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Day Five

Called to Be Different

Scripture: John 8:11; Romans 12:2; Philippians 2:15

I know that most people—a really high percentage—have sex before they get married. This means it is likely that most people reading this also fit in that category. 

If that describes you, please know there is no judgment here. I bought the lies too. And God is not surprised when people don’t follow his ways. Everyone fails to live up to God’s perfect standard; this just happens to be one of the most common ways people fail. 

God calls us to reserve sex for within marriage, not because sex is bad but because it’s so good. He created it, after all! And he knows that sex within marriage is what is best for us.

I know that what God is calling us to here is countercultural in the extreme. If you commit to God’s way, there will be those who don’t understand. Some people will think you’re crazy. Remaining pure may even cost you a relationship or two with people who think sex is a necessary part of dating (in which case, you can be thankful you’ve successfully dodged a bullet). 

But we are called to be different. We are to “not conform to the pattern of this world” (Romans 12:2). We are to be “children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation” who “shine among them like stars in the sky” (Philippians 2:15). 

So be different. Even if it were possible to avoid all the earthly consequences of sexual sin—it’s not, but even if it were—we should still strive to follow God’s design for sex and marriage. We should do so both because it is his design and also because it is different. It’s an opportunity to reclaim his world from fallen culture and serve as a living example that he makes people new. 

When Jesus started preaching, the very first recorded word out of his mouth was “Repent” (Matthew 4:17). And the famous line often translated as “Go and sin no more” comes from Jesus confronting a person caught in sexual sin, in John 8:11: “‘Then neither do I condemn you,’ Jesus declared. ‘Go now and leave your life of sin.’” 

If you are living in sexual sin (or any sin), nothing is preventing you from changing right now; today can be the day you change your ways. 

Do you have sexual sins you need to confess to God or someone else? Journal, pray or meditate on giving those sins to God and letting Him change you.