The Value of Virginity

Samantha asked:

"...how do you deal with still being a virgin because you just don't want to sleep around? I'm 19 ... At 16, almost all of the girls have lost their virginity. Even my physician gave me a weird look ... [when] I told her I was still a virgin. My main problem is the reaction of people in my environment. Do you have any tips?"

I hate this this is even an issue, Samantha-- it just goes to show how screwed up this world has become, that the one person in a group that has self-restraint and good judgment feels strange and apologetic because they've actually maintained purity.

Here are some thoughts about the value of virginity (not by any means is this an all-encompassing list, but hopefully these thoughts will encourage you to hold your ground in this area):

(1) While the world says that the sleep-around-single is the one "exercising his/her freedom", the virgin is the one who is truly free. Free from disease, which is a growing concern among singles today. Free from the emotional trauma that goes along with casual sex. And free to bestow the gift of purity and virginity upon their husband one day, as a precious gift, unspoiled and rare.

And this is something you can share with people who look at you crazy, by saying, "Look, I'm just trying to practice free love. Love free from shame, disease, guilt, emotional heartache, and self-loathing. Love that frees me to give a precious gift to the one who God created me to become one with."

(2) Humans were created as both soul and body for a reason; these two elements of our personhood are meant to act in agreement with one another-- that is to say, we are not meant to believe things but not translate those beliefs into our behavior. Our behavior shows what's in our souls. In a new book I'm reading, Rebecca Jones writes:

"Sexual intimacy is so powerful that when women use it lightly, they plunge into a valley of shadow. Those shadows thicken, and women cannot escape, because the bodies they own, in which they sleep, eat, and live, are the very ones they have sullied. One way to ignore such guilt is to divide the body and soul. The body can do what it wants and the soul remains detached."

This is all too common. Sex is an activity that, when exercised outside of God's proper boundaries, divides body and soul. Rather than being an incredibly intimate experience, it becomes an incredibly isolating experience. Casual sex isolates us, not only from the ones with whom we are "intimate", but even from our very own soul. We end up trying to protect ourselves from further heartache by dividing the action from the emotional connection it was designed to cement. We trivialize it by describing it as an action to engage in for a little fun, rather than only enjoying it within the boundaries and for the purpose for which God created it, which brings me to my 3rd point...

(3) GOD is the One Who created sex... we need to look to Him to know what it is for. A young adult looking to peers to find out what sex is for is like toddlers who look to other toddlers for clues about what's the best things to eat. They're going to place priority on candy, chips, and chocolate milk rather than on the more lasting things: protein that helps you grow muscles, vitamins that help you go strong, etc. In the same way that those toddlers need to look to their parents (who know better than they do what they need), we need to quit looking to a secular culture to tell us what sex is for, and instead look to our Father, Who, in the first mention of sex put it this way: "they shall become one flesh" (Gen. 2:24). Which brings me to point #4...

(4) ONENESS is the primary purpose of physical intimacy, which is why it hurts people so bad to sleep around. It's like pulling a woman's skin away from her bones, like pulling a head away from its body. There's no question: we become one with the person we are intimate with. That's the purpose. Is procreation a purpose? Yes. Is pleasure a purpose? Yes. But the primary purpose is oneness- to show an earthly example of the oneness Christ desires to have (and will have) with the Church. We can more perfectly understand the unity Christ desires to have with us when we look at a monogamous, committed, serving-one-another, loving-one-another marriage, and see the intimacy that happens there.

David Gardner, author of Sacred Sex, puts it this way:

"Sexual intercourse, by God's description, is the way of knowing and experiencing another human being in the most intimate way possible. This "knowing" is what melds two strangers into one. A wonderful example of this is a Dutch slang word for sex, naaien, which literally means 'sewing'. Two pieces of material are put on top of each other and then attached in a way that will 'keep them secure and fastened to each other long after the sewing is over and the weaver is gone.' This idea of being sewn together in sex is a useful image... husbands and wives don't dissolve together into one shapeless blob. However, they are intricately and intimately sewn together in such a way that man should 'not separate' them (Matthew 19:6). Oneness joins us permanently, ... [and] lasts beyond the immediate act of sexual intimacy."

(5) Finally, obedience to Christ (which means sexual purity--not only in action but in thought as well) is important, even if/when we're the last man or woman standing. Just like that sign-holding woman in the picture at the top of this article, even if we feel TOTALLY alone in a crowd of people going the opposite way, we are still to obey. The Bible says "obedience is better than sacrifice." Obeying, even when we don't feel like it and especially when we are tired and don't understand all the "whys", still is pleasing to our Father.

When I say "no playing in the street", I'm not trying to deny my children FUN. They might see a parade go by and say, "MOM- all those kids are playing in the street- dancing to music, waving to the crowd, eating candy, and they're having a really good time... why can't I play in the street?" That's when I have to explain to them that the time for THEM to be in the parade is not now- it may come in the future, but this is not the time. "Trust me," I'm saying. And it's true- their obedience (which will protect them from getting run over by a car or lost in a crowd) is important and pleasing to me, even if they don't understand all the reasons that I'm telling them not to play in the street.

BE ENCOURAGED and BE REBELLIOUS
Be encouraged, Samanatha-- and any other readers who are wondering about these things... I would encourage you to think of it this way: be a rebel. Rebel against the low expectations of culture, rebel against the easy way out, rebel against the "norms"-- and instead be a radical... a radical footsoldier in the army of the Most High God, a radical example of what Christ can do in the life of someone who obeys Him, and a radical person who swims against the stream of culture in pursuit of the source of Living Water.

1 Corinthians 10:12-13 says, "Let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and He will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it." Hang in there, Samantha, and look for your ways of escaping the stronghold of this generation- you'll be so glad you did!


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