Standing before the Roman proconsul, Polycarp knew the end was near. The skilled Roman official methodically questioned him and repeatedly demanded that Polycarp worship a pagan image. Each time he refused. The bloodthirsty crowd filling the amphitheater jeered the Christian bishop. Changing tactics, the proconsul encouraged Polycarp to persuade the people. Polycarp felt no compulsion to defend himself before such a hostile crowd. To the proconsul, however, Polycarp responded differently. “We have been taught,” he said (alluding to Romans 13:1), “to pay proper respect to rulers and authorities appointed by God, as long as it does us no harm.”1 While Polycarp held fast to his convictions, the words of the apostle compelled him to respect those in political authority.

This episode, recounted in the early Christian text The Martyrdom of Polycarp, captures the dramatic social pressures the early church endured. In some ways, the episode also reminds us of some of the pressures Christians face today. In his work The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self, Carl Trueman diagnoses the ills that afflict our society, and observes the resonances between the ancient and postmodern worlds. “The second­-century world is, in a sense, our world,” he writes.2 In spite of all our seeming progress, are we returning to the days when pagans wielded social and political power against the church?

Wisdom from the Fathers

If our modern world resembles the ancient one, perhaps we could glean some wisdom from the ways the early church navigated these murky waters. As Polycarp testifies, the Scriptures were essential to the early Christian apologetic. Passages such as Romans 13:1 and Matthew 22:21, alongside the examples of Old Testament figures such as Joseph and Daniel, guided the church’s vision for engaging the unbelieving world.

Of all the texts used by these early Christians, 1 Peter 2:16–17 clusters key themes of their public and political theologies. “Live as people who are free,” Peter writes, “not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God. Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the emperor.” Peter knew the faithful were suffering under the weight of societal pressures, but he still admonishes them to “live as people who are free.” While freedom certainly entails release from bondage to sin and death, it also means freedom from the fear of any social or political power. There is no sense of retreat or capitulation in Peter’s words. He expects that the church will embed itself in the fabric of its social context and live freely “as servants of God.”

“Cultural engagement begins with the fear of God.”

The joy of living freely, Peter continues, is found in a fourfold sense of Christian obedience: fear God, honor the emperor, love the church, honor all people. In four short phrases, Peter compresses a vision for engaging society that reverberates through the writings of the early church as they navigated a pagan world.

FEAR GOD

As an aspect of Christian wisdom, cultural engagement begins with the fear of God.3 I take this as a general phrase describing a firm conviction in the nature and work of God and the wisdom of God required for Christian living (see Proverbs 1:7; 9:10; Psalm 111:10). The early Christians formulated these convictions in a doctrinal summary, often called the “rule of faith,” that they confessed at baptism. Once they emerged from the baptismal waters, the rule of faith described the theological framework that guided their spiritual lives.

Irenaeus of Lyons, for example, begins his summary of the rule by saying, “God, the Father, not made, not material, invisible; one God, the Creator of all things: this is the first point of our faith.”4 The second and third points confess Christ and the Holy Spirit, a developed Trinitarian vision of God. This doctrinal summary informed every feature of their doctrine and practice, and fortified a theological and moral dividing line from the inherited cultural ideologies.

This means that the first step of Christian engagement is discipleship. The church’s necessary focus is on training members, helping them to cultivate a sincere commitment to Christ and Christian doctrine. Only when they deeply imbibed the church’s faith could early Christians defend against intellectual challenges, endure social pressures, and even face martyrdom. Eventually their commitment to the teachings of the Scriptures prevailed. The early church succeeded, first and foremost, because the “central doctrines of Christianity prompted and sustained attractive, liberating, and effective social relations and organizations.”5

HONOR THE EMPEROR

While the fear of the Lord was the first step, the early church affirmed the proper place of political power. Just as Peter encourages the faithful to “honor the emperor,” the early church respected those in political authority, even when they oppressed the church (see Romans 13:1–7; Proverbs 24:21).

