The Sin of Fornication

There's an old episode of Mayberry from 1960 where Barney and Gomer fall asleep in church listening to a visiting preacher. His message is on how to be a better person, and he's got a monotone voice and they fall asleep. It's pretty funny.

And on the way out, Barney shakes his hand and says, Reverend, that was a good sermon on sin. It was pretty common back in those days to go to church and hear a sermon on sin, but I doubt you're going to hear very many today. We are in our sermon series on sin, friends, and today I'm covering the sin of fornication, and I just might as well empty half this room with this one, friends.

It's a taboo subject, but how many times have I sat next to young couples in church that were living together, they were engaged, and they saw nothing wrong with living together without being married yet because of their commitment to one another, and they felt God knew their hearts, and that's the problem. He knows our deceitful hearts. The sin of fornication is so widespread that many couples just live together with no intention of ever marrying.

Like a country preacher once said, why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free? But we don't call sin sin in our society anymore. We just relabel it. Adultery is just having an affair.

Since the sexual revolution of the 1960s, sexual promiscuity has been promoted throughout society. It's in all our television programming and advertising programs. Morals have gone right out the window.

The statistics of the current population survey of American states that for the last 30 years, the number of people not marrying and living together has increased, and it's increased by at least 7%. More and more couples are deciding to forego marriage and just live together. But God's word in Hebrews 13.4 declares, marriage is honorable and all, and the bed undefiled, but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge.

There used to be a time in this country years ago when living together was a sinless sin. That's because back then the church still had a voice of authority and there was still a fear of God in the land. But we wanted to reach the world, so we invited the world into our church and we ended up with worldly congregations.

But the apostle Paul warned Timothy to flee youthful lusts. Today we live in a sin-soaked, sex-crazed society that promotes promiscuity. Society makes fun of Christians who are celibate.

They mock someone who's still a virgin. My friend Bill McDonald used to smile and say, I'm a 91-year-old virgin, and he was proud of it. But society would think that's weird because everybody's sleeping around today.

People would be shocked to learn that God considers fornication a sin. That's why bars and clubs are full late at night while everyone's trying to hook up with a partner. And basketball stars boast about the thousand women they have slept with.

It's bragging rights. But what they don't realize is that those thousand women will be 1,000 evidences against them at the last judgment where they won't be bragging about their conquest then, but they will be greatly ashamed. Fornication is a serious sin, and I wonder how many pulpits in America this week will tackle it and preach against it.

But pulpits in this country seem to just preach nice little messages that don't offend anyone, and sin is seldom dealt with. I'm afraid some people believe that once saved, always saved means you can sin all you want to and still get to heaven. But Jesus never preached a sin in religion, and God will have no rebels in his holy kingdom.

If he kicks Satan and his gang out of heaven, he will surely boot those out who are rebels, even if they're trying to smuggle their soul up there. The Bible speaks loud and clear on the sin of fornication. 1 Thessalonians 4.3 plainly states, For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication.