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Will you take your Bibles this morning and turn to Hebrews chapter 13, we continue our verse-by-verse study of this amazing epistle that speaks so clearly even to us, even though it was written back in the first century. For indeed it is the word of God; Hebrews chapter 13. This morning, we will simply look at verse four. Let me read the text to you.

"Marriage is to be held in honor among all, and the marriage bed is to be undefiled; for fornicators and adulterers God will judge."

Let's pray together. Father, this passage is so clear, and yet, even in the church, it is so profoundly disregarded and disrespected, I pray that that will not be true of us here today by the power of your spirit, soften our hearts to these great truths, that we might live consistently with them, and not only bring you great glory, but bring into our lives, into our marriages and into our families, great joy and great blessing. For it's in Christ's name, and I pray Amen.

This admonition was given to the early Hebrew converts that had come to saving faith in Christ back in the first century. It was given to them to warn them and to encourage them in this very important aspect of life. Such is true with all that God does. We know that he blesses us when we obey Him, and He disciplines us as any loving father would when we disobey him. And what we see here is our loving Heavenly Father speaking so clearly into all of our lives so that we might enjoy the fullness of his blessings. And what a benefit this is to those who have ears to hear.

By way of context, having been warned of the profound importance of love and hospitality and compassion that we studied last week in the previous three verse verses -  verses, which by the way, should set us apart from the rest of this ungodly world - now the Holy Spirit moves his author to address matters of marriage and sexual purity. He knows that if these areas of life are neglected, all the blessings of knowing Christ and embracing the great doctrines that he has presented, all of those things can be forfeited. Dear friends, one act of sexual indiscretion can destroy your life, can destroy your marriage, can destroy your family and bring unimaginable heartache.

Allow me to let you into my world a little bit over the course of my adult life in ministry, which now is getting a little bit above, a little north of 30 years in ministry. I have had the heartbreaking responsibility of dealing with people, especially Christians, who have not heeded what this passage has to say, and many others I know the excruciating pain of telling terrified college students that indeed their sexually transmitted disease is incurable, and here's how you're going to have to live with that. I know what it is to speak to distraught, unmarried young ladies who have an unwanted pregnancy, and they don't know what to do with the child. I know the pain of dealing with hysterical wives and husbands who are sobbing so hard they cannot even speak because they have discovered that their spouse is having an affair with another person. I know the pain of hearing adult children finally describe how their father has sexually abused them over the course of many years, and how their mother has covered it up. I've dealt with this on multiple occasions. I know the pain of dealing with stunned parents who have discovered that their daughter is sending nude pictures of herself to other young men and young women and inviting boys to have sex with her. I know the pain of dealing with shocked parents who have discovered that their sons and even their daughters are addicted to pornography. I know the pain of dealing with parents who have discovered that their son or daughter has been recruited by a homosexual. I know the pain of parents deeply troubled because their son or their daughter is now living with someone outside the bonds of marriage. I know what it is to deal with men and women so brokenhearted that they can't eat, they can't sleep, they can't even talk because their spouse has just told them that they don't want to be married to them anymore. I know the pain of trying to explain to young children why mommy or daddy is now living with someone else and you're going to have a new step mommy and step daddy. Folks, I can't begin to describe the intensity of the pain of these things in a marriage or in a family. You ask any law enforcement person what is the most dangerous of all of the calls they get, and they will tell you it's domestic disputes.

I can't begin to describe the sorrow I feel as a pastor when I encounter these things. And given this, perhaps you can understand why I'm so concerned about immodest dress among some of our young women, even in this church. Perhaps you can understand why I'm so concerned about some of the unaccountable dating that I've seen in Christian precincts, even in our church. Perhaps you can understand why I'm so concerned when I hear of kids having full and unsupervised access to the internet, and why I'm so repulsed by much of what you see on television, what Hollywood is presenting, and therefore why I'm so passionate to make sure you understand what God has to say. Now, all I can do is teach you and warn you and pray for you, which I do with all of my heart, because I love you. I am jealous for you, but it's going to be up to you to hear. Some of you will, many of you won't. You will learn the hard way.

