2008

Sex

Its Unknown Dimension

BY DAVID C. PACK

The world has been ignorant of the TRUE PURPOSES of sex. The result has been untold pain and suffering for the masses! This misery—now epidemic—is measured in disease, new kinds of perversion, unwanted pregnancies yielding abortions, illegitimate children or unwanted children in marriage, sky-rocketing divorce rates, which in turn produce corresponding numbers of jumbled families, bankruptcies, court battles and even crime.

Sadly, these conditions grow worse and more complicated, with each new generation compounding the problems and evils of the previous one.

Tragedy, unhappiness and confusion about sex and marriage have afflicted every nation of the world for thousands of years, and people have not known where to turn for the ANSWERS—the SOLUTIONS—to so many ill effects, now running rampant.

But there are answers—there are solutions—and you can know them. What has not been known is that there is a VITAL MISSING DIMENSION to marriage and sex that was not explained until the twentieth century.

This book reveals it!

Video Introduction from the Author (3:42)

Introduction

In 1964, Herbert W. Armstrong (1892-1986), Pastor General of the Worldwide Church of God, and Chancellor of the three Ambassador Colleges it sponsored, published a book then titled god speaks out on “The New Morality.” Several years later, it was given a new title, THE MISSING DIMENSION IN SEX. This book’s earliest edition was written to be a college textbook for the incoming freshman students at these colleges. Mr. Armstrong recognized, even then, the already serious and growing disaster of the sexual revolution—the “New Morality.” His book was most explicit, as will be this one.

Within twenty years, almost a million and a half copies of Mr. Armstrong’s book had been distributed, eventually reaching virtually every nation and territory of the world. This extraordinary book was later discontinued by his successors, and its vital principles were lost to nearly the entire generation that followed. With the rapid acceleration of the sexual revolution, begun in the late 1950s and early 1960s, there came a need to rewrite the truths revealed in Mr. Armstrong’s book from a twenty-first-century perspective. This volume brings these principles and truths of such colossal importance back to life. It also works in direct concert with, and is an important companion to, my book Dating and Courtship – God’s Way.

The world is now drenched—actually drowning—in a deluge of sex, with much or most of it having no connection to any real meaning or right purpose. More than ever in history, all mankind is awash in every conceivable kind of sexual pleasure, fantasy, perversion and pursuit—in or out of marriage, and with fewer and fewer people any longer making a distinction between the two. There has come to be no end to—and virtually no limits on—advertisements, television programs, movies, books, magazines, articles, photographs and websites for every kind of pornography and sex-related activity that the misguided creative genius of human beings could devise.

But sadly, there has been a worldwide drought in right understanding of these things!

Almost none know why they were born—what is the supreme purpose for human life. Most have no idea that there even is a purpose for human existence. Philosophers are not explaining it, because they do not know what is—or whether there is—a purpose for your life. Educators are not teaching it, because no one can teach what he himself has not been taught. Scientists do not speak to this subject, because it lies outside their field. Moralists are ignorant of it—and so are the theologians of all the world’s supposed “great religions.” These religions have collectively failed a world that was counting on them for deliverance from the misery besetting all civilization.

But this ignorance has been no more evident than in the misunderstood and largely unknown purposes of sex and marriage. Believing himself to be merely the highest of the animals in an evolutionary chain, man has remained in the dark, completely unable to see a reason for sex, or for human beings existing as men and women. Yet, there is an awesome purpose for humanity collectively—and you personally—and, when fully understood, it is inseparable from the purposes of sex and the marriage institution.

It is crucial to understand that it was necessary to write this volume with several early chapters laying the all-important foundation for vital information—the unknown dimension of sex—that can only be grasped after the reader has been prepared for it.

Chapter One –

Much Knowledge—Of the Wrong Kind!

The nations of the world possess a vast sum of knowledge, and this fund of knowledge increases daily, but they are ignorant of the right kind of knowledge—spiritually revealed knowledge. This is because the modern system of education is morally and spiritually bankrupt!

Deluded educators have been biased against God and His Word by having had the atheistic teaching of evolution funneled into their minds from childhood. They have taught young people for decades that there are “no absolutes” and that they must follow “situation ethics” in all circumstances—and these young people have grown up into what are now several generations from which the world’s leaders have come.

These misguided educators have led the world into a kind of secular humanism¯one in which people are driven by how they feel rather than clear definitions of right and wrong! This has led to a level of immorality and kinds of perversion perhaps rarely before seen in history. But there is right and wrong in life—and the educators of this world have cut themselves off from this knowledge (Isa. 59:1-2). Again, they cannot teach what they were never taught. And neither could their parents—who were also indoctrinated in the same false thinking—teach them what was missing in their education.

The problem is self-perpetuating—and worsening!

These misguided educators have led the world into a kind of secular humanism—where people are driven by how they feel rather than clear definitions of right and wrong! This has led to a level of immorality and kinds of perversion perhaps never before seen in history. But there is right and wrong in life—and the educators of this world have cut themselves off from this knowledge (Isa. 59:1-2). Again, they cannot teach what they were never taught. And neither could their parents—who were also indoctrinated in the same false thinking—teach them what was missing in their education!

Repression Taught

The pagan doctrine of the immortality of the soul, derived by ancient philosophers, has played a huge role in the idea that sex is shameful—evil—and is to be repressed as something exclusively of the flesh and contrary to the supposed pristine, pure soul “trapped” inside the evil “prison house” of the body.

This world’s churches have kept humanity steeped in traditional pagan philosophies and teachings that have deceived the world for millennia. All the world’s religions have ignored the great spiritual principle of cause and effect that governs every aspect of life. They have all neglected to teach true spiritual values—and that there is a vital, inspired Instruction Book from Almighty God that contains special knowledge, unattainable anywhere else. This largely ignored book explains that there is a great spiritual law that, when obeyed, brings all the good things that every human being seeks.

Confused by the conflicting influences of blinded religious leaders and deceived educators, the masses have been permitted to put the pursuit of sex for pleasure at or near the pinnacle of all human goals. At the same time, large numbers of others have unnecessarily languished under the repression of sex for any purpose.

The results have been terrible—the fruits absolutely devastating and most tragic to whole generations who have experienced a host of awful consequences almost too many to enumerate.

“Authorities” Do Not Know!

We live in an age when everyone is an “expert.” Newspapers, magazines, television and radio programs are filled with people offering their opinions about everything! Every problem, social issue or important current event confronting society now seems to command the view of journalists, scientists, psychologists, educators and every conceivable kind of self-styled or self-appointed “authority” on the subject. Of course, politicians now also enter virtually every debate, because, increasingly, government is expected to solve every problem men can create. But these men are also without answers, and government intervention only seems to complicate matters.

Invariably, these supposed experts disagree with one another—and this is because few even remotely consider what God thinks!

Though many are questioning marriage, only God can reveal its purpose. Now understand. There is certainly nothing wrong with questioning marriage. In fact, everyone should ask the questions that the “authorities” ask, but cannot answer. The problem is that these “authorities” do not even understand the little you have read so far, let alone all that will follow. Again, this is because they look to evolution as the origin of the human race!

Evolution—Box Canyon!

Consider however. Evolutionists are stymied by—actually trapped within!—the boundaries of their theory. They see no greater reason for the birth of a human than for a puppy or a giraffe. If, as they assert, human beings are merely the highest of animals, and products of blind, dumb evolution, it is impossible for them to simultaneously believe in an overarching or transcendent, God-ordained purpose for human life. The two positions are opposites. No one can honestly accept both!

Though often of exceptional intelligence, the evolutionist’s dependence on human reasoning, accompanied by his rejection of revealed knowledge, leaves him utterly incapable of knowing God’s awesome purpose for humanity. He has literally shut himself out of true understanding!

Evolutionists do not know—they simply do not and cannot know the purpose of sex.

Yet, if human beings are products of mere evolution, how and when did the tradition of marriage begin? Since evolution teaches that human beings are the highest form of “animal,” we must ask, if this were true, when did pre-humans—or near-humans—or almost-humans—begin to marry? And how did the two sexes come to be? This introduces the greatest question of all that confronts evolutionists. How could these extraordinary parts of the human anatomy—which exist with such precision and function—possibly have evolved? It is ludicrous to think, or even suggest, that this could have happened slowly, over millions of years. How did offspring survive, or even come to be, until the amazing mechanisms of sex could be perfected—in other words, were fully formed—and in no less than millions of species of animals, as well? Evolutionists simply cannot answer these questions.

The reader will learn the complete folly of evolutionary thinking as per the obvious design of these organs in both male and female, and see the creative brilliance of God in its place. It will also be understood that there is a wonderful, transcendent purpose attached to these differences.

Returning to marriage, evolutionists can, at best, merely suppose that man (God is ruled out), at some point in the distant past, devised the idea to “get married.” Naturally, they could not, therefore, see any special purposes or reasons attached to sex other than producing offspring.

The Great Hypocrisy

Many professing “Christians” claim to follow the Bible, while at the same time believing the theory of evolution. However, most of these never think through and examine their beliefs, including the origin of these beliefs—how they came to hold them. Consider that, while saying that they believe in a Creator, they reject the Genesis account as literal. This forces them to draw the same conclusion as evolutionists about the how and when of marriage. They cannot see that “GOD created” human beings “male and female” (1:27).