Early Christian theologians well knew that political power was meant to curb sin and establish order, even though it could be abused. Alluding to Romans 13:4–6 and related passages, Irenaeus observes that “earthly rule” has been “appointed by God for the benefit of nations, and not by the devil, who is never at rest at all, nay, who does not love to see even nations conducting themselves after a quiet manner.”6 Not all civil leaders are virtuous and, in the Lord’s providence, people experience different types of political governance. Some rulers “are given for the correction and the benefit of their subjects, and for the preservation of justice; but others, for the purposes of fear and punishment and rebuke.”7

Based on the doctrine of divine providence and transcendence, Tertullian made the bold claim that the emperor “is more ours than yours [the pagans], for our God has appointed him.”8 He also claimed that Christians pray for political stability, saying, “For all our emperors we offer prayer. We pray for life prolonged; for security to the empire; for protection to the imperial house; for brave armies, a faithful senate, a virtuous people, the world at rest.”9 Though not afraid to criticize the emperor (or any other political figure) for neglecting his duties, Christians respected the place of civil authority.

LOVE THE BROTHERHOOD

Not only did early Christians fear God and honor the emperor, but they also loved the church (Romans 12:10; Hebrews 13:1). Christians in the ancient world, as today, recognized that laws and political structures cannot make people truly virtuous; that remains the work of the Spirit in the church. Political structures can help facilitate that work and provide environments that promote virtuous living. But politics will not save us or make us holy.

“Laws and political structures cannot make people virtuous; that remains the work of the Spirit in the church.”

While the church — either in the ancient world or today — is not perfect, early Christians argued that “what the soul is to the body, Christians are to the world.”10 Even though the people of God are persecuted, ironically the Christians “hold the world together.”11 The early Christian community did not see the church as just another voluntary organization or social gathering but as the locus of God’s redemptive activity. From their vantage point, God is at work in the church, and the nations enjoy the blessings. The Christians, the early apologist Aristides writes,

love one another, and from widows they do not turn away their esteem; and they deliver the orphan from him who treats him harshly. And he, who has, gives to him who has not, without boasting. And when they see a stranger, they take him in to their homes and rejoice over him as a very brother.12

The love among the church is a living testimony of the potential for human flourishing found in the gospel.

HONOR EVERYONE

Finally, while the early church feared God, honored the emperor, and loved the church, they also recognized that Scripture called them to honor all people (Romans 13:7; 1 Peter 2:17). Christians “are distinguished from other men neither by country, nor language, nor the customs which they observe,” writes the author of the Epistle of Diognetus.13 Instead, “following the customs of the natives in respect to clothing, food, and the rest of their ordinary conduct, they display to us their wonderful and confessedly striking method of life.”14 Early Christians affirmed that all people are created in the image of God and worthy of respect, regardless of social standing. “We are the same to emperors as to our ordinary neighbors,” Tertullian writes.15

The early church pursued holiness and modesty, and in so doing hoped to persuade some. Justin Martyr, reflecting on the way the gospel transformed lives, writes that Christians “pray for our enemies, and endeavor to persuade those who hate us unjustly to live conformably to the good precepts of Christ, to the end that they may become partakers with us of the same joyful hope of a reward from God the ruler of all.”16 Now with renewed vigor and resourcefulness, we need people of faith living with this kind of vision for society: the living testimony of a faithful, virtuous, loving community that honors all people.

We Have Been Here Before

We could say much more about the wisdom of the early Christian approach to living in an unbelieving world. The words of 1 Peter 2:17 and the example of the early church provide a helpful framework to begin thinking through this complex topic. In one sense, the example of the early church may be comforting. We have been here before. The church has survived and even thrived in times like these.

But then again, these days are different. Modern paganism (in the words of T.S. Eliot) is still intermingled with the vestiges of a Christian past. Our social and religious institutions, organizations, and traditions are in transition, tangled in the messiness of losing the Christian mores that informed them. By looking to the early church, we see a vison that resonates with Peter’s exhortation. It begins with fearing God, honoring the emperor, loving the church, and honoring all people. Like Polycarp before the proconsul and the jeering crowd, it won’t convince everyone. Nevertheless, like Polycarp, we walk in faith, and live as people who are free.

