Proverbs 5

I can almost guarantee you’ll never hear someone get up at church and say, “Our Scripture reading this morning is from Proverbs, chapter five, verses 18 and 19: ‘May your fountain be blessed, and may you rejoice in the wife of your youth. A loving doe, a graceful deer—may her breasts satisfy you always, may you ever be intoxicated with her love.’”

Although this probably will never be used as a Scripture reading because it would have too many people blushing, it comes in the midst of a chapter where Solomon challenges young men to adhere to God’s ideals regarding love and sex. It even seems to be a matter of life and death: “For the lips of the adulterous woman drip honey, and her speech is smoother than oil; but in the end she is bitter as gall, sharp as a double-edged sword. Her feet go down to death; her steps lead straight to the grave.” (vs 3-5)

If that seems a little extreme, consider that lust—if not checked—is something that eventually destroys relationships, even lives. Many men (and, increasingly, women) struggle with lust. It can begin rather innocently, even just in the mind (although Jesus specifically warned against that, too, in Matt 5), but if left unchecked, it usually doesn’t end there. It can spill over into behaviors that can destroy marriages, families, and even personal health. Lust carries emotional, relational, and physical consequences.

By contrast, God designed that sexual intimacy between one man and one woman for life would be like a private, thirst-quenching cistern that would never dry up. Committing ourselves to monogamy (as God intended it) protects marriages, families, and even personal health.

Even in this area of life—which is so often considered nowadays to be “nobody’s business,” as long as the parties involved are consenting adults—submitting to God’s design is what brings true freedom. Drinking water from our own cistern (and nobody else’s) will ensure that our thirst will be satisfied. On the other hand, departing from God’s ideal inevitably leads to heartache, difficulty, and sorrow. Drinking water from the cisterns of others will ensure that our thirst will never be satisfied, and we will continue to be a slave to our thirst.

God designed sex, and He designed it to be an enjoyable, meaningful part of our lives. But it will only be that kind of experience when we pursue it within the boundaries in which it was designed. Pursuing sexual intimacy outside of those boundaries only leads to hardship and tragedy.