But there is an altogether different side of this coin. Recognize again that it has been traditional Christianity that has taught that celibacy—remaining unmarried—is a “higher” state of existence. This supposes that marriage, and of course sex within marriage, is purely for the purpose of procreation—having children and propagating the human race.

This presents a very big problem.

Consider again. All mammals reproduce in exactly the same way. This is a fact of nature. Yet, none of them marry. And human beings and animals are also different in practically every other way. Now, if having children is the only purpose for marriage—or sex—then why should human beings marry? If they are merely the highest of the animals and, once again, sex and marriage have no other purpose but procreation, then marriage is a meaningless waste of time.

Do you see the point? Understanding the purposes—the all-important unknown dimension—of sex “connects the dots” to marriage, and then on to the purposes of marriage itself. Because men have been unable to, and actually cannot, discern them, the purposes and right use of sex, and that it belongs only in marriage, must then be divinely revealed.

Take the point further—and consider this. If celibacy is the highest form of human existence, and sex is only for procreation, it would seem to be much better for unmarried people to only come together for procreation, before returning to celibacy. Remember, most professing Christians (well over one billion) are also taught that all birth control is wrong! This belief derives from the “sex-is-dirty-and-only-for-procreation” idea.

Do you see the logic? If traditional religion is correct, and sex is solely for procreation—and if celibacy is a higher state of being—then marriage has absolutely no value. And make no mistake, there is plenty of reproduction taking place without marriage (now one in three births, just in America). Understanding the God-ordained reasons for sex, then, eliminates much ignorance and confusion about marriage.

Orthodox, traditional Christianity, completely deceived on nearly every biblical point, has utterly failed its followers—and the world—by teaching the fallacies we have just described. It has done no better than the rest of the world’s religions. Sadly, when it comes to sex, marriage and celibacy, most believe the falsehoods of deceived men who claim to be God’s representatives, but who know little or nothing of His true teachings.

Is God the Authority?

The Bible is written by One professing to be God. This “One” leaves no doubt as to His authority and power, and that He created everything. Here is His declaration and challenge to all skeptics: “I am the Eternal, and there is none else, there is no God beside Me...Thus says the Eternal, the Holy One of Israel, and his Maker, ask Me of things to come concerning My sons, and concerning the work of My hands command you Me. I have made the earth, and created man upon it: I, even My hands, have stretched out the heavens, and all their host have I commanded” (Isa. 45:5, 11-12).

This statement is not ambiguous. If we are to accept the Bible, God establishes Himself as the One who has authority to answer life’s biggest questions!

In the same passage, God continues to establish Himself as the Author of the Genesis 1 creation account: “For thus says the Eternal that created the heavens; God Himself that formed the earth and made it...I am the Eternal; and there is none else...who has declared this from ancient time? Who has told it from that time? Have not I the Eternal? And there is no God else beside Me...I have sworn by Myself, the word is gone out of My mouth in righteousness, and shall not return, that unto Me every knee shall bow...” (vs. 18-23).

There is no ambiguity here! These are very strong words. They are either true or false—they cannot be both. You need to know which it is, because all who are unwilling to investigate—to even consider—what God says will one day be required to “bow the knee” before the God they rejected (also Phil. 2:10). Since sex is such a big part of the human experience and existence—and has become the very centerpiece of so many lives today—the God of the Bible would have much to say about its use and purposes, and whether it is for exclusive use in marriage.

He does!

It is possible to prove that God exists and that the Bible is His Word—His divinely-inspired Manual for how to live. (You may read our series of books and booklets available to prove that the One who speaks from the pages of the Bible has authority—and that the Bible is, in fact, God’s Word. Fulfilled prophecy, referenced above, is only one of the proofs of the Bible’s divine inspiration that our material discusses. Also, we have carefully prepared extensive material proving the folly of evolution and the truth of God’s existence. This literature augments this volume.)

Great Purpose Revealed!

This book is written for those who will consider what Almighty God instructs, not for the unwilling. God reveals that marriage and sex have a marvelous purpose completely beyond the bounds of human imagination. After hearing God’s explanation, you be the judge of whether it makes more sense than that which is offered by evolutionists and traditional Christianity.

Remember, if you will not accept God’s revealed Word, you are left with no choice but to be ignorant of how and when marriage began, and of the purposes of sex. You must accept that marriage is either a human invention on the road of evolution, or the falsehood of religion—that it is for no purpose other than procreation because celibacy is a “higher calling.” These are your only options! With either, the marvelous answers available here, to the great questions of marriage and sex, remain shrouded in mystery.

True Values

The world has been devoid of right values—true values, which would have brought it to enjoy every wonderful and good thing that a loving God could give to His creation. God is a parent. And like human parents with their children, He has wanted His children to enjoy all the good things that He could provide for them.

The problem is that God’s children have ingested false values, having wandered out of the “house” and into the “neighborhood,” where they absorbed the thinking of different “parents.” For generations, humanity has sought the wrong goals, it has had the wrong purposes in mind. Even though it has reaped a host of wrong results, and pain of every imaginable sort, it has not sought to examine the faulty foundation upon which it stands—wrong values!

Not long ago, none could have dreamed that so many today would be choosing a variety of “alternative lifestyles,” and that many centuries of basic marriage values and customs would be under attack—challenged, lampooned and ridiculed as hopelessly out-of-date. With many abandoning the once-sacred institution of marriage, and the now near wholesale loss of traditional values, many are left confused, not knowing where to turn for answers.

Why is all of this happening?

The Bible is filled with true doctrines. Each has a well-established counterpart—a substitute—a clever counterfeit—that has been largely accepted by the orthodox Christian world. These include the gospel, the nature of salvation, punishment in the afterlife, which day of the week Christians should keep holy, observance of men’s holidays or God’s Holy Days, and many others of God’s doctrines or teachings. Each requires one to not only learn the truth of what is being studied, but to also unlearn the common, popular errors taught about it.

It is the same with marriage and sex. Recognize that you have been trained—actually conditioned—in wrong knowledge and values. Not only do you need to learn the truth of when and why sex, and its vital, hidden role in marriage, but you have to be prepared to unlearn all of the error that has been pumped into you about them. You must be reconditioned to the truth about this subject. As you would with any other Bible teaching, this means that you must be prepared to wash your mind from all assumptions, error and wrong thinking.

Mr. Armstrong’s book contained explicit drawings and diagrams. So does this one—but only in hardcopy. This is because the online version is publicly posted on our website and is therefore available to those under 18 years of age. In addition, there are more (and very detailed) manuals now available than ever before, reducing the need for such illustrations. The hope is that all parents who read this book in hardcopy will teach from it and give it to their teenagers.

Before Reading

A couple of points to consider before continuing. The reader may be familiar with the fact that I have written a number of books, booklets and brochures that speak with clarity—and God’s authority—to the many different aspects of marriage, sex, the family, childrearing, dating and courtship, and other related topics. If you have not, it is hoped that you will take the time to explore all that we offer. Some are mentioned in context within the book and others are found in a list of related, available literature, located at the back.

Also, there are some few paragraphs that are basically repeated between related publications for help in a different context. These brief overlaps are important to what is being covered. (And it is vital that the reader remember that this volume is a companion to my thorough book Dating and Courtship – God’s Way, and recognize that each is incomplete without the other.)

Before examining what God reveals about the hidden, missing dimension in sex and marriage, we must first take a long look at the problems that misunderstanding this vital dimension has brought to the world as a whole. The reader will be much better prepared for the chapters that follow—much more ready to comprehend what has not been known to the vast majority.

Chapter Two –

A World Gone Mad with Sex

The sexual revolution of the latter twentieth century changed the entire world—and not for the better. During this period, the idea of “sex without boundaries” did, in fact, escalate beyond all bounds. The advent of cable television, the Internet and the vast expanse of every conceivable kind of pornographic website that it offers, and the ease with which adult videos can be obtained, have helped spread the mindset that all sex is good—in or out of marriage.

Barriers everywhere have dropped—and are still dropping as they near a complete collapse on all fronts. Seemingly, every day establishes new lows in immorality, perversion, debauchery and “anything goes” when it comes to sexual habits and appetites. Experimentation and indulgence have become the norm. Most today have come to believe that free sex of every conceivable kind, with the same or opposite sex—or both—is a simple matter of personal preference. It is as though there is no longer the slightest concern about whether sexual activity is right or wrong. Vast millions have come to believe that achieving sexual pleasure in any setting, for any purpose, and involving any kind of experimentation or activity (and this includes any number of men and women participating in a single sexual episode) is perfectly acceptable—and is now, at least unconsciously, even seen to be a kind of human “right” of sorts.

By every older human standard and definition of morality—not to mention what God teaches!—sexual values in the early twenty-first century are infinitely worse than a mere fifty years ago. Words like “disgusting, sickening, shocking” and “revolting” come to mind when one looks across the world at what is now seen to be almost normal conduct, at least in the eyes of young people. Even the bestiality more common in ancient times is quietly reappearing. It is not too early to ask: How soon before this perverse evil becomes at least tacitly accepted by society?

This Time Foretold

God foretold that in the “last days...men shall be...lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God” and “without natural affection” (II Tim. 3:1-4). In the age of gross materialism, mixed with rank hedonism, the three “L’s” of leisure, luxury and license have come to dominate the thinking of whole societies and nations.

