The Bedroom and the Bible: Single, Divorced, and Questioning Intimacy

Welcome to Episode 16 of the UnYoked Podcast with host Todd Turner: "Intimacy and the Single Divorced Christian." In this episode, we dive deep into the taboo yet pressing topics that face divorced Christians today. We explore a range of intimate matters [00:02:15], from the moral implications of masturbation [00:03:45] to the real definition of sex and establishing boundaries in new relationships [00:05:30]. Todd Turner challenges the hypocritical judgments [00:07:20] and the silence that often shrouds sexual behavior within the Christian community [00:11:50].

With candor and insight, Todd shares personal experiences and discussions [00:14:10] that shed light on the complexities of navigating intimacy as a single, divorced believer [00:18:25]. We confront the damaging effects of "purity culture" [00:19:45] and debunk myths about God's promises relating to sex and marriage [00:21:00].  

Join us as we address the sensitive issue of friends with benefits [00:32:22], recommend key resources for healing and shame [00:35:55], and discuss how to cultivate a healthy, biblical view of sexuality  

Transcript

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To support the Unyoked podcast and to help others. Please subscribe and rate right now. And if this resource is helpful, please tell a friend. Now let's get started. The Unyoke podcast navigating the pain, process and possibilities after a christian divorce. You let's talk about a taboo topic you will never hear from the pulpit or from the mouth of most preachers. The topic sex and the single christian post divorce. You know you might hear from most. God says no. Next topic, please. But this is layered and we're going to dive into the sometimes messy but authentic levels of this topic. We can't get into this without some ground rules. Why? Because every one of you listening, yes, you have on different lenses, assumptions, beliefs, practices, teaching influences the american christian cultural lens that we all have different ones. Many of you have made your mind up, many of you struggle, and many of you who don't even really consider what God has to say about this topic, you sort of live with the head in the sand, and many of you just live and manage your life without thinking of the truth or consequences or even maybe highly value wise biblical lens decisions. And some of you have just found your comfort zone around this topic and you want to leave it that way. We all have so many different perspectives, so how are we going to navigate this? Well, let's start with a lens we must have on before we get started. Truth and grace. The tension. We've talked about this in different episodes, this idea that truth and grace. Like the coin, Jesus is the only person who walked both sides perfectly. We, you and I, our institutions, our churches, we lean to one side or the other, but not just once. On various topics. If you're good at something, you look through the truth lens and you sort of shame anybody who doesn't have that right. But when it's your sin, it's a lot easier to look from the gray side and you don't like to hear the truth side. Jesus walks in the middle perfectly. And I'm going to pull this for those of you who have the benefit of looking this coin, we're going to widen it. It's a thick coin. We live in the middle, and we're going to talk about the middle between truth and grace. If you only look at issues from one side or the other, it is very dangerous. This podcast has always been about those living in this post divorce vortex, living in the milestones in the reality of post marriage. It's not a christian podcast in the terms of we're going to teach theology about marriage and divorce. If so I would just go ahead and throw some truth out, some verses, and we would just move on. But we're not going to do that. So remember how at the very beginning of this podcast, I said that I wanted this to be like when you're pregnant, the book, what to expect when you're expecting. Well, I want to identify the milestones post divorce that you're going to go through. And sex is one of the major milestones, and we're not going to avoid it. I've had people try to ask me, why are you doing this? I thought, well, I'm doing it because I made a commitment to talk about the tough stuff after divorce, and this is one of them. And what I'm not going to allow us to do is what I call t shirt theology, and that is just throw a verse, throw a saying on top of something that's very complex. We do this a lot with teenagers about sex, right? Just don't do it. Genesis one and two. Don't. How about that? We'll leave it there, and then we do it with drugs and addicts. Like, well, just say no. Okay, well, I'm a heroin addict. Well, it doesn't matter. Just say no. Well, it's a little more complicated. And we do this with the fringes, the far right and the far left, with debates on homosexuality and abortion. We do the exact same thing. So let's get into