Hello Mike,

If you believe in God, then you believe that God created our bodies, and the way human beings reproduce was His idea, His creation. God created our hormones and designed our bodies to react a certain way around members of the opposite sex.

So here’s my question. If God designed our bodies to respond a certain way around the opposite sex, why does He criminalize it when our bodies simply do what He created them to do?  I have trouble making any sense of this. Wouldn’t it have been much easier for God to have come up with a different method for humans beings to reproduce? One that doesn’t involve lust or sin?

I am going to provide a link to a video discussion on this topic. You may even be familiar with one or both of these men. Anyway, I am supposing that their take on this is different than yours. Both of these men claim to be teaching the Gospel.

Thanks, R____

Hi R____,

The first thing I will tell you is that I have had the exact same thoughts you express here:

So here’s my question. If God designed our bodies to respond a certain way around the opposite sex, why does He criminalize it when our bodies simply do what He created them to do?  I have trouble making any sense of this. Wouldn’t it have been much easier for God to have come up with a different method for humans beings to reproduce? One that doesn’t involve lust or sin?”

What you say here about our sexual instincts is just as true about all of our fleshly instincts and the breaking of any of Christ’s commandments. Why did he make us to just naturally hate our enemies, disrespect our parents, lie, covet and put physical possessions ahead of spiritual wealth? Wouldn’t it have been much easier for God to have come up with a different method for human beings to learn to love their enemies, honor and respect their parents, always tell the truth, never covet, etc? Just like you, I did not see the need to have to overcome so many of the pulls of our flesh and to go through the humility of dying daily with Him on His cross.

I was personally especially frustrated with why in the world God would, after putting Satan in prison for a thousand years, after having turned the rulership of this world over to His elect who had overcome the beast within us all and were granted to rule with Him over the nations of this world for that thousand years, after going to all that trouble, why would He then release Satan again “to deceive the nations in the four quarters of the earth” during “a little season [when] the thousand years are expired.”

Here is that story:

Rev 20:1  And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand.
Rev 20:2  And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years,
Rev 20:3  And cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled: and after that he must be loosed a little season.
Rev 20:4  And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years.
Rev 20:5  But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection.
Rev 20:6  Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years.

The Defeat of Satan

Rev 20:7  And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison,
Rev 20:8  And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the

In the same presumptuous spirit (Job 40:1-8), I actually told God that if I were Him, I would have made mankind with perfect spiritual bodies to begin with, and I would have completely avoided all the “fiery trials” (1Pe 4:12) of this physical life, with all of its sin, shame, suffering, adultery, fornication, stealing and murder, and bearing His cross and being “hated of all men for His name’s sake”. In my Job-like self-righteousness I had a much better way than His way.

So I can honestly say that I can identify with what you say here, but I must also tell you that you and I are both very spiritually immature and ruled by our carnal mindset when we think in those very natural terms. Being flesh is a curse through which we are all predestined to live whether or not we understand why:

Rom 7:18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

The men you cite say, “He made us this way, so it must be good.” I sometimes wonder if either of these men bothered reading the scriptures except to find verses that seem to say that flesh is not evil in and of itself.

The Truth of the scriptures is that God made us “marred in the hand of the Potter [with] no good thing… in [our] flesh”. That is why we as men just naturally lust after women in our hearts. It is not that we choose to do so.  It is because “there is no good thing” in us because:

Rom 9:16  So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.
Rom 9:17  For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh [the “old man” sitting on the throne of God in the temple of God, our bodies – 1Co 3:16 and 2Th 2:4], Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth.

Rom 9:18  Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.

Now, here is the same question all men and you and I ask of God…

Rom 9:19  Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?

…And this is the same answer God gave to Job:

Rom 9:20  Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?

Why is this question even being posed if we are to revel in our natural state as this video suggests? “The natural… carnal mind… the works of the flesh” are condemned throughout scripture:

1Co 2:14  But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

Gal 5:19  Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,
Gal 5:20  Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies,
Gal 5:21  Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. 

The men on this video are both “the natural… carnal men”, as we all are. But in this video they are teaching that being natural and being carnal-minded is something we need to embrace and appreciate. There is a total absence of any of the admonitions found throughout scripture in so many, many verses such as these:

Rom 8:7  Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.
Rom 8:8  So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.
Rom 12:21  Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.

1Co 6:18  Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body.

