“Cohabitation came to be seen by many as a sensible form of premarriage testing or even as an alternative lifestyle. The loosening of sexual relationships is reflected in our use of the term ‘partner,’ which is primarily an economic term.”

Last week, I recommended five resources that help us understand how sexuality functions in our social context and why it is important for Christians to build a healthy culture of marriage and sexuality in the days ahead.

Topping my list of suggestions was a book by Jonathan Grant, a pastor in New Zealand. Divine Sex: A Compelling Vision for Christian Relationships in a Hypersexualized Age maps the “modern sexual imaginary” and shows how our culture views sexuality within a philosophical framework of consumerism, liberty, and technology. Grant shows how our culture arrived at this point, and why we think and act the way we do.

There’s one section of the book I’d like to quote from extensively. Grant lays out five stages in which sex has been progressively “disembedded” and “liberated” from the social contexts that once gave it its essential meaning.

As you look at these five steps, don’t simply shake your head and wag your finger at the world. Ask yourself, How have our own churches taken these steps? 

Step 1 – The Separation of Sex from Procreation

“[This] was enabled by a host of factors, including the invention of contraception, medically assisted conception, and the modern priority given to sex as an expression of companionship rather than as primarily for having children.”

Step 2 – The Separation of Sex from Marriage

“Cohabitation came to be seen by many as a sensible form of premarriage testing or even as an alternative lifestyle. The loosening of sexual relationships is reflected in our use of the term ‘partner,’ which is primarily an economic term. In the name of authenticity and honesty, we declare that we will be partners in this common endeavor for as long as it suits our perceived needs and desires.”

Step 3 – The Separation of Sex from Partnership

“The commodification of sex as a form of recreational pleasure seeking means that many people have come to think of sex as a lone pursuit that just happens to involve another person.”

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