The Act of Marriage: The Beauty of Sexual Love (31 page)

5.
Rhythm method.
The oldest and now least effective method of birth control is the rhythm method. It produces about 140 pregnancies per thousand women. We often jokingly note in our family lectures that “the people who use the rhythm method are called parents.” The cost of the rhythm method is upwards of $1000 per pregnancy, but it yields the wonderful blessing of children. We suspect that it is so ineffective because couples find the self-control required to follow it almost impossible to maintain.

The rhythm method for controlling conception requires abstinence from intercourse during the days just after ovulation. It attempts to avoid conception by permitting sperm to be present in the woman only when the ripened egg is thought to be absent. No product is used in this method.

Ovulation may be predicted in two ways. The first is called the temperature technique, in which the wife takes her temperature before arising each morning. A slight drop in temperature, followed by a substantial rise, usually indicates that ovulation has occurred about the time of the decrease. This procedure must be carefully followed for many months, for only after a series of consecutive months of recorded body temperatures can a fairly valid prediction of the time of ovulation be made.

The second method for predicting ovulation requires a record of the wife’s menstrual cycles for at least eight months or, ideally, one year. This means that she must keep track of her menstrual flow on a calendar—thus the appellation “the calendar technique.” A formula can then be applied to this information to determine the days on which ovulation is most likely to take place.

Ovulation most often occurs about two weeks prior to the beginning of the menstrual period. A woman with a regular twenty-eight-day cycle will therefore ovulate about the fourteenth day. Allowing three days before and three days after ovulation to include the time when both the egg and the sperm are still alive, the fertile or unsafe days would last from about the eleventh through the eighteenth days. From the eighteenth day on, no egg would be present to be fertilized, and thus conception would not normally take place. The days before the eleventh day are also believed to be safe, but this is much less certain because of the length of time the sperm cells may remain alive within the woman.

From the recorded menstrual cycle information, eighteen is subtracted from the number of days in the shortest cycle and eleven is subtracted from the number of days in the longest cycle. The days between are considered fertile, or unsafe days.

The discipline of adhering to abstinence on certain days is the least of the problems presented by this method. The crucial problem is to know when abstinence is indicated. Unfortunately this cannot consistently be determined with accuracy for a specific woman because the menstrual cycle is often irregular and is never so reliable as it may appear on the calendar. If a woman’s periods are irregular, the safe and unsafe days will likewise be irregular. In addition, illness, shock, or other physical or emotional changes can disturb the menstrual cycle and upset the calculations of the time of ovulation.

For a practical, one-sentence suggestion on how to use the rhythm method effectively without resorting to unbearable self-control, you may consider it quite safe not to use contraceptives one week before your period, during your period, and for about five days after your period, but otherwise use them faithfully.

6.
Coitus interruptus.
Abstinence and coitus interruptus are two of the least commendable popular methods. We know that abstinence from intercourse is not a meritorious practice in preventing pregnancy, for 1 Corinthians 7:3 tells us, “The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife, and likewise the wife to her husband.” In this passage of Scripture (vv. 3–5), every husband and wife are absolutely commanded to do that which satisfies their marriage partner. No other permanent option is offered.

Another frequently used but meritless method of birth control is “coitus interruptus,” or the withdrawal method. This is generally considered a weak practice, because it imposes great restrictions on both partners at the very time each should feel the most free in the act of love. Also, it fails to take into account that some sperm are usually present in the lubricating fluids secreted from the penis during sexual excitement before ejaculation or climax. Only
one
sperm is needed to fertilize the egg, and that one may be well on its way before ejaculation occurs. Another reason we do not recognize this as a good procedure is that it is almost impossible for a wife to reach orgasm regularly this way. It is
not
recommended by most marriage counselors.

Irreversible Birth Control

Now let us consider the most popular irreversible method of birth control—vasectomy. It is a simple operation on the husband that is usually performed in the doctor’s office.

In chapter 5 we described the small tube called the vas deferens, which proceeds from the testicle upward toward the seminal vesicles near the prostate gland. This tube is about the size of the ink reservoir of an inexpensive ball point pen. If a husband will grasp the loose skin of his scrotum between his testicle and his body, he will be able to roll this little tube between his thumb and fingers.

During the operation the doctor grasps this little cordlike tube between his fingers and then, catching a loop of the tube with a sharp grasping instrument, makes a small (about one-half inch) incision in the skin of the scrotum, bringing a loop of the tube to the outside. This skin incision is usually small enough that it does not require sewing up after the operation, largely because of the looseness of the skin of the scrotum.

A section of this cord is then removed, from one-half inch to two inches long. For an older man who is absolutely certain he will never want to consider a future repair of the tube (an attempt to be capable again of releasing sperm), he may suggest that his doctor take out an extra-long section. The length of the section removed determines, more than any other single factor, the success of the operation, which can fail only if a new channel develops through the scar tissue between the two cut ends. The doctor may also cauterize or burn each cut end of the vas to help decrease the opportunity for recanalization.

