Purity or Depression?

Dannah Gresh seeks to help girls save their secret (their intoxicating female sexuality) for marriage. I love how she has gone about dealing with the subject in very practical ways by showing the medical research of those girls who have not restrained their sexuality. She writes in an article, "the recent brain research that gives evidence that a unique bond is created in the deep limbic system of the brain when two people have sex, and that when this bond is broken because a couple doesn't stay together, it leads to emotional depression."

This reminds me of a wonderful illustration of how God intended sex to work. Dr. J. Budziszewski (aka Professor Theophilus) gets together with college students to answer their questions. The subject of sex before marriage came up, "What is wrong with fooling around before you settle down in marriage?" Prof. Theophilus asked for some duct tape and then a young man's arm. He placed a six-inch piece of duct tape to the students hairy arm and told him to command the tape not to stick. He ripped it off and it did stick, of course. The prof. continued to put it back on and rip it off until it finally stopped sticking. He proceeded to ask him to now command that same piece of tape to "Stick." It didn't obey no matter how hard he pressed it onto the college student's arm.

"Do you get it?" he said. "Your sexuality is like that too. The first time you use it you're going to stick to whoever it touches. Sex can't help sticking; that's what it's for."

"So if you rip yourself loose —" said a student.

"Then there's going to be damage. Something in both of your hearts will tear. Not only that, when you do get loose, your sexuality won't be as sticky as it was before. What happens when you pull it loose from one person after another?"

"Eventually it won't stick any more," said the tall girl.

"Right. Your sexual partners will seem like strangers; you just won't feel anything. You will have destroyed your capacity for intimacy. So there's your answer. You can't have 'all the other things' now and commitment later," explained Professor Theophilus (in the article Sex at the Edge of Night).

Dannah Gresh was disturbed by Oprah's recent "expert advice" on talking to teens about sex. Oprah and the "expert" left out the option of abstinence. As I am parenting a daughter who is almost a teenager, I'm grateful for Dannah's article that addresses the truth about sex. God has a plan for how it works and the boundary of marriage is not restricting but protective. If sex is meant to be a bond between two people, it is only in the commitment of marriage that it is safe and fully enjoyed. To give it away early is to loose the "stickiness" or intimacy that can be had in a marriage. I'm so glad I new the truth at a young age and that my husband and I waited until marriage. We are reaping the benefits of an intimacy that God fully intended.