Proverbs 5:3-6. 3For the lips of a forbidden woman drip honey, and her speech is smoother than oil, 4but in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword. 5Her feet go down to death; her steps follow the path to Sheol; 6she does not ponder the path of life; her ways wander, and she does not know it.
Solomon now turns his attention to warnings about the forbidden woman. The seductress. The adulteress.
Is Solomon warning about literal sexual sin? Yes. Is he also using sexual temptation as a metaphor for all things foolish? Including the idolatry of the heart? Yes. There is a literal forbidden woman that would like to seduce our sons. And there is the “forbidden woman” of pride, self-righteousness, and God-forsakenness that would like to seduce us all.
And what she displays in the present is not where she is leading us in the future. Her lips are honey, and her speech oil, but her end is bitterness and death. Hers is the path to Sheol, the grave. And sadly she doesn’t even know it. That’s how all sin operates. Sweet in the mouth, poison in the stomach. Pleasure in the moment, death in the end.
The warning is clear – you can’t judge things by how they appear in the moment. You must remember the path principle. Pornography looks and sounds great in the moment. But what is the end of its path? Adultery or its fantasies may seem to satisfy an unmet desire, but what is the end of the path? How many lives will be destroyed? Sexual temptation is truly one of the most powerful forces in nature. Sex that serves one’s spouse is a gift from God, but sexuality that seduces its neighbor is a self-serving act of manipulation.
And might I add that all sex outside of a life-long covenant commitment is seductive and manipulative. It is a path to relational death. Why? Because the door is always kept cracked open. Without a covenant commitment either person can leave at any time. Now sex is a performance, an audition, the greatest emotional investment a person can make but without a promise to protect it. Either someone’s going to be deeply hurt, or both persons will deeply hurt themselves.
Overcoming sexual temptation may seem impossible to many of us, but in Christ it is actually possible. The covenant promise Christ makes to us is to never leave us, never forsake us, and to bring us into his figurative marriage bed with all the pleasure of the heart felt in his presence. When we know that we won’t be missing out on joy and pleasure forever, maybe we can begin to feel the joy of self-sacrifice and obedience now.
You: In what ways has your sexuality become seduction and manipulation?What seductions of sin do you give in to?
You in Christ: How can meditating on Christ’s covenant commitment to you keep you from the path of the “forbidden woman?”
Christ in you: How can you allow Christ in you to satisfy you more than sexual sin today?
Pray: Father, let me know the joy and pleasure of your presence through my union with Christ, and may this replace my short-sighted desires for illicit sexual pleasures. Amen.
To Live is Christ 
Amen. Blessings
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