Of course, God is certainly not against enjoyment, which includes many kinds of pleasure, and obviously sex is perhaps chief among them. But He declares of our wanton, lascivious age, through the Old Testament prophet Jeremiah, that “Every one neighed after his neighbor’s wife” (5:8). And then there is His now almost completely forgotten Seventh Commandment—“Thou shall not commit adultery”—that is being routinely ignored by great numbers who then, as professing Christians, turn right around each week and go to church. As one preacher so aptly put it: “Most people sow wild oats all week, and then go to church on Sunday and pray for a crop failure.”

The Bible is filled with scriptures—literally scores of passages—describing the sexual saturation of wrong conduct and wrong thinking in the modern age. God pulls no punches in labeling many different kinds of sexual behavior as sin. These will be examined more closely at the end of this chapter.

Again, before we can understand all that God teaches about the true purposes of sex, we must examine what is occurring today. This will require more than a superficial view if we are to grasp just how bad it is in light of what God instructs.

Rampant Adultery

Adultery is now rampant in all Western nations, with 83 percent of American households experiencing—and afflicted by—adultery, being committed by either one or both mates. The suffering of all kinds connected just to illicit sex by married people is staggering to consider. At what point will we find 90 percent—95 percent—or even 100 percent—of couples no longer faithful in marriage?

The widespread practice of adulterous “pleasure marriages” has grown stronger in the Middle East and is also quickly regaining popularity in the new, democratic Iraq. This is the custom of men marrying several so-called “widows” for the sole purpose of sex outside marriage, but done under the guise of taking care of women in need. In addition, because of China’s explosion of economic prosperity, adultery in that country has grown so widespread that there are now tens of thousands of private investigators whose sole task is to track and report the marital infidelity of wealthy executives whose wives doubt their faithfulness. Incredibly, only one in 100 is found to be faithful! Then there are the various cultures of Europe, where having a mistress has long been considered a badge of honor—and wives willingly accept the status quo.

But conditions have gone far beyond simple adultery, which is wrong enough and terribly damaging. Recognize that the very worst kinds of perversion and sick, degenerate practices in modern society cannot even be discussed in this book. Here is why: “For it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret” (Eph. 5:12). Again, we will momentarily discuss in more detail certain of these things—where we can. But it is important to bear in mind that the very worst things that are happening in the sexual arena throughout society are necessarily excluded from this book.

Most modern societies have been forced by militant social radicals to embrace the concept of political correctness. This mindset permits all people to live whatever lifestyle—including “alternative” ones—that they choose, as long as they can rationalize that “it doesn’t hurt anyone else.” Such tolerance was rarely, or possibly never, known before this age. Virtually everyone and everything that people do is now tolerated with little question. Of course, the arrival of the personal computer has helped spawn this era of tolerance, and we will momentarily explain how.

Pleasure and betterment for the self are the main goals and hopes of most people. In this vein, great numbers would argue that, if they are only hurting themselves, they should have the right to experiment and enjoy whatever they please. But is all this self-pleasure leading toward real betterment of lives?

Improving or Degenerating?

To some, the world exists in a state that appears to be improving. Great achievements in science, technology, medicine and economics have led to advancements of every kind imaginable. As problems and troubles arise, man seems unlimited in his ability to solve them. But is he really solving them? Are the inevitable wounds of advancement being healed by technology?

It has been said that the total fund of human knowledge doubles annually. Is all this information improving society? Is it allowing humanity to make better choices? Are human beings, as “informed” people, better off than the “ignorant and uneducated” masses of previous centuries?

One of the greatest areas in which knowledge has flourished is that of sex. A plethora of information—and “instruction”—is now available. But has this avalanche of information enabled human beings to make better decisions in their sexual practices?

Has the almost total pursuit of “better sex” and just plain more sex improved social conditions or solved personal problems—has it stemmed the tsunami tide of all the negative effects that hurt and destroy so many lives? Or is it making things worse?

Most people never stop to examine the depth to which sex permeates almost every facet of society. One can no longer turn on the television (and this applies to almost all movies as well) without finding a program that has at least sexual undertones—but more often blatant messages! Magazines, beginning with the cover, are literally filled with photos, stories and features that would shock even the most liberal-minded of past generations.

Just the sheer emphasis on number of articles about sex in these magazines is overwhelming. For instance, how many have been written with titles such as “Ten Ways to Please Her (or Him),” or “Twelve Bedroom Secrets to Use on Him (or Her),” or “Six Tips to Know When to...”, etc.?

And, again, there is now also the Internet, and its online magazines, which offer a veritable buffet—an astonishing smorgasbord—of incredible sexual perversions, titillations, venues and “activities.”

Internet World

The world is filled with many avenues of recreation—with many being merely escapism—especially in the Western world. Television, movies, dance clubs, bars and the Internet allow people to escape their daily lives or to meet others who share similar interests. By far, the most effective of these is the Internet. Never has it been so easy for so many to reach those who share similar interests—no matter how extreme.

The Internet literally has “something for everyone.” For instance, if you are interested in flying model airplanes, or stamp collecting, and have recently moved to a new city, the Internet permits you to find others in your area who share your interest. While these pursuits are harmless, with the click of a mouse, one can just as easily find people who are interested in pedophilia!

The Internet is the ultimate form of full-information access without regard to age or purpose. How it is used, and how sex has dominated this medium, is astonishing.

Never before could someone who was “curious” about same-sex relationships (or any other kind of sexual practice) find a partner to explore that curiosity in such an open and encouraged forum—and almost instantly. In the same way, children are now exposed—often without their parents’ knowledge—to predators of every kind, who could be across the world or just next door.

Such “windows” within society now exist for anyone who is even a little bit computer savvy.

But where does society itself now stand? Collectively, what is happening to children and the family? Are these things really having an effect on society? Is this public fascination with sex actually changing how we act, think and live? What about children? Does the explosion of sex-related material taught in schools and presented by the media have positive or negative effects on them?

Effect on Children

As part of political correctness, psychologists have suggested that children need the “seeds of tolerance” planted in them, beginning at an early age, to allow them to blossom into “well-rounded, open-minded”—and “tolerant”—adults. The result has been that many school curriculums have been altered to allow alternative lifestyles and viewpoints to be expressed, very often without the parents’ permission or even knowledge. Strict neutrality is maintained in the presentation. Taking a position is condemned as making a “moral judgment.”

Such seeds of knowledge have no chance of sprouting into a better, more tolerant society. In reality, this “re-education” of children today has come at a heavy price.

In today’s world, it is common, even expected, to lose one’s virginity by age 16. However, this is almost tame in comparison to the problems in middle schools throughout America. Instead of learning math and English, reports regularly appear about students caught having oral sex in school, or even in the classroom itself. Outside school, this practice is now generally considered to be at epidemic levels—and it has actually become common—even fashionable—for middle school children to have “oral sex parties” because they have been taught that “there is no danger of getting pregnant!” (What is reported to actually occur at these parties simply cannot be mentioned in this book.)

Over half of all American teenagers between 15 and 19 report that they engage in oral sex, with this number rising to seven out of ten for those aged 18 or 19. But these were the statistics in 2002. What are they several years later? And recognize that young people report that the use of oral sex is their way of remaining virgins. Incredible!

How bad have things become? It is reported that in a major metropolitan area, one in every seven girls now regularly masturbates on the bus to and from school—with no thought or concern about whether or how many boys are watching!

Fifth grade graduation parties often feature children involved in so-called “freak dancing”—a form of dancing in which participants simulate the sex act while keeping their clothes on. Is it any wonder then that young adults in their late teens and early twenties find it easy to go on to “raves”—a far worse form of party in which vast quantities of alcohol and drugs are mixed with free sex? This merely becomes the next natural step for ever-growing numbers who crave acceptance in whatever is the next trend.

Way Too Early

Preoccupation with being “sexy” is now starting even younger. The long popular “Barbie” doll has recently introduced a version called “Lingerie Barbie.” Although the manufacturer stated that this Barbie is for girls age 14 and up, the average market for Barbie is ages 8 to 12. The product description shows how children are forced to confront sexuality issues: “Barbie exudes a flirtatious attitude in her heavenly merry widow bustier ensemble accented with intricate lace and matching peekaboo peignoir.”

Of course, it takes little imagination to see what the obvious message is here. And no one has to wonder whether that message is being received.

Here is a worse message: A young college student reported to us that a professor in one of her classes stated that she did not wish to “decide” the gender of her child, so she dressed it in yellow—not pink or blue—so that the child would feel completely free to decide its own sex without any kind of “pressure” from the mother. Astonishing!—but this is the world of today, a world where such “professors” (the above was a gender studies professor) are permitted to teach tomorrow’s husbands and wives, and mothers and fathers!

One market that seems to have no concept of childhood is that of fashion. It seems that, if you want sex to sell, you must start with the very young, as this quote from ABC News demonstrates: “A fake lizard miniskirt...boots and fishnet stockings...If you think it’s the wardrobe of a 20-something, think again!” The report went on to explain that this is in the closet of a five-year-old!

Reading racy books has become a widespread trend among younger teens (and even earlier), particularly girls. The emphasis in them is on either fantasy or pure smut. Why is this not being connected to 10 million STDs among teens in 2004 alone, one half the national total?

