Last August, Carolyn and I celebrated our 35th wedding anniversary and so I blogged about it. What shocked me was the many responses I've received from couples in their twenties. All fall I have been getting these emails from mostly younger couples who are really committed to their relationships, they're committed to following the Lord, but they are saying, "Mike, what's wrong? It doesn't feel the same way." They are talking about the complexity of relationships. We will spend a whole month on issues around relationships and family because family is God's design for the development of personality. It is in healthy families that we really discover who we are and whose we are.

Open your Bibles to Genesis 2. Genesis is about beginnings, so we want to understand beginnings of relationships, male/female relationships, the beginning of sexuality. In Genesis 2, God intended that all of us grow and develop as persons in the context of healthy boundried families. It is in this family relationship that we discover that we are spiritual, moral creatures, created in the image of God. What sets man and woman apart from all of the other creatures in the animal kingdom is in verse 7, "Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being." Breath there means Spirit, the same Spirit that makes God is breathed into human beings. So what makes us different than the dog or cat that you love at home? They are creatures of God, loved by God, but you are a spiritual being in the image of God. Not only are you a spiritual person that has been infused with the presence of God, you are a moral being. Look at 2:16-17, "And the Lord God commanded the man, 'You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will certainly die.'" We learn in families that we are spiritual moral beings, not autonomous people who are in charge of our own bodies, and there are moral boundaries. God determines what those moral boundaries are or what we do with our bodies. Not only in healthy families do we discover that we are spiritual, moral beings, we learn to recognize and respect the image of God in other human beings. That is what happens when you grow up with healthy relationships and healthy boundaries as you learn to recognize the presence and image of God, and respect that image of God in other people. Personality is always shaped in community. That biblical idea is radically different from the rugged individualism of the American culture, but it is what communion is about. Not only are we shaped as human beings in communion with God, we are responsible and accountable for community with each other. Communion and community mean the same thing. That is why when we come here, the word says that we all partake of the same loaf. We are not autonomous and operate separately from each other. But I am responsible for you, to be with you, and to be a spiritual and moral person.

Read with me, beginning in verse 18, all personality is shaped in community. "The Lord God said, 'It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.' Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the wild animals and all the birds in the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds in the sky and all the wild animals. But for Adam no suitable helper was found. So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man's ribs and then closed up the place with flesh. Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. The man said, 'This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, for she was taken out of man.' For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame."

Pray with me: Father, it is in the area of sexuality that we can go from such heights to feel such shame. We pray, Father, that in the safety of Your presence, we can be honest and experience freedom and healing through Your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. It is in His name we pray, Amen.

You and I are created for intimacy; and intimacy is always soul to soul. In our culture, we are constantly immersed in this hyper-sexual culture. We are taught that intimacy is skin to skin. Intimacy is not skin to skin; intimacy is soul to soul. Intimacy happens when safe people come together and demonstrate to each other unconditionally that you are fearfully and wonderfully made. Intimacy is when we come together in healthy relationships and visibly demonstrate the presence of the God we can't see by demonstrating the love of God, the respect of God, the safety of God and the holiness of God. That's when people can be naked and feel good about who they are when another healthy, safe person comes around and demonstrates that you are wonderfully and fearfully made. Relationships are always soul to soul. There is no such thing as a casual relationship because it involves real people! Real people are complicated. Real people have cellulite. Real people have bad days at work. Real people have bad breath. Real people get sick. Real people get cancer.

Look with me again at verse 24, "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh." What does this mean sexually if all intimate relationships are based on soul to soul? Before a relationship ever can become skin to skin, a man or woman needs to leave the household of origin. This means there must be a level of maturity where a man and woman are independent emotionally and economically from their parents.

