• Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral. (Hebrews 13:4)

• Some people have the mistaken notion that God is anti-sex. In fact, He's outspokenly pro-sex! He invented it. What an incredible thought! Passionate sex was God's idea. He isn't embarrased by it. Song of Songs is an entire book in the Bible dedicated to celebrating pure sex in marriage. Part of the challenge Christians face in a lust-filled world is remembering that neither sex nor sexuality is our enemy. Sex is not the problem—lust is the problem. It's the enemy and has hijacked sexuality. We need to keep reminding ourselves that our goal is to rescue our sexuality from lust so we can experience it the way God intended. (Joshua Harris, Sex is Not the Problem )

• I enthusiastically agree that God wants us to enjoy sex, but godly sex is so much more than just fun. And many followers of Christ are once again poised to be left behind while nonbelievers dabble in this truth. Many people outside the church are discovering that sex is much more than merely a physical act; it has a spiritual component. They are realizing that the deeper connection of sex goes far beyond simply understanding how to overcome sexual dysfunction. It goes way beyond technique and physique. This deeper dimension is experienced when we move past pleasure as a goal and instead seek intimate connection—not just with our bodies but also with our souls. Some are finding that when sex has a clear spiritual and emotional component, the sexual union holds a deeper meaning and therefore offers deeper pleasure. But without a relationship with the Creator through Christ and full understanding of His purposes for sex, these people fall short of the encounter of oneness that God intended for us. They miss the core truth from which all other sexual truths flow. And that truth is that sex is holy. (Sacred Sex by Tim Alan Gardner)

• If you ask the average person to identify the primary purpose of sex he or she will most likely say either procreation or recreation. Of course, both are rich blessings of sex. But the essence of sexual intimacy can never be enjoyed, nor can true and lasting sexual fulfillment occur, until a wife and a husband grasp the truth that the number-one purpose of sex is neither procreation not recreation, but UNIFICATION. And I don't mean just the unification that is inherent in physical oneness, but also the relational unity that is celebrated, created, and re-created throughout a couple's married life. This unification is the celebration of the soul-deep bond that is present when a couple knows and experiences the certainty that are together, permanently, for a divine purpose. They know their expression of love is meant to represent the loving relationship of Jesus and His church. They know that their life together has meaning that is far greater than simply sharing a house or bearing children. (From the book, Sacred Sex , by Tim Alan Gardner)

• A mutually rewarding sexual relationship demands that both husband and wife deny "self" and meet their mate's needs. ( Staying Close -by Dennis Rainey - Word Publishing)

• A lot of couples fall into the habit of playing manipulative, selfish games with each other. Instead of mutually giving to one another and being willing to not deprive one another sexually, as 1 Corinthians 7 clearly states, they manipulate their mate to get what they want. And instead of being honest in their communication about sex with each other, they play games that hurt their relationship. We play these games because we don't understand our differences sexually. Women are wired: "No love, no sex." Men are wired: "No sex, no love." This is hard wiring, so we need to give ourselves to truly understand the way God made our mate.

Female wiring declares, "Value me, love me, make your love obvious to me, then I'll want to have sex with you." Male wiring says, "Have sex with me, then I'll know you love me." Generally speaking, that's the way we're wired. And guess what? God made us different sexually on purpose. He wants us to learn how to adjust to each other. You've got to learn how to understand each other and adjust to each other sexually, or you and your mate are going to be in a standoff that will harm your marriage. ... 1 Corinthians 7 makes it clear that the devil wants to get a foothold in your love life. And it also makes it clear that one way to kick him out of your bedroom is to be sure you are mutually giving to and willingly not depriving your spouse. (From the article: Kick 'em Out of Your Bedroom -
by Harold & Bette Gillogly http://www.premarriages.net)

• As my Family Life Conference colleague and friend, Bob Horner, says, "The bedroom is a lousy place for a battle of wills." For sex to be the fulfilling experience God planned, both partners must submit to the other and commit themselves to a mutually rewarding sex life. ( Staying Close -by Dennis Rainey - Word Publishing)