Jas 4:7  Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

I am well aware these two men have no use for the epistle of James, discounting him as “an apostle to the circumcision”, but these two men differ even with Paul and want us to believe we can walk in the flesh and still please God. They just ignore Roman 8:7-8. They tell us that flesh was created by God, and therefore it is good and should be appreciated. Anyone who has “the mind of Christ” will know immediately that the words and voice of these two men are definitely not “the voice of… the True Shepherd”:

Joh 10:4  And when he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him: for they know his voice.
Joh 10:5  And a stranger will they not follow, but will flee from him: for they know not the voice of strangers.

No one, neither Christ nor Paul nor I, advocates against taking good care of our fleshly bodies while we are in them. No one, not Christ, Paul nor I in any way condemns sex within the marriage relationship.

Heb 13:4  Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge.

God will also judge fornicators who teach and live lives of fornication:

Just because ministers were not tasked with performing marriages in scripture, there are many examples of “wedding feasts” where marriages were recognized by the entire family and community. There is no scripture promoting masturbation or homosexuality. Any form of sex outside of the marriage relationship is condemned in scripture.

Apparently these men have no idea what is meant by this message:

Jer 18:4  And the vessel that he made of clay [that is Adam and all in him]  was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.

These deceived men actually argue that since God made us to just naturally lust after women, and since he put their breasts right there in front of us at “eye level”, He obviously intended for us to lust after women” with no need to restrain ourselves or war against that lust as long as we only lust after single women.

What incredible lack of understanding of what God is doing to mankind!!! Our trials in these dying bodies of “sinful flesh” are designed to demonstrate for us that all flesh is sinful flesh and that “in my flesh is no good thing” (Rom 7:18).

These men have defined fornication as prostitution and actually play down the tendency we all have to commit fornication. Compare the message of that video to these inspired words of scripture:

1Co 7:1  Now concerning the things whereof ye wrote unto me: It is good for a man not to touch a woman.
1Co 7:2  Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband.

Whatever ‘fornication’ is it is to be avoided at all cost:

1Co 6:18  Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body.

One of the blessings of being married is “to avoid fornication”.

The logic suggested in the video is that since God placed the tree of the knowledge of good and evil right smack in the middle of the garden of Eden and He made it to appeal to “the lust of the flesh… good for food… the lust of the eyes… pleasant to the eyes… pride of life… a tree to be desired to make one wise”, that therefore God had no right to condemn Adam and Eve for doing what He made them to just naturally do. Their doctrine is that since God intended for man to eat of that tree, there should be no sin involved. After all, as both these men keep saying, “God made sex, so why should we ever feel guilty because we want to have sex with every sexy looking woman we see.”

Gen 3:6  And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.

1Jn 2:16  For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.

The fact of the matter is that God intended for Adam to disobey Him so He would have an occasion to judge Adam for His disobedience, as we are plainly told time and again in scripture:

Pro 16:4  The LORD hath made all things for himself: yea, even the wicked [Adam and all in him] for the day of evil.

Pro 20:24  Man’s goings are of the LORD; how can a man then understand his own way? 

Jer 10:23  O LORD, I know that the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.

Mankind does not sin because it chooses to sin of its own free will. Mankind sins because it is corruption and flesh which was created to be destroyed through God’s judgment:

Isa 63:17  O LORD, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return for thy servants’ sake, the tribes of thine inheritance.

The apostle Paul comes right out and tells us that when we sin, ‘It is not I that do it, but sin in my members’ operating on “the law of sin which is in my members”:

Rom 7:17  Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
Rom 7:18  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.
Rom 7:19  For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.
Rom 7:20 Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. 
Rom 7:21  I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.

Here is the apostle Paul saying things those who want to excuse their natural actions will never say. Paul is telling us that God did not make us to revel in doing what God has made us to just naturally do. Paul is not reveling in the fact that he just naturally lusts after women.

Rom 7:22  For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
Rom 7:23  But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.
Rom 7:24  O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
Rom 7:25  I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.

Mankind is a “marred… vessel of clay… in the Potter’s hand”, and the Potter is in the process of making every man to conform to the image of His dear Son:

Rom 8:29  For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.

God created us in Adam as sinning machines for the purpose of judging those sinning machines so that through His fiery judgments men would learn to live righteous lives:

Isa 26:9  With my soul have I desired thee in the night; yea, with my spirit within me will I seek thee early: for when thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness. 

