Teaching students to protect their purity by abstaining from sexual relationships before marriage may be one of the most wrong and unbiblical concepts that parents and pastors alike are preaching. Granted, while I believe they have their best intentions for the students, many parents and pastors do not recognize the harm they are causing. Somewhere along the way of teaching about purity and sex, many Christian teachers have missed the mark.

It is not wrong to teach that Christians should save sex for marriage. This concept is biblical and good. Throughout scripture, readers can find that adultery, sexual immortality and lusting are real sins with real, dangerous consequences.

1 Corinthians 7:1-2, now concerning the matters about which you wrote: “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.” But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.

There are even non-biblical reasons to save sex for marriage. Science has explained that Oxytocin and Vasopressinare chemicals that are released during sex inside the brain of a woman and a man. These chemicals bond the couple emotionally in a highly intimate way. If the couple separates, it would feel like losing a limb. A couple that has been chemically bonded is not meant to be separated. This, as well as scripture verses, are just a few of many good reasons to save sex for marriage. But doing it to keep one’s purity is not one of them. Being pure is not solely devoted to sex. It is a state of being. And the only way to keep being pure is to already be pure.

To reiterate, it is right to teach that Christians should save sex for marriage. But it is wrong to teach that Christians should save sex for marriage to stay pure. The human race lost its purity at the fall. Genesis 3 tells the story of when a pure human race became impure. How can young men and women keep their purity, when they don’t have it anymore? Having sex before marriage does not make a Christian any less good, pure, or righteous. This is because as a part of the human race, we are all already a bad, impure, and unrighteous race.

For the Christians who have had sexual relations before marriage, this is not to encourage you to keep indulging in sexual relations. But this is to relieve you of guilt and shame. Many Christians have fallen into a deep despair; thinking that they ruined their purity because they had sexual relations before marriage. A Christian who has had sex before marriage is not less pure than the Christian who hasn’t. This is because as a human race, all are impure. But this is the amazing epiphany: As the children of God, all are made pure again. This new purity that is found in Christ Jesus can never be taken away or be diminished.

Christians do not need to save sex for marriage to keep their purity.But they should save sex for marriage because they are a new creation in Christ and have been given a new, unbreakable, and everlasting purity. It is an act of recognition and obedience towards God’s love and grace, a good principal that encourages a healthy and fruitful relationship, and a testament to others to show the amazing love of the Lord.