• Whoever wants sex the least has the most power in bed. (Dr Dobson)

• The marriage bed must be a place of mutuality—the husband seeking to satisfy his wife, the wife seeking to satisfy her husband. Marriage is not a place to "stand up for your rights." Marriage is a decision to serve the other, whether in bed or out. Abstaining from sex is permissible for a period of time if you both agree to it, and if it's for the purposes of prayer and fasting—but only for such times. Then come back together again. Satan has an ingenious way of tempting us when we least expect it. I'm not, understand, commanding these periods of abstinence—only providing my best counsel if you should choose them. (From the book, The Best Thing I ever Did for My Marriage by Nancy Cobb and Connie Grigsby)

• So much of who your husband is lies in his sexuality, and when you constantly refuse his advances, you might as well be refusing all of him. God gave you the gift of sex to bring you together. Don't use it a a leverage against each other. Determine in your heart to make it a blessing and not a weapon. (Julie Anne Fidler - Adventures in Holy Matrimony)

• LADIES: Clearly, just as we want our husbands to love us in the way we need to be loved, our men want the same. And sex is a huge part of making them feel loved. (Shaunti Feldhahn, "For Women Only")

• Isn't sex just a primal, biological urge that he really should be able to do without? Well... no. For your husband, sex is more than just a physical need. Lack of sex is as emotionally serious to him as, say, his sudden silence would be to you, were he simply to stop communicating with you. It is just as wounding to him, just as much a legitimate grievance—and just as dangerous to your marriage. (Shaunti Feldhahn - For Women Only)

• Sexual intercourse, by God's description, is the way of knowing and experiencing another human being in the most intimate way possible. This "knowing" is what melds two strangers into one. A wonderful example of this is a Dutch slang word for sex, naaien, which literally means "sewing." Two pieces of material are put on top of each other and then attached in a way that will "keep them secure and fastened to each other long after the sewing is over and the weaver is gone." This idea of being sewn together in sex is a useful image for picturing the unification that still respects our individuality. Husbands and wives don't dissolve together into one shapeless blob. However, they are intricately and intimately sewn together by God in such a way that man should "not separate" them (Matthew 19:6) . Oneness joins us permanently without destroying our individuality. (Sacred Sex by Tim Alan Gardner)

• You need to know that every day a woman internally asks her husband, Do you really love me? Do you really care? How does she measure that love? How does she know she's truly cared for? It's usually not in the bedroom. If anything turns off a woman, it's the feeling that all her husband cares about is sex. If a wife thinks her main role is to be a willing recipient of her husband's sexual advances, she feels demeaned and disrespected. Men, if your attitude has become, Well, honey, are you gonna put out tonight or not? you don't realize how much you're missing. With that attitude all you're going to get—at best—is an accommodating wife, but never an eager one. I can give you the best sexual technique in the world, but with that attitude, your sexual life is still going to wind up in the pits.

What warms a woman up is when her husband helps around the house, picks up after himself, helps with the children, makes arrangements for dates, and overall cares for her. If a husband consistently and graciously does this without acting like a martyr, he's going to find, 6 out of 10, that his wife is ready and eager to enjoy an active and fulfilling love life. It will be a natural response to a lifestyle of sincere affection. ( Sheet Music by Dr Kevin Leman)

• Physical beauty is great while it lasts. However for 99 percent of us at midlife, the purpose of our clothing purchases shifts from emphasis to concealment. We experience a relocation of body parts due to a long association with gravity. Give your wife [or husband] some slack. (Patrick Morley)

• We have often pondered the seeming incongruity that a man peaks sexually in his late teens and twenties while a woman's sense of gratification moves toward a peak in the late thirties, the forties, or even the fifties. It seems like sort of an unfair arrangement, doesn't it? But if we're wise, we'll let that dilemma rest with the Creator who planned it all and move on toward a complete husband-wife relationship, which God set in motion and pronounced "very good." And we believe that phrase is descriptive of sexual happiness in midlife—and beyond. (Floyd Thatcher)

• Man—given enough time, opportunity, and privacy will turn everything to himself. (Chuck Swindoll)

• In her book Back From Betrayal, author Dr. Jennifer Schneider, asserts that for some dissatisfied people, fantasizing about affairs is the first step to a real affair. She suggests that the fantasization process occupies such a large part of a person's inner world that little energy is left for the marital relationship.