So as we examine this text, we see God emphasizing two very central truths, number one, marriage is to be honored by all, and number two, sexual impurity God will judge. Now when husbands and wives fail in these two areas, marriages become prisons and sometimes even war zones. Families are devastated. Children are left undisciplined. Families begin to fall apart, churches are weakened. Communities begin to suffer and decay, and the entire stability of a nation will be put in jeopardy. Look no further than our own country, and we can see this happening right before our eyes. According to the CDC, 40.3% of all births are from unmarried women today in the United States. According to the National Health Statistics reports, 54% of women and 64% of men agree with the following statement, quote, "It is all right for unmarried 18-year-olds to have sexual intercourse if they have strong affection for each other." Three quarters of women and men agree, quote, "It is okay to have and raise children when the parents are living together but not married." Three quarters of women and men agree with the statement, quote, "Gay or lesbian adults should have the right to adopt children."

We see that there is a decrease in the percentages of men and women who agree with this statement, quote, "A young couple should not live together unless they are married." In other words, that's becoming increasingly acceptable in our culture. Three quarters of women and men agree, quote, "It is okay to have and raise children when the parents are living together but not married." Now, of course, this kind of demand for erotic freedom leads to unwanted pregnancies, which leads to abortion. And according to the World Health Organization, every year in the world, there are an estimated 40 to 50 million abortions. That's 125,000 abortions every year in the United States, nearly half of pregnancies are unintended, and four in 10 of these are terminated by abortion. There's about 3000 abortions per day in the United States. In the United States, 15 abortions are performed for each 1000 women. The rate of women with Medicaid coverage, is three times as high as that of other women. Planned Parenthood says an estimated 1/3 of American women will have an abortion by the age of 45. Folks, I could give you all kinds of examples like this, and I think you're fully aware of it, but these are evidences of a moral free fall that we are having in our country, a violation of God's design. No longer is marriage honorable. It's optional at best, obsolete at worst. Sexual purity is no longer crucial, it's archaic. In fact, it's ridiculous. It's laughably puritanical. In our culture, this attitude is to be expected among believers, but it's appalling. It's expected among unbelievers, but it's appalling when we see it in the church, absolutely appalling. Which brings into serious question whether or not a person truly knows Christ.

The immoral attitudes of the Greco Roman culture of the first century influenced the church profoundly. The Spirit of God knew that many of these similar types of things were going on. Thus the warning. So let's look at what God has to say very, very carefully. Number one, under the heading, marriage is to be honored by all. Verse four, again, "Marriage is to be held in honor among all"; that is not hard to understand. Now, let me give you a big picture overview of what Scripture says. We know that, according to God's Word, God has given man two institutions, marriage and the church; both were ordained to glorify him, and he promised to bless both of them, as long as both of those institutions honored, the head, which is the Lord Jesus Christ. Friends, you will not have a high view of marriage or, frankly, of the church, unless you have a high view of Jesus, Christ, our Savior and our Lord. When he is disregarded and replaced, both the church and marriage will suffer and become a mockery of God's intended purpose. Marriage, we must understand, is God's design. Man did not create this, right? God created marriage. It was ordained as a covenant between a man and a woman. Genesis, chapter two, verse 18,

"'It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.'" It went on to say,

"And the LORD God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man and brought her to the man.

And the man said, 'This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; and she shall be called Woman because she was taken out of Man.'

"For this cause, a man shall leave his father and his mother and shall cleave to his wife and they shall become one flesh."

Jesus reiterated the same thing in Matthew chapter 19, beginning in verse four, Jesus said,

"'Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female,

"'and said, "For this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife and the two shall become one flesh"?

"'So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.'"

