Last updated on October 2, 2020
Question:
I am a 12-year-old boy who really likes a girl, and she likes me. I think we could end up soulmates and then get married. We live pretty near each other and our parents are pretty close friends. I am a Christian, and she is too. I really want to see what her “part” looks like and for her to see what my “part” looks like. I know you might say that it will lead to one thing then another, but I know that would be adultery. We’ve made out before and we really liked it, so we wanted to do some more. If we do decide to show our “parts,” would that be adultery? Would making out be adultery? If we were to be making out and we wanted to get naked (I usually am on top of her while we are making out) but not actually have sexual intercourse, but make out, would that be adultery?
Thank you for helping.
Answer:
“The highway of the upright is to depart from evil; he who keeps his way preserves his soul” (Proverbs 16:17).
You use a highway to get someplace fast. For those wanting to be righteous, the place they want to get to the fastest is the opposite direction from sin. You understand that intercourse with a girl you are not married to is a sin, but instead of staying away from it, you are longing to get as physically close to it as possible. That would not be the proper way to behave.
You call yourself Christians — followers of Christ. Do you think this is the way Christ wants his people to behave? “Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God” (I Corinthians 6:9-10).
- “Fornication” is when two people who are not married to each other have sex.
- “Adultery” is when a married person has sex with someone he is not married to, or when an unmarried person has sex with a married person.
- “Homosexuality” is when a person lets another person of the same gender have sex with him. “Sodomy” is when a person uses another person of the same gender for sex.
Notice that you cannot reach heaven and be involved in these sexual sins.
Sex ultimately concludes with a guy having his penis in another person, but that isn’t all there is to sex. What you call “making out,” the touching and stroking of each other’s body, is a part of sex. It gets the body ready for intercourse and is called “foreplay.” When unmarried people engage in foreplay, it is referred to as lewd behavior. “Lewdness” is when people act like animals instead of like people. “Let us walk properly, as in the day, not in revelry and drunkenness, not in lewdness and lust, not in strife and envy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts” (Romans 13:13-14).
“Lust” is a strong desire to do what is wrong, so strong that you are thinking of ways to excuse immoral behavior. Even though it is wrong to lay naked on top of your girlfriend, you try to excuse it by saying you won’t be committing fornication (but you are committing lewdness and lust). You offer the excuses that you might be soulmates and that you might get married, yet the fact remains that you are not married. You state that you are both Christians, but you contemplate doing things that a Christian should not do. Thus, you deeply into lust.
Your desire to be naked with your girlfriend comes from your lust, but even this desire is wrong. The general rule since the fall of man is that a person doesn’t expose his genitals to others. We make efforts to keep our privates private. “And those members of the body which we think to be less honorable, on these we bestow greater honor; and our unpresentable parts have greater modesty, but our presentable parts have no need. But God composed the body, having given greater honor to that part which lacks it” (I Corinthians 12:23-24). Of course, there will always be times when it can’t be avoided; yet, we should make efforts to minimize it, and being naked in front of a girl should be strongly avoided. Being seen naked in front of others ought to trigger a sense of shame. “Your nakedness shall be uncovered, yes, your shame will be seen” (Isaiah 47:3).
If nothing else, being naked with a girl makes it too easy to get wrapped up in lust, lewdness, and fornication.