In this panel discussion, Nick Stumbo and three speakers explore the pervasive disconnect between Christian faith and sexual practice. They note that many believers are taught to view sex as sinful or to avoid it before marriage, yet a large majority of premarital couples are already sexually active. This creates a split where belief systems and sexual behavior are unaligned, leading to emotional distress, crises of faith, and unhealthy patterns such as associating sexual pleasure with wrongdoing. The participants argue for intentionally bringing God into sexual relationships—both before and after marriage—by teaching that sex is a good, God‑designed part of life, that sexual curiosity is natural, and that biblical standards and mutual respect should guide intimacy. They also discuss the modern threat of pornography, especially to children with easy device access, and stress the need for early, responsible sexual education that equips individuals to make choices rather than be driven by unchecked urges. The conversation culminates in a five‑point framework for Christian sexual ethics: recognizing sex as divine good, acknowledging innate sexual responses, taking responsibility for how those responses are expressed, fostering mutual respect, and grounding decisions in biblical standards.
Chapters
So most people have kind of a divide between how they think about God and how they think about sex. So how do we learn to connect our sexuality to our faith system and our belief in God? And perhaps more importantly, why is this so crucial?
I had a woman that I was seeing who was dealing with sexual issues, and she said, When I go into the bedroom to make love with my husband, I leave God outside and close the door, which kind of pictured exactly what you're talking about.
But it is so common, and particularly now for premarital couples, because they've been raised with not to do it. And they haven't been taught much about how important sex is, and particularly how highly God values sex in marriage. And so they shut down everything. They either shut down all their feelings, and then when they say, I do, it doesn't come back.
Right.
It doesn't surface. And so they're so distraught, and sometimes it's even a crisis of faith because the pastor has told them, if you don't do it, you'll have a great sex life. but there's been no preparation for that sex in marriage, and no instruction about how wonderful it is, and how to make it, embrace it, and make it wonderful. And then the other factor is that at least 85— that number is probably higher than now— percent, 85% of premarital couples are already sexually active when they—
Have been sexually active before they get to marriage. We're talking now about Christian couples.
Yeah.
And so, there's kind of a split where they have this belief of what they should or shouldn't be doing, but then they end up not really planning for it or designing it, but they end up in sexual experiences anyway.
And then their sexual drive gets connected with something wrong, and it's only good— it's only got that dopamine when it's wrong. And I remember that one of the first women that came to us years ago, she was on her 4th marriage, and she said, I think it may be about me. And she had that pattern of— And that's also a pattern we see with women who have been sexually abused, where where it's only good when it's wrong, when they— because once they're in marriage, they feel trapped. But it also happens with this teaching and then being sexually active but not embracing it as good and of God.
And so we always talk about the split, the belief system and then the behaviors, and those aren't connected. And that's why, because they've kind of connected their sexual drives and their sexual activity with something bad or sinful or—
Sneaky.
Yeah, all that world.
Not embraced and good of God. So, we do work very hard on helping couples to bring God into their sexual relationship, and even premaritally helping couples wherever they are in their sexual journey To commit that to God, to bring God into that, rather than to keep that split going, to get their sexual drive, and teaching them how important sex is in marriage. And whatever we do before marriage should be what helps us have a great sex life in marriage. And how we handle that as leaders in the Christian world is very difficult. You know, how do we say, do we be the ones who approve it, or do we just get with them where they are and help them bring God into it? And that's more the role we take.
Yeah, yeah, that's a powerful observation that prior to marriage we've associated any sexual activity with something sinful or wrong, right? We've kind of jokingly said that the church's approach can be that sex is bad, dirty, and wrong, so save it for the one you love.
That's right, that's exactly right.
All of a sudden we're supposed to flip a switch and, and something we've only thought of of as sinful or wrong is now okay. But no one, like you said, no one has really taught us or shown us the way into really exploring and, and living in the beauty of God's design. And I, I really appreciate what you said earlier, that reality that it actually— there is a difference. It's not just that dopamine happened outside of marriage and now I'm getting dopamine inside of marriage, that those— there's those other chemicals coming into play that are involved in eye contact and closeness to another person's body and respect of them that's creating chemicals that are not present in something like pornography. And, you know, no one explained that to me as a 21-year-old young man, right, getting ready to be married. She's like, well, it's all been wrong and now it'll be good and God will bless it because we're married. But actually—
and now I won't be tempted for pornography. Yeah, yeah.
The other one is, and I won't be tempted for pornography either.
But that's not You know, when it's become such a part of a young man's life.
But what we try to do is to teach that sex is good and of God, and that sexual curiosity is natural.
So that's why children are so vulnerable to pornography. And now with even young children having laptops or cell phones, The pornography, they're carrying it around in their pocket, and so they don't have to have great techniques to find it. It just—
it shows up.
It gets them.
But anyway, so sex is good and of God. Sexual curiosity is natural. A third thing we say is sexual responses are automatic or innate. We are all born as sexual beings with sexual responses. But the fourth thing is That we have to be responsible for what we do with those. That part's up to us. We have to learn what we do with our feelings. Not that the feelings are bad, but we're called upon to make choices about those feelings.
And that's what's so helpful. If we help kids and individuals make decisions rather than just let their their drives guide them.
Or tell them it's all bad. Either one. And then the 5th thing we would try to teach is that biblical standards and mutual respect are the baseline for all sexual relationships.
And so our decisions, those decisions that we're responsible for, are based on the biblical standards and mutual respect.