A young man meets a girl. The whole world looks different when he sees her. Her voice reminds him of something he has been trying to remember all his life, and ten minutes’ casual chat with her is more precious than all the favors that all the other women in the world could grant. He is, as they say, “in love.” (Meditations in a Toolshed, C.S. Lewis)

Can you recall the enchantment? The intoxication of young love? Its gravity, its force, its demands? Perhaps we squint to remember what we thought we could never forget — the bottomless conversations, the nervous smiles, the rewatching in the mind moments just past. We may smile to ourselves, that was a lifetime ago. “Her voice reminds him of something he has been trying to remember all his life” — doesn’t that capture it?

But that was then. The spell wears off. The kids come. You’ve spent days and weeks and years together. You’ve seen her without the composure and the makeup; she’s seen you without the confidence and the strength. You’ve searched out this island called marriage; there is less to explore now. In love still, just a different kind. More realistic, we tell ourselves. The description above undergoes a revision.

A young man marries that girl. The world returns to normal a few years after. He seems to have remembered that thing that pestered him, and ten minutes’ casual chat with her seems next to impossible with young children. He is, as they say, “settled down.”

Much has been gained; something has been lost. You wish, at times, you could return to that first meeting, that first date, that first time telling her, “I love you.” The romance is still honeyed — when you make time for it. She is still beautiful, when you remember to really look at her.

She sleeps next to you now but seems, on some days, farther than ever. She is yours, but come to think of it, you miss her. You’ve grown: better friends, perhaps, better partners in the family enterprise, but are you better lovers? Has the poetry, requiring so much time and attention, turned into abbreviated text messages and generic emojis?

What a different vision for godly marriages the father of Proverbs hands to his sons:

Let your fountain be blessed,     and rejoice in the wife of your youth,a lovely deer, a graceful doe.Let her breasts fill you at all times with delight;     be intoxicated always in her love. (Proverbs 5:18–19)

Husbands, “be intoxicated always in her love.” What a command. Literally, “be led astray” continually in her love. Be swept up. Lose track of time. Forget about your phone. Wander. Inebriate yourself with the dark-red of marital love.

Your wife, as the father crowns her, is a lovely deer and graceful doe. Do we need reminding? As familiarity threatens to blind us, as fights and frets and changing figures would cool us, the king bids his son memorize the lover’s irrepressible song, “Thou hast ravished my heart, my sister, my spouse; thou hast ravished my heart” (Song of Solomon 4:9 KJV). She, not the adulterous woman, must be his addiction.

Led Astray to Her

We need this command, don’t we? We are so prone to be led astray by lesser things; we whose passions can somehow weaken with possession; we who dull with acquaintance and brighten at novelty. We need a father to tell us on our wedding day (and then again at our ten-year anniversary), My son, be led astray continually to her — away from the tyranny of good pursuits or worldly ambitions — be intoxicated always in marital love.

“In a blur of married and modern life, are we still awake to our beloved?”

Has your pool of passions stilled? Many of us remember being implored before marriage, “[do] not stir up or awaken love until it pleases” (Song of Solomon 2:7). Natural sprinters we proved to be. Desires galloped prior to marriage — when Satan tempted and we ached while apart — but now that time pleases and heaven smiles down, how our love slouches and our once unsleeping passions can hardly keep awake past nine.

In a blur of married and modern life, are we still awake to our beloved? Do we only see the mother of our children? Will we never pause to really see her who is beside us on this grand adventure?

The wise father knows that our hearts, unwatched, grow blind to beauty. We think life unextraordinary — as we live on a planet spinning constantly, flung into a corner of the cosmos, revolving violently around a massive flaming ball — yet we yawn and call it Tuesday. But what is more wondrous still, we live with an immortal soul — in Christ, a coheir of the universe, a redeemed one, indwelt by the God who made everything. A Christian wife. The Alphabet of good husbanding begins with seeing her through faith’s eyes. That is why I suggest, we need to cultivate the habit of seeing her as the Scriptures teach us to see her.