Magazines for teenagers promote a level of sex obsession never seen before, with article titles such as “Boyfriend Gave Me Herpes” or “Sex Slang Explained” or “My Affair With Teacher” filling them. Girls as young as nine are reading such promiscuity-glamorizing magazines. With the latter title in mind, a survey reveals that one in ten American students have had sexual contact with school employees.

Emphasis on Beauty

Society has also become completely obsessed with the idea of being beautiful—that a person’s attractiveness, and to a large degree one’s worth, is connected to physical beauty. This kind of thinking is primarily affecting girls but is also having an effect on boys. Everywhere one looks—television, magazines, Hollywood and advertisements—the look is the same, that of the “beautiful people” being the ones who get to enjoy the good things in life, who receive life’s rewards.

How far has this thinking gone?

Another British newspaper, The Daily Telegraph, carried an article “My Daughter Wants Surgery to Her Thighs, Eyes and Nose...She is 13.” This article depicted ten very attractive, scantily-clad, wanton-looking teenage girls and young women with supposedly “perfect” bodies posing in a picture as its centerpiece. The intent was to give the reader an idea of what large numbers of girls today are seeking to look like. It went on to report that little girls as young as five now believe that they have to be slim to be popular.

In ever greater numbers, children of such tender ages are reported to be unhappy with their bodies, and developing eating disorders as a result—with more now wanting surgery. In a growing tragedy of untold proportions, entire childhoods are being lost to foolish obsessions with vanity. And no one has any idea what to do about it.

Society’s current extreme emphasis on physical beauty—“being gorgeous”—has played more than a small role in the explosion of illicit sex around the world, and we have barely scratched the surface here of what is happening!

It is foretold to grow worse.

Innocence Lost

Children are supposed to be childlike—and innocent—throughout childhood! They should feel largely carefree, and happily enjoying this wonderful time of life.

Sexuality should never enter a child’s thinking. Yet, today’s children are constantly bombarded with—actually force-fed from all directions—images and products that push them into being sexy, into thinking thoughts once reserved exclusively for adults. Twelve- to fourteen-year-old girls feel driven to have relationships—to go steady—which then almost immediately brings pressure on them to be willing to perform oral sex on their young boyfriends. Again, no one has any idea what to do about it.

It is no wonder then that many in this age group of teen girls have adopted what has become the trendy practice of roving in small packs prowling for sex, dressed like streetwalkers and behaving like wolves—predators!—looking for prey. This is not overstated.

The sexualization of children has spawned a generation of adults who have either delved into or become familiar with every perversion under the sun. Relationships have also become twisted and perverted, with young people now involving themselves in forms of sex-related conduct and types of sex-related language that are so vile as to boggle the mind of those just one generation older. This state of affairs has devastated countless marriages, which are now more likely to end in divorce than not.

And yet again, the Internet has played a major role in this. An American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers survey recently showed that in the last 12 months, Internet-related “issues” caused a stunning 62 percent of all divorce cases. From meeting partners for affairs, to delving into perversions once suppressed or addiction to pornography, families are being destroyed by the now “immoral fiber” that has become pervasive in almost every nation in the West.

If studies show that over 80 percent of marriages in the U.S. have an unfaithful partner, then recognize that children learn by example. What example is being set? Children who are abused tend to become abusers. By extension, children of openly promiscuous parents take on the practices and character of their parents. Why is no one able to connect this kind of conduct in parents to the statistic that one-half of all girls in America under 16 are not virgins—or that some teenage girls now proudly wear buttons to school declaring “I love my vagina” or “vaginas rock”?

Now recognize that the nations where Christianity was once almost exclusively the religion of choice—and tens of millions are still attending churches in these countries—is where the worst part of all this is happening! Again, how could this be if those believed to be spiritual authorities were doing their job?

Disappearing Dress Codes

Directly related to this, student dress codes in schools of all levels are under assault, and are collapsing, everywhere. What can only be described as a state of war—and it has been called this in the media—now exists between students and their teachers, who are seen to be “fashion police,” merely for trying to keep schools from looking like a training class for brothels.

While boys focus on looking as disgusting and degenerate as they can possibly look—wearing extremely baggy pants, often with the belt riding underneath the buttocks so that most of the underwear will show, and the crotch of the pants actually riding at the knee level or lower—young girls try to look as sensual and seductive as possible. First, their necklines are now way too low while the bottom of the blouse is cut extremely high. Then, similarly, extremely high hemlines, coupled with very low waistlines, are turning skirts into little more than wide belts, with many girls also wearing obviously visible thong underwear. Certainly, fashion designers are only too happy to push the envelope on raunchy trends, if it will help them make more profit.

Of course, this is not the only place where emphasis on profit margin drives the thinking. Every sales marketer understands the adage that “Sex sells!” Virtually every advertising representative understands that he almost has to incorporate lust, sensuality, suggestive dancing and body language—and a lot of skin!—into his advertisements in order to “move product.” No worldly businessman today worth his salt would dream of ignoring this plain “market reality”—no matter that he is pandering to the very basest desires of human nature, or that he could be partly responsible for contributing to sky-rocketing divorce rates and levels of premarital sex.

In effect, as goes the saying, “It’s about the money.”

Masturbation and Perversion Epidemic

Masturbation, long a problem in society, but always considered to be at so-called “acceptable” levels, has grown to be an epidemic of almost unimaginable proportion among young people today. Again, media emphasis through magazine articles, pornography, and even as a direct result of sex “education” in schools, has elevated this problem into an obsession for millions.

Masturbation has almost come to be a kind of “civil right” of sorts to young people and single adults, with vast numbers today literally consumed with it and willing to freely talk about it, including with the opposite sex, as easily as they would “What’s for dinner?”

Gone are the days when anyone is told that guilt is associated with this activity. Modern “sexual psychologists” describe it as just one more way in which one may “explore himself.” Pornographic websites seem to stress this new social obsession.

But there are even more extreme forms of behavior happening in the home. Just as addiction to soft drugs leads to heavier drug use, experimenting with pornography leads to other perversions. Many couples are also delving into alternative lifestyles.

Swinging—Now More “Advanced”

Now becoming more popular across the West is the concept known as “swinging.” This social trend takes a host of different forms, and still seems to be evolving. In these encounters, couples meet other couples in group sessions, and each will then trade partners! The night could include several people of both sexes together in one room, or even several separate episodes with different partners—I repeat, in the same night! At the end of the evening, the married couples reunite and discuss what each did and “learned” from each encounter.

Contrary to every purpose of God, this truly appalling practice may be the single most damaging thing that can occur in any marriage, and it invariably leads to even more destructive activities.

In the end, no marriage is remotely strong enough to survive the kind of moral, emotional, psychological and mental perversion—disguised as so-called “freedom”—that couples introduce each other to when they enter this practice.

Imagine the awful confusion a child would experience if exposed to such blatant sexual debauchery and confusion in the home! What chance would he or she have to ever achieve a right relationship in marriage?

Arming the Irresponsible

A whole generation of young people has virtually been left to fend for itself when it comes to discerning the rights and wrongs about sexual activity. Never have so many known so little about what is so important—when so much is at stake—and when virtually none are telling them the correct answers—the solutions to wrong sexual trends and conditions.

Under the guise of neutral presentation of basic information about sex—“sex education”—most teenagers and children are given bits and fragments of knowledge and then have simply been left to explore and figure things out for themselves, with absolutely no hint, inkling or clue of where they can get real help—where they can find a road map to the right destination. Never mind what IS the right destination.

Of course, most seem to no longer want any help, and this is but the first step out of the labyrinth of confusion!

In an effort to provide information to help make the “correct” sexual choices, better judgment—or really any judgment—has been left behind. Imagine giving detailed instructions to a terrorist on how, when and where to plant a nuclear weapon. Then imagine that, after such a weapon is detonated, we deduce that the solution is to give such terrorists more information—with even more detail. No one would suggest such a ridiculous idea!

Yet, every day, children and teens are being given what they need to commit a similar moral catastrophe—both in their own lives and in the lives of others. Vast quantities of undigested information is being pumped indiscriminately into young people. This is done without telling them how to be careful so they do not “blow themselves up” with wrong uses of sex—and take others with them.

God’s Condemnation

Before continuing in Chapter Three, let’s at least briefly review what God describes about sex and basic human nature, if left to itself. Each of the following passages contains a list of the worst qualities of human nature. Notice how many times sex-related sins and perversions are referenced, and usually listed first.

The apostle Paul repeatedly described the kinds of behavior that will disqualify people from receiving eternal life in the kingdom of God. He wrote almost every congregation that he worked with, warning specifically of these things. He said this to the Galatians: “Now the works of the flesh are manifest [Grk: “obvious”—and they are!], which are these; adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God” (5:19-21).

Paul also recorded this: “Mortify [put to death] therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence [wrong desire, lust], and covetousness, which is idolatry: for which things’ sake the wrath of god comes on the children of disobedience” (Col. 3:5-6).

These are powerful indictments!

Speaking of the true Christian who has come out of what is today’s typical lifestyle, the apostle Peter wrote this: “That he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God. For the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles, when we walked in lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revellings, banquetings [wild parties], and abominable idolatries: wherein they think it strange that you run not with them to the same excess of riot, speaking evil of you” (I Pet. 4:2-4).

How many today do, in fact, live lives that could only be described as a non-stop “riot”?

Now here is what Christ Himself said when describing the basic elements of the human nature found within every person: “That which comes out of the man, that defiles the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness” (Mark 7:20-22).

