Welcome to the final part of the Before We series. I’ve particularly loved this series because I got to do this alongside my bride. I learn from her every day and I’m so glad you’ve heard from her in “Before We Say I Do” and “Before We Do It”. Today, I am rounding out the series with my perspective on “Before We Do It” for the guys so, let’s get into it.
When I think about sex, I think about intimacy. Not simply the physical aspect of it, but the full scope of that word. Elle introduced this idea, that intimacy can be understood as: “Into me you see,” and it’s that framework that opens up an honest discussion about sex. Someone seeing you–all of you, starts with God and His unending love. He is where we first begin to experience true intimacy. It’s from that place where we can learn how to love someone else intimately.
My list is by no means complete, but these are a great place to begin when considering what you should do before you do it.
1. Heal your relationship with your body before you do it.
This one is important. Before any man has sex, he needs to heal the relationship between his body and the idea of sex. We’ve come a long way in terms of mental health conversations as men, and healing from trauma, but what I hear less about is healing your relationship with your body. Ephesians 5:28 says, “husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies,” but how can you do this if you don’t have a healthy, holy view of your body? In our current hookup culture, bodies are transactional, they are used to satisfy our own desires. But in a complete reversal, as a husband, your body is no longer yours and your wife's body is now not her own. This doesn’t mean that you are in control of her body, but it does mean that in a healthy, biblical marriage, two people have given themselves to each other. 1 Corinthians talks through this where Paul tells believers to take care of one another sexually, in marriage, as a tool against the Enemy. Why? Because sex is a powerful thing and it unites us in powerful ways and men's bodies are valuable enough to keep sacred.
2. Learn intimacy before you do it.
Sex goes beyond physical pleasure. Sex is far more pleasurable when you know how to be intimate with your wife, and the best place to learn intimacy is from the Lord. As I mentioned before, if sex requires intimacy, and intimacy = “into me you see,” you have to be able to learn how to be vulnerable with your partner in every way before you can fully be vulnerable in sex. There are levels to this! So much of sex is understanding your own desires and the desires of your spouse, and neither of those can happen without vulnerability that extends to the body, mind, emotions, and spirit.
3. Communicate uniquely before your do it.
Before you do it, you need to prioritize communicating in all the ways that your partner needs you to. You’ve got to learn how to speak her language because your wife speaks a language unique to her and you need to be her number one translator. Her language needs to become your native tongue (no pun intended, or was it?). In Christian circles, I hear a lot of talk about love languages, but I think we should go even deeper than that. If your wife’s love language is physical touch, that might mean something different to her than to you, and it takes learning to understand how she receives love to hear her correctly. A lot of us have sexual pasts with other women than our wives, and those experiences can try to tell us what’s true of our wives, but I want to encourage you to treat your wife as someone to be learned, as someone unique. It’s not up to me to control how she speaks, but I can ask the Holy Spirit to help me understand her heart when she speaks about her pain, her desires, and how to make her feel safe and seen. It’s from this place of safety and knownness where the best sex can happen. 1 Peter tells us to be “considerate” with our wives, and that root word, consider, suggests that we need to take time to think and ponder all that she is, including how she communicates.
4. Pray before you do it.
Pray before you have sex with your wife. Oh my goodness–when I tell you the difference that it made when we decided to give our sex life to God. We literally prayed before we had sex for the first time and it changed everything. This one action made sex different in all the best ways. It went beyond our expectations and that may be because prayer actually allows us to do every one of the following points with our Creator: communicate, learn and heal, all at once.
Today, whenever Elle and I feel like we may be lacking in intimacy, we pray about that together too. As a man, I have given my sex life and my idea of sex over to God. I’ve allowed God to teach me what sex is and how it should be with my wife. We ask God to provide what we are missing, to teach us to love each other better, and to meet our needs just like we trust Him to do so everywhere else, so why not sex? Prayer is healing, intimate, and communication with our Father and through that, He can teach us so much about operating in unison with our spouses.
Intimacy, vulnerability, communication, prayer. It’s funny that the things we know that define relationships should also define our sex lives. It’s easy for us to fall into the trap of believing that sex is something to tape off in the corner, away from God, but if you are Christian, then He is refining everything about you, including your sex life! If you begin to redefine sex with these pillars, and consistently commit to them, it will shape your sex life in a way that both surprises you and blesses you and your wife, especially if you start on these things before you do it.
If you’ve been married for a while I’d love for you to answer this question: What has unlocked intimacy in your marriage? How has Christ taught you to care for your wife? Let us learn in the comments, and as always,
Live love,
-Ty
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