DEDICATION

To the new generation of young men and women who desire to bring back to this world what a previous generation threw away. This book is dedicated to them, for God's glory.

CONTENTS

Dedication

Statement of Purpose

Acknowledgments

Introduction

1    Sex Is the Sign of a Covenant

2    Creation

3    The Counterfeit Kingdom

4    The Power of Choice

5    Love vs. Lust

6    The Second Adam

7    God's Covenant with Man

8    The Tokens of Virginity

9    The Purpose of Virginity

10    Receiving the Glory of Virginity

11    What Next?

12    Released!

13    Go in the Power of God

14    Sex in Marriage

References

STATEMENT OF PURPOSE

"I believe God has called me to speak with a prophetic voice to the men of this generation. He has commissioned me with a ministry 'majoring in men,' to bring them to an identification with Christ, and impress them with the reality that manhood and Christlikeness are synonymous, declaring the Word of God as the standard by which we live. It is a ministry declaring a standard for manhood. For that purpose, to that end, and for God's glory, my life is given to fulfill His calling and to bring men to the manhood of Christlikeness."

— Edwin Louis Cole

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I want to acknowledge the efforts of my daughter Joann in preparing the manuscript and writing this book. I want to thank her for all she did to make this book possible.

INTRODUCTION

In this day and age, when sex has been degraded to "adult" humor and virginity is regarded by some as cheap merchandise, this book teaches why sex is sacred to God and virginity is a glory to His Kingdom.

The power of this revelation is gripping the hearts of men and women and raising up a new generation which is bringing back to the Church, and to the world, what a previous generation threw away.

Much of the Church has left the teaching about sex to a godless society that knows nothing about God's covenants. When the Church does talk about sex, so often we simply say, "Don't do it," concerning premarital and promiscuous sex. Attempts are made to point out the harm in such kinds of sex.

The Church often misses entirely the real message and fundamental truth of the sacredness of the marriage covenant and sex itself.

There are many books about sexuality in regard to Christians. And there are books about the technical, biological, emotional, moral, psychological, and purely pleasurable aspects of sex. But in order to grasp completely what God has provided through the sexuality of man, and to enjoy fully what He has created for us, we must learn God's perspective of sexuality, according to His Word, and understand why He created it as He did.

God creates everything good.

Man corrupts and contaminates it by his sinful, selfish nature. Sex was made for loving and giving, but when contaminated by man, it becomes an object of lusting and getting.

I submit to you that God made sex good.

Understanding this will enable you to attain to a higher degree of holiness and rise to a new level of faith. Therefore, it is imperative that you read these chapters carefully.

This book is written primarily for men. God has called me to a ministry majoring in men, and has revealed His Word to accomplish that ministry. But, women also need this revelation. And the young in particular need it.

In a day when children are birthing children, and vast numbers of our young people, even in the Church, are engaging in sexual intercourse at the earliest ages, the sacredness of sex must be taught and imprinted on the minds of our young. We cannot leave it to a godless, humanistic society.

In the Old Testament, young people were called, held accountable, and made responsible in their preteen years. Therefore, if you are a young person reading this, I don't speak to you as a child, but as a man or woman, capable of accepting responsibility for your own actions, and for truth itself.

Learn these truths — let them permeate your heart and mind. Prayerfully ask God to reveal them to you with their full force and impact, that you would never question the glory of your virginity, the sacredness of sex, or the covenant relationship of marriage.

Whether you are a man or woman, single or married, this could well be the most unusual book about sex you have ever read. I trust it will have a lasting, life-changing impact as well.

1

SEX IS THE SIGN OF A COVENANT

Sex is more than an act of marriage or a pleasurable experience. Sex is the sign of the covenant of marriage.

Sex is a divinely ordained, holy sign of a blood covenant, which is modeled after the covenant God gave to man through the shedding of the blood of His Son, Jesus Christ.

Sex is sacred to God.

Yes, God made sex good.

There is no reason to blush at the word, make excuses for your own sexuality, cover your ignorance by degrading sex to bawdy jokes and tawdry liaisons, or cause it to become cheap merchandise.

Sexual intercourse was created by God to be good, used for man's good, to be pleasurable, the sign of a covenant, and to be the most intimate act between a man and a woman.

Virginity is the state of men and women before engaging in sexual intercourse. Virginity was designed so there could be a fulfillment of the covenant when the man and woman join together in marriage.

There is no shame in being a virgin, but rather there is an intrinsic, built-in dignity and glory given to a human at birth. When that state of virginity is taken to a marriage bed, after two people have committed themselves to the holy covenant of marriage, that union brings glory to God.

People today imagine that if they haven't lost their virginity early in life, then they are wasting, or have wasted, years that could be spent on sexual pleasure. Virginity is a waste only if given outside of marriage, but never a waste when given in the act of consummating the marriage! Giving God the best you have is never a waste.

Giving God what is left over from your best is a waste.

Remember the Biblical story about Jesus and the woman with the alabaster box:

Matthew, chapter 26, tells the story of a woman who broke a box of costly ointment on Jesus' feet.Some people in the room grumbled, saying it was a waste. But using the ointment on Jesus wasn't a waste.

A waste is taking your life, filling it with cheap sex, spending it on the devil, then coming to God to give Him the dregs.

A waste is squandering what God gave for glory, lowering yourself in your own eyes, estranging yourself from the Kingdom, then coming and asking Him to remake you into what He originally created you to be.

Losing your virginity at an early age is a waste. It's a waste of what God meant for His great glory and your great fulfillment. Only if you hold your virginity until the day of marriage are you able to enter the covenant exactly as God designed it.

Virginity is very precious, because once you lose it, it is gone. Physical virginity may never be regained, but, as we will learn, the spirit and glory of virginity can be restored to you.

This is a serious issue with God. It is to be taken seriously by man. It is serious to society.

There is glory in virginity.

Sex is sacred.

Sex is the sign of the God-given covenant of marriage.

2

CREATION

In order for you to grasp what God intended by creating a virginal state in man, you must understand how God created man in relationship to Himself. That requires some foundational understanding of scripture, starting with Creation.

In the first chapter of Genesis we read, "So God created man in His own image, in the image and likeness of God He created him; male and female He created them."1

God created man in His image. God, in Himself, has both the masculine and feminine characteristics which we see in men and women today. God has the ability to be tender; He also has the ability to be tough.

When God created Adam, He placed into him both the masculine and the feminine characteristics which He possessed, that which is in God Himself, because Adam was created in God's image.

But when Adam was alone, he was lonely.

Being alone can be a blessing, being lonely never is.

That was the situation in which the first man ever created found himself. He was "alone," separate, with no peer upon which to set his love. For love to be love, there must be an object of love.

Adam had no peer to love. He loved God, but God is without peer. God has no peer.

So the woman was created to be the man's peer, the object of his love, and the joint-heir with him of the life, favor, and blessings of God.

In the Bible account of creation, the man was created from the dust of the earth, and the woman from the rib of the man. Men and women were created differently. They were, and are, "made different."

God's creating the woman from the rib of the man was a symbolic act, in a sense, for it represented the Creator's taking something from man and using it to create a new human being.