Certain medical articles suggest that a reversible method of vasectomy can be accomplished and in some cases has been successful. But we would advise any husband considering a vasectomy to regard it as an irreversible operation and not pursue it until he and his wife prayerfully consider that they
never
again wish to have children. One man had such an operation before his wife passed away. When he married a second time, they could not share the joys of children, much to the sorrow of his new wife and himself. No Christian couple should ever take this operation lightly or rush into it without careful consideration.

Summary

Every couple must prayerfully decide their attitude toward children and family size. It is best to have a plan; God will guide you to one as you seek His will. Make sure you are not unduly influenced by the humanistic philosophy of our day but seek the basic will of God as revealed in His Word. We feel every Christian family should plan on having children, if at all possible. How many they have should be based on the number they think they can adequately care for and train for a dedicated life of service to God.

Notes

1
. Portland, Ore.: Multnomah Press, 1993.

Thirteen

Sex Survey Report

Until recently it has generally been assumed that Christians or very religiously inclined couples were so rigid or confused about sex that they regarded it more for propagation than for pleasure. As counselors we knew differently. For several years it has been our conviction that married Christians enjoy a sex life that is as good as or, in many cases, better than that of the average couple. Even though many of the people we counsel reflect problems in this matter, we know a great majority of others who do not need counseling; their occasional comments and visible treatment of each other betoken a very fulfilling love life. Because most Christians do not have an obsession with sex, they do not need dirty stories, pornography, or artificial stimuli to motivate them toward each other. They simply continue year after year enjoying their love, as God intended they should.

A number of factors make us confident that believers do enjoy happier sexual relations. A Christian’s relationship with God produces a greater capacity for expressing and receiving love than is possible for a non-Christian. The fruit of the Spirit (love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, etc.—Gal. 5:22–23) removes the specter of resentment and bitterness that devastates an exciting bedroom life. In addition, people who genuinely love each other will strive harder to please one another, become better informed, and treat each other more unselfishly. This will naturally enrich their love life.

Those who believe the distorted notion that “Victorian ideas” about sex were spawned in Christian circles are totally misinformed. In actuality, the “Victorian morality” was not shaped by enlightened Bible students but became a cultural reaction in a day of biblical ignorance. Thus Christianity cannot be blamed for the sexual barrenness of many couples due to the Victorian influence, for the Bible has always viewed married love as a sacred and vital part of a happy marriage.

A primary consideration in writing this book was to take a sex survey to prove or disprove once and for all our thesis that Christians maintain a higher enjoyment level in the intimacy of their love life than the population in general. Since we had access to the names of thousands of couples from around the country who have attended our Family Life Seminars, we wrote them telling about our survey and asking them to return a card if they would be willing to respond to such a frank and intimate test. We acknowledged that the results would be computerized for use in doing the needed research for this book. Twenty-three hundred couples volunteered to take the survey, but the final number that were completed and returned totaled 3,377—1,705 women and 1,672 men.

It was a gargantuan job to prepare the responses. When the survey was coded and fed into a computer, we finally received sixteen pounds of data on large computer sheets. Now for the first time we possessed factual information about the intimate lives of a sufficient number of Christians to establish a general norm. We were delighted with the results, not only because they confirmed our assumption, but because they provided valuable information that will probably be used by researchers in this field for years to come.

While we were compiling the data for this chapter,
Redbook
magazine published their survey of 100,000 women who took a similar test. Doubtless, theirs is the largest ever compiled on this subject, and it too confirms that “the strongly religious woman seems to be even more responsive than other women her age.”
¹
Their conclusion was extremely interesting: “A positive religious approach to sexual pleasure, which links sex and marital fulfillment, is likely to have considerable effect on women for whom religious authority still serves as a sanctioning force in life.”
²
The reason is clear—if a woman really understands the biblical teachings on lovemaking, she will suffer few inhibitions and openly enjoy her husband’s expressions of love.

In comparing our survey with that of
Redbook,
we can draw many interesting conclusions. The
Redbook
survey was derived from both “religious and nonreligious” people, but we had almost no “non-religious” surveys with which to compare our data until theirs was published. Ninety-eight percent of those who took our survey profess to be born-again Christians. Those labeled “strongly religious” by
Redbook
include 20 percent Catholics and 80 percent Protestants, but there is no way to determine how many of these had experienced a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. The women in our survey reported a 10 percent higher degree of sexual enjoyment, greater frequency in lovemaking experiences per month, and a more active part in coitus than their “strongly religious” counterparts, likewise scoring much higher in these same areas than the average “nonreligious” women in the
Redbook
survey.

After carefully studying the first
Redbook
article, we discovered that their findings stood in basic agreement with our own. The only variations were percentages that can be explained by the religious difference between their mixed clientele and our predominantly Christian group.

On the strength of these two surveys we now feel even more confident that our original presupposition is true—that Christians do enjoy the sublimities of the act of marriage more than others in our culture—but we invite you to study the results of the following questions taken from our survey and see for yourself. At the end we will offer a few comparisons and analyses relevant to various groups and the
Redbook
report. (We purposely deleted those questions that did not relate specifically to this subject.).

The whole survey consisted of ninety-five questions regarding sexual involvement of both husbands and wives. Listed here are their comparative answers to some of the most relevant questions. These percentages will not always total 100 percent because some participants did not respond to every question.

Family Life Seminars Sexual Involvement Survey