"Why can't we go all the way?" Young people often ask this question, and they want honest, straight-to-the point answers.

But many times the questioning comes too late. The harm has already been done. And the consequences are too grievous to ignore: teenage marriges,abortion, unwanted babies, not to mention deeply troubled consciences.

Now the question is. Can sex hurt love?

Love is a feeling to be learned,
it is tension and fulfillment,
it is deep longing and hostility.
it is gladness and pain.
There is not one without the other.

Happiness is only a part of love- this is what has to be learned. Suffering belongs to love also. This is the mystery of love, it's beauty and it's burden.

Love is a special way of feeling- something to be learned.

If this special way of feeling is not learned, if there is no romance in the relationship between the sexes, sex and love become the same thing. This is still true love to a great extent , if sex is called love and love is called sex. "i loved a girl" means "i went to bed with a girl". If this special feeling is not learned, there is either nothing or everything. there is no in-between.

The consequences of this attitude are tremendous. The woman becomes little more than a womb, a well-equipped incubator. She is not a person, but a thing which can be traded, bought and sold, given and taken, exchanged and disposed of, an inferior being without a culture whre there is little sexual restriant, no romance and no in-between, the result is that the girl becomes simply a thing, a matter, an object.

All of us have to learn how to love, to appreciate the beauty of the in-between, the joy of the preliminary.

"The easiness of the in-between did not mean that there is no pain of longing and no suffering of suspense. but it bound pain and suffering together with deep felt happiness."

Love and suffering do not exclude each other. Rather they condition each other.

Sex problems may have their deepest roots in the refusal to accept suffering, in wanting to jump ove the in-between stage with it's tension and anxiety, thus making the word "love" an empty word.

It pays to suffer lover's grief.

Suffering is not something to be eliminated, regardless of the cost. if we live through it and accept it, suffering can become a spring of riches, of depth,growth and fulfillment-yes,of happiness.

Sufferring makes immature love grow into mature love. Immature, unlearned love is egotistic love. it's the kind of love that a child has- a love which claims and wants immediately. it cannot endure tension and has no patience with anything which stands in the way. it demands and consumes and tries to dominate.

Therefore, i say tha love can be hurt by sex. t can be killed by sex. Therefore, love has to be protected.

There is a verse in the bibles found in Genesis 2:25 that says: "they were both naked, the man and the wife, and were not ashamed."

naked and not ashamed.

"naked" is not meant here in the physical sense only. it means to stand in front of each other stripped and undisguised, without pretention, without hiding anything, seeing the partner as he really is and showing myself to him as i really am-and still not to be ashamed.

naked and not ashamed.

But this ultimate goal of mature love is promised only to those who,as the previos verse says, have left father and mother and cleave to each other, in other words, those who have been publicly and legelly married.

These two-not the ones before or outside of marriage- become one flesh.

But what about those who've done it already? Is it too late for them? Remember, for God there is never a too-late. There is no life so messedup, that He cannot bring into order. he is almighty. he can even make done things undone by His forgivenss. For this is what forgiveness means: to make done things undone."

You do not need to continue to live with this pain in your soul. There is a possibility of a new beginning...

first of all, you will hardly be able to suceed by yourself. You needan experienced spritual counselor as a helper.

secondly, do not stop half-way, but make this new beggining, a complete one. Here you have a chance to take the right step. In cleaning up the mess, don't stop with the sex corner, but clean up the other dark corners as well. Don't confess the trangressions of one commandment only, but bring to the light your trangressions of the other commandments as well.

Jesus says: "he who comes to Me i will not cast out."

This promise is for you too without rservation. You can accept His offer without fear. With Jesus it pays to trust Him completely.

Love is a feeling to be learned and to be protected.
It can be learned from Him alone.
It can be protected by Him alone.
Let us go with Him all the way as, "His peculiar people." (1Peter 2:9)