Creating man "in his own image," "in the likeness of God," the Lord "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." God's character and life were thus invested in the man. Adam's characteristics came from the nature of God which was invested in him in his creation.

In man were both the characteristics of the "tender and the tough," "the disciplinarian and the nurturer," "the masculine and the feminine," with all their strengths as they are known in the nature of God Himself. When creating the woman, God took from the man the strengths of the feminine nature, "the tender and the nurturer," and placed them in the woman.

Then when God brought the man and the woman together, uniting them in marriage as "one flesh," the strengths of each complemented, or completed, each the other. Which is why God called the man Adam at first, but after the creation of the woman He called "their name Adam."

Now, not everyone has to be married in order to have the character of God completed in his or her life. We men have those things that are considered "feminine" within ourselves, just as women do — only to a lesser degree. We are sensitive; we have tenderness, yet we are predominately masculine. Women likewise are predominately "feminine," although they can be strong, tough and have other "masculine" characteristics.

The tender and the tough were both shown in the nature of Christ as a reflection of God the Father. The gentleness which we see in the life of Christ was the true virtue of His real strength.

Part of becoming "Christlike" for a man is becoming secure enough in his own strength to allow himself to be tender.

Today you can see that men who are secure in their manhood can afford to be gentle, because they know what their strength is. Think of the men who are power-lifters or strong athletes. They know they need to be gentle with other people because they are aware of their own strength.

True gentleness always comes out of real strength.13

Men who are insecure in their manhood, men who are confused in their image of what they ought to be, often find themselves trying to shore up their manhood, or trying to find some kind of security in brutishness. As a result, they do all kinds of unmanly things toward women and others.

In the book of Proverbs, the Bible says that kindness (or gentleness) is what makes a man attractive.

Some men compensate for their insecurity in another way. As they recognize the part of them that has the characteristics of the opposite sex, they decide that's what they want to predominate in their lives, and they end up with homosexual behavior.

But God created us as male and female for a purpose. The man's primary purpose, given to him by God even before the creation of the woman, was to oversee the reproductive process in the earth. The woman was created to be the completion of the man in God.

Because of this, the reproductive process on earth is the most satisfying part of a man's life. This can be seen in the satisfaction a man gets from his work. If he's a salesman, his satisfaction comes from a sale. If he's in the services, it's a satisfied customer. For the businessman, it's the contract; for the laborer it's the completion of the job.

In his relationship with his wife as well, the reproductive process is the most satisfying aspect of a man's life. Whether at home or work, a man is most gratified when he can act to fulfill his God-given purpose on earth, which is to oversee the reproductive process.

That's why many men are satisfied with nothing more than a paycheck at work and sex at home. I am not saying that this is the way it should be, just that many times this is the way it is.

But to the woman God gave the power of sex. She is able to give herself sexually to a man to satisfy his desire for that reproductive process. A woman can use her power to complete the man in God, or to be the competition of God in that man's life. One brings a blessing, the other brings, a curse.

God created man and woman to bless each other's lives.

The next verse, Genesis 1:28, says, "God blessed them." And in the thirty-first verse it says that He approved what He had created when He created the earth and when He created man

3

THE COUNTERFEIT KINGDOM

Next in Genesis we read about what is commonly referred to as the "fall of man." Man lived in a state of concreated holiness in the Garden of Eden. But when sin entered, the man and woman were expelled from the garden.

Until that time, the world had been a part of the Kingdom of God, created in the positive by Him. Now, through sin, the world became subject to the kingdom of Satan, and the negative took over. As a result, God had to provide a Savior for man to bring him back into fellowship with Him in His Kingdom.

Colossians says that God "hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son." God made a way to translate us from the kingdom of darkness that sin produced, back into the Kingdom of light.

That is the plan of salvation through Jesus Christ. But even as Christians, we continue to live in a world that has been altered by sin. Let's look closer to see what you and I are living in.

Today there are two basic moral kingdoms in our world. The first is the Kingdom of God, the other is the kingdom of Satan.

Originally, within the Kingdom of God in heaven, there were three archangels: Michael, Gabriel and Lucifer. From what we see in the book of Isaiah, Lucifer was a beautiful archangel, but became discontented with his place and position. He became lifted up in pride and desired to take the place of God. He wanted to be worshipped, not simply lead worship.

Immediately God expelled him from heaven, because sin cannot be allowed to exist there. No disobedient spirit can ever enter into or remain in heaven. One disobedient spirit in a home will ruin the unity of the home. One disobedient spirit on the job will destroy the harmony on the job. One disobedient spirit in a church can ruin the fellowship in that church. One disobedient spirit in heaven would ruin the peace of heaven.

Peace is the nature of heaven itself. That's why peace in our hearts is the umpire for doing God's will here on earth.

Lucifer was cast out of heaven because his disobedient spirit could not exist there. When he was expelled from heaven, his name was changed. Notice that any time there is a change of name in the Bible, it denotes a change of relationship. Lucifer's name was changed to Satan, and he was cast out of God's Kingdom.

Upon his expulsion, Satan took one third of the angels with him and established his own kingdom, one that is directly opposed to the Kingdom of God. Satan's kingdom is antipathetic and antagonistic to God's Kingdom. Satan wanted to take the place of God and be worshipped. In his insurrection and rebellion, he has attempted to do exactly that.

The difference between the two kingdoms is the difference between day and night, heaven and hell.

Everything that God does, and everything that occurs in God's Kingdom, is based on the positive. But everything that Satan does, and everything that occurs in his kingdom, is negative.

God always builds on the positive, and He always ends things on the positive.

Every principle and virtue and attribute in human society that is positive originates in, is initiated by, and emanates from the Kingdom of God.

God created man in Adam and invested within him the principles of the Kingdom of God. When Adam was expelled from the Kingdom of God and became subject to the kingdom of Satan, every principle and virtue and attribute that God had instituted on earth in Adam became perverted.

Satan is only a counterfeiter. In his negative kingdom, there are no true principles, only perversions of principles.

Let me give you a simple illustration of this truth. There is an old expression, "It's not what you know, but who you know." That's actually a principle of the Kingdom of God. You don't approach God by yourself (by what you know), but by Jesus Christ (by Who you know).

The kingdom of Satan perverts this principle and uses it to manipulate for selfish gain. But the principle is true. It's not what you know, but Who you know (Jesus) that matters.

Everything that Satan has and does is counterfeit. God is the only Creator.

The corner barroom is a counterfeit church. The bartender is the pastor, people go there to have fellowship, to receive counsel, and to be filled with the spirit(s). It's simply Satan's counterfeit of the Church.

Look at this diagram:

KINGDOM OF GOD

POSITIVE

Peace

Obedience

Creative

Principles

KINGDOM OF  SATAN

NEGATIVE

Contention

Disobedience

Counterfeit

Perversions

Anything God creates, He creates in the positive. Whenever Satan counterfeits, he always counterfeits in the negative.

Because he was an archangel, Satan is still basically religious. He can transform himself, seemingly, into an angel of light. Therefore, he can tempt man to sin, while promising that it is really an opportunity to do good. That's exactly what he did to Eve, and still does today.

