Intertribal Life Newspaper -

Here begins the private correspondence between two young people and their pastor, which make up a bestselling book translated into 70 languages. Here are the first three letters...

M.......January 8

Sir,

This letter comes to you in my place. I'm too ashamed to go to see you. Besides, I don't have the money for the trip, because I'm no longer a teacher. I've lost my job.

Last Friday, I loved a girl-or as you would put it, I committed adultery-at least that's what the white folks call it and the Church, too. But the girl wasn't married, nor was she engaged to another. Consequently she didn't belong to anyone and I don't understand who it is that I have wronged. I myself am not married and I have no intention of marrying her. I don't even know her name. So, the way I see it, the commandment, "You shall not commit adultery" does not apply in my case. That's why I can't understand why the Church deprives me of Communion by putting me under discipline for six months.

One of my pupils told on me. And now I don't know where to turn.

Sir, you baptized me and taught me at school. You have counseled me often and know how I became a follower of Jesus. You know me even better than my own father does. I'm terribly sorry to disappoint you, but at the same time I tell you frankly, I don't feel very guilty. I'm ashamed because of all the talk about it, but I'm still a Christian.

I dare to tell you openly what I think even if you get angry. Aren't the desires of my body supposed to be satisfied? Aren't my sex organs given me to be used? Shouldn't you take advantage of that which is available? Why is it a sin to use what God has made?

Since everyone condemns me, I do not expect an answer.

I will stop now, There's nothing more to be said.

Sincerely,

Your unhappy Frank

B....January 19

My dear Frank,

I got your letter and I'm thankful you told me what happened before I heard it from someone else. Of course I'm sad. It's embarrassing for me too, because it was partly on my recommendation that you were given your job as a teacher.

But I'm not at all angry with you for being frank. Rather, I'm deeply moved by it, for then perhaps I can help you. May I answer your questions just as frankly as you have asked them?

Let us put aside for a moment the question of whether or not your case should be called adultery. You are absolutely right in saying that sex is no sin. Your desires, your thoughts when seeing a beautiful girl are not yet sin; neither is it sin if you feel attracted. You can't avoid physical desires any more than you can avoid having the birds fly around your head. But you can certainly prevent them from building nests in your hair.

Indeed, sexual desires are created by God. They are a gift of God, one of the most precious gifts you have received for your young life. But the existence of a desire does not justify its satisfaction. The presence of a power does not imply that one should be guided by it, blindly and without restraint.

What would you say about a fellow who stands in front of the window of a butcher's shop in a big city and reasons as follows: "Now that I see this meat, I'm hungrier than ever. The meat arouses my appetite. That proves it's meant for me and that I should have it. Therefore I have the right to smash the window and help myself."

You ask if that which exists should not be used. Yes, but only in its own time and place. Just imagine, for instance, that one of your friends has become a policeman. For the first time in his life he possesses a revolver. Now he says to himself: "I didn't acquire this revolver myself. It was given to me. Because it was given to me it should be used. Therefore I must shoot somebody with it-no matter whom."

No, he does not have this right. If the revolver has been given him, then he is responsible for its proper use.

The same is true about sex. It should be used, but in its proper place and time, according to Creator God's plan. Within that plan the sexual instinct is a good thing, a powerful source of life and unity between two beings. Outside of God's plan, it quickly becomes a means of division, a source of cruelty, perversion and death.

I could say it also this way: Within God's will, sexual union fulfills its purpose only when it is an expression of love.

One phrase in your letter struck me especially. You wrote, "I loved a girl." No, my friend. You did not love that girl; you went to bed with her-these are two completely different things. You had a sexual experience, not an experience of love.

It's true you can say to a girl, "I love you," but what you really mean is something like this: "I want something. Not you, but something from you. I don't have time to wait. I want it immediately, without delay. It doesn't matter what happens afterwards. Whether we remain together, whether you become pregnant-that has nothing to do with me. For me, it's right now that counts. I will make use of you in order to satisfy my desire. You are for me only the means by which I can reach my goal. I want to have it-have it without any further ado, have it, immediately.

This is the opposite of love, for love wants to give. Love seeks to make the other one happy, and not himself. You acted like a pure egotist. Instead of saying: "I loved a girl," you should have said: "I loved myself and myself only. For this purpose I misused a girl."

Let me try to tell you what it really should mean if a fellow says to a girl, "I love you." It means: "You, you, you. You alone. You shall reign in my heart. You are the one whom I have longed for; without you I am incomplete. I will give everything for you and I will give up everything for you, myself as well as all that I possess. I will live for you alone, and I will work for you alone. And I will wait for you-it doesn't matter how long. I will always be patient with you. I will never force you, not even by words. I want to guard, protect you and keep you from all evil. I want to share with you my thoughts, my heart and my body-all that I possess. I want to listen to what you have to say. There is nothing I want to undertake without your blessing. I want to remain always at your side."

Do you understand now how far removed your experience was from an experience of love? You don't even know the name of the girl. For you, she wasn't even a person, not even a number. You're not interested in her past, and certainly not in her future. You didn't even care what happened in her heart when you possessed her. And if she became pregnant-that's her affair. What does it matter to you?

