Next series up for us is Abraham. This morning is one more special morning for our church for we bury a time capsule to commemorate the beginning of Cross Church’s new building. Today, we arrive at the last of 7 Deadly Sins of Family. Today, I want to speak to you about the deadly sin of lust.
And just because we reserved lust for last, doesn’t mean lust is least. In a 2012 survey of a little more than 500 people, lust was one of the least deadly sins of the seven, alongside pride and apathy. No matter what we may think, lust can be a powerful deadly toxin to your family. Our world is saturated in sexual freedom. Just four decades ago, many were pushing the envelope of the sexual revolution, But today there’s little room to push it.
Pastoral Note: I always attempt to use verbal modesty when speaking on a sensitivity subject like sex.
I invite you to turn in your Bibles to Genesis 39 where we hear a story that could be torn from today’s headlines. A young man is accused of molesting a woman and a charge like this is powerful. Set in Egypt some 3,800 years ago, the story of Joseph, the Patriarch proves powerful even to our day.
Today’s Scripture
The Lord was with Joseph, and he became a successful man, and he was in the house of his Egyptian master. 3 His master saw that the Lord was with him and that the Lord caused all that he did to succeed in his hands. 4 So Joseph found favor in his sight and attended him, and he made him overseer of his house and put him in charge of all that he had. 5 From the time that he made him overseer in his house and over all that he had, the Lord blessed the Egyptian’s house for Joseph’s sake; the blessing of the Lord was on all that he had, in house and field. 6 So he left all that he had in Joseph’s charge, and because of him he had no concern about anything but the food he ate.
Now Joseph was handsome in form and appearance. 7 And after a time his master’s wife cast her eyes on Joseph and said, “Lie with me.” 8 But he refused and said to his master’s wife, “Behold, because of me my master has no concern about anything in the house, and he has put everything that he has in my charge. 9 He is not greater in this house than I am, nor has he kept back anything from me except you, because you are his wife. How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?” 10 And as she spoke to Joseph day after day, he would not listen to her, to lie beside her or to be with her.
11 But one day, when he went into the house to do his work and none of the men of the house was there in the house, 12 she caught him by his garment, saying, “Lie with me.” But he left his garment in her hand and fled and got out of the house. 13 And as soon as she saw that he had left his garment in her hand and had fled out of the house, 14 she called to the men of her household and said to them, “See, he has brought among us a Hebrew to laugh at us. He came in to me to lie with me, and I cried out with a loud voice. 15 And as soon as he heard that I lifted up my voice and cried out, he left his garment beside me and fled and got out of the house.” 16 Then she laid up his garment by her until his master came home, 17 and she told him the same story, saying, “The Hebrew servant, whom you have brought among us, came in to me to laugh at me. 18 But as soon as I lifted up my voice and cried, he left his garment beside me and fled out of the house. 19 As soon as his master heard the words that his wife spoke to him, “This is the way your servant treated me,” his anger was kindled. 20 And Joseph’s master took him and put him into the prison, the place where the king’s prisoners were confined, and he was there in prison” (Genesis 39:2-20).
Most of us know the general vibe of the Bible’s teaching on sex but every and now and then, we’re surprised.
The Wicked Bible
In 1631 royal printers in London, reprinted of the King James Bible with one glaring mistake. Today this rare Bible is known as the Wicked Bible because for the one little mistake that slipped past the proofreaders in Exodus 20:14. You know as the Seventh Commandment, but I doubt you’ve read it this way: “Thou shalt commit adultery.” Three little letters in English “N O T” were missing and they are really significant. Most of the Bibles were destroyed, but there are still a few in circulation that have actually become huge collectors’ items.
Sermon Preview
I want to introduce you two characters that treat sex in very different ways. First, there is Potiphar’s wife who reduces the value of sex. And second, there is the Patriarch, Joseph, who raises the significance of sex. There’s hope for you today: you may have walked in here like Potiphar but you walk out like Joseph.