All sin promises to please and serve, but only desires to enslave and dominate.

No sin will ever serve the purposes of God, no matter what Satan's enticement may be.

When sin came through the temptation of the serpent, Satan, in the Garden of Eden, it did not come to Adam first, it came to Eve.It was to Adam, not to Eve, that God gave the commandment not to eat of the tree. Eve received that commandment indirectly, from Adam. When the devil wanted to usurp God's authority, as he did in heaven, he came to the person with second-hand information — Eve. Eve first was deceived into sin, then she went to Adam, and Adam chose to sin.

4

THE POWER OF CHOICE

From then until now, sin has been a choice. In First Corinthians the Apostle Paul says that everything is lawful for me, but not everything is expedient. Not everything is good for me, and I will not be brought under the power of these things nor of any.

What Paul is saying here is that all things are lawful, but not all things are expedient, so he will keep them under the power of his choice.

In Romans Paul says, "servants ye are to whom ye obey." This simply means that as long as something is under the power of your choice, it is a servant to you; but once you choose it, you become the servant to it.

Once the cocaine is chosen, you become the servant to cocaine.

Once fornication is chosen, you become the servant to immorality.

The principle is, you become the servant to your choice.

That is exactly what happened to Adam. He became the servant to his choice, and because he chose to sin he became a servant to sin. The only way to undo what had been done was for a Savior to set him free.

Sin is not a bottle or a blonde. Sin is not a barroom or a brothel. All sin is basically just a denial of the right of possession of God, the Creator.

You can be a prince or a pauper, a churchgoer or bar hopper, but if you choose to deny God's right of possession of your life, then as far as God is concerned that constitutes sin. Sin is disobedience to God and rejection of God. Unless you repent of sin and believe on Jesus Christ, you cannot be saved nor can you live in the Kingdom of God.

When Adam sinned and became a slave to sin, Satan took over the dominion of the earth that had been Adam's. Expelled from heaven, and no longer in communication with God, Satan came into Adam's life and assumed control of his domain. He usurped the power and authority that had been given to man by God.

In the separation that occurred between God and Adam as a result of Adam's disobedience,

Adam died. He died spiritually. His mind became blighted and his body became subject to decay because he was cut off from the Source of his life.

Because man came under the dominion of the devil, his whole nature then changed. He began to live for himself. This was due to the principle which states:

The characteristic of a kingdom emanates from the character of the king.

The Savior was necessary to regain for Adam what he had lost through disobedience, and to restore him to a right relationship with God.

5

LOVE VS. LUST

Let's look at what you can already see regarding sexual relationships in light of what we've just covered.

In the Kingdom of God, you have love, because God is love.

Love is the desire to benefit others at the expense of self, because loves desires to give.

In the kingdom of Satan, the opposite of love is hate—emotionally. But when it comes to morals, the opposite of love is lust.

Lust is perverted love.

Lust is the desire to benefit self at the expense of others, because lust desires to get.

For years young men and women have been playing out a scenario like this:

A guy dates a girl for a period of time and then tells her, "I love you." During the course of their relationship, he comes to a point where he tells her, "I love you so much I can't live without you; let's have sex." She agrees. They have sex. She gets pregnant. Then she goes to him with her pregnancy and says, "I'm pregnant; let's get married." But he says, "Not me, Baby," and walks away.

The truth is, he never did love her, he merely "lusted her."

All he wanted to do was to benefit himself at her expense, and that is lust.

Rape is the result of lust. Burglary, embezzlement, and cheating are all the result of lust, because the one engaging in these acts is only trying to benefit himself at the expense of others.

If you really love in the way God loves, then your natural desire is to benefit others by giving of yourself.

This is an important step to understanding God's view of sex, because God made sex for loving and giving, not for lusting and getting.

God created sex.

The devil did not create sex.

Remember, Satan is not a creator, he is a counterfeiter.

God made sex good. Man, under Satan's influence, makes it bad.

God created sex, but the devil perverted it.

Lust is a counterfeit of the love that God created.

Pornography is a counterfeit of prayer. Pornography promises to produce what prayer alone can produce: intimacy.

Pornography doesn't produce intimacy, it produces distance and impotence. It promises to please and serve, but only desires to enslave and dominate.

The Bible shows us that prayer is what produces intimacy. The greatest intimacy a man and woman will ever know in their marital relationship will come out of times of prayer together. Nothing else will produce the intimacy and interpersonal relationships that prayer will.

You become intimate with the one to whom you pray, for whom you pray, and with whom you pray.

Look at the diagram:

KINGDOM OF GOD

POSITIVE

Jesus is Lord

Love

Sex

Prayer

Intimacy

KINGDOM OF SATAN

NEGATIVE

Self is Lord

Hate — emotionally

Lust—morally

Perversion

Fornication

Adultery

Pornography

Distance

Impotence

6

THE SECOND ADAM

When Adam sinned against God and was expelled from Eden, and when human nature changed and everything on earth became negative, the earth itself was also cursed.Everything was subject to the wrath of God and came under the curse as a result of sin.

Man's identity was no longer in relationship to God, but he was identified with sin and began to live in a negative world. He lived under the despotic rule of Satan, subject to powers of his lower nature instead of the higher purpose that had ruled him when he was endued with power by God's Word and Spirit.

From that time forward, the world began to move out of the positive and into the negative, so that it became degenerative in nature instead of regenerative. Into the world came hate. Into the world came cancer, AIDS, war, wrath, emulations, jealousies. Think of some other things ... greed, drunkenness, drug addiction, envy, murder, rape, incest, perversion, suicide. What does that kingdom sound like to you? It is a mess!

God saw the mess the world was in. God saw what was going to happen to humanity. He saw how we were going to be—hooked and addicted, lustful, envious, jealous and proud. He saw us as we were in that condition, and He did something for us that we couldn't do for ourselves.

The first Adam "blew it." He sinned, and through him came a curse on the earth. So God did something good. He sent a Second Adam.

Jesus.

Jesus is the Second Adam. When Jesus went to the cross, He took all the sin, the sickness, the wrath, and the curse upon Himself. When Jesus bore all that in our place, He provided a way for us to return to the Kingdom of God.

Today Jesus says: "If you're sick and tired of living in that mess, if you are willing to come to Me, I will forgive you your sin, I'll wash you in My blood, I'll sanctify you by My Spirit, I'll justify you by My Word, I'll regenerate your heart and renew your mind. I will give you of My own Spirit, and translate you into the

Kingdom of My Father where you will become an heir of My Father and a joint-heir with Me. We'll live in the Kingdom of God together forever."

When that happens, when you come out of the kingdom of Satan and are translated into the Kingdom of God, then you are a brand new person. You're not a "patched-up" old spirit. You are a new creation, created in Jesus Christ unto the glory of God the Father. You live in the Kingdom of God, and you're the heir of God, a joint-heir with Jesus, and everything Jesus Christ purchased for you on the cross of Calvary is yours through faith in Him. It's all yours. All you have to do is accept it and appropriate it by faith. That's what you get and who you are, if you're in Christ and Christ is in you.