One final, longer passage from Paul is important to read. Notice that the problem begins with men recognizing that they are rejecting God’s authority over them: “Because that, when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God...Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools” (Rom. 1:21-22).

The context continues with what resulted: “Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves...God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: and likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet. And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness...without natural affection...” (vs. 24, 26-29, 31).

These passages carry a stunning message. God takes very seriously the misuse for personal indulgence of one’s body, given solely for His Supreme Purpose. Yet, what you have seen in this chapter alone reveals that God has, in fact, given the world over to vile and unnatural affections.

The result?—He declares that His wrath will come on a generation who so willingly yielded to satisfying wrong appetites!

Worst Time in History

But there is much, much more to understand about the modern sex-permeated world. The next chapter is, in one sense, an extension of the last. The reader must recognize that never in history has mankind more botched and butchered even the once at least generally-recognized basics of sexual conduct, both prior to marriage and in marriage.

Chapter Three is even more plain!

Chapter Three –

Worst Time Ever

In Chapter Two, I referenced a prophecy recorded in II Timothy mentioning the “last days,” and describing the terrible breakdown of character that would accompany this time. This requires a closer look.

In Matthew 24, Jesus warned His disciples that the end of the age would reflect “Noah’s day” (vs. 37). This warning is repeated in two of the other gospels. Genesis 6 reveals that early period of history to have been a time so bad that there had occurred a complete breakdown of values and character throughout the world.

Of course, most ridicule this account as mere Hebrew literature—symbolism and allegory. For those who recognize that the events it describes actually happened, God could only find eight people He was willing to save in the Ark. The awful conditions extant in the pre-flood world brought God’s decision to literally start over with this tiny few.

In Luke 17, Christ repeats the warning that the modern age before His Return would reflect the “days of Noah.” He added here that the moral decadence, degeneration and appalling perversion at the end of the age would become so extreme that it would parallel conditions in Sodom and Gomorrah when God had to destroy those cities with fire and brimstone (vs. 29-30).

Again, as had happened before the Great Flood, conditions had sunk to the point that this time only three people would be permitted to escape God’s wrath upon these cities!

This time foretold by Christ has come upon the world, and the worst aspect of the prophesied character breakdown in the modern age is that of the endless pursuit of illicit sex in every forum of society.

Titanic, catastrophic changes lie ahead for the whole world. There has been a cause for what is coming—but few are seeking to discover it. Many will soon wish they had.

Modern Dating

The modern dating scene has become little more than a quest for physical gratification through sex with near strangers. Getting a date now largely means setting a date for sex. This is the central goal in almost all dating and is virtually expected of the other—as well as being seen by those who engage in it as little more than having a cup of coffee. Of course, no one should be even a little surprised by this because most television programs that depict dating are brimming with sexual innuendos and overtones. The object of all such programs eventually comes back to sex—who is going to “score.”

Many dates today are born in environments that revolve around sex, drinking, loud music and a poorly lit atmosphere, such as dance clubs and singles bars. With women dressed in sexually suggestive clothing—often also reflecting what could only be described by reasonable people as freakish, weird and garish—and both men and women employing well-honed body language, including signals and codes that have become their own language, sex is the game. The goal is to play and win this game over and over again. Millions are involved!

Conversations in such environments lack depth—are actually incredibly shallow—and can only be described as filthy, coarse, rude, gross, generally insulting and foolish, consisting of various patented one-liners, again, all designed to help people toward the sole purpose for which they went to such clubs: to prowl—to successfully troll—for sex. And there seems to be little or no difference between the approach of men and women. Gone are the days when men were almost exclusively the aggressors.

The word “relationship” has no real meaning in modern dating. Neither does “courting.” Virtually all forms of etiquette, manners and refinement have gone by the board—completely forgotten—in today’s world of signals, symbols and feelings. All the old standards and guidelines have disappeared, and with them have gone any sense of right and wrong practices between the sexes. Truly, anything goes.

People from two generations ago simply cannot grasp—and are not really even aware of—the prevailing environment today. Even those of just one generation ago have difficulty relating to today’s dating scene.

Media Assault

Many programs about sex also abound on the dizzying array of available cable television channels—of course, all for a significant price that great numbers seem only too willing to pay. These directly contribute to the idea that sex is free to all who are smart enough to engage in it without any kind of strings attached. Viewers can learn about sadomasochism, bondage, body painting, piercing and tattooing, but programs also offer an endless array of concepts attached to sex that are practiced all over the world. People can also learn about every conceivable kind of fetish and sex game without ever having to leave their living rooms.

The “pay-per-view” channels, available 24 hours a day, offer things that many people could not dream of, and would have difficulty believing if it was explained to them—and which could not be discussed in this book without violating Ephesians 5:12. What are common practices today have literally surpassed comprehension. Suffice to say, these channels routinely take the viewer down corridors of sexual activity that are so dark and awful that it is helpful to know that they exist, but to also recognize that there is no redeeming value whatever to discussing them in any detail—or ever viewing them!

Then there is the wildly popular program watched by tens of millions today about housewives who are “desperate” for sexual encounters anywhere they can find them. The picture created by this program is one of a society abounding with bored, attractive, cheating wives, with time, money—and a multitude of lusts!—on their hands, in neighborhood environments filled with opportunity. This utterly blatant sex-laced program, and so many others like it, go a long way to deepening society’s descent into the cesspool of immorality. Before that came the even more popular program featuring four women pursuing every possible occasion for “sex in the city.”

Here is one example of what it can lead to.

There are the growing number of college girls today who use the Internet, through use of a “dorm cam,” to display their “wares,” and their private “activities” with their boyfriends and roommates, to the public—for a price. Why? Many of them actually portray themselves as basically normal college girls who, as millions before them, have a “job” on the side to help them earn their way through college—“pick up a little extra money.”

Absolutely incredible—but now beginning to be more common than most could imagine!

Endless Advertisements

Then there is the endless stream of advertisements permeating television, newspapers and magazines of every kind, and the Internet, about various kinds of sexual boosters—nutritional and other supplements—and even surgical enhancements that are readily available to those seeking to “improve” their sexual “experience” and “performance.” There is absolutely no end of offers promising “better” or more “satisfying” sex. Clinics, treatments, sex videos and offers of information and help are everywhere. These are found every day in the sports pages of almost every larger newspaper throughout the United States and Europe, as are regular ads about all the many local strip clubs now seemingly available everywhere. Of course, these have multiplied in number far beyond the concept of “gentlemen’s clubs” or topless bars, which were bad enough. (Now women are even being told to consider going to strip clubs or to take classes so that they can learn to dance suggestively for their husbands.) The available vast array of these kinds of advertisements tend to open the mind to consider every kind of experimentation under the sun.

Studies have shown that 12- to 17-year-olds who spent years watching large amounts of sexually-suggestive television were twice as apt to become sexually active as those who did not. Should anyone be surprised that gonorrhea afflicts 15- to 19-year-old girls worse than any other age group or segment of the population? No wonder then that it is reported that over one in three people above age 10 (obviously including a great many who have not even reached the teen years), have a sexually-transmitted disease.

Despite all of this sexual activity, 55 percent of those surveyed about sex lack knowledge of even the most basic understanding. Such appalling ignorance comes at a steep price.

“Hooking Up”

With the idea that any kind of relationship is unnecessary, or even a nuisance, a truly horrific new practice has emerged that is sweeping America—hooking up. Also called “no-strings sex,” this no-limits-of-any-kind mindset is best described as “I had a beer last night, I hooked up last night,” as one professor described it. Today’s college campuses are fueled by alcohol, which serves to create a sexually-charged atmosphere in which up to 80 percent of students on many campuses engage in sex with complete strangers, with the prevailing practice being to not even ask the name of their “partner.” The feeling has come to be “It’s just sex. What’s the big deal?” The countless thousands who now do this several nights a week have come to believe there is only a problem if they “catch feelings” for the person with whom they are having sex.

The awful culture of hooking up pictures a generation of morally bankrupt young adults in which the pursuit of sexual conquests—“trophy nights”—could be compared to big game fishermen out on the open ocean, with the engine idling on very low power and the boat moving at low speed, as these “fishermen” troll for “big game” sex. Vast numbers of college students and others now seem to exist for the purpose of moving from one sexual encounter to another.

With condom machines readily available in bathrooms all over most campuses today, and safe-sex lectures routinely given to new freshman students, the unseen message is that sex is inevitable and pretty much everywhere. Of course, the advent of wireless phone technology has enabled individuals to easily find each other and “connect”—hook up—before a night is “lost.”

A Carnival

Author Tom Wolfe describes what is occurring on campuses today as a “sexual carnival.” He states, “It used to be that the worst slut in the world would put on a veneer of innocence or purity. No longer. The girl who is a virgin does not want to be known as a member of the Virgins Club. Sleeping with someone is a sign you’re on the right track today...” He then asks of this generation’s future, “Will husbands and wives think nothing of having little flings on the side?”

Prostitution, legal for a long time in Nevada, was more recently legalized in Germany (2003). Incredibly, because of technicalities in German unemployment law, women have been told that they may have to be prepared to “take a job as a prostitute” to prevent the government from “stopping your benefits.” One wonders how far governments could go. (With prostitution already growing faster than ever, made even worse by legalization, there inevitably comes gambling and crime. No one knows how to address the automatic escalation of these accompanying problems either.)