the weeds of that for a second. So the edge, the true side says abortion is wrong. The gray side says, well, it's a woman's body, it's her choice. And a lot of people argue from here with a lot of details in the middle. And I'm going to give you an example. I don't know a person who, if they had a 14 year old daughter who was gang raped, if they rushed into the emergency room and the doctor said, we gave her a pill, none of this is going to take, she's going to be all right. Thank God. Thank God that that happened, that we were able to save her from not getting pregnant. And then on the other side, I don't know too many people who would say, well, it's a woman's body, it's a woman's choice, but you can wait till eight months and 29 days, and then you can terminate that pregnancy. I don't think most people, 98% of the people would not agree with that statement, and 98% of the people would say, yeah, I'll take that morning after pill on a rate. Right. Well, if we work from where we normally work from. We don't even get to talk about those little details. Well, we're going to do that with sex because there's a lot of details in the middle, in this middle ground that is not as simple as, well, if it feels good, you can do it. And I don't care what the Bible says, and then absolutely, 100% not. Why are we even talking about it? Does that make sense? So why am I doing this? Well, I've never shied away from hard, so here we go. Let's jump in. So I'm going to ask a couple of things of you. If you're not post divorce, if you're not been unyoked and you're just listening in, this is like sitting in on an AA meeting, right? If you're not an addict, throwing verses and throwing theology at people, going through stuff is just not helpful. This isn't a place where God says, that's wrong. Stop, you big sinner. This is not that. And if you're like me and you're navigating life post unyoking and you're wanting to wade into the deep end of a topic that you're navigating, I want you to listen, to ponder, consider, reflect on this complex issue in a safe place. I'm not saying ignore truth. I'm saying let's talk about an issue at different levels, and let's don't ignore it because we're worried about the american christian culture and what they're going to think about you. Or remember the grace episode we talked about, the hand me your list christians? We're not worried about them. This is a safe place for this conversation. So at the recording of this podcast, I've been single about five and a half years. Due to my location, my personality, my career, this podcast, and my dating, I have literally talked with hundreds of christian single divorcees. It's not an exaggeration that 99% of every Christian I've interacted with is or will be having sex pre their next marriage. It's not 50%, it's 99%. I have only met two or three people who said they weren't going to have sex until they're married again. And then when I dug, two of them actually said, well, once I know that's my person and I'm engaged, I probably will, just in case. Right? I mean, I was following a christian singles social media account the other day, and they actually posted this meme and it said life is too short for bad relationships and bad sex. And I just thought, how interesting. On a christian site, they would put that, and it's this mindset that we're going to wade through because post trauma, many people just want to feel joy, they want to feel good, they want normalcy, which we can define that in various ways, but for those of you listening in to judge or wondering what's what on this sex is happening, just no one's talking about it. Once again, we preach genesis one and two and we don't talk about the broken world side of it. And it is happening and we're going to dig into the middle of it. I think many pastors, christians think teenagers, divorcees, maybe widows, just need to read their bibles and go to bed at ten. We get told date Jesus, but they ignore, especially for us divorces and widows, the fact that we've already had sex. We know how it works, we're familiar with it, we like it, we enjoy it, we think about it, we want it. Christian singles post divorce are having sex and these are the facts. And it's sort of funny, it's like to that group, what do they think we do? We're going to get graphic here for a second. Some might say maybe, just maybe you can masturbate. But some of you would be like, oh no, masturbation is a total sin. Why would you do that? And some would say, well, it depends. And what were you thinking about? What did you use to do it? I've got in this debate with christians, if you're married and you're on a month mission, I'll call it a mission trip, a business trip, can you masturbate from afar though you're married? What if you were thinking about her and it's a complex topic but I find it interesting because the attitude seems to be, well, it's better than sex. If you got to do it, that's better than sex because that would be the worst thing you could do is have sex. And