Bedrooms Are for More Than Sleeping
By Janel Breitenstein
When our kids were little and life resembled a 24-hour paper towel commercial, wild horses couldn’t have stopped sleep once I got horizontal, provided said horses had clean pants and a sippy cup.
My body wasn’t my own enough for me to take a shower. Let’s say sex could be a more of a “to do” than a “get to.”
Now that my kids can both bathe themselves and microwave a plate of nachos, it’s easier to prize and cultivate the gift of sex. Like money or time, sex is a microcosm of any marriage.
It was true when our kids were young, amplifying my burnout and the marital need to mutually see and sacrifice in a thin season.
Why’s sex matter so much?
Sex restates our connectedness.
Our married relationships furiously need the marital glue that is sex--that refrain of “naked and unashamed” (Genesis 2:25), the mini-vacations to our private kingdom, the return to the lush, steamy garden of Song of Solomon. Sex replays intimate unity.
And, like all of marriage, when we’re not turning toward each other, we’re turning away.
Sex expresses our story together.
One of the beauties of healthy, married lovemaking is graduate-level sex: Honed communication, creative variety, fine-tuned adjustments and technique. Memories that make you blush.
Yes, we still purposefully fan passion. But we need sex also to express the ways we’ve journeyed and locked arms just as much as lips: returning from that isolation of deployment or a work trip. Rolling over toward each other for consolation after a tough day, or the texture of each other’s skin. Navigating hormones, body changes, pregnancy.
For me, fulfilling sex is about traveling with the same person, loving them in every stage.
And in that rich, time-cultivated tenderness, I witness God’s fidelity in my body, heart, and soul: His steady companionship, attentiveness, generosity, and intimate communion.
The Good Stuff: The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing. (Zephaniah 3:17)
Action Points: At this holistic, intimate level, trauma and pervasive damage mar us. We need exceedingly safe, gentle, tender places that facilitate the long process of healing from the inside out. In fact, pursuing sex without addressing some deeply rooted emotional pain can create more harm.
If sex isn’t happening in your marriage, what could be damaged?
Have infidelity, porn, or other trust issues fractured your sense of safety? Could you use counseling to find where your lack of sex stems from?
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