• Make a pact with a friend of the same sex regarding purity and sexual fidelity to your spouse. Agree to share and ask questions regarding the details of relationships with members of the opposite sex apart from your spouse. Memorize a verse to recall in times of challenge. Recommendation: 1 Corinthians 10:13. "No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, He will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it." ( Lasting Love.How to Avoid Marital Failure -by Alistair Begg, 1997 Moody Press, Chicago, ISBN 0-8024-3401-0)

• It could be said that for centuries people have been using sex to get what they want. But to Michelle Weiner-Davis, the story is less agenda-driven than you might think. It's what she calls "real giving," or simply, the golden rule: Treat others as you want to be treated. "All good marriages are based on the notion that people who love each other take care of each other. It's a very simple principle, but when you're caring about your spouse's needs and desires, there's almost always reciprocity," she said. "What happened with those women is that, rather than wait for their husbands to be more of the men they were hoping they'd be, they all took responsibility for their own role in the marital stalemate and decided to tip over the first domino. And in this case, that was being more physical, being more sexual." (From: Smartmarriages Subject: Whetting your Appetite for Sex - 1/26/03)

• "Our culture teaches us that if you talk, if you go on dates, if you spend time together as a couple, the physical relationship will just fall into place," Michelle Weiner-Davis said."I've discovered the opposite is true too: When people start to invest more energy into their physical relationship, all of a sudden it triggers feelings of closeness and connection." (From: Smartmarriages, Subject: Whetting your Appetite for Sex - 1/26/03)

• In the book, "A Celebration of Sex" by Dr Douglas E. Rosenau there are several pages dedicated to birth control. He says, "The Genesis passage of being fruitful and multiplying is in the context of God's giving humankind control of the natural world. We are to be wise stewards of the children God places in our care. To choose to have one or two or five has to be a thoughtful and prayerful decision. You as a couple will have to sort through which method of birth control best fits you as you consider personal sensitivities and values.

…It is good for all of us to remember that God values family and procreation with the planting of seed and the possibility of contraception. Thinking through birth control requires us to sort through our theology of procreation and life, and the deeper meaning of lovemaking in God's overall sexual economy." He then says, "There are nine common methods of birth control. You as a couple will have to sort through which one is most applicable along lines of personal sensitivities, health, and who takes responsibility." (The book goes into details about the nine methods which are: Rhythm or natural method, Hormonal intervention, Condoms, Female condom, Diaphragm and cervical cap, Spermicidal sponge, Intrauterine devices, Spermicidal foam, jelly, and suppository, Vasectomy or Tubal ligation.)

• For many couples, sex is a deeply troubling part of their marriage, but they still want to avoid dealing with it. They hide behind excuses: "Talking about sex just isn't me" or "I'll be fine without dealing with it." That is not, however, a choice that we as Christians have. If we desire a marriage that honors God and fulfills His design for oneness, we can't ignore our sex life. Sexual intimacy wasn't designed to be something we fight about, it was not designed to be taken for granted or abused, and it wasn't designed to be disregarded when we become uncomfortable talking about it. If we are to be obedient to God then we must keep our marriage bed "undefiled" (Hebrews 13:4) . And that covers a lot more than simply not having an affair or not lusting after a person other than our mate. Keeping our marriage bed pure is also about keeping our sexual relationship a place of mutually desired celebration. No matter how difficult or unsettling a sexual issue is, we need to deal with it. ( Sacred Sex by Tim Alan Gardner)

• I'm not saying sex is everything. If you have a good sexual relationship, it registers about ten percent on the "important scale" — meaning it makes up about ten percent of what's important in the relationship. But if you do not have a good sexual relationship, that registers about ninety percent on the "important scale." A good sexual relationship can make you feel more relaxed, accepted, and more involved with your partner. But if your life together is devoid of sex, the issue becomes a gigantic focus of the relationship." (Dr Phil McGraw)

• Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body. Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body. (1 Corinthians 6:18-20)

• You are sexually pure when no sexual gratification comes from anyone or anything but your wife. (Steve Arterburn)

• When you turn to the definition of "unfaithful" Webster states "not faithful: not adhering to vows, allegiance, or duty." Nowhere does it state that unfaithfulness or infidelity is tied to a physical act. It's my belief that if you're using your emotional reserves on someone not your spouse at the expense of your spouse, then it's infidelity. For those who are calling it another name, I can only respond "a rose by any other name ...." (Dena B. Cashatt, MFT - Soldier & Family Assistance Program Mgr.)

• Professors Dolf Zillman of Indiana University and Jennings Bryant of the University of Houston have found that repeated exposure to pornography results in a decreased satisfaction with one's sexual partner, with the partner's sexuality, with the partner's sexual curiosity, a decrease in the valuation of faithfulness and a major increase in the importance of sex without attachment.

• All of us, men and women alike, are affected by what we let our minds dwell on. If our mental representation of who is having "great sex" stems from romance novels, movies, or soap operas, we'll by handicapped by a warped view. If we allow our minds to dwell on jokes, magazine surveys, or water-cooler conversations that deal with sex as an impersonal physical experience, we'll never leek the oneness nor experience the freedom that sexual intimacy was designed to provide. If we use our brainpower to form a critical picture of our spouses, our marriages, or our mating practices, we are, in fact, violating the sanctity of our God-created oneness. And we are robbing our mates and ourselves of the grace of holy sex. ( Sacred Sex -by Tim Alan Gardner)

• We've all heard that the male half of the population thinks about sex a lot. What I didn't realize was that they aren't exactly thinking about sex (as in, I wonder if my wife will be in the mood tonight). Rather, they're picturing it, or picturing a sexual image. And those pictures aren't necessarily of their wives. They are often images that have been involuntarily burned in their brains just by living in today's culture—images that can arise without warning.

You might be wondering, What kinds of images? Apparently just about anything: the memory of an intimate time with you (good) or the memory of a Playboy magazine (bad). It could be a recollection of the shapely woman who walked through the parking lot two minutes ago or an online porn site he saw two years ago. These images often arise without warning, even if the guy doesn't want them. Or specific images can be recalled on purpose. As several men put it, "I have an unending supply of images in my head, stretching back to my teens." (From the book by Shaunti Feldhahn, For Women Only )

• Even happily married, devoted men are instinctively pulled to look at "eye magnet" women, and most men have a mental Rolodex of stored female images that can intrude upon their thoughts without warning. As upsetting as these truths might be to you, remember that temptation is not sin, and your guy is likely trying his best to minimize those involuntary thoughts and win the battle of the mind. The lure doesn't happen because of you and has nothing to do with his feelings for you; in fact, most men wish they didn't have it. As woman, we can be supportive of our men's efforts to keep their thought lives pure, pray for them, champion madesty, and realize God created men to be visual and that His creation is good. (From the Discussion Guide for the book by Shaunti Feldhahn, For Women Only )

• 37 years of clinical and coaching practice has shown me that gender differences on this issue are not fiction, but based in how people actually feel. My experience working with men (and couples) where the man has been involved with pornography is that the guy's response is typically "They're just PICTURES" while his wife is enraged at his "affairs." And the poor guy just doesn't get it. I usually end by pointing out that IF he wants a good relationship with his wife again, he has to learn to understand how SHE sees it, since she's offended by his behavior. This often is greeted by the guy as unfair. To which I reply: "Well, 'unfair' or not, that's the way it works if you want your relationship back." (George Polley, LICSW)

