The Apostle Paul is a valuable model for pastors in so many ways, including the way that he boldly waded into controversial and touchy topics. Evaluating his ministry in Ephesus, he said, “I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God” (Acts 20:27).
We can see this kind of boldness on full display in his first letter to the Corinthians, where Paul publicly rebuked the church for their tolerance of “a man… sleeping with his father’s wife” (1 Cor. 5:1). Paul knew that this kind of flagrant sexual immorality must not be tolerated in the church, so he pressed past any awkwardness he may have felt while writing about sex. He had to call the church to holiness.
Unfortunately, many pastors today feel uncomfortable preaching about sex from the pulpit. We often hide behind pseudo-modesty, unwilling to shepherd this area of their lives while our churches have “sexual immorality among [them]” (1 Cor. 5:1).
I’m not saying that pastors should have a lustful urge to preach graphic, nearly-pornographic sermons, but I am saying that we need to stop shrinking back from declaring the whole counsel of God.
The task couldn’t be more urgent:
- More than half of practicing Christians use porn regularly.[1] In your church on any given Sunday, half of the men and women present have likely sought out pornography.
- More than half of Christian marriages have one-sided sex. One survey of 22,000 Christian marriages found that while 95% of husbands say they reached a climax in most sexual encounters with their wives, only 48% of women said they reached a climax most of the time. In other words, in a majority of Christian marriages, husbands aren’t serving their wives in bed.[2]
In a world as sexually confused as ours, we can’t leave our people like sheep without a shepherd. We need to speak up.
Here are five guidelines to consider how to address sex from the pulpit.
1. Preach Biblically About Sex
The Bible talks about sex. A lot.
From Adam and Eve’s “naked and unashamed” life in the Garden, the exhortations to become so intoxicated with your wife that you end up “lost in her love forever” (Prov. 5:19), Paul’s candor about sex and sexual sin mentioned above, and so many other examples—the Bible doesn’t shy away from speaking about sex.
You don’t need to force the topic of sex into a Scripture passage where it isn’t, but you do need to be ready when sex comes up to address it in an intentional way.
2. Preach Soberly About Sex
Sexual sin is deadly. The Bible doesn’t hold back and we shouldn’t either. The sexually immoral will not inherit the kingdom of God (1 Cor. 6:9–10).
This needs to be said. But if you stop here, you haven’t preached the whole counsel of God.
3. Preach Joyfully About Sex
The people in your church—married or not—should know that sex is a wonderful gift of God.
The Bible makes clear that sex is meant to be pleasurable. While Scripture clearly presents procreation as a central purpose of sex, it also devotes significant attention to sexual pleasure and mutual delight within marriage. Our preaching should reflect that reality too. When preaching about sexual sin, don’t just warn about the consequences of the counterfeit. Invite your church to the joys of the real deal.
However, sex is wonderful, not just because of this physical pleasure it can bring, but because it reflects profound spiritual realities about marriage. In the vulnerabilities of sex, we have an opportunity to serve one another with an intimacy not available in any other sphere of life.
The unmarried in your church need to hear this. Teach so that young people in your church one day enter marriage (if the Lord wills) with a holy excitement about sex, not lustful craving or legalistic trembling.
This is equally important for the married people in your church to hear. It’s easy for spouses to become roommates without regular, intentional effort. Set a beautiful vision of marriage before your church to give every couple something to aspire to in their own homes.
4. Preach Mutually About Sex
Remember the above statistic about half of Christian marriages having one-sided sex? That’s not going to fix itself. The sheep aren’t going to get out of the valley of the shadow of death without a shepherd. This issue is too deeply entrenched in the church and reinforced by the culture.
The men in your church need to be clearly called to serve their wives in bed. This should be included in the application any time that we call husbands to “man up” at home (because, statistically, most of them are failing in this area). This should be a topic of men’s retreats and marriage seminars. This should be called out from the pulpit with the same clarity that Paul called out the Corinthian man who was sleeping with his father’s wife.
Husbands need to be told that sex should be wonderful and pleasurable for their wives.
Husbands need to be told that the cultural lies about men having a “higher sex drive” than women are myths.
Husbands need to be told that their selfishness in bed is sinful and they need to cultivate real, honest conversation about sex with their wives.
5. Preach Carefully About Sex
We preach to sexual sinners, but we also preach to sexual sufferers. Sexual abuse has, almost certainly, wreaked havoc on the lives of men and women in your church. When we preach about sex, we’re entering a vulnerable space, so we must proceed with caution.
Make a plan with your elders about how to speak carefully about sex from the pulpit. What words are acceptable and what aren’t? For example, should we say “orgasm,” stick to the more generic, “climax,” or should we avoid both of these words altogether? Would the church be comfortable with “sex,” or is the vaguer “marriage bed” to be preferred?
If you think you may feel uncomfortable preaching about sex, send a draft to godly men and women in your congregation and ask for feedback ahead of time. Their careful eyes can’t control what you preach, but they can give you helpful feedback about how something might be perceived. Again, this is a vulnerable area to discuss, so we need to proceed with caution.
Talking about sex is hard. It has been ever since the fall, when Adam and Eve realized they were naked and covered themselves up. But Jesus restores the broken things. He is a redeemer and we look forward to the day when he makes all things new.
Author’s Note: If talking about sex seems overwhelming, I wrote a book to help. Sex and Self-Forgetfulness is a 30-day devotional for married couples. It unpacks God’s design for pure, pleasurable, unifying sex and helps couples live that design out by having honest, careful conversations with one another. I hope this is a resource that can equip you to preach and counsel with confidence. I also hope it’s a book you can put in the hands of people in your church.
[1] https://www.barna.com/trends/over-half-of-practicing-christians-admit-they-use-pornography/