then that gets into the question, what is sex? Kissing, petting, touching, oral, actual intercourse. Right. It sounds like the question for a teenage youth group. Right? Like that question comes up all the time, where are your boundaries? How far can you go? What's prudent? All the things we talk to kids about. Well, now when you're in your twenty s, thirty s, forty s, fifty s, sixty s, no one's having that speech anymore, right? I know people who kiss on the first date and I know people who hold off till date three or even date ten. And I know people sort of make up their own lines and as typical and judgmental as we get, we look down on somebody who thinks different than us. I know people who kiss on the first date because their argument is, I want to know right now, do we vibe? Why would we go any further if we don't? Well, then that begs the second question is like, well, if kissing is important and you want to vibe there, if I don't want to marry a bad kisser, why would I marry somebody who's bad in bed or not compatible with me? That's sometimes the logic. So let's get back to Genesis one and two, right? We're going to bring some truth in now. We're going to take a little rabbit trail right here. Marriage is sex, and sex is marriage. Adam and Eve did not get married with the ceremony. They had no rings. They didn't go down to the local judge. They didn't do the honeymoon. They didn't do anything like we think of as a marriage. Right? It was their sex that was the consummation of the marriage. That's the way God intended it. You're married at sex, not at the sheet of paper. The sheet of paper and the ceremony mean nothing. So if that's true, I want to just talk about our hypocrisy. Many of you listening right now, judging and rolling your eyes. Maybe don't throw your first stone yet. Right. Your current marriage statistics say most people have had sex before you've been married. So you've had sex before that piece of paper. Does God see you and that girl in the 10th grade or that guy as your husband? Well, I mean, technically, that is correct, because sex is marriage. God's not waiting for the state of Alabama to sign a sheet of paper before he considers you married. Right? It's complicated. So we as divorced people have had sex probably before marriage, during marriage, and post marriage. Right? Like, what is the theology with that? We're not naive teenagers, and so how are we supposed to act now? Once again, we live in a genesis three world. It's with broken people, broken marriages and situations. Sorry, I'm preaching a little bit. Here's what's very frustrating. And actually, it's actually very nice that God is so smart. He leaves certain things alone that we just dig on. Like, the Bible is this big, and sometimes there'll be a verse or two and we just camp on them. But when you look at the totality of scripture, it's like God didn't make a big deal about that. I'm going to give you example. Sometimes church, like, you need to come to church. Bible tells you to come to church. And God's like, well, I know when there's going to be this big plague. And in 1682, this isn't going to work in that country. And not everybody's going to meet in

a building at 09: 13:36

30 a.m. On a Sunday. So he says, don't forsake the meeting of the brethren. He left it vague because he understands there's messes. Well, right now, once again, we think like Americans right now, there are women. I know some that live in Africa, and it's all over the world. They are in prostitution. And they can be believers. It's the only way they can feed their kids. That's what they do. And there's rape, and there's just all kind of. Perversion is the word I'm going to use with sex. And God knows the issues are complex. He spends little time on cultural stuff, right? Does that make sense? He stays high on this. So here's another example we like from our truth side and our grace side. We Christians are really big. There's only two genders. Well, Genesis one and two, there sure was Adam and Eve. But we live in a broken world, and there are literally people born with both genitalia or neither in this world. And what do we do with those people besides sit over here and say, that's impossible? According to my theology, that's impossible. But it's reality in the middle. In this broken world, there are some horrible things going on in tough situations, and if we just throw our truth logic at them, really dangerous. Right? Life is messier than the t shirt theology. And the one verse answers, it just is. In this broken world, are divorces and widows supposed to marry somebody on their second or third marriage or whatever without knowing if their partner has any sexual issues? Do their parts work? Are they good in bed? Do we have the same sex drive and desires? Why would we have to live with whatever happens? We just can't do that. We're grown, rational, experienced adults who've been through a lot of trauma and walls. The Bible just doesn't speak much at all about post marriage. It