All of this makes it easy to understand why three to five percent of American adults suffer from what is now referred to as “sex addiction,” supposedly a “mental disorder” requiring “therapy” rather than having received the usual childhood dose of constant instruction about character and self-control. People are no longer being taught that life has real and dangerous pitfalls, with real consequences, and that they should be on the constant lookout for them, instead of merely giving in to the easy, natural human desire and emotion of lust.

Abortion

Modern society has also been deeply affected by abortion, and this has terribly undermined the institution of marriage and family. Since the mid-twentieth century, the new morality has been molding society, especially the younger, more susceptible minds in other ways that are not as directly connected to wrong sexual practices.

Before the new morality came on the world scene, couples at least generally dated toward and for purposes of marriage, and held a high regard for the institution of marriage. Sexual relations were generally saved for after marriage. Children were considered a blessing, not a curse—as so many now consider them to be in today’s get-based society. Women of just two generations ago would find incomprehensible the idea of having an abortion. Today, the notion of murdering an innocent, defenseless child in order to maintain a career or a single lifestyle seems perfectly reasonable to millions.

Think of abortion this way: Any American born after 1973 is technically a survivor of legalized (mass) murder.

Couples no longer feel that they have to get married, because “so many people are getting divorced, we’ll just live together.” Today, single and married women have the occasional abortion because they cannot handle the stress or responsibility of a child. Because families are so often torn apart through adultery and other domestic problems, and, because of the “tolerance” taught in schools, children are unable to grasp a clear-cut definition of exactly what a family should be—what a normal family should look like. Additionally, the sex education now commonly taught in classrooms, beginning as early as elementary school, serves to encourage teens to have, by the time they graduate from high school, more sexual encounters than they can count. And, of course, most today are not bothering to count. But many others are. For instance, one man on a television talk show described his conquests as having reached “a buck”—meaning 100 or more women!

Regarding sex education, abstinence is typically mocked and made to appear out of fashion. Crude, explicit language is common in such “education” so that the students become desensitized. Homosexuality and lesbianism—now wide open and highly publicized—are made to be things of no concern, as are a host of different kinds of perversions within them. Some “textbooks” actually encourage homosexuality, explaining as did one, “Everyone has homosexual tendencies in one degree or another.” No one should be surprised then to learn that large and growing numbers of teenage girls now think of themselves as “straight,” as having and preferring boyfriends, but also able to enjoy the trendy high school practice of having a lesbian relationship with a female classmate “best friend.”

Also, marriage is often lampooned, but at the subtle level. The student is usually led to believe that Christian values are something that are hopelessly out of date. Of course, contraceptives are discussed in almost excruciating detail, with explicit demonstrations and active participation by students. Incredibly, one teacher had children in his class taste flavored condoms. It requires little imagination to recognize the message this is sending to teenagers. Again, with abstinence the only other option for teenagers facing early exposure to and involvement in sexuality, and with self-control having become the object of subtle, if not open, derision, many default to the idea that dispensing and using condoms are dealing with “reality.”

In fact, in Ohio, advocates of sex education want the state Department of Health to stop all funding of abstinence-only programs. These unbelievably misguided thinkers assert that “there is no clear evidence that abstinence” either “reduces teen pregnancies” or “sexually-transmitted diseases”—that these programs are not “worthwhile.” One high-profile “taskforce” leader declared that “abstinence education spreads misleading or inaccurate information, blurs religion and science, is sexist and disregards homosexuals.”

How long can a society continue if it allows its “leaders” to offer such destructive opinions?

The “New Morality”

All of this is the new morality—actually amorality—that is being promoted by many in the media and in politics for the purpose of appeasing the degenerating morals of a decadent society, only paralleled by that of ancient Rome.

William J. Bennett (former Secretary of Education in the 1980s during the Reagan administration), in his book The Broken Hearth, writes this insightful statement about the state of sex, marriage and the modern family: “Men and women today can have sex more promiscuously, more casually, and with much lower odds of pregnancy and childbirth. For the first time, on a large scale, sex has been de-linked from both marriage and procreation. The results of this revolutionary shift are all around us, in our homes, on our streets, in the books we read and the movies and television shows we watch. Sexual promiscuity, heterosexual and homosexual alike, is a fact of life, incorporated into the mentality and often then behavior of even the youngest adolescents, and reinforced even by well-meaning adults through programs like the free distribution of condoms in schools. As for the by-product of increased promiscuity, the more measurable ones can be found in high rates of abortion and out-of-wedlock births, as well as the relentless march of sexual diseases both old and new.”

Again, this is the new morality.

Who Needs Marriage?

In what has now been described as, and openly admitted to be, an all-out cultural war, the idea of monogamy—marriage and faithfulness to one person—is under attack as never before. When star athletes, as did one famous basketball player, openly brag of having had sex with 20,000 women, much is desperately, desperately wrong.

USA Today carried an article (Dec. 16, 2004) explaining how Scandinavian families are forming with one or more children, and with both parents perfectly happy to live an entire life together without ever getting married. It describes an authority there declaring, “The traditional marriage in our society is more and more unusual,” and that, “in Scandinavia, there is no ‘family values’ debate, no soul searching to reverse the upward trend in divorces and separations.”

In other words, the article is declaring that the battle has been lost and that there is no point discussing it further. If people do not know the purpose of marriage, neither do they—nor could they—know the true purposes of sex within marriage.

Consider the declining percentages of those getting married. In 1970, 72 percent of American adults were married; by 1980, it was 66 percent; by 1990, 62 percent; with 60 percent in 2000 and only 59 percent in 2002.

Over time, many laws have been passed defining various kinds of illegal sexual activity, such as cohabitation outside of marriage, but they do little good. For instance, in one southern state, there are now 144,000 couples living together, and thus breaking an 1805 state law forbidding it. But that law goes unenforced. So do many others that could be cited here.

Such is today’s world.

According to what is acceptable in society today, the God-ordained institution of marriage and the family has taken a beating that has left it practically unrecognizable. No longer do most families (it was never all) have a father and a mother, raising healthy, happy children to live the way God intended, or even close. In fact, any concept of God has been pushed completely out of most people’s lives. Though many would claim otherwise, as we saw from Romans 1:21-22, most human beings do not want the Creator of all things—the Originator of human existence—to be in their lives, homes, schools, governments—or even their churches!

When understood, this is the true origin of and problem within the abortion debate—the governments and institutions of men have thrown out God’s instructions in His Holy Word, the Bible! Little surprise then that so have the masses.

Homosexual Marriage

Homosexual marriage has become an explosive topic in the United States and Europe. Yet, it has been legal in the Netherlands since 2000. The process there began in 1989 with “official sanction” to such marriages, and this opened up a host of different related issues that eventually found their way to courtrooms. Whatever the moral issue, it is the misuse of man’s adversarial legal system that invariably leads to the collapse of existing barriers.

Of course, entertainment today thinks nothing of homosexual conduct and routinely depicts it in movies, comedies and various television serials and sitcoms.

In another example of how technology has been coupled with illicit sex, homosexuals have been able, for some time, to carry an electronic battery-powered device that allows them to either give or receive a signal so that others nearby will know that they are present and “available.”

Also, lesbians and homosexual men are seeking the legal right to adopt children in various countries, while other lesbians are willing to have a homosexual man impregnate them so that they can enjoy children along with the rest of society.

As this issue also takes its place in the cultural war, governments are being forced to address it. Politicians are being forced to choose between traditional Christian values and “giving the people what they want” in the name of “human rights.” The result has been nation after nation, particularly in the West, legalizing homosexual marriage. Some individual states are following suit in America.

Related to this issue are politicians who are even being pressured to create legislation regarding cross-dressing and transgender restrooms in high schools so that “gender neutral” children and teens can enjoy a “gender neutral” restroom. Truly astonishing!

Societies that have no concept of biblical values are doomed to face such perverse choices, and with an endless, ever-worsening array of issues confronting them, they are forced to devise “answers” to ever worse and more complex questions.

Pornography

Already mentioned, the plague of pornography has come to be a booming industry raking in billions of dollars across the world. The sexual appetite of people for this pursuit seems to be without limit, as are the magazines, movies, and hundreds of thousands of websites that make it available. Studies show that 70 percent of all movies viewed in hotel rooms are pornographic, meaning that all other categories combined represent the other 30 percent.

People spend countless hours sitting in hotel rooms and lusting after women (and men) to which they are not married—and who are involved in every form of lewd conduct. How many today give a single thought to—or have any awareness of—Christ’s command in Matthew 5:28 regarding lust, let alone act on it?

Pornography is a powerful addiction for many. Much like alcohol, nicotine and drugs, it holds in its clutches ever-growing numbers who cannot find a way—the strength—to stop. Heartrending letters sent to our headquarters describe marriages and families torn apart by this destructive social plague.

But supposed experts and others are actually only beginning to learn the effects that this problem has on society as a whole, and on the individual minds of countless millions who spend much of their free time involved in pornography. The jury is still out on what just this single sin of indulgence will mean in the years to come for a generation that has wallowed in it as practically a way of life.

Ancients Worshipped Sex

While today’s civilization is more sex-permeated than ever in history, through the ages, sex has been an object of worship in many forms, with many kinds of religious rites and ceremonies attached to it. The religions of the world simultaneously turned sex and the sex organs into both objects of shame and objects of adoration, which carried supposed divine inspiration or insight into the “holy.”