Look at Her

The husband of the Song of Songs, drunk on anticipation and admiration, observes her as an artist bent over a portrait or as Adam waking to behold Eve,

How beautiful are your feet in sandals,     O noble daughter!Your rounded thighs are like jewels,     the work of a master hand.Your navel is a rounded bowl     that never lacks mixed wine.Your belly is a heap of wheat,     encircled with lilies.Your two breasts are like two fawns,     twins of a gazelle.Your neck is like an ivory tower.Your eyes are pools in Heshbon,     by the gate of Bath-rabbim.Your nose is like a tower of Lebanon,     which looks toward Damascus.Your head crowns you like Carmel,     and your flowing locks are like purple;     a king is held captive in the tresses. (Song of Solomon 7:1–5)

Now here, distinguish between descriptive and prescriptive. Charge not forth, good men, to describe your wife in this exact manner. But do learn from the husband’s focus, his alertness, his ever-attentive eye that surveys his bride in quiet wonder. Husband, what does your wife’s neck look like? Her smile in the morning? Her gentle spirit? Her strong convictions? Speak of them, perhaps sparingly, but notice them constantly. And when you do, thank God, the Artist, for what he is painting.

Keep Looking at Her

Does this sustained, admiring stare depend on the beloved’s appearance? Kept curves, bright teeth, ungrayed hair? Notice that the father teaches that the eye of the beloved does not recoil when it observes new wrinkles on skin, new wear and tear from everyday life. Look again at his charge,

Let your fountain be blessed,     and rejoice in the wife of your youth,a lovely deer, a graceful doe.Let her breasts fill you at all times with delight;     be intoxicated always in her love. (Proverbs 5:18–19)

“Rejoice in the wife of your youth.” How old is she now? Youth is somewhere in the rearview; the wedding day a distant memory. Decades have passed, perhaps. “Always” is your delight and duty. There she is. You gaze over your morning coffee at her — what do you see? The wife of your youth, the wife of your reminiscences, the wife of your now and former days.

The world, so crude and boastful, would tell you that she, with chronic knee pain and doctors’ visits, is past her prime, perhaps even disposable. With its diseased and rasping voice, it points to the youthful employee, the pornographic magazine at the checkout counter, the woman running past in painted-on attire — behold, a lovely deer, a graceful doe. She will thrill you with the chase, satisfy you with fresher springs.

No, no, no, foolhardy flesh. I have my lovely deer, my graceful doe. She, no longer a youth, is better: the wife of my youth. We keep a most blessed fountain. Her breasts have not stopped filling me at all times with delight. No, no, no, O dark and devilish temptation, you have no mastery here. My God, by his grace, has given me himself and more; he has gifted me her. And though our stay in this body be brief, though our figures droop and drag and waste away, she is even more beautiful now (more Christlike than ever before), a companion no harem of illicit pleasure could rival. Be gone, all others, be gone! I am swept away — intoxicated — always in her love.

King Caught in the Tresses

Consider how closely Christ looks at his bride. How particular is he to pore over that beauty which he himself bestows upon her (and at what cost)?

Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. (Ephesians 5:25–27)

His life, his crucifixion, his being “marred, beyond human semblance” (Isaiah 52:14), all so that he would watch her walk down the aisle toward him — “in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish” before him. His eyes, keener than eagles’, survey her.

Behold, you are beautiful, my love;behold, you are beautiful;     your eyes are doves. . . .You are altogether beautiful, my love;     there is no flaw in you. (Song of Solomon 1:15, 4:7)

And then he, the perfect Groom, will call her from this cursed world,

Arise, my love, my beautiful one,     and come away. (Song of Solomon 2:10)

What Marriage Whispers

Marital intimacy, though not the Aphrodite culture would make her, is a precious gift. The father, while not merely pointing us to the marriage bed alone, is here bidding old lovers to drink deeply of the uncorked vintage of God’s design.

Marital sex, a lordly and bright sunlight, should itself bow. I believe we learn something of intimacy’s proper place from (of numerous other passages) a text that has always struck me as something of an oddity. Concerning the marriage bed, Paul writes,

Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. (1 Corinthians 7:5)

Contra many skeptical notions, intimacy, in normal circumstances, should be enjoyed and regular. Our lack of self-control and Satan’s sure temptations ground this dictate. The soak under the silver waterfall serves more than delight and unity; it serves holiness. Regular “coming together” builds a gleeful rampart against the schemes of the enemy.

