Relationships
4 Let's talk About Sex

1. Let's start at the very beginning: Genesis 2:23,24
Adam and Eve: God said the two will become one. Be fruitful and multiply. Be helpers to each other. Avoid loneliness.
What clues are there here about Adam and Eve's relationship - also in Gen 3? How did God intend it to be?
(I believe that God's order of things is friendship, romance and then sex and that it's when we fail to follow this order that we can get into difficulties.)

2. Friendship and longing for intimacy
Friendships are in trouble; people have mates but not necessarily real friends, especially men. Look at David and Jonathan's friendship (1 Samuel 20:41)), and also Ruth and Naomi's. What can we learn from these intimate friendships? Those who are single, whether by choice, by circumstance or by bereavement, need friendships more than anything. It is perhaps selfish and short sighted for those of us who are married or in stable relationships to neglect friendships.

3. Romance
Sometimes we forget the excitement and pleasure of romance. Here are some excerpts from the Song of Songs to remind us about it.
Song of Songs 1:2; 2:6-7; 5:4-5; 8:14
Romance means something different to different people. It may be long walks, holding hands, flowers, films, candlelit dinner...
Why do people tend to become involved in sexual activity earlier in a relationship these days? (NOT just young people, also older people after relationships split up etc).
Beware of judging people in your group; you don't know about their past life/their children/grandchildren. Be gentle and careful in comments.

4. Sex and our culture
When we left Adam and Eve, everything in the garden was rosy but then they decided to put themselves at the centre rather than God and everything began to go wrong including sex. Sex should be relational, otherwise it is just desire and longing rather than leading to intimacy. Read Rom 1:20-32, 2:1 In what way was the sex described not what God had planned?
What does the passage lead us to conclude about?
1. Sexiness (as opposed to beauty)
2. Pornography (as opposed to art)
3. Homosexuality (practice as opposed to tendencies)

In what way can we individually make a difference to our sex obsessed world, to put sex in its rightful order?

Friendship - romance - marriage - sex

Pray for us to keep making new friends and to make the most of existing friendships. Thank God for romance, and pray for it to return to its rightful place. Pray for those who have been hurt or damaged by our sexiness culture through unhelpful relationships, abuse or any other sexual issue.

Pray that we will be transformed and not conformed to the world.
Pray especially for those young people we know who may be in danger of making disastrous decisions.
Pray for parents, schools, censorship bodies etc to set good boundaries.
Pray for the top shelf campaign and whether you might play a part in it.
Pray for the strength to run away from bad influences on us.
Ask God to help you to be healed and to forgive if you have been hurt yourself.

The past has happened; today is the start of the rest of our lives.

Marriage (could leave for another week)
What do you think about the advice: to marry your best friend… Look at Isaac and Rebecca, Abraham and Sarah.

Discuss any of the quotes below (if helpful).
Sex is important in a marriage, like hot dinners. Men are like gas ovens, quick to turn on and quick to cool down, where women are more like electric ovens…slower to heat up, but stay hot for a lot longer…
Sex in a marriage is important to help keep us together.
If you fall out of love, marriage is there to keep you together until you fall in love again. (Poet Judith Viorst)

When a marriage culture fails, sexual desire no longer unites; instead it fragments. Maggie Gallagher