Ancient religion almost invariably involved rites that were directly associated with fertility and certain symbols of fertility—for instance, rabbits and eggs have always been associated with Easter, because both have long been symbols of fertility, and because Easter (Ishtar) was another name for the goddess Astarte or Venus, who was the goddess of sex and love.

Virtually every religion of the world offers some kind of meaning or explanation for sex that elevates its different forms to a level connected with worship in some fashion. For instance, how many have any idea that steeples on churches are relics directly connected to phallic worship—worship of the male sex organ? Or how many know the true origin of the cross?

While not the subject of this book, the matter of sex and its involvement in worship through history is raised so that the reader will have just a little bit more comprehension of the colossal importance of having a right understanding of sex as God intended. Religion should have been the place where people could go to learn this critical understanding, but it became the source of greatest confusion and error—all through history!

The Awful Picture

We ask again in summary: What does all this new morality mean?—and what is the picture that it represents?

The answer is a world absolutely filled with premarital sex, unmarried couples living together, widespread adultery, open sexual experimentation in ever worsening and more degenerate ways, now including hooking up. An almost global society has now appeared where tolerance and exhibition of different sexual lifestyles, homosexual unions and marriage, exploding pornography, an endless stream of sex in virtually all of the different forms of entertainment and changing gender roles is the norm.

Then there is today’s prevailing climate that could only be described as childhood and innocence lost, including the constant conditioning of ever younger children to be accepting of any and all forms of sexuality, middle-school oral sex parties, the exploitation of children in general, including clothing manufacturers dressing seven-year-old girls in clothes and shoes that look like they are made for their mothers—but that even their mothers should be ashamed to wear—and with five-year-olds wishing they were thinner and 13-year-olds hoping for surgery to “correct” body deficiencies.

Then there is the rampant, sex-driven disease, with horrific suffering as the painful and tragic result, growing prostitution and more of it being legalized, a surge in sex-related crimes, including kidnapping, torture, rape, murder, pedophilia, and Internet-related crimes, involving ever more perverse kinds of offenses, many against children, such as incest and untold masses of children sold as sex slaves in some parts of the world. Space does not permit the relating of accounts, for instance, of at least one state in America that releases sex offenders from prisons back into communities—and then pays for their purchase of Viagra through Medicaid!

It must be asked again: How long before such problems overwhelm any society foolish enough to practice them?

Of course, now there is the experimentation with, and probably the eventual cloning of, human beings. Each day seems to bring new scientific “breakthroughs” in what has become a relentless march to extend boundaries that were defined by God and should be left alone. The evils of cloning, and the forces that want to use “stem cell” embryos for research, are perhaps the very worst examples. Recognize that stem cells have largely only been considered for research because, so contrary to God’s purpose, fertility clinics routinely create and throw away viable human embryos, made artificially. Then, while “successful” cloning of people will almost surely come with unforeseen results, it has been noted that it will permit people to have children without any sex being necessary.

The appalling list in this awful picture goes on and on and on!

Many Voices, No True Answers

The above summary, even though it is far from complete, has to at least include another reference to the cacophony of thousands of so-called experts who are spewing an endless stream of confusing ideas and “answers” to why problems and conditions have grown so far out of control. In reality, they are terribly complicating an already much too complicated picture. Examples of what is occurring and what is being proposed by scientists and “ethicists” could continue for pages. They would be almost too painful to read.

The different lifestyles, interests, habits and absolutely terrible choices regarding sex, being made by ever-increasing numbers and age groups throughout society that have been described here, offer just a small glimpse into the cancerous bowels and body of a civilization that is already absolutely filled with every conceivable kind of sex-related social illness.

I repeat: Those who are alarmed—and even this number seems to be diminishing because society is being constantly conditioned to be “accepting,” and to “tolerate”—have no idea how to turn back the clock. Long gone are the Nelsons of Ozzie and Harriet and the Cleavers of Leave It To Beaver (the beloved TV families of the 1950s and 1960s). First replaced by the coarse and disrespectful Bunkers, later The Simpsons, and still later by a variety of programs best described as cheap, sexual-humor-based sitcoms, these more wholesome families of the past have been replaced by The Osbournes—and high school girls wearing buttons celebrating their female sex organs.

What Is Missing?

What has modern sex education failed to teach? At what point did the discussion about sex and sex education come to be known as—be reduced to—“reproductive psychiatry,” as though sex is ultimately merely the study of how human beings propagate their species—reproduce themselves? Why are so many obsessed with the idea of “better sex,” yet find themselves so empty and unfulfilled after experimentation and indulgence?

What is missing that society has gone so far in the pursuit of wrong kinds of sex?

Chapter Four –

What Is the Unknown Dimension?

The world is filled with problems of every imaginable kind. Disease, pollution, poverty, ignorance, religious confusion, war, terrorism, crime, violence, hunger, immorality, slavery, oppression, political upheaval, and many, many more troubles, evils and ills, now reach virtually every nation on earth. Also, with the passing of time come more problems, not less. And existing problems grow collectively worse instead of better. Why, at every turn, has man bungled and botched all efforts to solve his truly great problems?

What has been missing?

Individually, people have never seemed more incapable of addressing and overcoming their personal problems. As with the world in general, the passing of time finds individuals and families drowning under an ever-greater sea of decadence and seemingly insurmountable difficulties. More and more millions seem completely incapable of managing their lives.

What has been overlooked?

I have described in other books how men have created many amazing technological inventions, but at the same time they cannot create solutions to their problems. I have shown that man has harnessed the power of computers to help process vast amounts of information, but human beings cannot correctly process their personal problems—that scientists have discovered a great deal about the size, magnificence and precision of the universe, but they cannot discover the path to peace—that astronomers can find majestic, beautiful new distant galaxies throughout the universe, but cannot find a way to preserve the beauty and majesty of earth next to them—that scientists have also unleashed the power of the atom, but are powerless to unleash answers to life’s greatest questions—that educators have taught millions how to earn a living, but not taught them how to live. And most tragically, that theologians have amassed thousands of opinions and theories, while leaving billions without knowledge of the purpose for human existence.

Mushrooming Fund of Knowledge

A look back into the last two centuries of scientific progress reveals an exciting and fascinating history of many inventions and breakthroughs that have emerged on a host of fronts. This has included additional knowledge and understanding of the human body.

There has also been more knowledge—and insight—into the physical anatomy and functioning of sex and the sex organs that has become widely available during the twentieth century. But this knowledge has not been able to translate into happier marriages. Rather, it has escalated into the downhill toboggan slide known as the “Sexual Revolution”—the “New Morality.”

Just as the old morality with its “sex is shameful” approach failed to yield happy, fulfilling marriages, the New Morality has likewise failed in this quest. The New Morality—now meaning without any morality—has caused marriages and the social fabric of nearly every Western nation to further deteriorate. Why has this happened? Each of these extremes, along with man’s entire spectrum of knowledge, is missing a vital dimension, long since dismissed by professors of higher learning. Knowledge of this unknown dimension would rectify the ignorance that dominates this age.

We need to examine today’s knowledge explosion and come to understand its shortfalls.

The rapid upward acceleration in the total fund of knowledge began about two centuries ago. All this technical know-how was gradual at first, until the momentum advanced to the crescendo of what could be called a non-stop explosion by the mid-twentieth century. Some alive today can remember when horses and buggies were more common than T-model automobiles and other rudimentary cars of the early 1900s. Air transportation gained in momentum about this time, along with other modes of transportation. Telephone communications steadily improved throughout the 1900s.

By the mid-twentieth century, the jet age had arrived, along with the nuclear age just behind it. By the 1960s, the space age had truly made its début. All the technological advances that marked the 19th and 20th centuries brought in their wake a new level of wealth. With this influence, people became more materialistic in their outlook and lifestyle. Modern science came to be looked upon with awe and reverence—it would bring the solution to every known trouble and ill plaguingmankind! With this science as their new god, many sought to dispel the traditional crutch of religion.

Vast numbers were deluded into thinking that once man had advanced sufficiently in knowledge, he could address and conquer all the world’s evils and problems. Of course, even the casual observer can plainly see man’s advancement across nearly every field of knowledge in just the few intervening decades.

Yet, half a century later, it is just as easy to see that man’s know-how has not lived up to his previous exalted expectations. The spiral of unhappy and unfulfilled marriages remained widespread, while the most critical piece of the puzzle had been excluded in the materialistic world that he had created.

Modern Science—False Messiah

As mankind’s mushrooming fund of knowledge accelerates, we have seen woes and evils throughout civilization accelerating at the same pace. Since increasing evils have kept pace with increasing knowledge—and even exceeded it—something must be seriously lacking with this knowledge. This can be traced back to the principle—actually the great spiritual law—of cause and effect. For every effect there has to be one or more causes. There is a reason mankind’s fund of knowledge has utterly failed to bring resolution to the many crises besetting it.

Before the fast pace of today took hold in the twentieth century, humanity at large had continued on a relatively even keel for millennia. The knowledge explosion of modern times has produced a type of “future shock,” as one thinker labeled it, in which man attempts to adapt to increasing technological innovations that are coming at him faster than he can process them.

There is an extraordinary, but little-known, Old Testament prophecy in which this age of incredible increase of knowledge was specifically foretold by the prophet Daniel. Here is what God inspired him to record: “O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book [his prophecy], even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased” (Dan. 12:4).