just doesn't. We have no parents to go back to. The Bible says, you leave your parents, you cleave. We don't have any kids to make. Some of us, at some age, we're post raising a family. We left our families. Are we supposed to go back to them? No, it's impossible. We live in a broken world. We have no families to return to. What are we supposed to do? So let's take a quick break. Are you facing the challenging crossroads of Divorce? I bet you know of someone who is. Well, now there's a resource for your shelf. Maybe for you, maybe for a friend. Unyoked choices the Christian Handbook for divorce decisions, a book for those in need. Buy one for you or for a friend? Navigate the divorce decision and the execution of unyoking with wisdom, strength, and confidence. Available now in paperback and kindle only 899. Order your copy today. Visit toddturner.com books. Unyoked choices because these decisions matter with this lens. By the way, I'm speaking a little bit in third person here. I'm not trying to make a point yet. I'm just throwing out a lot of thoughts. But sometimes singles will have sex out of wedlock, partly for compatibility research. Right? It's like, do we vibe? Do we fit? Do we have good chemistry? People want to know. But once again, back to this idea. People live and move along a line from sex whenever I want to. Absolutely not. Or maybe if I'm comfortable with this person, or maybe I'm testing the waters. There's just multiple places in this journey that we're on. So when in your relationship, how do you build it and deepen it? And there's a part in this line that's, well, we're two consenting adults. We're not really testing marriage. It feels good. We agree. We both walk away happy. Who does it hurt? And then there's the, oops, one too many glasses of wine moment. Didn't mean to do that. But it did it. And there's that varying line between the sin of a mistake and a lifestyle of sinning. But then in the lifestyle, what if you don't have guilt about it? Because as Christians, our theology is like, well, the Lord's going to lay it on your heart and you're going to feel guilty. Not everybody does. Trust me. I'll talk about that in a second. I'm a backtrack a little bit. But here is a case where it's hard for christian believers who are married to think outside their covenant. They're in a covenant. We're not in that same covenant. We're outside of it. We were in one and we're out of it. And we think differently. And when you're in a covenant, you're worried about, well, I shouldn't look at that or do that or even put myself in a weird like. But you can be in a weird position because you don't have a wife that you're worried about. You don't have a husband that you're worried about. And so it's a little more complicated. My counselor one time asked me, I'm going to be a little transparent here. He's like, okay, Tod, so how do you decide when or if you have, you know, I told, said, you know, here's how it's happened in the past. And I honestly don't feel guilty about some of this stuff at then our theology would scream, the Holy Spirit will convict you. But what if there's no conviction? Right? And so you can't. Well, some of you would say, well, you're not a serious Christian or even a real Christian if you don't have it. Well, I'm like, well, I hate to tell you, brother, but I am. And the guilt doesn't always come. It really doesn't. And I wouldn't say I have peace, but I've had peace. So we'll get into that here in a second. So once again, what is sex? Not defining it? Is it kissing? Is it grabbing or whatever? But I say that to you, the listener for you, or who are dealing with this, what defines it? What is it to you? Why does it feel good to you? Have you really deep dove into it? Instead of just saying, this is my numbing, this is what I'm going to do. I have my own lines, but this is how I'm going to live. Have you really thought about it? Have you been in therapy? Have you unpacked that? Because I certainly have. I still am. I still journey through this with deep discussions because I have not landed the plane. I mean, I still miss it. I still crave it. It is bonding. Sometimes it can be just transactional. Isn't it weird how God knows things so far in advance? I was walking around, I'm going to call it a year or two ago, and I just had a pep in my step. I had a glow. And a person I know looked at me and was like, man, you were in a mood. And I literally remembered that I had had sex the day before. And I was like, it felt great. But you know why? Endorphins. It was feeling cherished and important. All the things we're not getting to the weeds of it. But there was true, the physicality of it was mood altering. And the thought of like, no, you can't do that was like, oh, my goodness, it was wonderful. And I can't pretend it wasn't. I can't pretend I went home and shaved my head and gnashed my teeth and put on some sackclock I did not. Right. It just feels funny that we're supposed to pretend we're a 14 year old girl living thousands