My friend and I are both engaging in fornication. Do you think God will hold this against us?
Question:
Hello,
I came across your website and was wondering if I could ask a question that I need some advice on.
I have a friend who was been in a relationship for almost five years. She wants to get married but her boyfriend doesn't want to marry. They loved each other but a relative told her that she will not get to Heaven due to their fornication. I was wondering what God's words are on the situation. He doesn't want to get married for some time. She is a very Christian woman and she speaks to Christ in prayers. She believes that she won't to Heaven now because of her fornication. She believes the Lord won't forgive her because it is something that her boyfriend wants, she loves him and wants to make him happy. He is very good to her in every way. They don't interact in this fornication a lot, but she doesn't believe God will forgive her. She asks for forgiveness each time they commit fornication.
Now she will not get out of bed. She feels that if she isn't getting to Heaven what is the point. She doesn't want her boyfriend to leave her, and she believes they will never marry. She has been married multiple times. She wants to get married again, but she doesn't believe he will ever marry. It just isn't something he wants to do.
And my other question is, I have only been dating this gentleman for a while now and we just recently engaged in fornication also. I also would love to get married, but it's too soon to bring up the conversation of marriage. My body and mind thrive on having intercourse, and it's something I have a very hard time turning down. And when I'm in love with someone it's even harder. I know the Lord has forgiven me for my past sins. But I am always wanting sex, and I have prayed and prayed about it. But my flesh is too weak to say no. Do you think that the Lord will be angry at me for engaging in sexual acts until I get married? Most men won't stay around at all if you make them wait for long periods of time. I hope you can give me some advice and help me and my friend out.
God bless and may God be with you!
Answer:
Right and wrong don't change with people or with situations. So let's start with a truth:
"Marriage is honorable among all, and the bed undefiled; but fornicators and adulterers God will judge" (Hebrews 13:4).
"Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God" (I Corinthians 6:9-10).
"For this you know, that no fornicator, unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God" (Ephesians 5:5).
"Knowing this: that the law is not made for a righteous person, but for the lawless and insubordinate, for the ungodly and for sinners, for the unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, for fornicators, for sodomites, for kidnappers, for liars, for perjurers, and if there is any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine" (I Timothy 1:9-10).
"But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death" (Revelation 21:8).
I listed these verses because it is clear that you don't take these matters as seriously as God does. Though it is depressing your friend, she got the matter correct in regards that you can't get to heaven by sinning. It isn't that heaven is forever blocked to her or you, but you have to start acting on the fact that Jesus is Lord. "But why do you call Me 'Lord, Lord,' and do not do the things which I say?" (Luke 6:46).
Where she is wrong is deceiving herself into thinking she has to sin. You are doing the same thing. You both wrongly assume that the only way to get a guy to like you is to make yourselves available for sex. Yet the guys who insist on sex without marriage are also the ones who make lousy husbands or have no interest in marriage.
What is disappointing is that neither of you plans on making changes to your lives to conform to God's will. You both apologize for sinning, but you don't see yourselves leaving sin. "What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?" (Romans 6:1-2). What is missing is repentance -- a complete change in your attitude toward sin and in your behavior. "Now I rejoice, not that you were made sorry, but that your sorrow led to repentance. For you were made sorry in a godly manner, that you might suffer loss from us in nothing. For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, not to be regretted; but the sorrow of the world produces death. For observe this very thing, that you sorrowed in a godly manner: What diligence it produced in you, what clearing of yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what vehement desire, what zeal, what vindication! In all things you proved yourselves to be clear in this matter" (II Corinthians 7:9-11). Your friend has the worldly form of sorrow. She sorry that she is in the wrong, yet she won't change. You talk about being sorry enough to pray each time you sin, but you have no inclination to change. What puzzles me is why either of you thinks this is acceptable to God.
"But if a wicked man turns from all his sins which he has committed, keeps all My statutes, and does what is lawful and right, he shall surely live; he shall not die. None of the transgressions which he has committed shall be remembered against him; because of the righteousness which he has done, he shall live. Do I have any pleasure at all that the wicked should die?" says the Lord GOD, "and not that he should turn from his ways and live? ... Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, every one according to his ways," says the Lord GOD. "Repent, and turn from all your transgressions, so that iniquity will not be your ruin. Cast away from you all the transgressions which you have committed, and get yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. For why should you die, O house of Israel? For I have no pleasure in the death of one who dies," says the Lord GOD. "Therefore turn and live!"" (Ezekiel 18:21-23, 30-32).
Don't you think it is time to be Christians in truth instead of in pretense?
Question:
Thank you for your input on the situation. But I am a very Christian person. I follow the Word of Christ, and I honor him. I, yes, made the mistake of committing fornication, and I do repent. I also talked to my partner, and he has agreed to wait. I know the only one unforgivable sin is to deny Christ. I spread his Word and worship him. I made the mistake of fornication and you make it sound that I don't take my love with the Lord seriously. I do very much so; that is why I wrote you!
I do believe I asked for advice because I want to become a better Christian and you judged me through this whole letter. I do have problems with temptation, and I have, yes, prayed about it. Everyone sins and some people can't even admit their sins. I have taken a step toward admitting I have a problem. I know it is wrong. It isn't like I wouldn't get married. It's just too soon for that. Now I ask if you are engaged to this man does that change? I read on adultery that it's the same if your married or engaged to sleep with another person.
I ask you to not judge when someone is seeking help. I thank you for your input, and I hope you see that I am the person that the Lord is forming me to become. I am young and still learning.
Thank you.
Answer:
You declare yourself to be "a very Christian person." Is that not a judgment that you have made? When you tell me not to make a judgment about what you told me, is that not a judgment as well? If so, then why are you upset that other people also made decisions based on what they know? " Therefore you are inexcusable, O man, whoever you are who judge, for in whatever you judge another you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things" (Romans 2:1).
You came asking for advice on your situation. The very nature of what you asked of me involves my deciding from the information you gave me what is wrong and how to improve. That you don't like facing the facts is understandable. Few people like to see that they are sinning. But it isn't the watchman's fault when he sounds the alarm that enemy armies are approaching. "So you, son of man: I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel; therefore you shall hear a word from My mouth and warn them for Me. When I say to the wicked, 'O wicked man, you shall surely die!' and you do not speak to warn the wicked from his way, that wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood I will require at your hand. Nevertheless if you warn the wicked to turn from his way, and he does not turn from his way, he shall die in his iniquity; but you have delivered your soul" (Ezekiel 33:7-9).
The fact that everyone sins does not excuse anyone's sins. The fact that you intend to marry one day does not permit you to have sex when you are not married to the man you having sex with. An engagement is not a marriage and it does not permit sex.
The reason I came down hard was not that you had once committed fornication, but that you've done so repeatedly and expressed that you thought you would continue up until your marriage. It was you who said you could not say "no" to sex. I merely took you at your word.
My job is not to make you feel good about your sins. My job is to talk you out of sin and into serving God completely. You are not serving God when you accept the presence of sin in your life and attempt to make excuses of why you have to stay in sin.