Folks, you might think of marriage as something like water. I mean, think about it. God created it; he created water. Man cannot create water, and man cannot live without water. Man didn't create marriage, and he can't live without it. Like water, man can't create it, and if he tampers with God's design, if he tries to create his own version of water. I don't know if they've ever even been able to get close to that, but if they were to, it would certainly not sustain life. It would destroy life. The same is true with marriage. Marriage is God's perfect creation designed to do essentially seven things. This is another whole series. You're not even going to have time to write this down. You can just get it, you know, online, but because I want to move on to other things. But essentially, as I see it, marriage provides seven things biblically. First of all, it provides the blessings of companionship (Genesis 2:18). It provides the incredible joy of sexual intimacy, as we see here in this passage and others. Thirdly, it provides a means for preventing sexual sin (First Corinthians 7:2). It provides the means for the propagation of children so that they can be raised to honor the Lord, to worship the Lord, to obey Him (Genesis 1:28), and God gave it to us to reflect the oneness, the mutual submission and the love, of the Triune Godhead. We see this in various passages, especially Ephesians 5. Number six, it's to be a living illustration of God's covenantal love for us manifested through selfless sacrifice; a picture of Christ's love for his bride, the Church (Ephesians 5:25),  and finally, it is the context for godly masculinity and godly femininity to be cultivated and to be enjoyed; First Peter 3, and other passages similar to that.

Let me camp on that for a moment to help you understand God's design for all of this as a male and a female. God created us to be very different, yet we were designed to complement and even complete each other, not to duplicate one another. Indeed, marriage provides the perfect context for godly masculinity and godly femininity to be manifested. By the way, as a footnote, God calls a union between two men and two women and abomination. It is an inversion of God's created order. It is a violation of his moral order, and these things he will judge, along with other forms of immorality. Sodom and Gomorrah is a perfect illustration of that. Now at the heart of godly masculinity is a a passionate commitment to lead and to provide and to protect for one's wife. Mature masculinity will express itself in a desire to to serve, and it will have with it a strong commitment to sacrifice for the good of our wife. These virtues, of course, have been lost in our godless Bible mocking culture. Mature masculinity really recognizes the call to leadership as a call to humility. Husbands are to model Christ. Ephesians 5:28, "Husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself." We're to make our wives happy, help them grow to become more like Christ and so forth. And at the heart of godly femininity is a liberating commitment to enjoy and to respond to the loving leadership of a husband who honors Christ. Ephesians 5:22, for example, "Wives be subject to your own husbands as to the Lord."

Now, seldom do we see these virtues of godly masculinity and femininity in our culture. These days, modern stereotypes and current trends bear little resemblance to God's original design. Instead, we see a continuum of masculinity among heterosexuals, ranging from the perverted extremes of the macho tyrant to the effeminate girly man. And the perversions of femininity range from on one end, the emasculating feminist shrew to on the other end, the seductive bimbo; and the perversions are even more extreme among male and female homosexuals. Perversion is too vulgar to even think about, much less describe in public, and now we've got a whole new category called transgender, which doesn't even really exist, except in the minds of some people. God made, he says, man and woman, male and female; there's no third category. And this is not only a denial of reality, it's a rebellious denunciation of who God made a person to be. Moreover, it's an attempt to create a delusional identity that rebels against biblical femininity and biblical masculinity and tries to produce androgyny. You know, it's en vogue today, isn't it to look both male and female? I can't tell you how many times I will say to Nancy, is that a boy or is that a girl? You just don't know. Transgenderism is a perfect example of what happens when God gives a person over to a reprobate mind. He describes this in Romans one; a mind so deceived by sin it can no longer function within the confines of reality. They become what we would say, delusional. Sadly, so-called transgenders are 19 times more likely to commit suicide. Folks, these dear people, need the gospel. They need us to love them enough to give them the truth of Christ so that they can be liberated from the bondage of their sin that has blinded them. This is the ultimate assault against God's design for marriage that is to be held in honor among all and it is the ultimate assault against God's demand for sexual purity within the confines of marriage.

Folks think of it this way, God's design for marriage is the very bedrock of society. When marriages collapse, the families collapse. When families collapse, societies collapse. When societies collapse, nations collapse. When nations collapse, entire civilizations collapse. This is where we are headed. But you must understand, there can be no social order apart from private virtue, apart from an understanding and embracing of the gospel of Jesus Christ that transforms sinners so that they are now capable of honoring Christ in their life. The greatest threat to our country today is not ISIS. It is not North Korea or Iran or even, I don't know, the swamp in Washington that they're trying to drain. Our greatest threat is the wholesale disregard for the one true God of the Bible, who calls men and women to repentance and obedient faith in His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Only then can man be delivered from the ravages of his own depravity.

