Thoughts from the Diary of a Desperate Man: A Daily Devotional

by Walter A. Henrichsen

MARCH 7 Day 67 Sexual Sin “Shun immorality. Every other sin which a man commits is outside the body; but the immoral man sins against his own body.” I Corinthians 6:18 Curbing your appetites forms an essential component in the Christian life. Two appetites must be kept in check: First, the appetite for wealth and establishing limits on how you can use the civil courts to settle disputes; and second, sexual appetites. “Food is meant for the stomach, …the body…for the Lord.”1 When you die your old body will finish its slide toward decay, and disappear, but your new body will be resurrected upon the return of Christ. Your stomach houses food, but your body houses God. “Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit?”2 For this reason sexual immorality is a uniquely hideous sin in the sight of God. You would think Paul wrong when he says, “every sin a man commits is outside the body.” Alcohol and drugs appear to be more destructive to the body than sex. The union of a man and woman, however, has a mystical dimension. During the time of Paul’s writing, temple prostitutes were used in pagan religions as a spiritual exercise, but Paul likens marriage to the union of Christ and His church. Because your temporal body is the temple of Christ, to bring a harlot into union with it is to defile Christ’s temple. It would be analogous in the Old Testament to bringing a prostitute into the Holy of Holies. Such a thing is too reprehensible to contemplate. All sin is wicked and...