touch my love seat (or not): 30 days of sex or abstinence (depending on your context)

Dave Coverley in SpeedBump with a hilarious cartoon today-- combining the territorial ambitions of children with the results of a selfish and dry marriage...

This goes along, nicely, with some recent posts on lengthy and presumably fulfilling marriages (here and here)-- and how churches might purpose to increase the probability of a glorious marriage.

And then there's a church which is focusing on a very different angle: a church-wide challenge for married couples to have sex for the next 30 days-- and for the non-married to abstain over the same period. They have also produced a (study) "guide" for the 30 days...

Tammie Fields reports for Tampa Bay's Channel 10:

Pastor Paul Wirth says at Relevant Church...they're not only talking about sex they're doling out homework....

Pastor Wirth says "We thought if we could challenge our married couples to really engage in intimacy for 30 days and really focus on each others needs for 30 days it would revolutionize their relationships and if we could get single people to remove sex from the equation for 30 days and focus on what really makes their relationships really work it could revolutionize their relationships the current ones that they're in and maybe their future relationships with their future spouses."...

Wirth says church is an appropriate place to talk about sex. “Why not? If God truly created us then he created us as sexual beings. So God invented sex and why would the church be afraid to talk about what God invented? God invented it for pleasure along with procreation so why would the church remain silent on it? I think they're remaining silent on it because they're afraid to talk about it."

Wirth points to Song of Songs as a book in the bible that talks very specifically about sex. “I don't think sex was created in the back alleys of the porn industry. I really think God is the one who designed it and it's a beautiful thing and God wants us to enjoy it."

Preach it, brother!

And live it out, people!

God wants physical intimacy to be fully enjoyed within the context of marriage!