• If you have lunch with someone you fancy and you don't tell your partner, that's an affair. Affairs don't begin with kisses; they begin with lunch—or something like it. So when you hide the shared meal and the excitement that came with it, you do so for a reason. You don't want to upset your partner. (Thus you know, in fact, that there's something to get upset about.) You want to keep it to yourself. Why? Because maybe some part of your mind is planning ahead and it doesn't want your partner to know that this lunch gig has started at all because one day, you hope, it won't just be lunch that you're hiding. By these standards, my e-mail flirtation was already a full-blown affair. And when I realized that, I stopped it. Most important, I began to think more carefully about sharing intimacies [with anyone other than my spouse]. (From an article titled "The New Infidelity From: Smartmarriages - 3/03)

• When you share intimacies with one person, and keep that secret from another, you create distance. It's inevitable. This kind of emotional mission creep—whether intended or not, is made so much easier by the new technologies of communication. One can lie about lunch with little risk of detection. One can suggest a date with an old friend, and whatever happens, nobody has to know except the two of you—a new two. The geographic reach of infidelity is now limited only by one's determination and budget. And if the ex-lover, or new friend, happens to be within driving distance, well then— you can make arrangements from the computer on your desk at work—or on the phone, in the car. And nobody—not your partner, and certainly not your boss — need know about it. The inbox and voice mail — both guarded by those enigmatic, secret passwords — patrol the porous border between what we say and what we do. (From an article titled "The New Infidelity - From: Smartmarriages - 3/03)

• A major reason for infidelity, and a subsequent divorce, is ''people don't want to give up what they think is the ultimate high, the newness, the excitement phase of marriage,'' Vaughan says. (The State of Our Unions - By Rick Hampson & Karen S. Peterson USA TODAY Feb 26, 2004)

• But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality , or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God's holy people. Nor should there be obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking, which are out of place, but rather thanksgiving. For of this you can be sure: No immoral, impure or greedy person — such a man is an idolater — has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. (Ephesians 5:3-5)

• Marital therapist Michele Weiner Davis has a book out entitled, The Sex-Starved Marriage. Exciting new "research" reveals that for many people, waiting for the urge to strike is pointless; better to bash ahead and hope for the best. Davis asks, "Have you ever noticed that although you might not have been thinking sexual thoughts or feeling particularly sexy, if you push yourself to 'get started' when your spouse approaches you, it feels good, and you find yourself getting into it?" Many of her clients have received this counsel with enthusiasm. "I really wasn't in the mood for sex at all," reports one of her advisees after just such a night, "but once we got started, it was fun. I really enjoyed it." (From: Smartmarriages Subject: The Wifely Duty - Sex Starved America? - 1/24/03)

• Sexual sin doesn't just happen. It almost always is the result of a process of nurturing temptation. When people (with whom we feel a sexual chemistry) are placed in our lives our natural inclination is to run from or nurture temptation. Both tacks will likely lead to sexual sin. (Bill Hybels, "Tender Love")

• Left to our own resources, more times than not, we will sin sexually. The pressures are just too great. That's why a vital relationship with God is critical. Without it, good sex is simply not possible. Only fully devoted, committed, authentic Christians can feel the inner tug of the Holy Spirit, the voice that tells us "Abhor evil, cling to good." (Bill Hybels, "Tender Love")

• " Oh, don't be so hard on yourself, one might say. It's natural for a male to look. That's part of our nature." But what you're doing is stealing. The impure thought life is the life of a thief. You're stealing images that aren't yours. When you had premarital sex, you touched someone who didn't belong to you. When you looked down the blouse of a woman who isn't your wife, you were stealing something that isn't yours to take. It's just like walking down Main Street behind someone who drops a one-hundred-dollar bill out of his pocket, and you pick it up. That money isn't yours—even if he didn't know he lost it. If you choose to keep the money instead of saying, "Hey, Mister," then you've taken something you're not entitled to. Similarly, if a woman's blouse falls open, you can't say, "Hey, that's in my sight line, I get to have that." No, you have to look away. Otherwise you're a thief. You need to leave that valuable creation in the hands of God and her husband or her future husband. (From: Every Man's Battle -by Stephen Arterburn & Fred Stoeker)

