Trinity and Humanity

                One of the hazards of having a Netflix membership is that you feel like you have to watch movies that you wouldn’t necessarily pay to see in a movie theater.  If it says “Romantic Comedy,” then sign me up.

Most recently we watched a movie called “No Strings Attached.”  This movie is about a couple of acquaintances who decide to have sex (as a business-sort of arrangement) without actually having a relationship.  This theme mirrors another recent theater release (“Friends with Benefits), and according to what I’ve read in the news, the idea of friends/acquaintances having sex without any sort of commitment is commonplace among the 20-something generation. 

This idea of sexual intimacy without relational intimacy bothers me.  Call me old-fashioned, but the idea of sex without love sounds animalistic.  If anything, our ability to have relationship with those with whom we have sexual intimacy makes us different from animals.

I think the issue comes down to the fact that we were created for relationship, first and foremost.  The Father, Son, and Spirit didn’t need to create us.  They were enjoying their relationship with each other so much that they wanted to share it.  Think of a deeply in love, married couple who decides to have a child.  They want to share their love for each other with that child.  When I picture the Triune God making the decision to create Adam and Eve, I see them enjoying their relationship with each other so much that they wanted to share it.  They didn’t create humanity to fill a need, but they wanted to create to share the joy and laughter they were already experiencing.

Since humanity was created out of relationship, sex without true intimacy will never satisfy our hearts’ longing.  I Corinthians 6:16-19 says:

“There’s more to sex than mere skin on sin.  Sex is as much spiritual mystery as physical fact.  As written in Scripture, ‘The two become one.’  Since we want to become spiritually one with the Master, we must not pursue the kind of sex that avoids commitment and intimacy, leaving us more lonely than ever –the kind of sex that can never ‘become one.’  There is a sense in which sexual sins are different from all others.  In sexual sin we violate the the sacredness of our own bodies, these bodies that were made for God-given and God-modeled love, for ‘becoming one’ with another.  Or didn’t you realize that your body is a sacred place, the place of the Holy Spirit?”  (The Message).

                The best part of the movie “No Strings Attached” (and I assume the same is true of “Friends with Benefits”) is that the main characters realize their mistake and end up making a commitment.  I only hope this is true in real life for those who think that such an arrangement would be a win-win for everybody.  The bottom line is this:  humanity was created for intimacy and relationship, and anything that goes against that will only lead to loneliness and heartbreak.  It’s like gravity:  you can challenge it but it will always win.

~by Nan Kuhlman

~photos courtesy of  www.inquisitr.com and

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