So with utmost clarity and without any equivocation, our Creator God says this, "Marriage is to be held in honor among all, and the marriage bed is to be undefiled; for fornicators and adulterers God will judge." Folks, at the heart of virtually every problem in America today is the decay of home life, the absence of parental involvement and discipline, and underneath all of that is an utter contempt for God's design for marriage and his demand for sexual purity; and we see this even among Christians. Yet you must understand that marriage is God's way to bring great joy and blessing into our life. Do you realize that's what he wants for us? Marriage was sanctified and blessed while Adam and Eve were still in an unfallen state. Think about that. While they were still in paradise, God blessed that union symbolizing the sheer joy and happiness that belongs to all who marry in the Lord. But marriage man's way is not going to bring joy and blessing. It's going to bring great sorrow, and it will bring divine judgment. In fact, our society's current disregard for God's design for marriage and his demand for sexual purity is actually a part of God's judgment upon this nation. It's not just going to bring judgment; it's a part of it right now. Those who scoff at God's commands by having sex out of marriage, those who live together as if they are married or they marry somebody of the same sex, or marry multiple wives, or whatever the perversion, those people all demonstrate what we would call the wrath of divine abandonment upon their life. Romans one speaks of this. Remember, in verse 18, the apostle Paul says, "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness." They don't like the truth. They're going to suppress it. He went on to say that they deny his invisible attributes, his eternal power, his divine nature. They refuse to honor Him as God or gave thanks. They become futile in their speculations, their foolish heart is darkened, professing to be wise, they become fools. And then as we read the text, God gives them over to immorality, to homosexuality, receiving in their own persons, the due penalty of their error. And you certainly see that with AIDS, along with the many other physical problems that are associated with that lifestyle. And then finally, God gives them over to a depraved mind, a worthless mind to do those things which are not proper. In verse 29 we see what this looks like, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice. They are gossip slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful. And although they know the ordinance of God that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them. "Oh, I just can't figure out, why did this guy shoot all of these people in Las Vegas?" Here's why. This is why we have evil in the world.

So what's the answer? Well, the answer is genuine repentance that only occurs through the transforming power of the gospel. Only the gospel can save and sanctify, enabling man to honor the Lord in his marriage and in sexual purity. Marriage is to be held in honor among all.

Secondly, sexual impurity will be judged by God. Notice what he says in the second part of the text here. He says, "and the marriage bed is to be undefiled." Undefiled means pure. It could be translated "unstained," "pure" or "free of any contamination." You could translate it that way. Then he says, "for fornicators and adulterers God will judge." Now, let me explain the language here. A fornicator, it's "pornos" in the original language. It's related to the word "pornea," and it's used to describe sexually immoral people; and by the way, we get our word pornography from that, and it's used to cover a wide range of sexual deviation and perversions in Scripture that violate the purity of marriage that God designed and that he demanded. Things like premarital sex. You want to know where a Bible verse is for that. Here it is. People ask me, that was there a place in the Bible? Yeah, right here, along with many other passages. Things like premarital sex, sex outside of marriage, prostitution, bestiality, homosexual sex, pornographic indulgence, and every other kind of unlawful form of sexual intercourse that God describes. So that's the fornicator.

The "adulterer," it says, "and adulterers," that's sexual involvement with someone other than your spouse. God's going to judge these kinds of people. So these are the two forms of sexual sins that defiles the purity of marriage. And think about it, fornication, which defiles marriage before it occurs, and adultery, which defiles marriage after it has been entered into. Satan's world system is uniquely and diabolically designed to tempt us in these two areas. And isn't it interesting how he absolutely overwhelms us with all of the sexual filth. I mean, you can't go anywhere without seeing it and hearing it like the popular song that says, simply irresistible. It's just simply irresistible. And you know, for a person without Christ, it is; they have nothing to restrain the flesh. We see it in TV, commercials, movies, song lyrics, videos. We see it in fashion. I've noticed, the tighter the better, the skimpier the better. The more revealing, the better. And gradually, the standard for modesty is lowered to a point where our conscience no longer even holds us to a standard. It's like anything goes now. It's like there's no standard, even in ostensible evangelical Christian schools and colleges and churches.

