Sexual sin has temporal and eternal consequences

1 Thessalonians 4:6 in our passage says God is an avenger. When we do wrong to each other, God cares about that. He executes judgment. Now Christians are forgiven for sexual sins, like any other sins, and yet God chastises his people—particularly those who are giving themselves over to things. He punishes. He disciplines. If you are a man—including if you are a married man—and you are going to indulge in things like pornography, it is going to affect your marriage. It is going to do so naturally. Do not expect God to just let that go without consequence. It may lead to a terrible divorce in your family. You may pick up, through promiscuity, sexually transmitted diseases. You will certainly experience the grieving of the Holy Spirit, and your spiritual life can only suffer in that way. And God may be wise and judicious in dealing out other forms of chastisement—perhaps even an untimely death. If unrepented, sexual sin will strip away our assurance of salvation. It may lead to a lessening of the heavenly reward. We are told that what we do now matters in eternity. We are saved by the work of Christ—faith alone, grace alone—and yet we will stand before the Lord. Well done, thou good and faithful servant, he says of all our stewardships.

We will give an account. Greg Beale points out the stark language of the New Testament, and he writes this: Those who do not break off from their former pagan way of living should not be considered truly Christian. Such people who confess to be Christians and live like Gentiles will be judged like unbelieving Gentiles. Now he is talking about the unrepentant—those who were living in an ungodly way, who were involved in adultery and fornication, and who now just continue doing that. They are effectively denying the reality of their Christian confession. That is certainly true. God holds us to account and will judge.¹

Richard D. Phillips