The way I see it, when we separate into peer groups with men and women together we end up having "emotional fornication." Chew on that for a second. Repeat it out loud. Emotional Fornication. I remember the first time those word were put together in my thoughts. "What?" was my first response. "YucK!" was my second. I didn't really care to define my past male friendships with such a disgusting thought. Consider this carefully and I think you'll agree that emotional fornication is an accurate definition for what foes one between people who share their hearts with someone who is not their spouse.
When a person fornicates before marriage we normally think of it in a sexual contect. I'd like you to think about emotional fornication. Here's a word picture to help you understand where I'm coming from.
Imagine for a moment one of those huge lollipops, the kind that you buy at an amusement park candy store. Take off the wrapper and pass it around to ten people. Allow them to lick as much as they want. The left over is saved for the husband or wife, the rightful owner of the lollipop. Yuck! Who would want that? When we give pieces of ourselves emotionally and spiritually to ten different boy/girl friends what is left over for the rightful owner? Just the leftovers! The rightful owner is first God, then a mate of His choice. Keeping yourself emotionally pure is a gift that should be left wrapped and given to the rightful owner, your spouse.
When the lollipops is passed around for anyone to taste, it is not being kept pure. When we spread our hearts around and share deep emotional feelings with a boy/girl friend, or even a handful or boy/girl friends, we are robbing our future spouses of parts of our emotional selves. In a word -- Fornication. Being pure is the goal of the believer; "Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God" (Matt. 5:8).
You might be trying to reason this out: "Sharing myself or my thoughts isn't bad, is it?" Or, "It's not hurting anyone, so what's the problem?" The problem is that when intimate ideas, secrets, or dreams are shared with wrong motives or unclear relationship boundaries, the heart feels the effects when those in unclear relationships break up or start dating someone else.
- Emotional Purity - at page 52 &53 by Heather Arnel Paulsen, Winepress Publishing
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