1. Reducing the Value of Sex
God has given us a great gift when he made us sexual beings. But we can twist and pervert God’s gift. When we pervert God’s gift, we bring a tremendous amount of hurt and misery both to ourselves but to so many around us. Watch how Potiphar’s wife reduces the value of sex both to her demise and those around her.
1.1 Potiphar Wife’s
Mrs. Potiphar knew a good thing when she saw it for the end of verse six says, “Now Joseph was handsome in form and appearance” (Genesis 39:6b). Now, Joseph inherited the good looks of his mother, Rachel – both were described as beautiful people to look at. In fact, in all of the Bible, these two – Rachel and Joseph – are the only two people to receive the double reference to their good looks. Joseph must have had model good looks. First, this sexually aggressive woman tries a direct frontal assault. The English translation at the end of verse eight doesn’t do her demand justice. In essence, this married woman says to her husband’s slave, “Sex! Now!” But she soon she trades her direct approach for a more subtle approach: “And as she spoke to Joseph day after day, he would not listen to her, to lie beside her or to be with her” (Genesis 39:10). She progressively stepped up her approach over time.
Now, most of know the old line “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned”? And this was certainly true of our Egyptian friend. Mrs. Potiphar was so insulted and so embarrassed that she decided she would get even with this young man. She began to scream that he had assaulted her. Then she disheveled her hair and perhaps, tore her clothing a little bit, maybe even scratched her face. All the while she still had Joseph’s coat in her hand, and she told the other men there, “This young Hebrew tried to do this terrible, horrible thing to me.” When Potiphar came home, it was reported to Potiphar, and Joseph is now cast into prison. Now, Mrs. Potiphar had at least three faulty attitudes regarding sex.
1.2 Sex as Pleasure Only
First, she viewed sex as only for pleasure. Most men in our day (at least in stereotype) see sex as Potiphar’s wife here does. And the irony is to see a female viewing sex as only pleasure. We can only speculate as to what is happening here to Mrs. Potiphar. Was her husband bored with her? Did her husband “step out” on her and she began to sleep around as result of his transgressions? We don’t know what was happening inside Potiphar’s wife mind at this time but we do know the pain she caused.
Ancient Christians made a serious mistake after the close of the writing of the Bible – they would often reduce sex to only a biological necessity. To fight against the problematic sexual behaviors, ancient Christians taught that sex as pleasure should be shunned. While sex should not be reduced to the animal instinct of sexual pleasure alone, neither is the enjoyment of sex a sin. God includes the book of Song of Solomon of the Song of Songs in your Bible where a married couple enjoys their love for one another. Then, Proverbs 5:18 teaches us, “Let your fountain be blessed, and rejoice in the wife of your youth…” (Proverbs 5:18). So to remove the pleasure from sex is to go too far, but to reduce sex as only pleasure is to throw the baby out with the bathwater. We’ll see a better fix to this problem in a moments to come but pulling the joy out of sex isn’t the answer.
Really, Potiphar’s wife is really a spokesman for many within our American culture. “If it feels good, do it,” we think.
1.3 Sexual Harassment
We should note that this is the boss’ wife. This is a really big deal in our culture, though usually with the male pursuing the female. Her actions were a power play in sexual politics at work. This past week, the upper management of the prestigious insurance firm, Lloyds of London, were shocked by evidence of widespread sexual harassment inside its company. The report showed women were subjected to inappropriate comments as well as physical attacks by male colleagues. And it’s not just in the insurance industry, the Houston Chronicle discovered widespread sexual abuse and harassment inside many churches just like ours over the past twenty years. Their report discovered 700 people had reported being victimized while 380 Southern Baptist church leaders and volunteers had faced allegations of sexual misconduct. Of those, at least 220 were confirmed convictions. How awful for anyone to experience this kind of abuse of all places a church. This is a time when Jesus Himself would cleanse the Temple, if you will. This should not be like this. Here was a woman (Potiphar’s wife) who didn’t understand what that “No” meant “No” no matter how many times she asked Joseph.
