Temple or Amusement Park?

1 Thessalonians 4: 1-12

The Reformer's Fire
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Exposition by Max A Forsythe

Question 71:
What is required in the seventh commandment?
Answer 71:
The seventh commandment requireth the preservation of our own and our neighbor's chastity in heart, speech, and behavior.

As we consider appropriate and in appropriate behaviors related to the seventh commandment, I believe we can divide those who obey from those who do not in a joke from the Croft puppets who appeared on the Barbara Mandrell show more than a decade ago. As those puppets observed the human condition they divided mankind on the issue of how they saw the human body. Some consider the body a Temple for the Holy Spirit while others only consider the body as an Amusement Park! Therein lies the difference in behavior as it relates to the seven deadly sins upheld by the church of Rome and in the Puritan tradition as well.

However, let me be very careful to describe the Puritan tradition. The first Puritans in Europe were castigated by the Roman viewpoint because the Puritans took what were considered great liberties to enjoy the physical relationship between man and wife. To the Roman world at the end of the Dark Ages, intimate relationships were only for the procreation of children. Martin Luther and all the rest of the newly married clergy in Europe during the Reformation actively sought to destroy that mentality by modeling a healthy loving relationship for their congregations to imitate.

Gone for good were the monastic orders and unnecessary rules and regulations. "What God has joined together let not man keep apart" we might understand the new found freedom. In fact, there are phrases in the two catechisms that are understood to admonish those who would neglect the expected duties of the marriage bond. Old John Knox on one occasion even publicly charged one of the men in his congregation that he was tired of hearing his wife complain about his lack of marital enthusiasm. Now wait a minute, you may be wondering if you have wondered into a public Amusement Park instead of a church of the living God? No indeed, all that I am saying is that the most necessary regulation of sexual activity is that of the marriage covenant where man and wife promise to the conditions of the normal contract!

Certainly, many single people can and do live a constant Christian witness outside of such public contracts. And by character they are not tempted specifically with breaking the seventh commandment. Remember, every person is finely tuned by body chemistry, moral training and integrity of character. The temptations that some are plagued with do not bother others in the least. However, I do not think that there is any person who does not have a particular sin that continues to make them aware of their sinful nature.

Our catechetical question today does encourage us to build and maintain a Temple like attitude and character. And we can see in our passage from 1st Thessalonians that such a character is the expected development of a life in Christ. The word "control" is an essential thought here in the process of sanctification. The catechism simply enhances that control by describing the necessity of applying control to the heart, speech and behavior.

Any such moral control is suspect in our day and time. After all we have positioned a body of secular high priests and priestesses in all of the public schools to make it difficult for parents to impose any particular behavior on their children. I remember when guidance counselors were first required in public school. They began their work by explaining to us students that they were there to help us deal with the generation gap between us and our parents. They were there to protect us from unreasonable expectations for success that might drive a student to distraction. Many of them also presumed that relationships that were once considered wicked and perverse should be destigmatised so that those who were born with a love of sin would not be categorized as ethically challenged! Somehow or another in the application of their wisdom the love of chastity in the heart, speech and behavior disappeared so that today any form of chastity is considered odd and even, if I may use an old word in its normal sense - queer.

The sanctified goodness that even many worldly pagans were once raised with is now becoming a distant memory. At least an honorable president, Jimmy Carter did admit the wisdom of Matthew 5:28 in that he, like many in our day had sinned in his heart when it came to lust. And while the country spent thirty years installing a triad of submarines, bombers and missiles against nuclear attack, hardly any public effort was made to hold back the wholesale rush of the sixties and seventies to normalize every brutish form of lusty adventure.

Long before Primary Colors became a popular novel, movie and topic, the escapades of Tom Jones and many many others became sensational prequels. Earnest Hemingway and many other novelists of this century popularized the sensual press and helped to enriched the entertainment industry. To be fair, not all of the books, papers, magazines, television, movies and internet is totally romanticized, it only seems that way.

There are still good solid materials to be found if you are willing to look. In fact, very many of the best R rated movies would only need 30 seconds to five minutes censured to make a wonderful entertainment vehicle. Yet, the powers to be refuse to allow their work to be improved for public consumption. And why not, the general public has allowed the bad to drive out the good. And no public or private agency has succeeded in the preservation of chastity in the public square.

Red Skelton, before his death publicly deplored the dirty mouths of the comedians who followed after him and the giants of that industry in the forties, fifties and sixties. Now there is so much filthy talk that it almost seems normal. Women who a generation would have slapped any sexual aggressor silly, now hesitate because such an action would reflect more on them than those who perversely harass them.

Behavior is indeed the child of the heart and speech, if we would not restrain the heart and speech, neither will we be successful in holding back the behavior. One family of educators removed a daughter from public school rather than leave her to the mercy of an unprotected environment. Some social do-gooders even look for children who have moral restraints put upon them by parents who would seek to control the lives of their children. The public square in education has become one giant mouse maze where socialization is much more important than learning. The greatest sin in our day is to be judgmental and anyone who will not associate with the most perverted pests must suffer from some form of dementia!

At the very least today, you have learned that the calling of this commandment is indeed becoming ever so much more difficult. That does not justify any laxness on our part. We are still called to live a life holy and pleasing to our Lord even if we are the only Temples in a whole suburb of Amusement Parks. C.S. Lewis observed in the fifties, that the direction which society was taking then would one day make the true Christian character shine out like a great light in the midst of a dung heap!

To that society we have now arrived. And believe me, you don't have to be too good to stand out in your witness today. Just being able to say "NO" to anything will set you apart and separate you from the general pagan climate. Recently I spoke to one of our ornery students and noted that it was time for him to improve his behavior because the people who made him look good were now all gone! He didn't appreciate the fairness of that calling! Neither do we sometimes, it is too easy to behave well if we have the Spirit, but do indeed let us go on to improve the behavior of our speech and even our heart as well.

For if we neglect the spiritual training and development of our heart, it will not be too long before we take the on ramp to the twenty-six lane highway to hell! May the Lord our God bless us with self-control and the empowerment of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

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