of years ago and we don't know anything about sex. It's just not true. But once again, isn't there a difference between group sex for fun, doing whatever I want, when I want, and being in a relationship with someone in discovery and bonding mode? There are just different places along the line here. I've said this multiple times on this podcast. Thoughts disentangle themselves over the lips and through the fingertips when you talk things out. When you write, you really can get to the bottom of garbled thoughts. And I think when it comes to sex, many of us just already have landed the plane, or we're in the ping pong of it, of not knowing where we draw our lines. And do we feel guilty or do you not feel guilty? Then? Is your theology wrong? Is the holy spirit holding back of laying that on you? And there's just some logic here. I know when it comes to the Bible logic, even though God owns it, but there's some things that God's like, yeah, you just have to trust me on this. Well, I know couples who have waited to have sex, and they had horrible marriages, and I know people who didn't wait. They had plenty of premarital sex, and they've been married for 40 years, and it's all good. They have great lives. So where does this idea come from that you're going to be blessed if you wait and you're going to have a horrible marriage if you don't? Right. We're going to danger dive into that. I know couples who have sex with their ex, meaning they're divorced, but for some reason, they have a comfort that they can still have sex with that person versus somebody new, because they're like, well, we're not married, but we are in God's eyes, and I'd rather just have my sex there. And they navigate it that way. That's their logic. And as I said before, numbing post divorce is a real thing. Sitting in your bed, sleeping, alcohol, you become an adrenaline junkie. Porn, sex, a lot of numbing that goes on. And when you're depressed, feeling good and being cherished feels so good. But let's don't forget the personalities. Men are microwaves. Women are crock pots. It gets complicated with how sex works. Right? So that's a lot of unloading of thoughts and identifying the different scenarios that are along the way. Post divorce christians having sex along the gamut of all the possibilities. But what got us here, what causes different lenses that christians have about sex outside of marriage? Where did it come from? Well, let's get back to that american christian culture. I'm going to call it the purity culture, a big push that a lot of us grew up in. It's the lens that many christian pastors took. And there's up on stage speaking on God's truth and theology, and they got it from some books. Oddly, the guy who really started this movement isn't even a Christian anymore. By the way, I'm going to name names, but it's a complicated topic. Many of us are damaged by over the top unhealthy teaching of purity culture. The boys were taught on lust, masturbation and porn. They pulled us into a room. That's what we were taught about girls. You were taught about modesty, virginity, and being a treasure. Not so much on women and lust. Women are sort of made feel guilty if they had a sex drive. Like the men's are the ones had that sex drive. The women's are the ones had to protect themselves and help us. You don't dress that way so he won't get turned on. It dehumanizes women. Your worth is way more than your sexual function and your virginity. You know what your greatest gift is? It's not virginity that is disproportional teaching. It really is. I mean, God did not sit here and spend chapters and chapters on this. There's way more topics that matter than that. Virginity and how you're holy. Your sexual function does not score very high at all. And men, our problem with this was self control. Like, oh, you just can't. You're an animal and you've got to run away and you got to shut your eyes. And now we've made women think that boys will be boys. You all can't help yourself. And this comes into self fulfilling prophecy. By the way, if you're given a green light now, you're fighting your whole life against this idea that what even God sanctioned in the first place, right? Men, you have a holy spirit in you, like women do. You're not an animal. You can say, no, we're not built that different when it comes to this. Some of these best selling books, every man's battle, the kissing, dating, goodbye, wild at heart. These are all books that have this purity culture embedded within it. And it was echoed in the pulpits, private schools, small groups, church camp, mentoring. It leads to really unhealthy views. Sex is not the big elephant in the room for christians, fruits of the spirit. God's commandment. Love God, love your neighbors. Mercy to the poor and to the widows. These are screamed in scriptures. This other stuff are outright lies. And you know what it does? It smells a lot like the prosperity gospel, right? It is. If you do this, your marriage is going to be wonderful. You are going