Are you in Christ? Is Christ in you? If you believe in Jesus Christ unto salvation, then the answer is "yes." Now, does that make you worthy of everything in heaven? The answer is "yes!"

If you have never received that worthiness before, then praise God for it now. You are worthy in Christ! You are worthy of everything in that Kingdom. God's intention for you is to live a brand-new life.

When we enter into a covenant relationship with God, it is through the shed blood of Jesus Christ. It is especially important to understand God's provision for this covenant relationship because the marriage relationship between man and woman is also a covenant.

7

GOD'S COVENANT WITH MAN

Look at Genesis 17 starting with the ninth verse when God made a covenant with His people:

"And God said to Abraham, As for you, you shall therefore keep My covenant, you and your descendants after you throughout their generations.

'This is My covenant, which you shall keep, between Me and you and your posterity after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised.

"And you shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin; and it shall be a token or sign of the covenant, (the promise or pledge), between Me and you.

"He who is eight days old among you shall be circumcised, every male throughout your generations, whether born in [your] house or bought with [your] money from any foreigner not of your offspring.

"He that is born in your house, and he that is bought with your money, must be circumcised; and My covenant shall be in your flesh for an everlasting covenant.

"And the male who is not circumcised, that soul shall be cut off from his people; he has broken My covenant."1

Then in Deuteronomy we read: "And the Lord thy God will circumcise thine heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, that thou mayest live."2

You can see that God intended circumcision to be an external evidence of an internal work.

God is not talking about a religious exercise for vain purposes, He is talking about His people who believe in Him and who are in covenant relationship with Him, first in heart, and then with an outward evidence.

In Colossians 2:9, Paul said of Jesus Christ, "For in Him the whole fullness of Deity (the Godhead), continues to dwell in bodily form — giving complete expression of the divine nature."3

The eleventh and twelfth verses read:

"In Him also you were circumcised with a circumcision not made with hands, but in a [spiritual] circumcision [performed by] Christ by stripping off the body of the flesh [the whole corrupt, carnal nature with its passions and lusts].

"[Thus you were circumcised when] you were buried with Him in [your] baptism, in which you were also raised with Him [to a new life] through [your] faith in the working of God [as displayed] when He raised Him up from the dead."4

In the Old Testament, when Abraham had his heart circumcised by faith, the Bible teaches that he believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness.

God and Abraham joined together in their spirit in a covenant relationship through faith that brought God's righteousness into the life of Abraham.

God then wanted everybody to know that Abraham was in right relationship with Him.

God wanted to show externally the internal work of His grace in Abraham's life, so God gave circumcision as the sign of the covenant.

Circumcision, which is the putting away of the foreskin in a man, represents the putting away of the uncleanness of the man's life. The external evidence of circumcision in a man's body was to show the circumcision of his heart. Where he had put away all unrighteousness internally, the circumcision showed the putting away of uncleanness externally.

That was the sign of the covenant relationship.

Now think again of the New Testament, or "new covenant," God made through Christ:

When Jesus came as the Second Adam and shed His blood on the cross to make a new covenant with man, He made the way for man to be "circumcised" in his heart through belief on Him. In other words, man's heart can be purified of all uncleanness through Christ.

The external evidence of that internal work is no longer physical circumcision, but is now water baptism.It is the sign of the new covenant God provided for Himself and man.

You should understand at this point that God has made a covenant with man through the blood of Jesus Christ, that there is an outward evidence of His internal work, and that this is not something new but is the way God has always shown His relationship to man. With that in mind, let's go on.

8

THE TOKENS OF VIRGINITY

In Deuteronomy 22, God tells His people specifically what to do about a man and woman who join together in marriage. Starting with the thirteenth verse we read:

"If any man takes a wife, and goes in to her, and then scorns her,

"And charges her with shameful things and gives her an evil reputation, and says, I took this woman, and when I came to her, I did not find in her the tokens of a virgin,

"Then the father of the young woman, and her mother, shall get and bring out the tokens of her virginity to the elders of the city in the gate;

"And her father shall say to the elders, I gave my daughter to this man as wife, and he hates and spurns her,

"And, lo, he has made shameful charges against her, saying, I found not in your daughter the evidences of her virginity. And they shall spread the garment before the elders of the city,

"And the elders of that city shall take the man and rebuke and whip him;

"And they shall fine him 100 shekels of silver, and give them to the father of the young woman, because he has brought an evil name upon a virgin of Israel; and she shall be his wife; he may not divorce her all his days.

"But if it is true that the evidences of virginity were not found in the young woman,

"Then they shall bring her to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death; because she has wrought [criminal] folly in Israel, by playing the harlot in her father's house. So you shall put away the evil from among you."1

What you just read may not be completely clear to you. When the young men and women of Israel were married, they were both supposed to be virgins. God expected both to be virgins.

There is an evidence of a woman's virginity, but there isn't of a man's. When a woman's hymen is penetrated the first time, it generally causes the shedding of blood which in turn causes the stains that become the "tokens of virginity."

The evidence of virginity here in the Old Testament was incumbent upon the woman, but it doesn't mean that God required virginity of the woman while the man was to be promiscuous or "experienced." God has no double standards.

At the time of the wedding, the father and mother of the bride would give the couple bedclothes for them to use on their first night. They were brand-new bedclothes given for the use of the couple during their first intimate sexual relationship together.

If after the wedding night, the man, for whatever reason, decided he didn't want to stay married to the woman, the only way he could get an annulment of the marriage was to accuse her of defrauding him about her virginity.

This might sound strange unless you are familiar with law and realize that this Old Testament statute is the basis of our modern laws that state that marriage can be annulled if one of the parties defrauded the other at the time of marriage. This is exactly what God is talking about here.

When the man and woman were married, if, in order to be excused from the marriage, the man said that the wife was not a virgin, then the father and mother of the bride would bring the bedclothes out and spread them before the elders of the city. If there were bloodstains, or "tokens of virginity," on the bedclothes, then the man was accused of slander. He was fined 100 shekels of silver which he had to pay to the bride's family, was beaten, and was required to keep his wife and care for her for life with no opportunity for divorce.

Now, I am getting to another point here, but let me say something parenthetically that may help you. There are men these days who go around bragging about how they have had some sort of sexual relations with a girl, even when it is not true. That is the slander that God is talking about here which He so vehemently abhors. It is literally the slander of a woman's reputation, and it still angers God. God hasn't changed.

Even if the woman is not a virgin, that gossip and slander will keep a man from being "maximized" in his manhood and from becoming all that God intends for him to be. It's slander, murmuring, backbiting, whatever you want to call it, and God will not stand for it.

By the very seed that such a man sows with his mouth, he will reap the retribution. For by his words he will live and die. "Death and life are in the power of the tongue."

Now, the other part of the judgment was that, if indeed the woman was not a virgin and there were no "tokens of virginity" on the bedclothes, then the man could be granted an annulment. But the woman would be taken out and stoned to death for having lost her virginity while still "in her father's house."

Some people feel that this is a harsh injustice on God's part. But God said, "So you shall put away the evil from among you." The Old Testament is part of the old covenant, yes, but look what Acts says in the New Testament,

"...and walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, (they) were multiplied."5 (Italic words added.)

The truth is that much of the Church today has learned to walk in the comfort of the Holy Ghost but without the fear of the Lord. In the fear of the Lord is the restraint from doing evil. But if a person only walks in the comfort of the Holy Ghost and not in the fear of the Lord, then there is no restraint from doing evil, and without that restraint lasciviousness (or "loosed-from-restraint" living) becomes the rule.

God ordained punishment in order to bring a measure of the fear of the Lord to His people.That is the reason for the severity of His punishment against those who took their virginity lightly.

Today in many of the youth groups in churches, there are young people who are content to walk in the comfort of the Holy Ghost and go to church regularly, but in their private lives they don't have the fear of the Lord and are not restrained in their desires to do evil.

Recently a young man told me about a problem he was having with his girlfriend, but his account just didn't sit right with me.

"It sounds to me like you've had sex with this young lady," I said. He insisted that he hadn't.

As he continued to give me sketchy details, I became distressed with him because he was giving me symptoms of a problem between them that I recognized usually involved sex. Finally I pinned him down and said, "I want to ask you a question, and I want you to look at me. Did you have sex with her?"

"She's still a virgin," he replied.

"That tells me nothing," I said. "Did you have sex with her?"

"Yes, we had oral sex, but she's still a virgin."

There he stood, too ashamed to tell me the truth because he knew in his heart that it was wrong, yet trying to insist in word and deed that it wasn't sex! How ungodly! How much of the fear of the Lord was operating in his life?

Sex was made for loving and giving, not for lusting and getting. This young man was "lusting" his girlfriend, not loving her. He needed to love her as God loves her, and prepare himself to be a husband by learning to love a wife scripturally the way that Christ loved the church.

The truth is that private renunciation of sin leads to public denunciation of sin. When men are publicly denouncing sin, the fear of the Lord can come into the world. But it is up to those in the Church to bring a measure of the fear of the Lord into the world.

9

THE PURPOSE OF VIRGINITY

This is serious to God, and yet we live in a society in which a young man wants to get rid of his virginity at the very earliest of ages to show that he's a "man." Keeping it means that he's a "wimp." A young woman wants to get rid of her virginity in order to gain acceptance. If she keeps it, she's considered a "prude."

But God has established something higher than the lascivious behavior of this world on which you can base your life and through which you can experience this great blessing.

God has given you a glory in the virginity which is yours from birth. It is the one thing that you possess that is yours to give as your greatest gift to the person you love, with whom you will spend a lifetime, with whom you will become "one."

Being a virgin doesn't make you an "oddball" or a "weirdo"! Being a virgin makes you the person God created you to be so that in your life you can have a holy covenant relationship with someone He brings to you. God has given you a blood covenant. It's His divine provision given out of love for man, and in order for man and woman to become truly "one." It's something to rejoice about, not something to grumble about or feel inferior because of! Virginity is a glory!

This is what God has done for us through the creation of a virginal state in man:

When a man and a woman get married as virgins and have their first intimate experience, and her hymen is broken, it causes the shedding of blood which then flows over his part. To God it is a sign that they have entered into a sacred relationship with a blood covenant which is symbolic of entering into a sacred covenant relationship with God in Christ by the shedding of His blood.

The shedding of blood is the symbol of the covenant a husband and wife have entered into together, first in heart, then in body. It's an external evidence of an internal work.

When a man and woman make their commitment to one another before God, and they declare their desire to become "one flesh," as God intended for them, then God has provided for them an actual blood covenant whereby they can seal their commitment.

Awesome! Joyous! Wonderful!

To those who are married, the sexual part of their relationship takes on an entirely new dimension when they understand the perfection of what God has done between them.

To those who are not yet married, it gives an entirely new outlook on the future that God has prepared for them.

Think of it. On your wedding night, you take your bride into your arms in the hotel room. She's dressed in her beautiful white peignoir, you're in your new silk pajamas. You have toasted each other with your sparkling grape juice, and now you look into her eyes and say, "Darling, you are God's gift to me. I love you. I want to give you the glory of my manhood. I want to enter into a sacred covenant relationship with you 'until death do us part.'"

What a way to start a marriage! What a way to show true manhood! What a way for a woman to start a relationship with a man! Contrast that to the woman who marries "Mr. Macho" who has tried to take the virginity from as many women as possible, or "Mr. Cool" who married her because he was tired of buying so many dinners to get something that marriage would give him continuously for free.

What a cheap kind of attitude toward marriage!

Sex is no reason to get married.

Getting married just to have sex is one of the poorest reasons in the world. It's just like the woman who marries someone just to get away from her father, only to find that she has jumped from the frying pan into the fire.

There's only one reason to get married, and that is to fulfill the covenant relationship God has given to man through His great love for man, and by doing so, to bring honor and glory to God.

HOLY COVENANT: Abraham

INTERNAL WORK: Circumcised Heart (Faith in God)

EXTERNAL WORK: Circumcised Flesh

Result: Righteousness of entering a blood covenant, bringing glory to God.

HOLY COVENANT: Jesus

INTERNAL WORK: Acceptance of redemption through shed blood

EXTERNAL WORK: Water Baptism

Result: Righteousness of entering a blood covenant, bringing glory to God.

HOLY COVENANT: Marriage

INTERNAL WORK: Commitment, Unity, Love

EXTERNAL WORK: Sex

Result: Righteousness of entering a blood covenant, bringing glory to God.

10

RECEIVING THE GLORY OF VIRGINITY

I've looked eyeball to eyeball with thousands of young men and asked point-blank, "Aren't there any young men who are real men in this world? Aren't there any who have enough guts, enough love for God in their hearts, enough of a desire to serve God and be a champion for God to 'present their bodies to God, a living sacrifice which is their reasonable service'"?

"Aren't there any who want the glory of God to be present in their lives through their virginity and in their decision for moral excellence?

"How many of you have come from broken homes and have sworn you won't do the same thing to your children, yet you are not taking the steps necessary today to prevent heartache tomorrow? Aren't there any young men who want to take their stand for God?"

Thousands have responded. When faced with truth, there are godly young men today who are willing to accept it and change so their lives measure up to God's Word. Almost 100 percent of them admit they've been struggling with a spirit of lust.

The spirit of virginity is necessary to replace the spirit of lust.

The Bible says that when an unclean spirit goes out of a man, it comes back and, if it finds the vessel empty, it will enter the man again with seven spirits more wicked than it is, and "the last state of that man is worse than the first."

There are a lot of people today who want to get rid of the spirit of lust because of what it's doing to them, but they don't know what to fill up the emptiness with when that spirit leaves.

The spirit of virginity is the answer to the spirit of lust.

Some people make a decision not to engage in adultery or fornication, but then everywhere they go people are talking about it. They fight an ongoing battle. The truth is that sex was not created for the kingdom of Satan but for the Kingdom of God.

Sex was created by God for marriage.

In the counterfeit kingdom, however, there is adultery and fornication and every kind of perversion. It's all a counterfeit of what God originally created as part of His blessing for man, and so it ends up being a curse instead of a blessing.

