Song of Solomon 4:11-15, “Your lips drop sweetness as the honeycomb, my bride; milk and honey are under your tongue. The fragrance of your garments is like that of Lebanon. You are a garden locked up, my sister, my bride; you are a spring enclosed, a sealed fountain. (He’s talking about her virginity. It’s not his literal sister; it’s his bride.) Your plants are an orchard of pomegranates with choice fruits, with henna and nard, nard and saffron, calamus and cinnamon, with every kind of incense tree, with myrrh and aloes and all the finest spices. You are a garden fountain, a well of flowing water streaming down from Lebanon.”

Wow! Song of Solomon 5:1, “Eat, O friends, and drink; drink your fill, O lovers.” 1 Corinthians 7:5, “Do not deprive each other….” Some of you are so tense, it’s hilarious.  You talk about sex and people freak.  The sexual nerve is woven into everything that we are, because remember?  We’re fully physical and fully spiritual.  We’re not animals.  Animals are just physical.  They’re not spiritual.  We’re not angels.  Angels are just spiritual.  We’ve got to be fully human. And when we take sex outside the marriage bed; when we go from big sex to small sex, we’re stripping away our humanity and we’re becoming dogs in doggy beds.

Well, why are Christians so weird about sex?  Let’s do some church history.  It’s time for church history.  Do you remember Plato? A lot of us have this platonic layer over our lives.  I’m not talkin’ about platonic stuff like in When Harry Met Sally, can men be friends with women?  Not that.  I’m talking about the philosopher, Plato.  Plato said something very interesting.  Plato basically said, “The soul is good; the body is bad.”

I want to ask you, have you done that?  You want to see God move?  Move your money.  I’m telling you, it’s all about the money.  Again, don’t blame me.  Again, I have to go back to Jesus, Matthew 6:21.  “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

You know last Sunday I was driving to church, and I found myself at an intersection here. I was a little bit late.  And I saw all these cars lined up on the frontage road to get into Fellowship Church.  There is traffic to get into church.  Have you ever thanked God for the traffic that we have at Fellowship Church?

Instead of cussing, why don’t you say, “God I praise you, this is incredible.  We have traffic to get into church.  We’ve had to start all of these locations to get a lot of people out of here to other places.  Man, this is phenomenal. We have to have police officers directing traffic in church.  Man, this is not a professional basketball game or a concert.  This is crazy, man.”

So I saw all of these people heading straight toward Fellowship Church.  I was watching the cars go by, all types of people.  White people, African-American people, Asian people, Hispanic people, young people, old people, and then I saw these kids and I’m thinking, “Man isn’t this great?”

These young people are coming to Fellowship Church, the next generation.  And then the light turned red, and I saw one guy picking his nose.  Now, I want to tell you something again.  People can see inside your car.  Don’t pick your nose at a traffic light.  You will get busted every time.  But the nose picker even came to Fellowship Church, and that’s okay.  We’ll take everybody.

And here’s what happened. This is very interesting. God and Hosea got into this conversation about Gomer. And if you read between the lines, you can almost hear God saying, “Hey, Hosea, do you know where Gomer is?” Hosea was probably saying, “Well yeah, I know where she hangs out.  I know the hotels and corners that she works.”

And God said, “Hosea, I’ve removed a lot of stuff from her. She’s gone over the edge and the ledge. She’s gone through the briars, and now I’m going to take away all the bling-bling. But,” God said, “Hosea, I want you to some silver and gold, some groceries and some clothes and, Hosea, I want you to track down Gomer. I want you to find your wife, who slept in all these wrong beds; I want you to track her down and I want you to get her this stuff.  I want you to bless her.”

So Hosea obviously found one of her lovers, one of the last few guys who would have anything to do with her, and he gave this guy all this stuff; gold and silver and clothes and groceries and money and all this stuff. And then Hosea stood at a distance and watched his wife’s lover walk up to her and give her all this stuff. His stuff!

Well, the lover takes credit for it. Hosea is standing at distance thinking, “Man, if Gomer only knew the source. If she only recognized the source!” That’s some unconditional love isn’t it? I ask you, what happens when you are blessed? Who gets the credit when you get silver, gold, groceries and money? Who does? Do you say, “Well, man, I did it! I’m the man! I’m the woman! I made the company!

Often, I will tell them, say, “Okay, guys, you are putting it on me that I am suppose to have you at three birthday parties this weekend.  You are going to be singing at this little deal at the church and you are going to have three friends over in the next week.”  With four children, there is often times that many things going on…”

Ed:  Five children.