to have the best sex life ever. You say no to premarital sex and you wait till you're a virgin. Your life is going to be great. Wrong. Not necessarily right, not necessarily wrong, but it is wrong to make that promise. Remember we talked about one of the commandments, don't speak for God. Don't take the Lord's name in vain. This literally is a violation of that commandment. Promising somebody if they do some behavior, God is going to reward them a certain way. It's not true necessarily. It can be true, but you can't promise it. So people have this mindset of here's how women work, here's how men work. And if we draw these lines, our wife is going to be blessed in this way or cursed in this way, unhealthy. We live in a broken world. These promises are dangerous. The lies about men's behavior, dangerous. The lies about women's behavior and their value or lack of value, dangerous. Those divorced. The greatest gift you can give your spouse is a heart for Christ, not your first virginity or your second. And by the way, we know we're not virgins and we're like, well, it's a new virgin. It's a second virgin. Okay, not here to argue that. I'm trying to argue the idea, the whole idea that you're going to get blessed by God a certain way. If you do certain behavior is nonsense. Instead of getting something better rewarded with a better marriage or the gift of virginity or incredible sex, if you obey, then sometimes that turned into a scare tactic of you're going to get STD, you're going to get pregnant. Well, here's the problem with that argument. Things called condoms and vasectomies, stop that. So now what? You can't scare us with stds and pregnancy at certain ages. We're not dumb. We know how to prevent both of those or fix both of them. So those scare tactics that worked on teenagers don't really work on us. We're older, smarter, and wiser, and we're not in the backseat of cars anymore. If you messed up, if you had sex outside of marriage, you're robbing your spouse of this great gift, or you're not a complete person anymore. That was taught a lot. It's like you're taking a little bit of out of you and you're giving away, and it's not going to be there for your husband or whatever. You haven't lost part of yourself. There's some truth there. But smell the prosperity gospel, right? Just smell it because it's not healthy. And some of you were saving yourself for this amazing marriage, and then the marriage failed. Well, that'll mess up your theology, and you're just not going to buy the lie anymore. And now the pendulum has swung into, well, that didn't work. And so now I'm just going to manage this myself. I'm going to have sex and I'm going to manage this and make sure I actually find somebody I can have sex with. That's good. And I don't have to wait for this. Promise, empty promise. Because, by the way, we're all divorced, we're all listening. Some of you were versions before, didn't work, did it? Right? Your motivation crumbles and then you swing into. I got this many of you listening, need your lens change. You need healthy ways to look at the opposite sex. I know the purity culture, and I'm not saying this is wrong, there's a lot of truth in there. I'm just poking around the edges of it. They talk about Joseph running, right? Remember when his boss's wife tried to seduce him and he ran? There are times for that. Notice Jesus didn't run. He didn't run ever. You know why? Because he had perfect theology. He's man and God. He sees women perfectly. He sees the opposite sex correctly, and it solves issues better than don't run. It's like he was tempted, but he didn't have to run. He just saw people for how God sees them. And it's not looking selfishly for self gratification. And I think what it is, is a lot of us grew up in a culture where we were given bad lenses, and therefore we're either swinging the pendulum or we're just saying, well, that lens didn't work. Let me try my own here. Right? I mean, I know this is crazy. This is where I'm going to get in trouble, but I'm going to say it. I had a theological debate one time. I'm not saying this is true. It was just for the sake of debate. Could Jesus have been married? Sometimes we act like Jesus had a halo and walked around like. Like my argument was, if it was found out that Jesus was married, like, okay, so he married somebody and he had sex, probably didn't have a kid. That would have been a weird lineage deal. But my point is, how would that have been a sin? There's nothing sinful about it. And maybe in the bathing in the streams or the sea of Galilee, he saw a naked woman. Okay, big deal. He didn't lust. He never sinned. You know why? He could probably have looked and not even thought about lust. Because he saw that person as God sees them. Men are not animals, and women don't have to walk around with only their eyes showing. That's just not healthy. Right? It's not. So I'm going to tell a little side story here, but one time I went to a tournament with my son. He was staying somewhere else. I