In our culture today, you wonder why there is such a problem with intimacy. I know this from being a pastor for 30-some years, that there are many, many people who are lonely in marriages. They don't know how to have intimacy. There are many, many people who are sexually lonely in marriages. Sixty percent of teenagers report or admit to a sexual encounter by the time they graduate from high school. Yet God's plan is that there must be a level of economic and emotional maturity where a person is separate from the household of origin. This is the way God has designed us. They must come together in the commitment of marriage. It means a man shall leave his mother and father and be united with his wife before there can ever be true vulnerability, which is needed. Intimacy comes when two people can be vulnerable with one another. Before there can ever be vulnerability, there has to be unconditional commitment. Before I can ever be naked and unashamed, there has to be a person who says to me, like Jesus, I will never leave you or forsake you. You are fearfully and wonderfully made so even with your cellulite, even with the bad days at work, even if you get sick or get cancer, I will never ever leave you for you are fearfully and wonderfully made. There can never be true intimacy without the unconditional commitment that comes through the covenant of marriage. Before you can ever go from soul to soul to skin to skin, there has to be that kind of commitment with another person who will not leave. Then the two can become one flesh or the two can become naked and unashamed because there is this level of maturity where there is not emotional dependence and economic dependence on the household of origin. When there is the level of maturity of unconditional commitment for better or for worse, then we can be naked and unashamed.

This is incredibly difficult in such a sexually charged and saturated environment that we live in today. So you and I, as followers of Jesus, have to understand the consequences of the fall - that means what happened when they decided they could go it alone without God. Sin and the fall are very real. We all suffer from the consequences of the fall in our life. What the fall has done is reduced intimacy from soul to soul to skin to skin. How many TV shows or movies do you watch where people have sexual relationships and then they try to get to know one another? This has taken the design of intimacy between human beings who can demonstrate the boundaries of God, the goodness of God, the unconditional love of God, and it has turned intimacy into isolation. The Bible has a word for casual sex. The word is porneuo. Does that sound like any other English word? From porneuo we get pornography. Porneuo is any kind of relationship that separates sex from the living human relationship and all the stuff that comes with this - cellulite, child rearing and household responsibilities. That is porneuo. The Bible clearly teaches that there is no way you can have casual sex.

In 1 Corinthians 6:16, the Corinthians made a practice of going to temples, whether they were men or women, and having porneuo sex with both male and female prostitutes. The Bible says don't you folks realize that your body belongs to the Lord? Any time you come together skin to skin with another person, you literally become part of that other person. Now you can see the complexity of folks who have had multiple physical relationships and why we struggle. It is almost like demonic oppression. We are carrying parts of other people with us all of our lives. Some of you sitting in this room know exactly what I am talking about. I do not say this to embarrass anyone for we are here for the purpose of healing and liberation in our lives.

There is a movie called Vanilla Sky with Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz. Cameron's character was stalking Tom's character after a sexual encounter in this movie. There is a line that her character says that says it better than any modern movie. She says "Don't you know that when you sleep with someone, your body makes a promise whether you do or not." Isn't that a great line? Casual sex and the way it is portrayed through pornography and everything else, there is nothing, absolutely nothing more lonely than waking up next to a person that you just had a sexual relationship with who doesn't love you or who won't be there tomorrow. Casual sex creates isolation. Instead of being naked and unashamed, it is attached with much shame. I know there are many of you, through some way, have been infected with porneuo. There is guilt and shame because you are in some kind of sexual relationship whether it is with another person or with the internet that is not a part of God's will. All it is doing is destroying your personality and creating shame. That is not God's purpose for you. God's purpose is to deliver you and heal you and enable you to experience true intimacy.

This means for us as followers of Jesus, that we don't buy the world's lie of vampire sex. Vampire sex is people who totally relate to sexuality not on the basis of intimacy and being a spiritual, moral person, but they relate to it on the basis of appetite and every time they are hungry, they feed. That is called vampire sex. As followers of Jesus, we want to cultivate intimacy. Unmarried young people, you want to protect your spirit for the ability to experience fulfilling intimacy in a relationship. It is the same with those of us, men like myself in my 36th year of marriage, or men who are in the first five years of marriage, we have to protect our minds and hearts from the cheap substitution of porneuo where we separate sexuality from the complicated living relationship with women who have cellulite and bad work days and everything else. That is intimacy.

We have to nurture intimacy in our own lives. Here is an example of intimacy. I was busy at work yesterday trying to get everything done and Carolyn called me and she was crying. She was in Cincinnati and the brakes went out in her car. She was with her mom - it was her mom's 88th birthday and she wanted to take her mom out to lunch. She was having a terrible time and so I left my meeting at work and told her I would come get her. I picked up my wife and went back to her mom's. It was getting dark, but she was going to take down her mom's Christmas decorations hanging down over the eve of her house. So, I climbed up there in the dark to get the lights off the eaves of my mother-in-law's house last night. Then we drove back home. I had work to do today that I wouldn't have had if I could have finished it yesterday. How many women in the house know that that is real intimacy? I still can't believe that when I tell my wife of 35 years, that I really want to be married to her, she doesn't believe me. She says, "You just say that because you are a committed Christian and you are supposed to say that." I'm going - "No! You don't get it. I really, really want to be married to you. I am set apart for you. I don't want anyone else but you." This is truly is what intimacy is all about. When you drive to Cincinnati and take your mother-in-law's Christmas lights down. All of the bad work days, the cellulite days - that is truly what God has created us for, where we really experience the abundance in relationships. Whether single or married, no matter how many times we are tempted, we can't take cheap shortcuts.