Lisa:  Five counting Ed.  So, I said, “Look, I want to tell you something.  Deuteronomy 6 does not say anything about I have to have you at Ashley’s house on Wednesday.  It doesn’t say anything about having your birthday party at whatever place, the greatest birthday party adventure in the world.  It says I am supposed to teach you about the Lord.  If some of those other things fit in, hurrah for Mommy.  Yeah!  You’ve done a good job.  But this is the basic foundational stuff.  So I even share that with them.  I just kind of stumbled upon this because it was like, “Okay, I want to tell you, it’s not just me, it’s God.  God said this.  It’s not all falling on me.”  What that does is it shows them that everything in our lives is painted by the backdrop of the Scripture.  It’s put right there for us to see, so that is how we determine how we live.  We have to line things up.  We have to eliminate.  What do we eliminate?  What are we saying no to and what do we say yes to?  We better be saying yes to time alone with the Lord.  We need to be saying yes to time with our spouse.

Ed:  Oh, yeah.

Lisa:  You like that one.

I constantly woke to dreams of him and her in bed together. It would play over and over and over. I stopped feeling positive about myself and about life. It was all negative, jealous, enraged, diminished, bitter, frightened, lonely, ugly, mistrustful, exposed. His deception blinded me from how I saw myself. I started doubting and questioning everything about myself. I thought, ‘It must be me. I must have caused this affair to happen. I must change myself.’ I felt the fate of our marriage was in my hands. [End of letter]

Is that what you want? Is that the kind of stuff that you want to sign up for? As I’ve said, I’ve talked to hundreds of couples who have faced adultery. And every single person whose committed adultery has eventually come back to me and said this, are you ready? “Ed, I wish I could go back in time. I wish I could reverse the process.”

The process to promiscuity is painful and methodical. The process of having a true love affair with your spouse is also methodical, but it’s not painful. It’s awesome.

In John 8:44 Jesus is talking about the evil one. “He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.”

This process that I just described to you regarding how to have an affair is full of lies. Just lies. Half truths. Lies. Deception. And the evil one takes people down the same path, the same predictable path of promiscuity over and over and over and over and over again.

How To Have An Affair With Your Spouse

Well, let’s reverse the process, what do you say? Let’s take this process and reverse it. I want to talk to you now about how to have a love affair with your spouse.

S, K, D    “steal, kill and destroy.”  He says, “I’m going to steal from you and I’m going to kill you and I’m going to destroy your life and your marriage and your family and your money. Because here’s what I’m going to do…” He’s putting the cards on the table.  He’s saying, “Here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to tell you time and time again, ‘What happens here stays here.  Everything is cool.  Everything is compartmentalized.  Everything is in a neat little package.

You just stay there.  Everything will be fine.  What you do there will not affect who you are here.’” Man, it is working, isn’t it? So my challenge to all of you, men, women, students, whoever; my challenge for you is to develop a sexual strategy.  The devil has one.  We need to have one. If I walked up to you and said, “What’s your sexual strategy?” could you give me your sexual strategy?  I have one.  Lisa has one.  A lot of other people have sexual strategies, because if we’re going to win and act like victors and not victims; if we’re going to really have the confidence of winners and take hell by the square footage; if we’re going to dominate and incarcerate and infiltrate this whole thing, we have to have a sexual strategy.

We have to be defensive and offensive. That’s why 2 Corinthians 10:5 tells us, “…take every thought captive and make it obedient to Christ.” Again, I’m a warrior and I take captive every thought.  You’re going to have sexual thoughts.  You’re going to have leadings to go to Lust Vegas.

Philippians 2:3 says, “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others (consider your spouse) better than yourselves.”

So that’s something else we can do.

Respect, vulnerability, honor (admiration and affirmation): that’s all about marital fulfillment.

Reconciliation

Then instead of stonewalling; instead of icing someone out, how about reconciliation?  Here’s what happens. Let’s go back to John 10. Jesus said (paraphrased), “I am the door. If anyone enters through me, he or she will be saved, will go in and out and find pasture, will be saved, safe and satisfied.”

And because of Jesus we have the power and the ability to do these things and to walk through the door of marital fulfillment.

Here’s what happens when we walk through the door.  2 Corinthians 5:18-19. Check this out. “All of this is from God.”

Everything is from God.  I’m not just making this stuff up. I mean, this is from God.  This is what it means to be a full court follower of Christ, a full court husband or a full court wife.