was by myself and I was in a small town. I won't even tell you where it was, but I looked online and I saw a picture of somebody who just did not fit the culture of where I was. And I was online dating app. And I swiped, and then they swiped on me and we started talking. Well, long story short, me and this person met in a hotel lobby, because that's where I was staying. And we talked for a couple of hours. Then we felt comfortable with each other. We went up to my room, right? Some of you, right, who are married, like, oh, no, they would never do that. And I hope you wouldn't if you're in a covenant marriage with your wife, or I hope you wouldn't, but I wasn't. And we sat there till three in the morning, and we had the best conversations. I learned so much about her life. We literally turned on music, we danced, and she left at three in the morning. Didn't kiss, didn't even date afterwards, we just had a moment, and I remember thinking, wow. One, that's one of these benefits of being single. And two, it was just nice to be around somebody where there was no intention of anything, just getting to know each other. And I know we sometimes preach this. Well, guys, you're over here. Girls, over here. And we have a men's ministry and a women's ministry, and everything is genderfied. And the Bible is like, the Bible is written. All of us, like, you're allowed to have friends of the opposite sex. You are. It's okay when you have a healthy lens of who somebody is. Right? And then I want to talk a little bit, too, about the idea of american culture being pushed on every situation. Do you realize right now in Germany there is a pastor who's probably drinking beer after he preaches and his wife she's probably going to swim topless. That at a beach in America gets you fired. And there it's just normal part of culture, right? Like they don't inherit our views on nudity and modesty and alcohol and God knows there's different cultures. And so I think a lot of us just have some unhealthy views of sex, the opposite sex and the functions of the opposite sex. Right? Now listen, this episode is a primer. I hope no one walks away, assuming I've landed the plane, and you certainly shouldn't either. Research, talk, pray, search scripture, start a conversation. I actually hope you got whiplash listening because I'm not over here on the grace side. I'm not over here 100% on the truth. I want both to be true at the same time. But we made a commitment to navigate where we are and if we move anywhere along this line, it's great. Like everything we do is for God's glory and should be for God's glory. So I'm not landing the plane perfectly, but let's get a little practical one. Your church. You are the church. You don't have to have church programs to minister and to love. But you can talk about this topic to those in your church and find the people you can trust. But churches need to not make this a taboo topic. I actually feel sorry for young christians who get married and we're just like, good luck. As long as you waited, you'll figure it out. It's like, well, not sure. I'm not sure. Once again, we live in a broken world. How are you going to figure it out? Adam and Eve, I guess they could figure it out. Us. I'm not sure we can. I think we need help, right? Here's something else practical. I'm going to get in the nitty gritty. Those of you who have your friends with benefits, just know that it can haunt you when it comes out with your next spouse. Know that some places you live on this line can be very painful later. I have a friend. I know she listens. I won't even use her name. She'll know I'm talking about her. But she was in a highly dysfunctional relationship with somebody who's truly a horrible person. Horrible. And I remember telling her when I was trying to convince her that she needs to walk away is there's just a point where with your new spouse, you're probably going to have to admit that relationship now. It doesn't mean there's not some. If you remember, we had an episode about when you have to unload what I would just say hers was significant part of her life that probably was not going to be able to be hidden anymore. Right? Be careful. Be careful. There are some places you can live along this line that are very dangerous. God does not land at. Well, whatever you want to do, you can do it. We can't land over. I mean, and it's not as simple as. Don't. Next topic. So here's what I recommend on my website. I'm going to put this. You don't have to write it down now, but making all things new with David Pelson and shame and sexuality with Preston Sprinkle, I highly recommend those two resources. I'll put links to them. They're healthy, they're healthy, they're good. I can recommend it. So once again, some of you have a point of contention with the various sex drives. Why would you get in a relationship with somebody and not believe their definition? People can say, oh, I have no anger issues, but you see that they do. Well, maybe it requires way better questioning than maybe it's not sleep with, but it is real deep conversations. Because once again, we're too old and wise to just gamble. And we may have come out of a painful relationship, that sex was our problem, and then to enter blindly into another one doesn't even feel rational. Also, once again, remember I told you it's going to be hard to have this conversation because we're all in different places. Many of you listening are older, and there is a point where sex won't be as important in a relationship. Intimacy does come in different ways, and sex is a subset of intimacy. And I know some of you can't fathom a life without robust sex, but there will be a day where that just fades away and you may be closer to your spouse. So the day can come. It really can. It's not an impossibility. Move yourself along the line. And I see this whole conversation as if you were here and you moved to here, that's progress. If you were here and you moved to here, that's progress. I don't look at it from the truth side that just says if you've done anything, it's a total failure. Though it can be sin. It's sort of like the alcoholic. If I can get him to take less drinks and not ruin his life, that's success. And I see that the same way in this conversation. I challenge you to think where you are on the line. How did you get there? Have you moved? And do you need to move again? So it's sort of like my dad said, be home at midnight. But if you're here at twelve one, you're late. And if

you're late, you might as well stay out till 06: 40:41

00 a.m. Because late is late. And so when you look at things that way, it's like, well, if I'm already in trouble, I might as well go have a good time. And some of us are sort of doing that. It's like, well, if I'm going to violate God's law, I'm least going to really violate it and hang out a little bit more, do a little bit more crazy things, because you just don't want to deal with that truth side. If sex outside of male and female is a sin, and God does rank sin, he does. It's not like all sinners are equal. They're not. God literally tells you things he despises and he does rank sexual sins differently. He does. Read one corinthians 616 through 20. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I take Christ's members and make them members of a prostitute? Of course not. Do you not know that anyone who joins himself with a prostitute becomes one body with her for the two it says will become one flesh. But whoever is joined to the Lord becomes in one spirit with him. Avoid immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the immoral person sins against his own body. Do not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you whom you have from God that you are not your own. You have been purchased at a price. Therefore glorify God in your body. I have failed a lot. I have done things that don't feel like a fail. I'm still pondering, questioning and navigating this topic. Why? Because God says it's important. So I want to make it important. As always, I like to be a change agent. If this topic has caused you to think, rethink, consider, want to talk it out with a trusted friend, then good. I literally want to highly encourage you to be in professional counseling. Talk about your sexuality, talk about the birthing of your sexuality. Like, when is the first time you had sex? What was it like? What happened? Was it through trauma? Was it normal? What was sex like in your marriage? Like? Talking this out is probably going to be very beneficial for you if you're just sort of winging it, winging this journey and just thinking, well, I failed the first marriage, failed. I'm doing it my way. That's not very healthy. Please share this episode. Start a conversation with a grace filled friend about this very topic. And as always, you know you can go to toddturner.com slash divorce for links to some healthy resources to get you a good lens, books podcasts that can help you further blessings. Thanks for talking about this. Thank you for listening to the unyoked podcast with me, Todd Turner. This was originally planned to be a limited 17 episode podcast navigating the major milestones after the divorce. Well, the feedback and needs were too great and now I'm going to dive deeper into each episode. But with a female cohost, we are excited to help further the conversations into divorce recovery and gaining healthy single legs as a Christian. But would you do us a favor as we prepare our topics and episodes? Please go to toddturner.com contact and give us feedback on the podcast specific episodes topics you wish were addressed. We would love to hear from you. Then after that, please rate and review this podcast. You might not know how important that is to help grow the popularity and the reach of this resource for thousands of people who need it and don't even know it exists. Rate, subscribe, share all of it. But let's start with go to toddturner.com contact and let me hear from you. I read every single email that comes in blessing.