Hey, leave room for the Holy Spirit. Careful with that hug. Show your love with the Christian side hug instead. Guard your heart. Guard her heart, you dig?

When you stack all of these phrases on top of one another, they sound pretty over the top. But, these are the kinds of phrases we drop all of the time in Christian circles. They usually come from well-intended thoughts of protecting you from making sexual mistakes, but they have an unintended side-effect: fear.

It’s not uncommon for Christian brides and grooms to be afraid of sex. They’ve been taught for so long that it’s bad and now all of the sudden, thanks to marriage, it’s supposed to be good? We’ve twisted the narrative. Sex was never bad. God made it to be good. It’s us who’ve been abusing sex — not sex abusing us.

We don’t talk about sex in a healthy way

We act as if God never intended for sex to be an enjoyable activity. That He somehow created it and after the fact was like, “Whoops, didn’t know they’d like doing that so much.” No, of course not. However, as with all good things, humanity finds a way to make sex bad.

We’re reckless with it. We use it for pleasure. We use it for power. We use it to hurt people. We use it to fulfill ourselves. And the sad thing is, a lot of this can be avoided if we were better about talking about sex in a healthy way. If we could be open about sex, we could help future generations avoid the same mistakes we’ve made.

The Bible and sex

God made sex to be good. It is the most intimate physical form of connection one person can share with another. It certainly has its place in our lives, so why do so many Christians shy away from the topic?

Here, let’s break some walls real quick. This is a passage from the Bible:

“Your very figure is like a palm tree,

your breasts are like clusters.

I said: I will climb the palm tree,

I will take hold of its branches.

Now let your breasts be like clusters of the vine

and the fragrance of your breath like apples,

And your mouth like an excellent wine-

that flows smoothly for my lover,

spreading over the lips and the teeth.​”

Ever read that passage? If not, you might be thinking, “Surely, this is not from the actual Bible.” Well, it is. This is from the Song of Solomon, a poetic conversation between a bride and groom to be. This book has so much to teach us, but we’re afraid of it because we don’t like to talk about sex.

We do ourselves a disservice by not wrestling with the passages from Song of Solomon and other passages about sex. Song of Solomon has a lot to teach us about sexual intimacy as it’s designed to be, and even about our relationship as the church with God. Why wouldn’t we want to learn more about that?

Our sexual conscience is driven by guilt and fear

A healthy Christian relationship has plenty of room for amazing sex. That’s one of the perks (read perks, not purpose) of marriage. You’re supposed to enjoy one another. Sure, it is a little awkward at first, but that’s how it is with anything new and exciting. However, there shouldn’t be any stigma placed on sex that makes it scary.

In our Unfiltered Radio podcast series, we get real in conversations about sex. Whether you’re a Christian or a skeptic, there is a lot to learn about intimacy, desire and the joys of sex. We hope that this Swipe Right podcast breaks down some barriers that have been built up in your life between you and the sexuality you were meant to enjoy.