“All this is from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us  the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them..”

That’s some good news right there.  God does not count my sins against me.

[the verse continues] “And he has committed us to the message of reconciliation.” Isn’t that great to know that today?

Because I have been reconciled by God through Christ; because I’ve walked through the door; because Christ is in my life, as a Christ follower, I should rush to reconcile.

Any time Lisa and I have a relational sticking point; any time there’s an argument; any time there’s a problem; any time I’ve done something against her, as a believer, I should rush to reconcile because I’ve been greatly and perfectly reconciled by the person of Jesus Christ.  Reconciliation.

I was on this phone call with this gentleman for over 8 hours that day.  He could not come up with the account or the money.  We called our legal counsel in, our board members, and finally I said, “You know what? It’s late. Tomorrow we’re going to go down to the bank. I’ll fly in and we’re going to meet with our bankers.”

This guy kept telling me, “I would never lie. The money’s in the account; I swear to you my relative has given it to Fellowship Church. I would never lie. I swear to you. I would never do anything to hurt the church.” Early the next morning I received the most devastating and brutal phone call I have ever received.  It was the staff member that so many trusted.

He said, “Ed, I lied about the money. I made the donor up.  I lied about the beach house. None of it is true.” My head was spinning.  I felt a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach.  Here, at the time, our small church was putting everything on the table to build a building of epic proportions.  Our board was together, our staff was together, our church was together, and I was talking to a betrayer, evil incarnate.

And I found myself saying, “You know, thank you for being honest with me.  We want to help you because you are sick.”  And then I said, “I forgive you and hung up the phone.” I have never seen this guy or talked to him since.  And here is what is so wacky about it.  Our accountants came in the next day—and we worked with one of the major accounting firms around—not one dime was missing.

Well, a high priest could go into the Holy of Holies once a year on the Day of Atonement to do what?  To atone for the sins of the nation.  And it was a pretty tenuous deal because the high priest had to have bells on his robe. And this guy would have a rope around his ankle, because if he misstepped in the presence of God, in the Holy of Holies, behind the door; if he walked in there with any sin or if he as unclean in any way, boom! He would just clock out.  Well, the people wouldn’t go in there and get him, so they had the rope and they would just drag the body out. And Scripture tells us if they couldn’t hear the bells anymore, they would just drag the dead body out.  God is holy.  He is powerful.  Standing in the presence of God is nothing to be taken lightly or flippantly.  The tabernacle, which ultimately, of course, became the temple, was all about a door.

Well, then God decided to do something, God stepped forward in a time of history and he sent the second person of the Godhead, the Trinity, to planet Earth.  God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit.  God the Son, Jesus.

Jesus lived on planet Earth. And one day during his 36-month public ministry, Jesus said this in John 10:9: “I am the door.”

Isn’t that incredible?  He said, “I am the door.”

He didn’t say, “I am a door.” He said, “I am the door.”

And then, if you keep reading in verse 9, Jesus said, “If anyone…” What does anyone mean?  It means anyone. “If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out (you can say he’ll be safe) and find pasture (you can say he will be satisfied).”

You cannot out give God. And recently I had the opportunity to sign the biggest book deal I’ve ever signed in my life. I signed with a publisher out of New York and they gave me an advance. I thought about telling you how much money, but then I said, “No.” Let me tell you why I’m not going to tell you. Because if I told you how much money I’m making on this book from this publisher, some of you would go, “That’s not that much.” Others would go, “Whoa! Bling-a-bling, ching-a-ching.” So, I’m not going to tell you. It’s between me and God and you and God. It is what’s left over.

I don’t care if you have millions or thousands or hundreds, it’s what’s left over. We bring the tithe, we give offerings. It’s what’s left over. So when I signed that deal, I just knew God was telling me, “Ed, I want you to give this to Town and Country.” I said, “Okay Lord,” I said, “It’s a lot of money.” If I talk to my accountant man she would just break out in hives. But I made that decision, and we’re in the process of doing that right now.

Well, then as I began to think about it and pray about it more, I said, “Okay, we have these savings over here and we’re vested in some areas. I’m going to match that from savings.” So I’m going to give the advance and also I’m going to match that from our savings to Town and Country.”

Now, let me tell you why I tell you that. I don’t tell you that to go, “Whoa, man, Ed’s a spiritual giant. Whoa, hey!” No, no. I tell you that because if you read your Bible, specifically in 1 Chronicles, David, King David said, “Okay, we’re going to build God’s church, his temple” in the Old Testament.