• A new study conducted by a researcher at the University of Florida finds that 83% of spouses who had Internet encounters with the opposite sex didn't consider it to be cheating. The study's author, Beatriz Mileham, believes "the Internet will soon become the most common form of infidelity, if it isn't already." Focus on the Family marriage analyst Glenn Stanton tends to agree with her. "When you've lived with an individual, you see every part of them. The very deceptive thing about these online affairs is that, like in dating relationships, you're only seeing the best part of the other person. That is a lie from Satan that really sandbags a lot of marriages," Stanton says. Stanton urges Christian husbands and wives to steer clear of Internet chat rooms geared specifically for married couples, and to be as intentional about investing and managing their relationships as they might be about their 401-K.

• If you want to know if you're risking infidelity, tell your spouse the whole truth about the other relationship. If you find yourself wanting to "edit" the story, you know yourself that you're playing with fire, even if you want to say you're protecting the spouse. I agree that secrecy is a key feature of infidelity, so I'd suggest that either spouse has the right to ask and receive a complete and true answer to any question about anything at any time. (Mark Odell, PhD University of Nevada)

• We have countless churches filled with countless men encumbered by sexual sin, weakened by low-grade fevers — men happy enough to go to Promise Keepers but too sickly to be promise keepers. (From Every Man's Battle by Stephen Arterburn and Fred Stoeker)

• "Today's workplace is the most fertile breeding ground for affairs. The observed increase in women's infidelity is because more women are in the workplace and more women are in professions that were previously dominated by men." (Shirley Glass: Expert on Infidelity, Is Dead - The New York Times October 14, 2003 )

• "Those who assume that only bad people in bad marriages cheat can blind themselves to their own risk," said Beth Allen, a researcher at the University of Denver who, with colleagues David Atkins, of the Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, and the late Shirley Glass, a Baltimore family psychologist, recently completed an extensive review of infidelity research." They're unprepared for the risky times in their own lives, the dangerous situations when, if they aren't careful, they'll suddenly be very tempted," Allen said. (THE ROOTS OF TEMPATION - Los Angeles Times - October 20, 2003) (Smartmarriages Subject: Infidelity - 10/21/03)

• Everything that God has created as good and as a gift, man has perverted.

• It is God's will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality; that each of you should learn to control his own body in a way that is holy and honorable , not in passionate lust like the heathen, who do not know God; and that in this matter no one should wrong his brother or take advantage of him. The Lord will punish men for all such sins, as we have already told you and warned you. For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life. Therefore, he who rejects this instruction does not reject man but God, who gives you his Holy Spirit. (1 Thessalonians 4:3-8)

• If we don't kill every hint of immorality, we'll be captured by our tendency as males to draw sexual gratification and chemical highs through our eyes. (From Every Man's Battle -by Stephen Arterburn and Fred Stoeker)

• For single women, it's important to understand how God views sex so that it's not misused. There is right worship and there is wrong worship. Wrong worship brought death to Aaron's sons when they offered the wrong fire and incense before God. To look at this literally, you can say that sex outside of marriage brings about death to our spirits, as well as to our sense of well-being or esteem. In some cases, it brings death to our bodies through sexually transmitted diseases, abortions, and the fatal attractions that are a result of soul ties from the sexual union. (Michelle McKinney Hammond, The Power of Femininity)

• I wish I could say that if you've been sexually active, don't worry—you can be just like a virgin again. But if I said that, I'd be lying. God will forgive you, your spouse can accept you, but it's far healthier to be realistic if you've had previous sexual experience. A recycled virgin still brings more baggage to the marriage bed than a true virgin. There's a reason God tells us to save sex until marriage, and there are consequences if we step over that line. ( Sheet Music by Dr Kevin Leman)

• Safe-guard your marriage. If you take care of how things look, you'll end up taking care of how things are. (Jerry Jenkins on Focus on the Family 3/13/99)

• An unaccountable man is an accident waiting to happen. If you don't have someone asking you after you go on a business trip, "how did you do?" you're an accident waiting to happen. (Kevin Butcher)

• We can take a lesson on the way affairs happen by looking at King David. He put himself in the way of temptation when: (1) He chose to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. (2) He chose to be unaccountable. (3) He got proud and minimized the power of his flesh. (2 Samuel 5:10 and Deuteronomy 17:17) (4) He minimized the power of the enemy. (5) He stopped nurturing his marriage to Michel. (6) He wasn't nurturing his own heart. (Kevin Butcher - The Anatomy of an Affair)

• Don't forget to nurture your marriage.