A 26-year-old woman came running up to me after a service one night and said, "Brother Cole, this is the greatest day of my life."

"Why?" I asked.

"Because," she said, "I'm a virgin and I told someone at work who told everyone else and now they all make fun of me. Even my own mother mocks me and asks when I'm ever going to grow up, which to her means losing my virginity. I've begun to feel so guilty, so inferior and ashamed, because I'm still a virgin. It's been hard for me, but tonight I'm set free from all that. Tonight I have accepted my virginity as a glory, and I thank God I have it so I can give it to the man I marry, so I can have a blood covenant some day with the man God has for me."

A 16-year-old man walked up to me after a meeting, shook my hand, and said, "Thanks."

"For what?" I asked.

He looked me right in the eye and said,

"Because now I don't have to do it."

All the pressure of "proving his manhood" was gone.

Some have not kept it as these two did. Perhaps you have already given away your virginity and now realize the true significance of what you did. You may be one who grew up in church but still played around without the fear of the Lord and lost that glory.

You may be married and realize you have never experienced this glory of the covenant God gave you, and want to have that "wedding night" of covenant with your spouse.

Perhaps you're a woman who gave her virginity to some guy thinking he was worthy of it, only to find that he really didn't love you, he just "lusted" you. Perhaps you're a young man who was seduced by a woman who thought you were a handsome "jock" and wanted your company to make her feel good.

Many experience the feeling, "My God, if only I could get my virginity back!"

You may not be able to get it back physically, but you can have it mentally and emotionally, and you can keep yourself in the anointing and the glory of that spirit of virginity until the time comes that you marry. If you're married, you can have it back spiritually to cleanse you of the lust and impurities you brought into your marriage.

Are you one who wants to have a sex life in the Kingdom of God instead of in the kingdom of Satan?

Are you one who never understood before what you had in your virginity? Or are you one who has lost your virginity and now you realize, "Hey, I've lost it, but now I want the glory of my virginity back spiritually, mentally, and emotionally."

Let God give it to you as you pray this prayer. But don't pray it unless you're serious with God. You may feel like you're all alone wherever you are right now, but God is there and you are going on His record when you pray. Have integrity before God and pray this with all your heart:

"Father, in the name of Jesus, I'm coming to You right now because You've made me a man. I want to be a man of God, I want to be a man of God in every area of my life—my mind, my heart, my spirit, my body.

"Thank You, Lord, that I've been born into the Kingdom of God. I've been born into Your Spirit. I'm a partaker of Your Divine Nature through my Savior Jesus Christ. So by faith right now I receive a fresh anointing of Your Holy Spirit in my life.

"By the authority of Your Word and the ability of Your Spirit, I turn toward the powers of darkness, I turn toward that spirit of lust, and I say to it, 'Spirit of lust, get out of my life, in the name of Jesus. I am receiving the glory of virginity, and I reject your lust.'

"And now, Lord, I thank You for the anointing, and by faith I receive that glory of virginity into my spirit. I present to You my body—holy, acceptable, which is my reasonable service. I not only present it to You, Lord, but by the power of Your Word and Your Spirit, I hold my body in the glory of virginity to present it to the woman I marry as the glory You gave me.

"I want my sex life to be pure, holy, righteous, and good, the way You intended it to be. I don't want sin. I don't want unrighteousness. I want the glory, Lord, in my life, in my marriage — and even if I never get married. I praise You for it right now. Thank You, Lord."

Now praise God for it and by your thanksgiving seal the work God has done in your life.

11

WHAT NEXT?

The verse in the Bible that is often quoted for salvation is:

"If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."1

Many people receive the forgiveness that verse speaks of, but forget about the cleansing. Many have a mental catharsis which frees them so they no longer have the guilt of past sins, but they don't complete the process by waiting upon God and seeking Him for the cleansing He has promised.

When you were first saved, you were translated into the Kingdom of God, yet you left a bunch of "junk" over in the other kingdom. The same is true right now.

You have just received that spirit of virginity which is a part of the cleansing of unrighteousness. But although your sexuality has been translated into the Kingdom of God, there are other areas of your life that are still over in the other kingdom.

There are memories, hurts, sins, habits, anxieties, attitudes, emotions, and many other things that will continue to affect you. Until they are all translated over into the Kingdom of God, they can hinder you from achieving the moral excellence to which you have just committed yourself.

You need that cleansing process started in your life today. First of all, you need to understand that God made sex good. The Bible says that the marriage bed is "undefiled," so married people can enjoy their sexual relationship freely and without guilt.

The Bible also says that "whatsoever is not of faith is sin," so the couple must respect each other's faith and not use their freedom as an occasion to sin.

But there are many things other than love or physical desire that drive a person to want to have sex. Whether you are single or married, you need for these things to be cleansed, sanctified, and brought into the Kingdom of God through Christ.

One young lady told me she finally realized why she had been sexually promiscuous for many years. She said that her father had always leered at the football cheerleaders on television and at other sexy-looking women, but he didn't pay any attention to her.

In order to get the attention and affection she desired, she first learned to dress skimpily, and later to have sex with her boyfriends. She was looking for a father's love and acceptance, but she couldn't find it so she went from boyfriend to boyfriend.

Another example is the college man who had been molested by a male friend of his father's and, as a result, had developed homosexual tendencies and desires. Another college man had a mother who so belittled him as he was growing up that he learned to prey upon women sexually, trying either to "get even" or finally to get accepted.

There are many women who were molested by their fathers or other men. Now they find that they have a difficult time seeing God as their Father, having normal relationships with men, or relating to their husbands in a sexual, vulnerable way.

It is very difficult for a lot of these people because of that trauma they suffered.

It's true that many people in the Church today don't like to talk about sin any more, but instead talk about "problems." They never seem to realize that the problems they are talking about, and the wrong motivations and the bad memories, and the bad images, and all the rest of it, are all based on sin — either theirs or others'.

But in dealing with sin, what Christianity cannot control, it rationalizes and "psychologizes." What the world cannot control, it decriminalizes and legalizes.

Just remember, no one is more interested in seeing you change than God is.

Even when you were at enmity with Him through sin, He sent Jesus Christ to die in your place.How much more will He help you now to overcome the sins that hinder you.

When you stand honest and open before God, the Holy Spirit can do more in ten seconds than you could do in ten lifetimes.

12

RELEASED!

There is a powerful biblical teaching that has helped thousands of people to be released from "problems" and sex sins, and it can release you as well.

It comes from John 20. The Amplified Bible version of this passage is the clearest (italic words added):

"And having said this, He (Jesus) breathed on [them] (the disciples), and said to them, Receive (admit) the Holy Spirit!

"[Now, having received the Holy Spirit and being led and directed by Him] if you forgive the sins of any one they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any one, they are retained."

You see, it's not just our own sins that hinder us, but through unforgiveness we actually bind the sins of others to our lives and they become a problem to us. It wasn't necessarily what we did; we didn't ask for it; yet nonetheless their sin creates a problem in our life.

The principle is, the innocent always suffer for the guilty.