I took the time to listen to that video just so I could answer you. Yes, indeed I am very familiar with those two men. One of them, with his entire family, has spent weekends at my home on several occasions back in the late 90’s.

Neither man knows what is the function of grace. One of the last conversations I had with him as my guest was over the location of heaven. He thinks heaven is a physical planet with a physical city called New Jerusalem. That should give you some idea of the depth of spiritual understanding these two men have.

I have never met the other man, but I am familiar with his writings, and in his writings he does the very thing he condemns Catholics and Protestants of doing. He defines words for himself and then uses them as he defines them. He defines the word ‘fornication’ as being prostitution, and then with his totally physical mindset, he tells you that if you lust after an unmarried woman you are not committing adultery with her in your heart, because she is unmarried and you are unmarried, so go for it. That is the way He actually believes; that since God made us men and women, and since He made us to naturally be attracted to each other, that therefore it is not sinful to have lust in our hearts.

While it is true that many of the churches of this world have no idea of the purpose God has in creating mankind as sexual beings, the conclusions drawn by these two men are nothing short of turning the grace of God into lasciviousness:

Jud 1:4  For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.

Do not waste your time looking for anything in the writings of either of these men concerning all of the unnatural things Christ requires of those who name His name. Things like “love thine enemies… turn the other cheek… return good for evil… resist not evil,” etc.

You said:

If God designed our bodies to respond a certain way around the opposite sex, why does he criminalize it when our bodies simply do what he created them to do?

I can easily understand your dilemma because my flesh is the same as yours, but let God be true and every man a liar. That includes you, these falsely directing men and me. Let the Word of God be true, and whether we “have trouble making any sense of this” or not, let’s not deny what is right before our own eyes, telling us that God makes us as “wicked men for [our own] day of destruction of that old first man Adam, that man of sin, Antichrist, a brute beast made to be taken and destroyed.”

Pro 16:4  The LORD hath made all things for himself: yea, even the wicked [all men are wicked] for the day of evil.

Col 1:21  And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled.

Isa 63:17  O LORD, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return for thy servants’ sake, the tribes of thine inheritance.

How does God go about ‘making us to err from His ways’? This is how He has ordained that we are all wicked sinners, made to be taken and destroyed, so the new man can be born through the death of our old, wicked, sinful flesh and blood man:

Rom 7:17  Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. 
Rom 7:18  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.
Rom 7:19  For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.
Rom 7:20  Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. 
Rom 7:21  I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.
Rom 7:22  For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
Rom 7:23  But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.

We are not the ones who are sinning of ourselves. We sin simply because God, the “one lawgiver”, has placed within the flesh of all who are “in Adam… the law of sin” which “makes us to err from His ways”. What can we do? We are helpless of ourselves to overcome this “law of sin… in [our] members”. The death of our old man is inevitable. There is just one solution:

Rom 7:24  O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
Rom 7:25  I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind [of Christ] I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.

There is a “carnal mind” and “the mind of Christ” which supernaturally helps us to fight against the carnal mind with which we are all born. Neither of these men see the need to fight this battle. There verses describe their doctrine to a ‘T’:

Rom 8:5  For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.
Rom 8:6  For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.
Rom 8:7  Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. 
Rom 8:8  So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.
Rom 8:9  But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.

You and I may struggle to understand why God created us with a carnal mind which ‘cannot be subject to the law of God’, but let us never deny that it is so. Rather, let’s cry out with the apostle Paul:

Rom 7:24  O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
Rom 7:25  I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind [of Christ] I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.

Let’s stop listening to men who “speak smooth things”, which naturally appeal to our carnal logic and carnal desires, and fight the good fight of faith:

Isa 30:10  Which say to the seers, See not; and to the prophets, Prophesy not unto us right things, speak unto us smooth things, prophesy deceits:

That is exactly what these men are doing, and in doing so they, like most ministries, are also making merchandise of God’s people. “This is the best $23 you will ever spend” are words in this video. When you hear anyone say one word about buying the gospel, you should know immediately you are not hearing the voice of the True Shepherd who said this:

Mat 10:8  Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: freely ye have received, freely give.

These men are quick to point out that “God has ordained that they that preach the gospel shall live of the gospel” (1Co 9:14), but they do not want you to realize that the support of the gospel comes only from “cheerful givers” and not from the ‘peddling of the gospel’ which is specifically condemned in the scriptures:

2Co 2:17 For we are not as the majority, who are peddling the word of God, but as of sincerity, but as of God, in the sight of God in Christ, are we speaking.