How do we nurture intimacy? All of us are victims of the fall. All of us have failed in some way, so we all need to repent. Repentance is agreeing with God, not arguing with God. God made you and he is not trying to frustrate you on the sex thing. He is trying to protect and provide for you so you are not going to be lonely in a relationship but that you truly know intimacy. So it is agreeing with God that I am a spiritual and moral being. I am different than my giant schnauzer. God has breathed into me the breath of the Spirit. He has set boundaries in my life for the purpose of provision. It is agreeing with God as followers of Jesus that the fallen culture doesn't set our standards. We wait until we have an emotional and economic maturity from the households of origin. We make an unconditional commitment for life to a person for better or for worse, and then we will be naked and unashamed. That is what it means to repent.

All of us have failed and we need to accept God's forgiveness. If you are always going to feel guilty about your failures, you will never truly be able to be a reflection to the person you love that they are fearfully and wonderfully made because you are carrying this guilt. Here's the promise of the word of God: "If any of us say that we have not sinned, we lie and the truth is not in us. But if we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and cleanse us of all unrighteousness." So confession and receiving God's forgiveness needs to be a continual thing.

The next thing to remember: I have to recognize my own brokenness. I can stand here and teach this stuff and five minutes after I leave here, be infected with the disease of lust and everything else. Have you seen the Blade movies with Wesley Snipes? Not great movies, but had some decent story lines. In those movies, he was bitten with the virus of the vampire. What is so amazing, this is the part of the movie I like, is that he never succumbed like other vampires to his hunger. He never used another human being for the purpose of feeding. He knew that every day he had to take the antivirus. Every day, I have to take the antivirus: Jesus Christ is my strength and salvation - that is my antivirus. As we come to the communion table, remember that communion is community and communion with God. I am shaped, formed and healed as a human being in my communion with God and my communion and accountability with you, my brothers and sisters. Like Wesley Snipes in Blade had to replace the diseased blood with the good blood, every day as I take the healthy life of Jesus, the healthy thinking, the mind of Jesus, the healthy love of Jesus about myself, then I can become a source of healthy life and love to other people around me.

Next week Carolyn and I are going to teach together. We will team teach on lessons from seasoned pros and marriage. I will let her tell you: does she ever feel lonely? Do I still not meet all of her needs? That is why we have Jesus, our Savior, who can meet all of our needs. When we quit expecting our spouses to meet all of our needs and we know our needs are met, then our relationships become more realistic and we can become more serving in our relationships. We will get into that next week.

Again, I know there are some of you here who are living with each other, some of you here who have created much pain in relationships. I'm not here to condemn, but to offer you the good news of the Lord Jesus Christ who has died and risen from the grave that you can be set free. God is a God of another chance.

Let's open ourselves to God's healing as we prepare to come to this communion table. "Father, I thank You for every person You have brought here and the people to whom they are connected. I know folks have come here who have experienced pain from people they have trusted. They have experienced abuse. There are those who have been sexually abused by folks they have trusted. Lord, some of us are carrying stuff that we have carried for so long it has blocked our ability to trust anyone else. It's for Your healing that we pray. Set us free from all of the addictive behavior, the broken behavior we carry, the illusions of feel-good love. Allow us to know Your love and intimacy that will set us free. Lord, I pray for the families represented in this room and for the fulfillment of Your promise in that relationship regardless of how numb some may be feeling, that they keep on keeping on in obedience to Your will for that relationship, knowing that resurrections come in the morning. We give You thanks as we come to this table to truly feed on You, that Your life is our life, that Your love sets us free. I pray as a father, a husband and a man of God, with other men, fathers, husbands and women, daughters, mothers and wives that we can be who You need us to be and who others believe us to be. We pray in Jesus' name, Amen."