No, you did not love her. True love involves responsibility-the one for the other and both before God. Where love is, you no longer say "I," but "you"; "I am responsible for you. You are responsible for me." Together then you stand before God where you do not say "you and I", but rather "we".

Only in marriage does this "we" become a full reality. Only in marriage can love really unfold and mature, because only there can it find permanence and faithfulness. True love never can and never will end. That's why you should use the great words, "I love you" very sparingly. You should save it for the girl whom you intend to marry.

Here in marriage is the right place to use your sexual powers. There they will help you to love your wife. They are one expression-one among many others-by means of which you make her understand how much you love her.

If you use your sexual powers apart from this kind of love, you are preparing yourself for an unhappy marriage.

Let me close here. This letter will give you enough to think about. Please remember that in spite of everything you can count always on my friendship and my prayers.

Hoping for another frank letter from you,

Sincerely yours,

T.

M.....January 25

Dear Sir,

Your letter has reached me. Thank you very much for it. I'm grateful that you do not give me up. You criticize me severely, but you help me too. I'm very glad that I have found in you someone to whom I can write frankly, but I must admit I didn't understand everything you said to me. What surprised me the most was what you said at the end of the letter.

Sir, if I did have a true motive for my action, it was precisely that of preparing myself for a happy marriage. But now you tell me just the opposite. I ask you, sir, how can one know without first learning? How can one learn without experimenting? Didn't we do the same thing in our chemistry and physics classes?

In my mother tongue we have a proverb which says "Before you go hunting, sharpen your spear."

What use is it to be married if one is impotent because of not having trained sufficiently the powers of his body? Isn't there a danger that the organs will remain under-developed if they are not used?

Do you understand what I mean? I hope you will find time to answer me once again.

Frank

B....., February 3

Dear Frank,

Thank you again for writing so honestly. I take it as a sign of your confidence.

There's a strange comparison between love and death in the Bible which says: "Love is strong as death" (Song of Solomon 8:6). Both love and death have this in common that you cannot try them out beforehand. But just that is what makes both of these experiences so powerful. Do you think you could try out what it feels like to be dead by sleeping very deeply? Even less can you try out what it feels like to be in love by a mere sexual contact. The conditions under which love can be experienced are so much higher, so much different.

Take another comparison: If you want to try out a parachute, you will be tempted perhaps to jump down from the top of a house or a high tree. But a distance of thirty or forty feet is not enough to give the parachute a chance to open up; therefore you may very well break your neck. You have to jump out of an airplane several thousand feet up if you want the parachute to open up and carry you to safety without mishap.

The same is true with love. You cannot try it outside the "high flight" of marriage. Only then can its wonders really unfold. Only then can the sexual organs function as they are meant to function.

When one is married, the sex act takes place under completely different conditions. There is no hurry, no fear of being discovered, no fear of being betrayed or left in the lurch by the other, no fear of a pregnancy resulting from it. But above all there is enough time to open your hearts and get used to one another, to correct together lovingly the awkwardness and minor difficulties which are always there at the beginning.

It is good, Frank, that you want to prepare yourself for marriage. But what is most important here is not the physical functioning of the sex organs. What matters is the psychological adjustment-in other words, the meeting of the hearts and minds of the two partners.

If there are sexual problems in marriage, it is not necessarily because of physical difficulties. These can be revealed and corrected before marriage by medical examinations. No, a far more common source of trouble is that very lack of psychological adjustment, which I have just mentioned.

Have you ever heard an orchestra tune its instruments before a concert? First comes the oboes, the violins and the flutes. If the conductor started with trumpets and drums which make a great deal of noise, he wouldn't be able to hear the oboes and violins and flutes. It's the same in the orchestra of marriage. The adjustment of heart and mind corresponds to the tuning of woodwinds and strings; then later the drums and trumpets of sex can be sounded.

It's this delicate tuning that you must learn if you want to prepare for marriage. This is what must be trained. But you are certainly not doing that when you have sexual relations with just any girl. Instead you are making your own heart numb. The drums drown out the flutes and you deaden your own feelings. What you have to be afraid of is not the underdevelopment of the sex organs, but the under-development of love.

If you prepare yourself for marriage by having intercourse without this love, then, at best, you are imitating outwardly only some of its phases. You lower the sexual act to something machine-like; something bestial, for your heart is insensitive. You miss the decisive experience, the opening up of the "I" to the "you," and you block yourself from being able to love your future wife as deeply and as fully as she will expect you do.

Did it ever occur to you that sexual adventures before marriage can awaken in you a polygamous desire, a taste for variety, which may endanger your future marriage in advance? You may acquire wrong habits which will be very difficult to get rid of. Serious sexual handicaps, such as impotence, which can threaten the happiness of your marriage, can result....

My dear Frank, I hope you will understand at least one thing. I am not trying to deprive you of a pleasure, but rather I would like to protect you so that you will not spoil one of the greatest joys of your life. If you pick the blossoms of an orange tree, you will never know the taste of its fruit. So, when I advise you not to pick flowers, I do it not to take something away from you, but to assure you of a reward even more fulfilling.

May I answer your proverb with another: "In trying to make himself too rich, a man often makes himself poor."

With brotherly greetings,

T.

© 2017 Trobish Family. Used with permission. Books available from http://www.quietwaterspub.com