Jesus' very life taught us this principle. He suffered the sins of all mankind.Those of us who pay high insurance premiums suffer for the sins of those who drive recklessly, practice medicine irresponsibly or sue others for greedy gain.

The young man whose mother berated him was actually suffering for her sins first, and later for his own.

Those whose virginity was forcibly taken from them, or who have been raped, molested, forced into incest, or who were in some other way hurt by someone else are suffering for that person's sins.

In the Word of God, Jesus said to receive the Holy Spirit, then to release those sins out of your life.

And when you release them, reject the images and attitudes that came with them.

Man communicates through word, gesture and spirit. When you accept the words and gestures of anyone, you accept also the spirit in which they are given.When you accept lustful actions against you, you accept the spirit of lust behind those actions.

You need to release those things through forgiveness, as the Holy Spirit reveals them to you, and reject whatever else came with them.

First, ask God for a fresh infilling of His Holy Spirit in your life. Ask the Holy Spirit to search your heart and reveal to you those whose sins you need to be freed from.

Next, picture that person who has done you wrong, and then by faith forgive him or her. You may not feel like forgiving, but do it by faith, taking the step of obedience by following Jesus' instructions. God doesn't say, "Can you forgive?" but rather, "Will you forgive?"

Now pray this prayer:

"Father, in the name of Jesus, I confess that You created me to be a man (woman) of God. You created me for a purpose and put within me everything I would need to accomplish it. I thank You for who You created me to be. I confess that all I ever want to be is that special person You created me to be.

"Now, by faith, I receive a fresh anointing of the Holy Spirit. And by the authority of Your Word in my life, and the power of Your Spirit, I forgive _______who has made my life so miserable. I forgive him, Lord, with all my heart.

"And now I turn toward those powers of darkness and I say to those demon spirits: 'Get out of my life. I reject you and all your lies. I reject the image of myself that you tried to create.

I am God's creation through Jesus Christ, and you have no part in my life.'

"Now, Father, I receive the righteousness and worthiness of Jesus Christ in my life. I am being changed from glory to glory and I receive more of it right now. Thank You for it."

Receive God's work inside you, restoring you to be the person you were created to be before that thing ever happened to you. Receive the righteousness and worthiness of Jesus Christ.

Reject out of your life the poor self-image. Reject the shattered father's image that has made it so difficult for you to accept God as your Father. Reject the lies, accusations and bad attitudes. If someone has told you that you will never amount to anything, reject that idea. If someone has told you that you are cheap, reject that false image.

Now again praise God and seal this work that He has done.

13

GO IN THE POWER OF GOD

The relief and peace of God that you now feel are yours. God is working in your life.

Spend time daily in prayer and in God's Word, letting it purify you and renew your mind. "How a man thinks" determines who he is, and from the heart "spring the issues of life."

Don't set unrealistic goals for your prayer life, like getting up at 4:30 in the morning to pray when you can barely get up at 6:30 now. Set time apart for God at a time you know you can give Him.

Be renewed.

Remember, change is not change until it is change.

Decisions are not made, they are lived.

If you find that you absolutely cannot date without sinning, then don't date. Instead, discover God as your friend, confidant, counselor, the One Who knows you best, accepts you just as you are, and loves you perfectly. Let Him be the One to Whom you can go at any time under any conditions, and allow Him to fulfill your desires by bringing to you human companionship and a spouse.

Don't get married just to have a "steady date" or "legal sex." And don't get divorced thinking it will rid you of problems.

Whether married or single, you still need to find the peace and security of a friendship with God, then allow Him to work out the rest of the details of your life.

Marrying the wrong person or quitting a marriage will only make life more difficult, not easier. Remember, success is based on the ability to say "no," not the ability to say "yes."

It is never too late to say "no": "no" to illicit sex, "no" to a wrong engagement, "no" to sin. Saying "no" on the day of the wedding is difficult, but it is far easier than a disastrous marriage. Saying "no" after you've led someone to believe you want to engage in sex won't make you popular on earth, but it will in heaven. It is never too late to say "no." Don't say "yes" to sin just because someone intimidates you. Honor God more than man.

And when you do sin, repent. No sin is too great for God's forgiveness. Yours is no exception. God's grace is great for all.

The sequentially ordered results of sin are — guilt, fear and hiding. Don't feel too guilty or be too afraid to go to God. Don't try to hide from Him. Go to God immediately.

Satan can only spoil your life through temptation or accusation. Even if you don't succumb to the temptation, he will accuse you as if you did. Reject it.

Only repent for what you have really done, not for what Satan tries to accuse you of doing. Let the Holy Spirit be your guide, not "the fiery darts of the enemy."

If you are not yet married, get as much of your life into the Kingdom of God now as the Holy Spirit directs. It will not make you "too spiritual" to find a spouse, but it will save you a lot of painful growing later on.

God's purpose for you is to go from glory to glory. To enjoy the true glory of marriage, enter with the glory of virginity.

14

SEX IN MARRIAGE

If you are married, you may think that this teaching doesn't apply to you, because you are not a virgin now. You may think the opportunity for a holy covenant through the glory of virginity is now past, and you are living in the best, most righteous covenant possible.

The truth is, you can still have that glory, though it may have been taken from you years ago. You can still enter into that covenant spiritually, which you were unaware of when you initially married. Have God impress it into your spirit, and become renewed in your mind, spirit, attitudes and emotions toward your sexuality.

If you read the preceding chapters knowing you lost the glory of virginity and thinking it couldn't be restored to your life, then re-read them and pray the prayer. Release the old habits, thoughts, memories, and hurts that keep you from experiencing the fullness of God in relation to your sexuality.

Having done that, you now need to realize that just because you are married, and in covenant, that doesn't necessarily mean you have the most perfect, righteous, moral, pure and holy sexual relationship possible. Nor does marriage automatically ensure you the most pleasurable, intimate relationship with your spouse.

Getting married just means that you now have the potential for a moral, pure, holy, pleasurable, fulfilling sex life, because only through marriage can God bless and sanctify sexual relations. God will work on your behalf to bless you in the area of sex if you ask Him.

God wants you to have a good sexual relationship with your spouse. God is there for you. When you enter your bedroom at night to have sex, you don't leave Jesus outside the door. Christ abides within you, and He is there in the sanctity of the act of marriage between you and your spouse.

He knows what you're doing! It's through Him that you're able to enjoy that sexual freedom in marriage!

Your sexual relationship begins with your spiritual relationship. When Adam and Eve were joined together, they became "one flesh." Ephesians says,

"For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church."1

Marriage isn't a 50/50 proposition. It is a 100/100 covenant in which a husband and wife give to the other their all, and become united as one.

In Hebrews the Bible says,

"Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge."2

Physical, sexual relationship is the most intimate, physical way to show and express the union in spirit that man and woman have. Therefore, the Bible says, "Marriage is honourable in all." God will honor you in your marriage as you honor Him.

The greatest times of intimacy a man and woman will ever know are the times when they have first experienced spiritual intimacy through prayer together, and out of that, experience the physical intimacy of sex.

Prayer produces intimacy.