Let me give you an example, because I've seen this. I've dealt with this over the years. I continue to deal with it. Try imposing just a reasonable dress code, just a reasonable dress code, on Christian kids and watch what happens. And you know what I've discovered, the ones that scream the loudest are the mothers. I remember one mom that I was counseling, she had a 17-year-old daughter, a beautiful girl that was into everything that you don't even want to talk about, and she dressed like a hooker: involved in all kinds of gross immorality. And I remember talking to the mother, "Why would you let her dress like that?" and so on and so forth. And this is a paraphrase, but she said, "If my daughter doesn't look sexy like the other girls, the boys won't notice her, and she'll feel rejected. And I know how painful that is in my own life." And I've had a lot of women that I've talked with share kind of that same sentiment.

Yet, Ephesians five, beginning in verse three, the Spirit of God spoke through the Apostle Paul says, "But immorality or any impurity or greed must not even be named among you." For some of you young gals that just ruled out some of the skimpy little bathing suits that you like to wear, or the extreme short shorts or miniskirts or whatever. He went on to say, "as is proper among saints"; it's not proper among saints. And he went on to say, "and there must be no filthiness and silly talk or coarse jesting, which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks." That rules out all of the smutty jargon that you hear. That's a prohibition against laughing at those smutty jokes; rules out of most of what's on the internet, most of what we see on television. It certainly rules out late night comedy, doesn't it? Where you just have these innuendos all the time, it rules out most of what we hear in our music. Country music has gotten so perverse I can't listen to it anymore. Rap music, hip hop, some of that, it is so vulgar.

I remember I was in in the little store down here yesterday. I stopped before I went to the Tin Can Safari, and I needed to pick up some Gatorade and all this stuff and this lady had this, I guess it's rap music, it was just blaring. And she was a lady probably 50 years old, and I could hear some of the lyrics. And I said to her, what is that guy saying? I thought I would just, you know, what is this guy saying? And she said, "Oh, honey, you don't even want to know." I mean, this is what we're bombarded with, right? And yet Paul says, "but immorality or any impurity or greed must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints; and there must be no filthy talk, silly talk, coarse jesting, which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks." Folks, every time you immerse yourself in the satanic sewage of this culture with all of its immorality, you are contaminating your mind and your heart, and eventually you are going to silence your conscience, and it will no longer hold you to a righteous standard. Don't kid yourself. Virtually everything that's coming out of Hollywood exalts immorality. If you notice the increasing numbers of homosexual programs and commercials, even cartoons. Nancy has to be very careful with what we let Pepper watch because now they've got cartoons with two mommies or two daddies. Public Schools are cramming this kind of wickedness down the throats of our children, and the danger is that the church becomes so influenced by all of these kinds of things that we subtly begin to adopt those same values and behaviors. And so what's acceptable now in the world becomes increasingly acceptable in the church. It's kind of like what's acceptable on the West Coast gradually makes it to Nashville, right? We see that all the time. It's the same thing in the church.

The Pew Research Organization says that there is a growing acceptance, for example, of homosexuality among evangelical Christians right now. 51% of millennials, that's people born between 1981 and 1986 believe that homosexuality is okay among evangelicals, compared to a third of evangelical baby boomers, that's in my category, and a fifth of evangelicals in the silent generation. And there's a few of you are who are in that category, so you can just see the trend overall. They say that this acceptance among evangelicals has grown from 26% in 2007 to 36% in 2014, and folks the trajectory is still moving in that direction. This is what happens when people ignore the truth that God has set before us. God warns in verse five, back to the text in Ephesians five, "For this you know with certainty"; I don't know how much clearer you can be right? "For this, you know with certainty, that no immoral or impure person or covetous man, who is an idolater, has an inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God." Let me put it a little bit differently here, so you're sure that you understand this. Professing Christians who live in immorality and who see absolutely nothing wrong with it and give hearty approval to those who live that kind of a lifestyle, have no basis for the profession of their faith. These people have no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ, in God. Now I know, because I hear it all the time, people will say, "Oh, come on, preacher, you've just described the majority of the people who have ever lived, and many of them who claim to be Christians. Are you actually telling me that the LGBTQ and whatever else they've added to it, that community, that they are going to go to hell? You really saying that? Are you saying that those who see nothing wrong with living together outside of marriage, that that they're going to hell? Are you saying that high school and college kids who just like to experiment and just kind of mess around a little bit, that they're going to hell? What kind of God would send people to an eternal hell for that?" Well, I'll tell you what kind of God, a holy God and a merciful God who has revealed himself in the person of his Son.  And who calls men and women and boys and girls to repentant faith in Christ. That's why he went on to say in Ephesians five, verse six, "Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things, the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience." You see, those who refuse to submit to God's authority, and who choose to live their life on their own, any way that they please, on their own terms, are traveling down a road of divine judgment. All I can do is warn you and give you the truth.

