When I was in high school I participated in an abstinence awareness program in which high-school students educated middle-school students about the dangers of sexual promiscuity and drug use. At the beginning of each presentation we each gave reasons for why we intended to save sex until marriage. My reason was something like this: “I don’t want to deal with the danger of sexually transmitted diseases; I want to save myself for my future wife (and because of my faith).”

Despite how wonderfully righteous and wise this statement seemed to me at the time, I now realize that it, and any statement to similar effect, completely vitiates the sanctity of godly sexuality. In no way does this statement speak to the actual God-intended purpose for sexuality within a marriage, and in no way does it set me apart from any Jew, Muslim, Mormon, or monogamous Environmentalist. The closest I came to preaching the Gospel through my sexual purity was that parenthetical statement tacked onto the end of my sentence: “because of my faith.” This was a denial of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We all do this when we try to tell the world of the pleasures of godly sex within marriage while avoiding the messy work of preaching the Gospel. Even those of us who fight most strongly for the confinement of sex to the marriage bed weaken its power when we use worldly rationalizations of “delayed gratification,” and “the simple joys of monogamy.”

These pleasures are directly linked to pictures of Jesus Christ and his relationship with the Church, but they fall short of the actual glory of God. When we stop at our own pleasures as the ultimate reason for sexual purity, the only thing that separates our description of “godly” sexuality and the world’s sexually immoral gratification of the flesh is the legal institution of marriage itself. But what ultimately separates pure sexuality from impure sexuality is not just marriage, for that limits the power of what sexuality represents. No wonder the world scoffs at the idea of sex being restricted to marriage. Why would anyone want to limit himself by this standard for no reason, when it seems that promiscuity and sexual “liberty” are so much more fulfilling? If it’s all about personal pleasure anyway, why bother with marriage?

Pure sexuality is holy because it honors God, because it is a picture of Jesus Christ’s relationship with the Church. Defining sexual purity simply by the presence of marriage not only denies the presence of God in marriage, but it perpetuates the idea that sexual purity is a battle to be fought only until marriage. As I approach marriage I have been fighting this particular deception a lot. Sexual purity is not a fight until marriage; it is a fight that continues up to and through marriage. In fact, marriage is simply a continuation of godly sexual purity, not the end goal. We know this because we know that sexual temptation does not simply go away upon getting married—which is a lie that most single Christian men want to believe. Recently, I had the chance to read dozens of testimonies of men who carried sins of lust, pornography, and promiscuity into their Christian marriages, and it opened my eyes to the falsehood of this idea. So why does this lie still entice us?

Well, Scripture says that one purpose of marriage is to defend against sexual immorality (1 Corinthians 7:2). Right? Yes, but this does not make marriage a license of sexual liberty. In fact, all sorts of impurity can exist, even within marriage; even a married couple can engage in sinful sexual relations when they deny the presence of God’s authority in their union. This also means that what separates sexual purity and sexual impurity is not simply the presence of marriage. Marriage is manifold in its functions, and limiting it to just one function lessens its power and spiritual significance.

In fact, we have turned marriage into nothing more than a band-aid for sexual sin. The single man runs around as though bearing a mortal wound, searching for the right material to stop the incessant bleeding. And even after he thinks he has discovered it, and gets engaged to the “right” woman, he cannot wait to apply the bandage, fearing that he may die from loss of blood before he makes it to the date set forth. Sexual sin is such a mortal wound; but marriage is no cure, and no man should enter marriage bearing mortal wounds, lest he meet his demise and abandon his wife to widowhood.

Men, marriage does not save you from your sexual impurity, and it does not heal you. Only by Jesus Christ’s wounds are we healed. And before you can actually lead a marriage that honors God you must be daily applying the salve of his Son’s blood to your wounds. Let us use the glorious opportunity of our sexual purity to represent the Lord Jesus Christ in our marriages as an overflowing outlet for the Gospel.

“He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed. For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls” (1 Peter 2:24-25).

“So Jacob served seven years for Rachel, and they seemed to him but a few days because of the love he had for her” (Genesis 29:20).

Seven years! And I complain about 3 weeks…