The intimacy of prayer touches the very core of your being as you strip off outer masks and bare yourself before your God, with your spouse at your side. That is incredible intimacy. Joyous. Wondrous!

When you have intimacy in the spiritual realm, you will have greater intimacy in the physical realm.

But note that when the Bible says that the bed is undefiled, that is not a license for lustful, kinky sex in marriage. Lust separates. Love binds.

Any sex outside marriage is defiled. Only sex within marriage is undefiled. That is the meaning of that truth.

Any sex outside of marriage is defiled because it is not in covenant. Sex between two people before marriage is fornication. Between two people outside of marriage, when married, is adultery. Between two men, homosexuality. Between two women, lesbianism.

A man cannot engage in any kind of bestial, lustful, violent, or kinky sex in marriage, then hold up the Bible and say, "the marriage bed is undefiled."

That's a perverted attitude.

People have tried to corner me on what is good and righteous in the marriage bed. "What about oral sex?" "How often can you have sex?" I'm not the sex doctor of Christianity! I'm not handing out earthly opinions based on human wisdom!

The Bible does say, "whatsoever is not of faith is sin."1 Therefore, if you cannot have sex through faith, it is sin. And to force your spouse to engage in sex that is not in keeping with her level of faith is not regarding her as a joint-heir and preferring her in love. It is, therefore, sin.

That's Bible.

Sex is sacred and is to be kept sacred even within the bonds of marriage.

It isn't too late to reconstruct your thinking and attitudes concerning sex. Pray, wash your mind with the Word, release old patterns through forgiveness, and slowly allow God to transform you into His image, even in your sexuality.

God will do it for you. He loves you and wants you to be blessed and prosperous even in your sex life. Turn it over to Him and allow Him to make the changes.

REFERENCES

Chapter 1

!Matt. 26:7-13

Chapter 2

Gen. 1:27 AMP

Gen. 2:18

Is. 46:9

Gen. 1:27

1 Pet. 3:7

Gen. 2:18-25

Gen. 1:27

Gen. 5:1

Gen. 2:7

Gen. 2:24

Gen. 5:2

2 Sam. 22:36

Ps. 18:35

Prov. 19:22 tlb

Gen. 1:28; 2:15 amp

Gen. 3:16

1 Cor. 11:11,12

Gen. 1:28,31 amp

Chapter 3

Gen. 3

Col. 1:13

Is. L4:12-15

Col. 3:15 amp

Abram, Gen. 17:5; Jacob, Gen. 32:28

John 14:6

2 Cor. 11:14

Gen. 3:1

Chapter 4

1 Cor. 6:12

Rom. 6:16 Ps. 24:1

Chapter 5

2 Cor. 11:13,14; 2 Thess. 2:9

Chapter 6

Gen. 3:17

Rom. 5:6

Rom. 8:5-8 tlb

1 Cor. 15:45-47

Rom. 5:9; Gal. 4:7; Col. 1:13

Rom. 5:17; 8:17

Chapter 7

Gen. 17:9-14 amp

Deut. 30:6

Col. 2:9 amp

Col. 2:11,12 amp

Gen. 15:6; Rom. 4:11

Rom. 2:29 Col. 2:11,12

Chapter 8

Deut. 22:13-21 amp

Prov. 18:21

Deut. 22:21 amp

Deut. 22:21 amp

Acts 9:31

Prov. 16:6

Acts 5:1-11

Eph. 5:25

Chapter 9

Gen. 2:24

Chapter 10

Matt. 12:45

Chapter 11

John 1:9

Heb. 13:4

Rom. 14:23

Rom. 5:8

Chapter 12

John 20:22,23 amp

1 John 2:2

Luke 6:38

Chapter 13

Eph. 6:16

Chapter 14

Eph. 5:31,32

Heb. 13:4

Some of the thoughts expressed in The Sacredness of Sex have been published in other of Dr. Cole's books.

Communication, Sex and Money (Tulsa: Harrison House, 1987).

Courage: A Book for Champions (Tulsa: Harrison House, 1985).

Maximized Manhood (Springdale: Whitaker House, 1982).

The Potential Principle (Springdale: Whitaker House, 1982).

The teaching on the "Sacredness of Sex" is also a remarkable videotape, filmed live before an enthusiastic crowd of 5,000. The challenge for moral excellence at the close of the meeting produces an avalanche effect at the altars. The powerful anointing of the ministry compels people to answer the challenge for excellence via video in schools, churches, and even in the privacy of their own living rooms. Soul restoring. life changing. Moral energizing. Heart repairing. This video will be tremendous ministry for you, your friends, family, and church! Only $25.

Order your video today simply by writing to Brother Cole at:

P. O. Box 610588 Dallas, TX 75261

"And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

"So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

"And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

"And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.

"And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.

"And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day."

Genesis 1:26-31

"And the lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.

"And the Lord God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.

"And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:

"But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

"And the lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.

"And out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.

"And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him.

"And the lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;

"And the rib, which the lord God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.

"And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.

"Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.

"And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed."

Genesis 2:7,15-25

"Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?"

Romans 6:16

"For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.

"For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.

"Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.

"So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.

"But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.

"And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.

"But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.

"Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh.

"For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.

"For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.

"For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.

"The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:

"And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together."

Romans 8:5-17 KJV

Internationally acclaimed speaker, television personality, best-selling author and motivational lecturer, known for his practical application of godly wisdom in everyday life.

Brother Cole has been called to speak with a prophetic voice to men, challenging them to fulfill their potential for true manhood, which is Christlikeness. As founder of the Christian Men's Network, he teaches monthly via videotape to 1,500 Network Centers for men in 23 countries. He also travels extensively, exhorting men to reach their full potential in life by disciplining themselves to God's Word, and receiving God's wisdom, favor, and courage.

“The Sacredness of Sex could well be the start of a new sex revolution. . .with chastity and virginity as the way to find deep joy, pure romance, true fulfillment.”

“Edwin Cole’s hard-hitting book exposes the truth about morality, purity, and holiness. . .going all out for God.”

Leonard LeSourd Former Executive Editor Guideposts Magazine

A NEW SEX REVOLUTION!

Today, when sex has been degraded to crass “adult” humor and virginity is regarded by some as cheap merchandise, a new generation is bringing back what the previous generation threw away — a generation that understands...God made sex good!

This could be the most unusual, the most important book about sex you will ever read. Single or married, man or woman, this book holds WISDOM to help you understand why God created you to be sexual. . .and what to do about it — HOW TO LIVE RIGHT IN A WORLD LIVING WRONG.

This book will forever change your thinking.

If you have been hurt, you will find RESTORATION within these pages.

If you have the heart for it, it will change your life!

Table of Contents

Dedication

Statement of Purpose

Acknowledgments

Introduction

1 Sex Is the Sign of a Covenant

2 Creation

3 The Counterfeit Kingdom

4 The Power of Choice

5 Love vs. Lust

6 The Second Adam

7 God's Covenant with Man

8 The Tokens of Virginity

9 The Purpose of Virginity

10 Receiving the Glory of Virginity

11 What Next?

12 Released!

13 Go in the Power of God

14 Sex in Marriage

References