But this was not the oddity. The oddity to me concerned what the couple might decide (together) to lay it aside for. “[Don’t] deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer.” It struck me as odd that the apostle considered prayer the alternative and the superior.

What does prayer as a planned interruption to the marriage bed suggest? It tells me that sex is a good and necessary gift for married couples from a good and gracious God, but not an ultimate gift. Sex was made for man, but not man for sex. Greater pleasures perch on higher branches. One might halt the lesser intimacy, might intentionally fast from the feast, for the higher and the greater — prayer. The prayer closet — the place of intimacy with God — holds higher rank.

Swept Away

Marital intimacy — with all its high glories and some crawling challenges (here left undiscussed) — samples wine from a coming orchard. Wine within this covenant challis is ultimately about blood-bought union with a covenant-keeping God. The mountain peaks, the ocean deeps, the untamed thrill, the transfigured moments of pleasure and beauty in a healthy married life exist for him (Colossians 1:16). Our union with him is not of one flesh as with a wife, but greater, of one spirit (1 Corinthians 6:17). Considering Ephesians 5:31–32, John Piper clarifies,

Leaving parents and holding fast to a wife, forming a new one-flesh union, is meant from the beginning to display this new covenant — Christ leaving his Father and taking the church as his bride, at the cost of his life, and holding fast to her in a one-spirit union forever. (This Momentary Marriage, 30)

Marital union sketches union with Christ.

So, husbands, look at her, keep looking at her, awaken slumbering summer, foment tidy sheets, cast down enthroned shams — and forgo this intimacy, at times, to pray. Be intoxicated always in her love, be led astray, and in that affection be swept away to a higher love, the love of Christ. Let her voice and her love remind you of what you’ve been trying to remember all your life.

Audio Transcript

From the first year of this podcast, we decided to address mature topics and awkward questions. No apologies. If you’re comfortable asking it, we will address it. Needless to say, today’s question is a mature one for married couples. The question arrives from men and from women. Here are three representative emails I’ve picked out.

First, from an anonymous wife: “Pastor John, I have a question. It’s embarrassing. But here it is. My husband likes to use role-playing in the bedroom, and various levels of bondage and dominance. He wants me to say things like ‘I am your slave.’ He wants me to wear certain collars around my neck. To the far extreme, he likes to fantasize that he is raping me. But he’s a very nice person outside of the bedroom. He only asks if he can play out the fantasy in bed. What should I do?”

Second, another anonymous wife writes in: “Dear Pastor John, thank you for the podcast. I have been married for twenty years. Before we got married, my husband told me he had struggled with porn. After we were married, he asked me to try some of the things he saw in the porn he had watched. I consented. Our premarital counselor told us that anything was okay in the marriage bed with mutual consent, and I wanted to please my husband. But this has had a detrimental effect on our marriage. I am now to the point where I don’t want any physical intimacy, and he doesn’t feel loved. Was it okay for us to do those things since we agreed at the time? I think dominance in the bedroom is completely anti-biblical. My husband continues to think it’s fine with mutual consent.”

Third, and finally, the question also arrives from a husband: “Pastor John, my wife recently told me she was unfaithful to me and hasn’t had an emotional connection to me in sex or in general since we got married three years ago. She wants to engage in domineering sexual acts that I see as sinful. She thinks I’m too boring in bed. She now wishes to leave me so I can find a new wife, and so she can engage in sexual experiences with other men. How do I respond?” Pastor John, how would you respond?

Here are five perspectives on sexuality that I hope will help couples get their bearings if they are willing to seriously seek God’s will for their sexual lives. And I do promise that God’s will for your sexual lives is the most satisfying way of life.

Fantasized Sin

First, fantasizing sin is sin. Playing out a situation or behavior in your mind because of its pleasure that is sinful — a sinful situation or a sinful behavior if you did it outwardly — is sin in your mind. And if this is true for fantasies, then it is all the more true that playacting sin is sin. Pretending to do something that, if you did it when not pretending, is sin — that pretending is sin. I say this because of Matthew 5:27–29.