Verse seven, he went on to say, "Therefore, do not become partakers with them." In other words, don't support them. Don't encourage them. Don't be in association with them. The term means don't try to identify with them. Don't act like them. Don't think like them. Keep your distance from them. He says, "For at one time, you were darkness but now you are Light in the Lord; walk as children of light." Practically young men, listen to me. Here's what this means. Practically, in your life, keep your distance from young women who dress immodestly, who love to flirt, who love to use vulgar language. Keep your distance from them. The more a woman exposes on the outside, the less she has to offer on the inside. She may seem simply irresistible to you, but the day will come when you will wish you had never met her.

Young women, avoid young men who are fascinated with your body and who are also fascinated with every other sexy girl that walks by eyes that are filled with fornication and adultery. Stay away from those types of young men, because those men will use you, and when they are done with you, they will throw you away like last week's garbage. I have seen it 1000 times. You will never be able to satisfy the lusts of that man's flesh. O child of God, please hear this. God calls us to obey His commands for our joy, not for our sorrow. These commands are not to be seen as bondage. I mean, this is real liberty. This is how you can enjoy real pleasure, for example, in marriage; this is where life is found. This is where you can enjoy real, relational oneness and physical oneness. This is God's great design. For this reason, the apostle Paul tells us, in First Corinthians six, beginning in verse 18, "to flee immorality." The idea in the grammar here is to run from it and keep on running. Never stop running from it.

"Flee immorality. Every other sin that a man commits is outside the body, but the immoral man sins against his own body.

"Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?

"For you have been bought with a price: therefore, glorify God in your body."

You see, for the believer who is indwelt, therefore, by the Spirit of God, any form of immorality desecrates the very sanctuary of God; the place where the Holy Spirit dwells within us. It pollutes the very core of our being, because you must understand that sexual sin is so deeply personal. It's an all-encompassing sin. It will leave you with physical, as well as emotional wounds and scars that will stay with you the rest of your life. Moreover, a great way to transmit venereal diseases. I understand that today, there are more than 20 types of sexually transmitted diseases affecting more than 13 million men and women in the United States each year, and four of them are incurable. Oh, dear young people, listen to what I'm warning you through the word of God. I don't want to have to sit in front of you someday and say, "Look, this is what you've done, and here's the consequences." But worse yet, given what Paul had just said regarding how the Christian's body is joined with Christ - he talks about how we are members of Christ Himself - because of that, any kind of unlawful sexual union with someone other than your spouse makes a mockery of this magnificent mystical union that we have in Christ. That's why, in verse 15 of First Corinthians, six, he says, "Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take away the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? May it never be!"

So again, God is saying, "marriage is to be held in honor among all, and the marriage bed is to be undefiled; for fornicators and adulterers, God will judge." Well, I want to encourage you for a moment, and then I want to give you some practical application, okay? First of all, a word of encouragement, because I know all of us, at some level, if not at least in our minds, are guilty of sexual impurity, right? And some have, and maybe are even now, involved in things that that you shouldn't be involved with. Let me give you a word of encouragement. If your life is characterized by sexual immorality, know this: God is merciful. You realize that he is merciful? Do you realize how merciful he is for you to be here, hearing what he is saying to you right now and giving you this warning? He is merciful. He is long suffering. He is compassionate. He is a forgiving and redeeming God, and he's calling you to repentance this very day. He knows that if you will hear him, you will experience great joy and pleasure like you have never known before. And so I invite you to come in brokenness, in repentance and ask God to forgive you and release you from the bondage of whatever you're involved in.