You will not find one verse of scripture which is not in line with Christ’s words, “freely you have received, freely give.” You can find what the scriptures teach on this and most any subject, and there will never be any mention of money anywhere on the iswasandwillbe.com web site or any of the sites to which we link.

The scriptures are not “smooth things”, but they are “the Truth”, and when it comes to sex outside of the marriage union, you will not find one verse which condones such lascivious fornication. Rather, this is what you will find:

Joh 12:24  Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.

Act 14:22  Confirming the souls of the disciples, and exhorting them to continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God.

Gal 2:20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.

Here is a verse which mystifies these two men who both teach that Christ did everything for us, and we have nothing to do but accept His sacrifice. Dying with Christ makes no sense to those who teach that false doctrine of a “substitutionary sacrifice” instead of “dying daily [with, and being] crucified with Christ”:

Col 1:24  Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body’s sake, which is the church:

Here is that verse in the CLV:

Col 1:24 I am now rejoicing in my sufferings for you, and am filling up in my flesh, in His stead, the deficiencies of the afflictions of Christ, for His body, which is the ecclesia.” (CLV)

I asked Concordant ministers, including one of these men in the videos, about that verse, and I was told, “If you can explain that verse, you will be doing something no one in this room can do.” The reason they cannot understand that verse is because they are preaching smooth things instead of this Truth:

2Ti 2:12 If we suffer, we shall also reign with him: if we deny him, he also will deny us:

Joh 12:24  Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.

Eph 4:22  That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; 
Eph 4:23  And be renewed in the spirit of your mind; 
Eph 4:24  And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.

I am the first to acknowledge that none of us is capable of following in Christ’s steps and going ‘as a sheep dumb before his shearers’ to the slaughter of the cross. None of us is, of himself, capable of turning the other cheek when we are slapped in the face. We are no more capable of doing those things than we are of not lusting after a woman. Sex is merely one of many things God has given us to learn to control and use properly in both time and place.

We will all “fall seven times” and we will be forced to acknowledge that we are living in a sinful body of death. Only then, after we have been brought to our wits’ end, will we brought to cry out to God for His strength and His mercy. Only under those specific circumstances will any of us be delivered from the storms of this life which God Himself sends to us to make us to acknowledge our helplessness in fighting against sin in our lives.

What you and I just cannot understand, and which our flesh refuses to accept, is four times in Psalms 107 called, “His wonderful works to the children of men.”

Psa 107:21 Oh that men would praise the LORD for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men! 
Psa 107:22  And let them sacrifice the sacrifices of thanksgiving, and declare his works with rejoicing.
Psa 107:23  They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters;
Psa 107:24  These see the works of the LORD, and his wonders in the deep.
Psa 107:25  For he commandeth, and raiseth the stormy wind, which lifteth up the waves thereof.
Psa 107:26  They mount up to the heaven, they go down again to the depths: their soul is melted because of trouble.
Psa 107:27  They reel to and fro, and stagger like a drunken man, and are at their wits’ end. 
Psa 107:28  Then they cry unto the LORD in their trouble, and he bringeth them out of their distresses.
Psa 107:29  He maketh the storm a calm, so that the waves thereof are still.
Psa 107:30  Then are they glad because they be quiet; so he bringeth them unto their desired haven.
Psa 107:31  Oh that men would praise the LORD for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men!

This is what being brought to our wits’ end accomplishes:

2Pe 2:12  But these, as natural brute beasts [our old man], made to be taken and destroyed, speak evil of the things that they understand not; and shall utterly perish in their own corruption; 

These two men, whom I love and whom I know will, in time, come to know the Christ of all these scriptures, are totally unaware that the very purpose for the natural man is “to be taken and destroyed”. They are totally unaware that God made us all as “natural brute beasts” on the sixth day right along with all the other beasts.

I hope the Lord will grant you to see that the struggles you are enduring are part of what God has intended for all men to endure, and that in His time He will begin to destroy that beast within you and within all of us, and as that old man dies, our new man, Christ in us, will begin to grow:

Joh 3:30  He [Christ in us] must increase, but I [our old man who is still under the law for the lawless (1Ti 1:9-12)] must decrease.

Your brother who, Lord willing, is still dying daily to my own beastly carnal mind.

Mike