First of all, let me say that I am no expert on the subject of sex. I'm not a sexologist. I'm not a doctor or a psychologist.  There won't be any studies or collection of data found here for you to look over.  All that I write comes from what I have personally experienced and also from what I have learned in studying "The Song of Solomon" from the Bible. Yes, this book is devoted to the sexual loving relationship between a husband and his wife.

God made sex. And sex is meant to be a beautiful expression of love between a married couple. And although many single people have sex within their relationship, I am specifically speaking to those couples who are married.

My attitudes toward sex have not always been healthy. I was taught that the word "sex' was dirty. In my parent's house, just saying the word would get your mouth washed out with soap. If we were watching television, and anything intimating the sexual act came on, the set was immediately turned off. Of course, all of this was in direct contrast to the actions of my father, who began molesting me when I was eleven years old, and continued until I left home at the age of eighteen.

Needless to say, I was pretty messed up in my view of sex. And when I began engaging in sex of my own free will, my body was present, but in my mind, I was always somewhere else. In my mind, it was always dirty, yet in some strange way, I felt that was the only value that I had. And I'm sure this was due to the abuse that I had suffered.

Years later in my marriage, whenever my husband and I would argue or when the stresses of married life became too much for me, I would withhold myself sexually. I would never come and out say "no". I would always be busy or not feeling well. As a result, my husband felt rejected and unloved. And then I would feel guilty. What resulted was a disconnect in our spiritual union. And in that void, resentment came to live.

But over the past few years, as my inner healing began over my abuse, I discovered something. And this discovery was made quite by accident.  I found that during those times of anger or stress when I did not withhold myself sexually, something almost mystical occurred. The anger, stress, and bitterness would leave and would be replaced by a loving tenderness. It seemed to come out of nowhere. And in that, my husband and I would very often forget that we were even angry with one another. We would forget the resentment and the stress. It had all been replacing by this loving tenderness for one another. I am so convinced that sex has been a healing balm to our marriage that I initiate it now when we are having a bad day.

I know so many couples who have let their sexual relationship slip by the wayside. Of those I know, this is the result of the wife just deciding she no longer wants to have sex anymore. The husband feels rejected and unloved. And this spills over into every other area of their relationship. Soon they are not communicating on any level. They have let that spiritual bond become disconnected because they are not living as husband and wife in the way that God intended them to live. When this happens, the husband can decide to live with the rejection, look outside the marital relationship, or get a divorce.

In the "Song of Solomon," he relived a similar experience. He is rejected physically by his wife after returning home late one evening. Feeling rejected, he turns and leaves. She then becomes worried that he is looking for fulfillment elsewhere. There is a happy ending in this story of this spiritual loving union that depicts the importance of sex within a marriage. And I believe if more couples would adhere to this, and remember that physical intimacy is a very important of their marriage, there would be less divorce.

I believe that God made sex to be about much more than procreation. It is the wonderful glue that holds us together when nothing else seems to be working. Sex is made to be a healing balm for the hurts within our relationship. And I believe that within the sexual relationship, there God is as well. The result is a spiritual union that cannot easily