1.4 Love vs. Lust
First, she viewed sex as only for pleasure. Second, she didn’t understand the office dynamics of what was appropriate. Third, she failed to appreciate the difference between lust versus love. Love pursues the good of the other person. Love has self-control, along with patience and reason. Where lust pursues its own gratification, headlong, impatient of any control, and immune to reason. The fundamental and practical difference here is sex inside of marriage.
When you are dating or living together, you have to prove yourself to another. Your relationship outside of the marriage vow is a consumer relationship. A consumer relationship is the relationship I have with my car dealership. When I arrive, I tell them up front the kind of car I want but I have no loyalty to them. Indeed, if I can get the same car at a better price, I’ll sever my relationship quickly. I am a consumer. Dating and living together is just that, a consumer relationship. You cannot be vulnerable with one another Instead, you must keep up the facades. You are constantly promoting yourself and marketing yourself. Had only Potiphar’s wife been told of Adam and Eve: “And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.” (Genesis 2:25) We don’t have to keep selling ourselves, marketing ourselves. We can lay the last layer of our defenses down and be completely naked with one another. You see, when you live with someone without the piece of paper, you are not completely naked. To be completely naked is be completely vulnerable with one another. It’s to open yourself up to another person physically, emotionally, financially, socially, legally, and personally. Marriage is can be defined minimally as a one man and one woman in an exclusive sexual relationship for a lifetime.
Potiphar’s wife said, “Sex! Now!”
1. Reducing the Value of Sex
2. Raising the Significance of Sex
Again, Joseph’s resistance should encourage all of us. Mrs. Potiphar places Joseph under a sexual siege. Joseph was no more than nineteen or twenty years old and his hormones were working in overdrive. Her two words were met by thirty-five words from him: “But he refused and said to his master’s wife, “Behold, because of me my master has no concern about anything in the house, and he has put everything that he has in my charge. 9 He is not greater in this house than I am, nor has he kept back anything from me except you, because you are his wife. How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God” (Genesis 39:8-9)?
He refused her for three reasons: 1) because of her husband’s trust in him; 2) because she was married; and lastly, 3) it was a sin against God Himself (verses 8-9). This would be a good place to say, “Amen!” for Joseph.
2.1 Joseph Stands All Alone
Joseph’s resistance should encourage all of us. What is so surprising in this story is this: Joseph resists sexual temptation when so very few in his family are able to resist. Joseph’s father was a polygamist. Joseph’s grandfather was a polygamist. His older brother, Judah, slept with his own daughter in law, thinking she was a prostitute! His sister, Dinah, was tragically raped when Joseph was around eleven years old. And Reuben, his brother, shamefully slept with one of his father’s wives. Joseph’s story is a story of hope in a sexually confused world. Joseph teaches us that dysfunctional families don’t define us.
2.2 Construct Barriers
Joseph knew he was confronted with an evil woman… …so he constructed a barrier – he kept his distance and refused even to lie next to her. Joseph refused her at every turn. I love this about Joseph – he didn’t sleep with Mrs. Potiphar thinking he would sleep himself up to the top. Be like Joseph - put a barrier between you and sexual temptation. Put a barrier between pornography and you. Exposure to pornography has a crushing effect upon marriages. Put a barrier between the “office flirt” and your marriage.
From last week’s message: Sin is always an inflammation of the imagination. The Bible intentionally says at the end of the Ten Commandments, “You shall not covet…” (Exodus 20:17a). It is not the first glance but the second stare that causes you trouble.
2.3 Skip Ahead to the New Testament
Nearly, 1,800 year later from Joseph’s story, the Apostle Paul would combat the same kind of thinking in his day: on screen: “Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food”—and God will destroy both one and the other. The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body” (1 Corinthians 6:13).
