Quiet Time: The Bible is Not a Sex Manual

Here's the rewritten devotional:

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We love to turn the Bible into a rulebook — especially when it comes to sexuality. We flip to the passages that say "don't," highlight them in red, and skip right past the Song of Solomon, where a bride describes her beloved's body with the boldness of a poet on fire. Scripture doesn't hand us a clinical manual. It gives us something far more dangerous: a vision of what love looks like when it reflects the heart of God.

Micah 6:8 cuts through our impulse to reduce faith to a checklist: "Act justly, love mercy, walk humbly with your God." Notice the order. Justice first — which means every conversation about intimacy and the body must begin with the dignity of the person sitting across from you, not the dictates of your comfort zone. Then mercy — because every human being carries wounds in this area, and the church has too often handed out stones when Jesus knelt in the dust and wrote in the dirt. Then humility — because the moment we believe we have sexuality figured out, we have already stopped listening to the Spirit.

Father, forgive us for wielding your Word like a weapon when you meant it as a lamp. Teach us to hold conversations about the body with the same tenderness you showed when you fashioned Eve from Adam's side — not from his head to rule over, not from his feet to be trampled, but from near his heart. Make us a community where honesty is safer than silence, and where your mercy always gets the last word. Amen.