. Rather than being slaves to sexuality, we can be servants only of God.
1 Corinthians 7:1 "It is good for a man not to touch a woman. 2 Nevertheless, because of sexual immorality, let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband. 8 But I say to the unmarried and to the widows: It is good for them if they remain even as I am; 9 but if they cannot exercise self-control, let them marry."Sexuality is for those who have little sexual control. It is better to be "married" to God, than another, but God knows the power released with the eating of the forbidden fruit. His "loophole" is marriage. It is ordained of God for multiplying and friendship, but he knows that we now have a biological need induced into us by original sin. By his allowing, or winking (Acts 17), is just one more example of God's mercy on his creature!
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