You have heard that it was said, “You shall not commit adultery.” But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell.

“To the degree that you pursue some act as more pleasurable because it is illicit, you are in a fool’s bondage.”

In other words, Jesus’s standard of holiness is not merely a standard of bodily deeds, but also of mental delights. If you pursue a pleasure in your mind that is unlawful for your body, you are sinning. What is sin? Think of it. Sin is the heart’s preference for anything above God and his ways. Sin is not primarily the movement of the muscles or the body. It is primarily and fundamentally the movement of the soul, the movement in pursuit of pleasure in a way that God has forbidden. It’s the failure to pursue pleasure in God himself above all else.

So, it was an overstatement or a misstatement (I’m not sure which the counselor would admit to) when the premarital counselor said that anything you mutually agree on in the marriage bed is permitted.

If you mutually agree to playact a rape, it is sin.
If you mutually agree to pretend you are having sex in Times Square with a thousand people watching, it is sin.
If you mutually agree to pretend that you are two strangers who happened upon each other in the woods and have sex, you are sinning.

Fantasized sin is sin, no matter how many people agree on it. Playacted sin is sin.

Self-Serving Sex

Second, demanding or coercing unnatural and bizarre sexual acts when they displease the partner is sin.

Romans 12:10 says, “Outdo one another in showing honor.”
Philippians 2:3 says, “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others [like your wife] more significant than yourselves.”
1 Corinthians 6:19–20 says, “You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.”

All of that leads to the conclusion that in the marriage bed, the other person’s desires and delights and disapprovals and displeasures are as important as our own — indeed, more so. To press for your own private bodily satisfaction at the cost of the spouse’s displeasure is

a failure to honor,
a failure to count the other more significant,
a failure to glorify God with your body, and
a failure to show you are not your own but bought with a price, belonging to Jesus.

If you need ever more kinky sex — ever more bizarre, unconventional sexual acts at the expense of your spouse’s enjoyment — you are elevating your appetite above his or her delights. That’s not the way of Christ.

Folly of the Forbidden

Third, if you pursue a sexual act or an imagined sexual situation because it is more stimulating, scintillating, pleasurable because it is forbidden, then you are living out the way of the fool, and you are embodying the principle of bondage. Proverbs 9:16–17 says, “To him who lacks sense [folly] says, ‘Stolen water is sweet.’” If you pursue forbidden water because its prohibition makes it sweeter, you’re a fool.

Paul got at the principal like this. He said in Romans 7:7–8,

If it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment [through the prohibition], produced in me all kinds of covetousness.

“Fantasized sin is sin, no matter how many people agree on it.”

In other words, when you see a child have no interest in a toy until it is forbidden, you are watching bondage to a sinful nature.

So, in the marriage bed, to the degree that you pursue some act as more pleasurable because it is illicit, you are in a fool’s bondage to a sinful impulse.

Disordered Desires

Fourth, if sexual desire has become so prominent in the way you pursue satisfaction in life that you must push the limits of sexual conventions in order to be a joyful and contented person, your God and your purpose for living have become too small. Bodily appetites become gods when God diminishes. Sexual urges become too big when we lose big purposes for our lives.

Paul says in 2 Corinthians 3:18, “Beholding the glory” — now, that’s an infinitely beautiful thing he’s just mentioned. “Beholding the glory of the Lord, [we] are being changed into [his] image from one degree of glory to another.” In other words, we need a big, beautiful, glorious, transcendent, majestic vision of God and his purpose for our lives if sex is to stay in its pleasurable, small place.

Love Where It Matters

Finally, I would say to men especially, if you hope to have a thrilling, joyful, mutually satisfying sexual relationship with your wife for the next fifty years, you absolutely will not have it by demanding or expecting ever more bizarre exploits. Rather, you will have it by devoting 99 percent of your effort to loving your wife well outside the bedroom, so that she finds you somebody she really desires.

I don’t promise paradise. There’s too much brokenness in the world. But I do promise you, you will not find fifty years of mutual pleasure on the path of playacted perversion.