Expert: Pastor Don Carpenter - 10/27/2009

Question
What is sexual immorality? I know this has been asked somewhere but can you expand?

Answer
Hi Ashley,

Thank you for this great question.  The word for sexual imorality in the King James is "fornication" which comes from the Greek word "PORNEA"  the same word from which we get the English word pornography.  So fornication is any kind of sexual activity outside the boundary of marrage between a man and a woman.

Hebrews 13:4
4 Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge.
The King James Version, (Cambridge: Cambridge) 1769.

Often when people want to know the exact meaning of fornication or sexual imorality, they want to know how much one can touch someone else before crossing the line.  Paul gives us a very clear line to avoid fornication:

1 Corinthians 7:1-2


Now concerning the things whereof ye wrote unto me: It is good for a man not to touch a woman. 2 Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband.
The King James Version, (Cambridge: Cambridge) 1769.

To avoid fornication you either need to not touch each other at all, or to get married.  

I hope that this helps you.

In Christ
Pastor Don