The Ten Commandments: Six

Martin Luther recommended daily meditation on the Ten Commandments, using each Command to Instruct, to provide inspiration for Thanksgiving, to reflect upon in Repentance, and to conclude with Praise to God.

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Sixth Commandment

You shall not commit adultery.  What does this mean?  We should fear and love God so that we lead a sexually pure and decent life in what we say and do, and husband and wife love and honor each other.

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.  God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it.  Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”  Genesis 1: 27 – 28

But for Adam no suitable helper was found.  So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and closed up the place with flesh.  Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. The man said, “This is now bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman,’ for she was taken out of man.” For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.  The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.”  Genesis 2: 20b - 25

You shall not commit adultery. Exodus 20: 14

If a man commits adultery with another man’s wife—with the wife of his neighbor—both the adulterer and the adulteress must be put to death.  Leviticus 20: 10

You have heard it was said, ‘Do not commit adultery.’  But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.  If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away.  It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.   And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away.  It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.  It has been said, ‘Anyone who divorces his wife must give her a certificate of divorce.’  But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, causes her to become an adulteress, and anyone who marries the divorced woman commits adultery.  Matthew 5: 27 – 32

Now for the matters you wrote about:  it is good for a man not to marry.  But since there is so much immorality, each man should have his own wife, and each woman her own husband.  The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife, and likewise the wife to her husband.  The wife’s body does not belong to her alone but also to her husband.  In the same way, the husband’s body does not belong to him alone but also to his wife.  Do not deprive each other except for by mutual consent and for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer.  Then come together again so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.  1 Corinthians 7: 1 - 5

For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.  Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.  Therefore God gave then over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another.  They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised.  Amen.  Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts.  Romans 1: 21 – 26

So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking.  They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts.  Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, with a continual lust for more.  You, however, did not come to know Christ that way.  Surely you heard of him and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus.  You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.  Ephesians 4: 17 – 24

Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature:  sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry.  Because of these things, the wrath of God is coming.  You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived.  But now you must rid yourselves of all such things as these:  anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips.  Colossians 3: 5 – 8

It is God’s will that you should be sanctified:  that you should avoid sexual immorality; that each of you should learn to control his own body in a way that is holy and honorable, not in passionate lust like the heathen, who do not know God; and that in this matter no one should wrong his brother or take advantage of him.  The Lord will punish men for all such sins, as we have already told you and warned you. For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life.  Therefore, he who rejects this instruction does not reject man but God, who gives you his Holy Spirit.  1 Thessalonians 4: 3 – 8

Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral.  Hebrews 13: 4

Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.  Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.  For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body of which he is the Savior.  Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.  Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.  In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies.  He who loves his wife loves himself.  After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church—for we are members of his body. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”  This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church.  However, each one of you must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.  Ephesians 5: 23 - 33

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The Lord God created human kind in his image, as male and female he created them.  He gave them bodies and breathed his life-giving spirit into mankind.  Gender and sexuality, fertility and physicality, are a reflection of God’s nature demonstrated in and imparted to his creation.  They are gifts from him.  Gender, sexuality, marriage, the roles of husband and wife—these predate the fall into sin. They are good by design and by intent.  There is nothing innately sinful about sex.  Marriage and sex are by nature good and a blessing to humanity.  Men and women are created to become one flesh, to function in tandem and to complement one another.  Husbands and wives were created to desire one another physically, emotionally and spiritually; and the sexual act was designed for the benefit of the individuals, the marriage and for procreation.  When Paul describes men and women, husbands and wives, and the relationship God desires for them, he talks simultaneously of Christ and the church:  the desire to save, and the selfless actions which did indeed save, the church; the desire of Christ to preserve the church for himself in purity and self-sacrificing love; and the mystery of the one-flesh relationship which will ultimately come to pass in eternity. In his letters to the various churches he planted, Paul strenuously warned against sexual sins, against sensuality and licentiousness; and he admonished believers to live godly lives in self-control, faithfulness, sexual purity and respectful love for one another.  

Creator God, Jesus the Word of Life, Holy Spirit breath of God, you created humanity in your divine Image, the image of eternal love and faithfulness, the image of relationship, the image of holiness and purity.  We thank you for your creative goodness, for your divine design of human sexuality.  You created men and women to serve and love you, and to serve and love one another; you created them to become one flesh for their good and for the continuation of humankind. We thank you for our bodies, for our sexuality for the genders of male and female; we thank you for your perfect plan to unite the disparate natures of men and women into one flesh, for their benefit and for the benefit of their children.  Thank you for the pleasure you have given us in the sexual act, for the bonds of love which are created and reinforced within relationships. We thank you for the joys of marriage, for the support and comfort which you give.  

Lord God, we confess that we abuse your good gift of sexuality.  We selfishly seek our own pleasures, disregarding your intent for sexuality; we reject faithfulness in marriage and we reject sexuality in marriage, seeking pleasure with others and causing pain to those whom we have vowed to love the most.  We are disrespectful of our bodies and the bodies of others, putting our own needs before the needs of our spouse.  We reject your good gift of children, allowing fear or selfishness to supplant your command to be fruitful and multiply.  We have disrespected the sex act through coarse joking, through lustful thoughts, by indulging in entertainment that is not godly nor edifying.  We have demeaned and diminished the value of the opposite gender in our thoughts, words and disrespectful actions.  We show contempt for your design of male and female, we disregard their strengths and take advantage of their weaknesses.  You have given us marriage as a type and foretaste of the relationship you desire with your redeemed church eternally; we reject the mystery of sex, the faithful love of marriage, and hold only to carnal pleasure and a grasping of our base animal natures.  Forgive us for Jesus’ sake.  As he redeemed the church to be his bride into eternity, pure and spotless, let us hold our marriages and our sexuality in purity and for mutual help.  Forgive our selfishness and our neglect, for our lustful abuses and our fearful rejection of sex.  Where there is unfaithfulness and brokenness, bring reconciliation and reunification.  Where there is fear and pain, bring healing and comfort.  Where there has been abuse, bring safety and respect.  Where there is infertility, bring comfort and healing.  Pour out your Spirit like oil, smoothing over the conflicts, disagreements, hurts and misunderstandings which plague the sexes in this fallen creation.  

Heavenly Father, Christ the Son, Holy Spirit, we praise you for your great glory, the glory you revealed in the redemption of the world through the death and resurrection of Christ; and the glory you reveal as you redeem each person and each relationship.  We praise you for the forgiveness and renewal which you bring to us daily; we praise you that you continually pour out your forgiveness to us, and you give us your Spirit to reconcile us to you and to each other.  We praise you for the complex goodness of your creation, for the complexity of male and female and the complexity of marriage and family.  We know that your design is good and pure; we praise you that even in this fallen world, you sustain the goodness of your creation and you continue to bless your creatures with happiness, joy, unity and pleasure in marriage.  We pray for your protection on each marriage, each husband and each wife; we pray for your blessing of peace and harmony.  Lord God, King of heaven and earth, continue to bless each of us with the joy of your plan and your creation; we praise you here in time and long for the day that we will praise you eternally with all the saints and angels in heaven.  AMEN.