Last updated on May 30, 2025
What is one of the greatest challenges facing Christian teenagers today? Whether it’s coming into our living rooms over cable television, playing at the movies, in streaming video for I-pods, or in eye-catching advertisements on the Internet, sex permeates our society. It seems almost impossible to tune it out; unless, of course, we want to go live on an island.
“What difference does it make whether I have sex outside of marriage?” Teens often ask.
The Bible provides vivid accounts of individuals who remained pure before God and those who didn’t. Perhaps what isn’t so obvious is what the long-term consequences were of the choices these men and women made. It may be hard to understand how having sex outside of marriage could have such devastating effects.
By looking at some examples from the Bible, the consequences of impurity become more obvious. It isn’t just a matter of morality but of one’s relationship with God and how God might choose to use you in the future.
Sampson was enticed and wooed away from his first love by the allure of beauty and deception. He used poor judgment. As a result, his eyes were gouged out by the Philistines. The Lord had left him and his strength was gone.
King David had it all. Only one thing wasn’t his — a young woman named Bathsheba who belonged to Uriah, the Hittite. The first child born of that marriage died.
King Solomon’s falling away from God and intermarriage with foreign women played a significant role in the breakup of the monarchy following his death.
Joseph was tempted day after day by Potiphar’s wife, but never succumbed to her enticements. He said in Genesis 39:9: “My master has withheld nothing from me except you, because you are his wife. How, then, could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God?”
By a divine set of events, Joseph eventually became the “Ruler of all Egypt,” second only to the king himself, and saved his people from starvation during a great famine. God could not have used Joseph to save an entire nation if he had given in to the temptations of Potiphar’s wife.
Gomer was the unfaithful wife of Hosea. She was driven from the house by her children, hoping to seek her reform. Despite adultery, Hosea took her back. The relationship of Hosea and Gomer is allegorical to our relationship with God. When we are immoral, it is like spiritual adultery, but God, in His mercy, loves us enough to forgive us and restore us.
A lack of morality is departing from God. What blessings will we miss if we choose to go our own way? God leaves the choice in our hands, imperfect as we are, because God loves us enough to allow us to choose.
With His help, we can make the right choice, a choice that in your life could have divine consequences.
MATTHEW 5:8
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