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Is intimacy before marriage wrong
if you don't have sex?
To answer the
question properly, we must first define what it means to be intimate.
Since the question mentions marriage and sex, the intimacy is sexual in
nature. Any type of sexual union, contact, intimacy is for the
marriage only between a husband and wife. If a man and woman who
are not married go to bed together naked and do not have sexual
intercourse, this is still sinful. If they fondle each other
without having sexual intercourse it is sinful. If they go to bed
together naked and just hold each other, it is sinful. The whole
point is that the nakedness, viewing the nakedness, the touching of the
private areas, fondling, etc., are all reserved for the marriage bed
between a husband and a wife. God clearly instructs that we remain
morally pure.
- 1 Cor. 6:18, "Flee immorality. Every other sin that a man
commits is outside the body, but the immoral man sins against his
own body."
- Eph. 5:3, "But do not let immorality
or any impurity or greed even be named among you, as is proper among
saints."
- Col. 3:5, "Therefore consider the
members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity,
passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry."
- 1 Thess. 4:2, "For you
know what commandments we gave you by the authority of the Lord
Jesus. 3 For this is the will of God, your
sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality;
4 that each of you know how to possess his own vessel in
sanctification and honor, 5 not in lustful passion, like
the Gentiles who do not know God."
Since intimacy
before marriage involves the touching and often seeing of the naked
body, this is an off limits action. Save this for the proper
context of marriage.
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Questions on Sexuality
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