And if you're a believer caught up in some habitual form of immorality, then on the basis of the Word of God, we know this: right now you are absolutely eaten up with guilt. If you're a non-believer, it doesn't bother you all that much. If you're a believer, it's eating you up. And that's a good thing, because God tells us in First John one and verse nine, "If we confess our sin," a compound word in Greek, "homologeō" - “homo," the same; "logeō," to speak - if we say the same thing about our sin as God says. If we agree with God that what we're involved with is sin, if we confess our sin, He is what? "He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins." And I love this, "and cleanse us from all unrighteousness." You remember David's confession after he was with Bathsheba, Psalm 51 beginning in verse one,

"Have mercy on me, oh God, according to Your steadfast love; according to Your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions.

"Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.

"For I know my transgressions and my sin is ever before me.

"Against You, You only, have I sinned and done what is evil in Your sight, so that You may be justified in Your words and blameless in Your judgment."

He went on to say, in verse 10,

"Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.

"Cast me not away from your presence and take not Your Holy Spirit from me.

"Restore to me the joy of Your salvation and uphold me with a willing spirit."

Now, let me exhort you to do four things, all right, very practically, very important. Number one, folks, learn to fear the Lord. Learn to fear the Lord. Proverbs 1:7, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. Fools despise wisdom and instruction." Proverbs nine and verse 10, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding." Said differently, you need to make sure that you are constantly developing a reverential awe and an admiration for the nature, for the character of God, so that you learn who he really is and joyfully submit yourself to him. Because I will tell you this, people that are caught up in immorality know nothing of any of this. They have no fear of God. Remember what the writer of Hebrews said in chapter 12, verse 28, "Since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe. For our God is a consuming fire." Folks, God is serious about his holiness, he is serious about sin, and he will not let sin go unpunished, even among Christians. As our loving Heavenly Father, he will chasten us. Folks you do not want to live under the cloud of divine chastening, because it can be severe. So you want to ask yourself honestly right now, Do I really fear God? Do I have this admiration and awe for his holiness, for his transcendent majesty, for his purity, his righteousness and all of his attributes? Is my life marked by a deep reverence for the transcendent, sovereign God who has created me? Do I long to live Coram deo, which means "in His presence," knowing that he sees all that I do; and if so, I will have an insatiable appetite for the Word of God and a desire to obey it? Is my life governed by a theologically accurate awareness of his holy nature.

We see these marks of a God-fearing man and the Lord's warning to Israel through the prophet Isaiah, when he said in Isaiah 8:13, "It is the LORD of hosts whom you should regard as holy, and He shall be your fear, and He shall be your dread. Then," and I love this, "He shall become a sanctuary." Fearing God means you'll be committed to walk by the Spirit, so you will not carry out the desires of the flesh, right?  You'll feed on the Word. You'll hide it in your heart. Psalm 119:11, "Thy word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against Thee." Young people, you need to be memorizing scripture, meditating on scripture, talking about scripture among one another; spend your time around godly people, avoid the ungodly. This might practically mean that you turn off YouTube, that you get rid of Instagram, that you choose your friends wisely. Avail yourself of the Spirit's resources; the sermons that you hear, read books, articles, devotionals. Because I will guarantee you this, the drunken fools involved in all of the debauchery during spring break know nothing of what I'm describing to you right now; and left them to themselves, they will perish in their sins. Learn to fear the Lord.

