- Bob Lepine, FamilyLife Today Broadcast
“By engaging in pre-marital sex, a person is saying to his or her partner, ‘I am a person who is willing to have sex with someone I’m not married to.’ That person’s partner is also communicating this back to them. Even if the couple goes on to get married and remain faithful, doubts can enter into their thinking because of their past willingness to indulge in sex outside of marriage. These doubts can weaken their emotional intimacy even after they get married.”
- Heather Jamison, Reclaiming Intimacy, p. 39
“I, along with many other teens, had used unmarried sex to meet the legitimate longing for intimacy. Sensing the need inside, I had tried to fill it with a tangible relationship. What I didn’t realize was that all people are sinners, and no one could meet my need for total acceptance and love except God.”
- Heather Jamison, Reclaiming Intimacy, p. 62
“For some young married couples, financial difficulties may be exacerbated as a result of premarital sex. If a young man fathers a child out of wedlock, he must support that child financially. Sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) require visits to the doctor. STDs frequently cause infertility. If a young person suffering from an STD marries and wants children, it can lead to huge expenditures for fertility treatments and surgeries.”
- Stephen Arterburn and Fred Stoeker, Every Man’s Battle, p.42
“We aren’t victims of some vast conspiracy to ensnare us sexually; we’ve simply chosen to mix in our standards of sexual conduct with God’s standard.”
- Gary Thomas, Sacred Marriage, p. 223
“Teens are urged to wait because by doing so their future marital relations will be all the sweeter. Faithfulness seasons the marital bed in many delightful and profound ways.”
- Stephen Arterburn and Fred Stoeker, Every Man’s Battle, p. 9
“‘But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality or of any kind of impurity’ (Ephesians 5:3). If there’s a single Bible verse that captures God’s standard for sexual purity; that is it.”
- Joshua Harris, I Kissed Dating Goodbye, p. 208-209
“When we find ourselves attracted to someone, we need to make building a deeper friendship our first priority. Too often we believe that relating in a romantic, exclusive relationship will automatically mean we’ll be closer and know each other better. But that doesn’t always happen… Remember, as soon as we unleash our emotions in romantic love, our objectivity begins to fade. For this reason, we need to focus on developing a closer friendship with a potential partner before introducing romance.”
- Heather Jamison, Reclaiming Intimacy, p. 78
“Enjoying in premarital sex creates a hindrance to healthy marital sex, may cause health problems, increases the risk of infidelity, and intensifies family difficulties.”
- Joshua Harris, I Kissed Dating Goodbye, p. 206
“Every time you feel attracted to someone, keep in mind that you’re involved in three kinds of relationships: your relationship with the person you’re interested in; your relationships with the people around you, including family and friends; and most important, your relationship with God. You have a responsibility toward each.”
- Shannon Etheridge, Every Woman’s Battle, p. 117
“One of the concepts that I impress upon women is that we teach people how to treat us. We either teach them to treat us with respect or we teach them to treat us with disrespect.”
- Chip Ingram, Love, Sex, and Lasting Relationships, p. 121
“Our culture has gotten confused about the difference between love and sex in two ways: (1) We have tried to separate love and sex, describing sex as a harmless and meaningless form of casual entertainment between people who have no lasting commitment, and (2) we have tried to make sex and love almost synonymous, so that great love means great sex and great sex means great love. Both are mistakes.”
- Chip Ingram, Love, Sex, and Lasting Relationships, p. 112
“Research indicates that once an uncommitted couple gets involved in sexual intercourse, the relationship usually begins to end.”
- Joshua Harris, I Kissed Dating Goodbye, p. 92
“Many couples have made commitments to sexual purity, but instead of adopting a lifestyle that supports this commitment, they continue relationships that encourage physical expression and place themselves in dangerous settings. The path you take with your feet should never contradict the conviction of your heart.”
- Joshua Harris, I Kissed Dating Goodbye, p. 65
“We need to throw out the misconception that love is some strange force that tosses us around like leaves in the wind against our will. We cannot justify doing what we know is wrong by saying that love grabbed hold of us and ‘made’ us behave irresponsibly. That’s not love. Instead, it’s what the Bible calls in 1 Thessalonians 4:5, ‘passionate lust.’”
- Joshua Harris, I Kissed Dating Goodbye, p. 37
“Physical involvement can distort two people’s perspective of each other and lead to unwise choices. God also knows we’ll carry the memories of our past physical involvements into marriage. He doesn’t want us to live with guilt and regret.”
- Joshua Harris, I Kissed Dating Goodbye, p. 32
“Often dating encourages intimacy for the sake of intimacy—two people getting close to each other without any real intention of making a long-term commitment … It’s like going mountain climbing with a partner who isn’t sure that she wants the responsibility of holding your rope.”