It’s a rare person, if anyone, who comes to marriage without sexual “stuff.” You did. And so did your spouse. Last time we talked about dealing with your own stuff, and this time we’ll talk about how to support your spouse when they have sexual baggage.
Are you aware of how you are hiding? You are hiding, you know, whether you think you are or not. That is, unless you’ve found complete and total transformation in Jesus and are fully formed in His image. Otherwise, you’re hiding. Hiding and intimacy cannot coexist. And you need intimacy. So it’s time to stop hiding. But how do you do that?
You’ve got sexual baggage, and your sexual baggage is impacting your marriage. Your spouse has baggage too, but today we’re talking about your stuff. If you want better intimacy with your spouse, dealing with your own sexual story is a vital part of making that possible. As you stop hiding from yourself and God, you will be better able to stop hiding from your spouse as well.
I did it right. I made it. I didn’t have sex before marriage. And it was a long wait, too.
And I did it very wrong. “Not having sex before marriage” was not because of any superior virtue on my part. Oh yes, I’d heard all the church stuff about waiting for marriage, and I planned to wait. But I was not tending to my heart. It took me a long time to figure out that while behaviors do have consequences, sex is about so much more than behaviors. And the stuff going on under the surface in my heart was seriously messed up.
Sex and intimacy (they are related, but not the same!) is a top area of conflict in many marriages. Trying to demand sex from your spouse, or giving up and withdrawing yourself, are not good options. As with all marriage problems, you’ll get farther if you take time to understand something of the Why behind the issue, the reasons your spouse doesn’t want to sleep with you.
