“No one is to approach any close relative to have sexual relations. I am the Lord.” (Lev. 18:6)
Expanded Passage: Leviticus 18:4-6
Design and innovation are intended to make life better. We see a problem and experiment with ways to mitigate or eliminate it. However, due to human sinfulness, what is meant for good is inevitably perverted and used for evil. What is supposed to promote flourishing steals, kills, and destroys instead. For example, rather than meaningful connection through social media, we find ourselves bitterly divided and lonely.
When God designed humans for sex, he gave it as a means to strengthen the marriage relationship and, as a result, lead to thriving families and communities. However, when sin entered the scene, sex became a tool used to abuse, control, and objectify fellow humans made in God’s image, particularly those most vulnerable to victimization. Little destroys a person’s ability to live life abundantly quite like sexual abuse.
There is a crucial motivation underlying God’s design for human sexuality outlined in Leviticus that is easy to overlook. When we remember the Law and Prophets hang on the command to love God with our entire being and our neighbor as ourselves, God’s desire for justice and right relationships comes more clearly into view. The Lord’s instructions to Moses were a shield for those with the least power in the family so God’s people could live fully by obeying his teachings. No greater metric exists for our obedience than how we treat the least of these.
Become a shield of God’s love for the vulnerable in your community.
Shaunna Sturgeon is the pastor of the Watershed Collective, a microchurch movement in rural Kansas. She loves helping people discover God’s purpose for their lives.
© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.