• One man said he's currently involved in several virtual affairs with married women. He simply fills "an emotional deficit" in women's marriages", he said. Their husbands have no idea he exists. Big-name Internet companies don't care whether it's cheating or not, because the more people looking for love means more eyeballs for online advertisers. But spouses who discover a loved one engaged in such behavior are nowhere near as ambivalent." If it's found out, people tend to feel very betrayed —even if the contact is restricted to the computer only, because you're channeling sexual energy. You're also channeling emotional energy. You're flirting and creating a little bit of an emotional bond here that people (feel) is reserved for them," Mileham said. (CYBERSEX: IS IT REALLY CHEATING? MSNBC.com -11/05/03)

• God has designed wives with a desire to emotionally connect. We read in Genesis 2:24, "For this cause a man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they shall become one flesh." Did you know humans, compared to the rest of creation, are the only ones who are sexually intimate face to face? This is a cleaving face to face, and the desire of a wife is to experience that at an emotional level with her husband. (Dr. Emerson Eggerichs)

• "Never before has the dating world been so handy for married men and women looking for a fling," said Beatriz Avila Mileham, who conducted the research for her doctoral dissertation in counselor education at UF. "With cybersex, there's no longer any need for secret trips to obscure motels. An online liaison may even take place in the same room with one's spouse." In the words of one 41-year-old man in the study, "All I have to do is turn on my computer, and I have thousands of women to choose from. (It) can't get any easier than that." Counseling organizations report chat rooms are the fastest-rising cause of relationship breakdowns, and the problem only stands to get worse as today's population of Internet users, estimated at 649 million worldwide, continues to grow, Mileham said. "The Internet will soon become the most common form of infidelity, if it isn't already," she said. (From: Smartmarriages Subject: Online Dating Irresistible to some married Folks - 7/03)

• Just as many men fail to understand how important it is to become deeply involved in all emotional aspects of his wife's world, many women fail to understand how deeply sex can be connected to emotional oneness for their husbands. Part of this is due to the fact that many men do a very poor job articulating the incredibly intense and immense sensations that are occurring within them far beyond what is happening on the physiological level. To many men, being one sexually is the place where they feel most one—most naked and unashamed—with their mates.

However, if they are unable to fully communicate that to their wives, their desire for sex can come across as just that: a desire for sex. Therefore, it's not only important for husbands to attempt to express what they truly feel about their sexual connection with their wives, but it's equally important for wives to know that, even in the absence of a meticulous exhaustive explanation of the sexual insides of their mates, much of their husband's desire for sex truly is a desire for oneness, a oneness that brings comfort and security in our harried world and helps them feel loved. ( Sacred Sex by Tim Alan Gardner)

• Sex is a type of worship. Did you know that? Even the heathen know it; that's why orgies were a part of the worship ceremonies for pagan deities. ( The Power of Femininity -by Michelle McKinney Hammond, 1999 Harvest House Publishers, Eugene, OR 97402)

• Sexually abused children eventually become adults. Many of them will marry and discover that time didn't heal the scars. Sexuality is at the heart of our humanity and when it's distorted in childhood, it poisons the root systems of our relationship skills as adults. By sexual abuse I mean any sexual activity, verbal or physical, which is forced upon another individual without his/her consent, which uses his/her as an object to meet another person's sexual desires. Such an act perpetrated upon a child sets in motion a whole series of emotional and physical reactions that have a detrimental effect upon a child's normal sexual maturation process. This distortion of sexuality follows the child to adulthood and often causes problems in the marital relationship. These victims of sexual abuse will often find it extremely difficult to enjoy healthy sexual interaction with their spouses. Many are filled with shame, guilt, fear, anger, and often revulsion toward sex. ( Loving Solutions -by Dr Gary Chapman, 1998 Northfield Publishing of Chicago)