The Roman colony of Corinth would have agreed with Potiphar’s wife as sex as pleasure only, sex as an appetite. Potiphar’s wife would have fit in nicely to ancient Corinth, the Las Vegas of the New Testament. Like our friend Joseph, New Testament Christians did not fit in with the Roman people’s view of sex. The Bible comes along and says, “Enjoy sex only inside of a marriage where one man and one woman stay together ‘until death do us part.” Both Rome and Egypt before them saw the biblical sex ethic as an antique. Like a milk carton, the Bible’s views on sex have expiration date.
2.4 Letter to Diognetus
Twenty or thirty years after the New Testament is completed, we have a very, very ancient Christian document. It’s called the Letter to Diognetus. Diognetus was a non-Christian, and somebody wrote him a letter trying to explain Christianity. This is a paraphrase, but it says: “They share their beds with none but their spouses and their money with all.” Many people think we should share our bed with everyone but our money with none.
We forget that when the Bible was written, people’s sexual views were just as crazy as they are today. The New Testament’s sexual ethics emerged in a time when sexual looseness was prized and sexual purity was frowned upon. When Paul is speaking to the people of Rome, affluent men would a “three-women man.” He had a slave girl on the side, a wife for legitimate children, and a temple prostitute for religion purposes. The people Paul is writing to have all tasted of the fruit of sexual freedom and found it wanting. They had experienced lives where sexual liberty was freely espoused and they turned against it.
2.5 The Refugees of the Sexual Revolution
Today, we are experiencing the refugees of the sexual revolution. They are coming to our shores and to our churches. The sexual revolution failed to deliver on its promises. We have so many broken homes because of the broken promises of the Sexual Revolution. We cannot even decided how many genders there are now in our lives.
The early Christians practiced the very opposite of this.
You can be Joseph. The Holy Spirit in you empowers you to transform your sexual appetite. You may have walked here more like Potiphar’s wife but you can leave like Joseph. There’s hope for us.
2.6 The Conversion of Your Sexual Appetite
Something profound happens in the life of a believer. Did you know that? When you experience the inner power of Christ’s forgiveness for your sins and the empowerment of the Holy Spirit to fight sin, something changes inside a believer. You are freed up to no longer reduce the value of sex as pleasure only. You are freed up to realize the significance of sex. There is a tremendous power available to you called the grace of God. God’s grace will reprogram even your sexual desires.
You can be Joseph. The Holy Spirit in you empowers you to transform your sexual appetite. You may have walked here more like Potiphar’s wife but you can leave like Joseph.
2.7 God Was With Joseph
Now I want you to notice a phrase in verse two: “The Lord was with Joseph…” (Genesis 39:2a). Notice that phrase again in verse three: “His master saw that the Lord was with him” (Genesis 39:3a). And we didn’t read it a minute ago, but look into verse twenty-one with me: “But the LORD was with Joseph…” (Genesis 39:21a). Look in verse twenty-three, the last part of verse twenty-three: “…the LORD was with him. And whatever he did, the LORD made it succeed..” (Genesis 39:23b).
“And the Lord was with Joseph.” “The Lord was with him.” “The Lord was with him.” “The Lord was with him.”
Do you get the idea God’s trying to tell us something? Nothing can empower you like the presence of Jesus and being transformed by the grace of the cross of Jesus Christ. Nothing! The Lord wants to be with you just like He was with Joseph.
Conclusion
You know, as you read this story, it gets you to thinking, doesn’t it? Just think with me for a moment. The last time Mrs. Potiphar sees Joseph, he’s heading to jail. But soon, Joseph is the supreme ruler in the land of Egypt: unlimited power, in control of everything that Pharaoh has. Now, who was Pharaoh’s chief guard? Potiphar. Imagine Potiphar coming home to supper one night. He says to Mrs. Potiphar, “Do you remember a slave boy long ago? I bought him in the slave market. And do you remember you said that he attacked you, he assaulted you, and tried to rape you? Do you remember that young man?” “Oh yes, I remember him,” she says. “Well, sweetheart, I hope you were telling the truth, because tomorrow morning I report to him.”