Secondly, flee from immorality. Let me put it this way, be like Joseph who ran from Potiphar's wife, not like David who ran after Uriah's wife, Bathsheba. Consequences were absolutely devastating in David's life. The guilt of his sin is described in Psalm 32 beginning in verse three, "When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night, Your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer." You see, folks, that kind of description of guilt and physical torment is indicative of what happens when a true believer is completely out of fellowship with God. False believers, doesn't faze them much; doesn't really bother them. David's sin cost him dearly, didn't it? Public humiliation, the death of his little baby boy with Bathsheba. A tragic family life filled with conflict. My goodness, you read the story. Deception, rape, murder. The sins of the fathers may affect a generation to come, o you realize that? Folks, please hear me, you sow the wind, you will reap the whirlwind. Learn to flee from every form of immorality lest it capture you in its snare. Job 31:1, "I have made a covenant with my eyes." Guys in particular, guard what you allow yourself to look at. Get rid of anything that might trap you. Certain television channels, the internet, whatever you need to do. Romans 13:14, "Put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh and the lust thereof."

Two more things, and I'll close. Women, let me speak to you. Get serious about modesty, okay? Get serious about it. Immodest dress betrays moral failure in the heart, and perhaps an unwillingness, perhaps even an inability, to reign in passions and desires. It screams, "Please, look at me. This is all I have to offer. I'm desperate for your attention. I have no other way of finding real meaning to life, because I don't really find it in Christ. So please look at me. Chase after me. That's where I find life." Oh, what a dangerous thing. Worse yet, immorality seduces ungodly men to thoughts and actions. Do you really want an ungodly man to marry you? Raise your kids? Is that really what you want? First, Timothy two, verse nine, "I want women to adorn themselves with proper clothing, modestly and discreetly, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly garments, but rather by means of good works, as is proper for women making a claim to godliness." Let me give you a little example. The philosopher Philo gave a description of what the prostitutes looked like in those days, and in one of his writings called "The Sacrifices of Cain and Abel," here's what he said, quote, "A prostitute is often described as having hair dressed in elaborate braids, her eyes with pencil lines, her eyebrows smothered in paint and her expensive clothes embroidered lavishly with flowers and bracelets and necklaces of gold and jewels hanging all over her." End quote. Well simply stated, ladies, dress tastefully, not provocatively.

I love what Luke Gilkerson said, and I put this in your bulletin,

"Modesty is a respectable manner of adorning one's body and carrying oneself born out of a freedom from a worldly definition of beauty and worth and motivated by a hatred of sin and a desire to draw attention to God."

Ladies, the most beautiful women in all of the world, are not beautiful because of something that they've made or something that they've bought in a store. They are beautiful because of their chaste discretion, because of their love for Christ, because of their desire to draw attention to him and be faithful to their husbands. First Peter three, beginning in verse three, "Do not let your adorning be external, the braiding of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry, or the clothing you wear; but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight, is very precious."

Finally, young men, I'm going to use an Old Testament phrase here, because I don't want you to ever forget it, learn to drink from your own cistern. Learn to drink from your own cistern; Proverbs 5:15. It carries the idea of reserving your sexual affections for your wife and for her alone. Seek the satisfaction of love's desire from your wife and her alone. Jettison anything in your life that might draw your attention away from her. The text says, "Drink water from your own cistern," Proverbs 5:15,

"...and fresh water from your own well.

"Should your springs be dispersed abroad, streams of water in the streets?

“Let them be yours alone and not for strangers with you.

"Let your fountain be blessed, and rejoice in the wife of your youth. As a loving hind and a graceful doe, let her breast satisfy you at all times; be exhilarated always with her love.

"For why should you, my son, be exhilarated with an adulteress and embrace the bosom of a foreigner?"

Then he says this,

"For the ways of a man are before the eyes of the LORD, and He watches all his paths.

His iniquities will capture the wicked, and he will be held with the cords of his sin.

"He will die for lack of instruction, and in the greatness of his folly, he will go astray."

Beloved if you violate God's design for marriage, and if you ignore his demands for sexual purity, you will pay a terrible price. So I plead with you, on the basis of the gospel, to hear what God has said; humble yourself before these truths, live consistently with them, and watch what he will do in your life and in your marriage. Amen? Amen. Let's pray together.

Father, thank you for the clarity of your word. Thank you for its compelling force, Lord. We know that you, when your word is preached, it will do one of two things. It will either harden or soften hearts, and I pray that it will be the latter, that the hearts of our men and women of Calvary Bible Church, and all who hear this, will be softened for your glory and for their joy. I pray in Jesus' name, Amen.