• The marriage bed is one of the most crowded places on the face of the earth. It is teeming with people, some of whom you've never met, but they're all there — all affecting your sexual intimacy, looking over your shoulder, and shaping the quality of your sexual pleasure. Don't look behind the pillow, but be aware that your parents are lurking right underneath it! And if you think that's bad, you also better get used to your in-laws, who are hiding under your spouse's pillow! At the foot of the bed? Oh, that's your and your spouse's siblings. Underneath the bed? Don't even get me started on that! What am I talking about? You come into marriage with more baggage than you know. This baggage has formed into what I call your "rulebook" — unconscious but very influential beliefs you hold about how things should be done (especially in bed). A big part of my counseling practice is devoted to helping people understand their rulebook, because a person's rulebook governs everything about his or her life, especially sexuality. ( Sheet Music -by Dr Kevin Leman)

• 60% of all Web site visits are to pornographic sites. The tragic reality is that statistics link pornography to an increase of unrealistic expectations, decreased sexual desire, decreased sexual desire, decreased sexual performance, weakened or destroyed marriage relationships, aggression toward women, and violent crime. 70% of all pornographic magazines end up in the hands of minors. It seems to start innocently enough but what happens is that enough is never, ever enough. Recently one man told us, "The more I got into it, the more I felt that the material had to be stronger, more explicit. I started getting videos. I even called some of those dial-a-porn lines." Feeding the preoccupation leads to ritualization, then to compulsive sexual behavior, and eventually to a sexual addiction. Patrick Carne's describes sexual addiction as "the athlete's foot of the mind." It never goes away. It always is asking to be scratched, promising relief. (From the magazine, "Marriage Partnership" Fall 2001)

• Pornography is different on the computer networks. You can obtain it in the privacy of your home—without having to walk into a seedy bookstore or movie house. You can download only those things that turn you on, rather than buy an entire magazine or video. You can explore different aspects of your sexuality without exposing yourself to communicable diseases or public ridicule. (Philip Elmer-Dewitt, “On A Screen Near You,” Time Magazine , July 3, 1995)

• Whenever God is knocked out—sin is minimized.

• When we do wrong, we set in motion a cycle of complications. (Chuck Swindoll)

• Our culture feeds us the notion that love and sex are the same thing. If only our youth could know that sex does not mean love—it is a biological drive.  And if they could know that love does not mean required sex, what a different attitude they'd have when going into marriage! Of course, when love grows into dedication and commitment of marriage and THEN is sealed with the union of sexual response then that is the best.  That is God's design.  Sex is used to seal the commitment. If catastrophic health, absence (like being called away to armed service) or other issues come up that make sexual response limited or maybe ended, the love, (commitment) is there to keep the love relationship going. (Delores Stone)

• Whenever we make orgasm the goal of sex, we fail to experience godly sex. In other words, the "Big O" of sex is not orgasm; it's oneness. (From the book, Sacred Sex , by Tim Alan Gardner)

• We aren't victims of some vast conspiracy to ensnare us sexually; we've simply chosen to mix in our own standards of sexual conduct with God's standard. Since we found God's standard too difficult, we created a mixture—something new, something comfortable, something mediocre. What do we mean by "mixture"? Perhaps a good example is the muddled definition of "Sexual Relations" that surfaced in the sex scandal involving President Bill Clinton. After the president stated under oath that he didn't have sexual relations with Monica Lewinsky, he later explained that he didn't view oral sex as being in that category. So by that definition, he hadn't committed adultery. That represents quite a contrast to the standard Christ taught: "But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart" (Matthew 5:28). (from Every Man's Battle by Stephen Arterburn & Fred Stoeker)

• Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me and know my anxious thoughts; and see if there be any hurtful way in me, and lead me in the ever lasting way (Psalm 139:23-24).

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