Knowledge has greatly increased, and many are now able to travel thousands of miles daily by modern air travel, high-speed trains (as in Europe and Japan), un-ending lines of automobiles and by various forms of metro-transit. As man is bombarded with new innovations, he attributes this dizzying kaleidoscope of wonders to the false Messiah of modern science.

Whether in the areas of technological innovations, space probes pushing into the frontiers of outer space or the latest medical breakthroughs, often penetrating deeper into the recesses of inner space, people now focus on the materialistic approach in their expectations from modern science. Again, in reverence to this new god, many, within the last six to eight decades, have thrown aside what they have considered to be the traditional crutch of religion. Others have reduced religion to a simple feeling derived from attending a church, while entirely disconnecting it from any kind of behavior or conduct—and from what the Bible teaches.

Evolution Exalted and Revelation Dismissed

Take a moment to consider yet again the foundation upon which man’s knowledge is now supported—the theory of evolution, which postulates a creation without a Creator. Revelation from God has been dismissed as fiction while science has been elevated and deified to replace the “superstition” of religion. The very existence of God has been rejected by many of the modern proponents of “higher learning.” Science focuses upon the material while dismissing God and His revelation to mankind.

Evolution has come to be accepted largely without question. To merely offer possible problems with this theory, and to seek proof of it, is considered academic heresy. Practitioners of higher learning demand acceptance without reservation. No one may challenge what they have decided the masses must believe.

Error usually comes from the acceptance of a false premise, but one that is so supported—so taken for granted—by its advocates that it must be considered exempt from being questioned. This is based on the assumption that it should be self-evident to all who are informed and educated. Such is the false premise of evolution, and therefore it is granted near immunity from scrutiny or verification. Since evolution, by its nature, is not subject to verification or proof, it is actually more proper to categorize it as a religion or a faith—a blind faith! Probing into its veracity, into the supposed proof that it is true, is prohibited to its followers.

We have seen that educators have duped generations into accepting the evolutionary lie. This has caused countless millions to believe that mankind is continually evolving into a better and higher order of existence. But to simply look around is to expose the devastating fruits of this deception. (Again, you are strongly urged to read our thorough publications addressing the fallacies of evolution, and those proving the existence of God.)

Man is far from evolving upward—he is degenerating downward, into ever new lows of indulgence, debauchery and immorality of every kind. Sex has not been an exception.

To grasp an overview of the trends mentioned above along with their implications, it is necessary to examine what higher education has completely dismissed—divine revelation. Since mankind’s fund of knowledge has failed in helping to resolve the mounting evils abounding in society, we must revisit what man has rejected. The most logical place to start is at the very beginning. Prepare for many surprises, because orthodox teachings and religious assumptions will be seen to be consistently at odds with what the Creator reveals.

How It All Started

The apostle John recorded that “In the beginning was the Word” (1:1), and then continued with “the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Let’s understand what this means. For there to be One who was God, but who was also with God, it is obvious that two Beings—two Persons—are described.

Verse 14 continues, “the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.” The only God Being who ever became flesh in order to dwell among men is Jesus Christ. Remember, it states that the Word “was made flesh.” Christ was not flesh until He came to earth to become the Savior of mankind—to pay the ransom for sin, His life, and eventually deliver mankind from captivity.

Genesis 1:1 states, “In the beginning God...” Moses recorded the first five books of the Old Testament in the Hebrew language. The Hebrew word translated “God” is Elohim, a uniplural word like team, group, family or church. The God of the Bible is one Family—one God—composed of two Beings. This is why Christ could be God and be with God at the same time. John 4:24 states that “God is a Spirit.” God is made up of, or composed of, Spirit. Men are composed of flesh.

God and Christ enjoy complete harmony and complete agreement in everything. They reflect perfect outgoing concern, love and cooperation. The Father is the Supreme Leader of a Family that both chose to expand.

First, God created the angels and then the entire physical universe, including earth. Then, later in Genesis 1, we find that God said, “Let us [more than one] make man in our image, after our likeness” (vs. 26). There was clearly more than one Person involved in the creation of man.

Verse 25 shows that each animal was made after “his kind.” Dogs come from dogs and have puppies that look like dogs. Cats come from cats and have kittens that look like cats. Horses come from horses and have foals that look like horses. This is true throughout the entire animal kingdom. Of course, this is no mystery.

But here is what has not been understood. Men are not part of the animal kind—and evolution does not understand or allow for this. They do not carry the likeness of any “beast of the earth” (vs. 25). They are made in the image and likeness of God. They are part of the God kind. This is the plain message of Scripture, and this understanding is directly connected to the purpose of sex.

Immortal Souls?

Most people do not understand the relationship between men and souls. Almost everyone has been taught and assumes that every human being is born with and possesses an immortal soul. The popular belief is that, upon death, the souls of sinners go to hell forever, while the saved go to heaven forever.

Is this what the Bible says?

God’s Word declares, “the wages of sin is death” (Rom. 6:23), and that “sin is the transgression of the law” (I John 3:4). Could the Bible then also teach that human beings have immortal souls? It certainly does talk about “souls,” but in what context?

God has been most clear about this, and about what man is, from the beginning. Notice this in Genesis 2:7: “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.” This verse does not say that men have souls, but rather that they are souls. Adam became a soul—he was not given one.

Then, almost immediately, God warned Adam, “And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat: but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat of it: for in the day that you eat thereof you shall surely die” (vs. 16-17). When placed together, these verses reveal that men are souls, and that souls can die!

The prophet Ezekiel confirms the instruction in Genesis. Twice he was inspired to write, “The soul that sins, it shall DIE” (18:4, 20). Death is the absence of life.

Finally, notice this in Matthew 10:28: “And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear Him [God] which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” Souls can be destroyed!

Adam and Eve were physical, material beings who were capable of death, and eventually they did die. The Tree of Life symbolized God’s offer of eternal life. God made the tree available to Adam and Eve as a gift. Had they taken of this tree, they could have qualified to receive eternal life at the end of their physical existence.

Our original parents were created as mature adults, yet had to be instructed and educated from the time they received consciousness. They were given the gift of understanding speech, as well as being able to communicate with speech. God had to bring about this capability immediately since such development usually requires a matter of years with newborn children.

Mankind Required to Choose

Once Adam and Eve were given a foundational level of knowledge and education, circumstances almost immediately required them to make a choice. They would be held accountable for their choice.

While 6,000 years have passed, nothing has changed for those of this generation—and for you who are reading this book. We too must choose. Let’s consider their choice and ours.

Consider this direct instruction to our original parents: “And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there He put the man whom He had formed. And out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil” (Gen. 2:8-9).

It is important to repeat that God warned Adam that eating of the second tree would bring death. Notice again: “But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat of it: for in the day that you eat thereof you shall surely die” (Gen. 2:17). God explained, “...for dust you are, and unto dust shall you return” (3:19). The choice was clear and the original parents of mankind had no excuse for claiming that they did not understand it. This well-known—but little-understood—account in the Garden of Eden holds an absolutely vital key, unlocking all that is wrong with the world today—including why its misuse of sex.

The account records that Adam and Eve made a fateful—and ultimately disastrous—choice. Genesis 3 next records this: “Now the serpent [Satan] was more subtle than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made” (vs. 1).

The world is ignorant of an enormous truth overarching everything that happens among the nations. Revelation 12:9 states, “Satan...deceives the whole world.” II Corinthians 4:4 adds to this that he is “the god of this world.” These passages reveal the devil to be cunning, clever—and very subtle in manner—which is what made him so effective in his appeal to Eve. Satan’s role will be discussed at some length here. (I have written various booklets explaining much more about the prehistory of this great fallen spirit being, his methods and devices, and his influence on civilization.)

Continuing with the Genesis account: “And he said unto the woman, Yes, has God said, You shall not eat of every tree of the garden? And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden: but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, You shall not eat of it, neither shall you touch it, lest you die. And the serpent said unto the woman, You shall not surely die” (vs. 1-4).

The devil lied to Eve. Not only did she believe him but she was also able to lead Adam into sin with her. Satan told them, “You shall not die”—in other words, “you have immortal souls.” This same cunning serpent has been lying to mankind ever since!—and it has continued believing him!

Satan continued, “For God does know that in the day you eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and you shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat. And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons” (vs. 5-7).

The devil got these first two human beings to reject—to disbelieve!—God’s warning in Genesis 2:16-17. His deceit brought these adult children to believe that they no longer needed to listen to their Parent. Human nature entered. Thrust from the garden, they were forced to fend for themselves.

Satan convinced Adam and Eve that they could become “gods” (the Hebrew used here is also Elohim) by appealing to their human pride—their vanity. He convinced them that their minds were complete apart from God. Seduced by false arguments, they believed him and took God’s prerogative to define right and wrong for themselves. Their initially perfect human minds became corrupted by vanity, which seized them and changed their thinking to believe that they were above receiving instruction from God.

Fateful Decision

The Genesis 3 account represents a truly fateful decision. Mankind—in the person of Adam and Eve—was faced with a great choice between God’s Way, which leads to eternal life, or the devil’s, which leads to death.

Human beings are not born instinctively knowing everything necessary to operate successfully throughout their lives. They must acquire ever more knowledge as they grow older and as more demands are placed upon them.

All kn