It’s not too hard to
have an orgasm, particularly if you are a man. Sure, it takes a bit more effort
for a woman, but if she has a husband who has learned the art of lovemaking
then she can expect normally to orgasm when she makes love.
The past fifty years have seen an enormous amount of attention given particularly to the female orgasm: the right of a woman to have one, the importance of the clitoris, female masturbation, vibrators, arousal techniques and so forth. Result, women have more or less caught up with men in the sexual fulfilment stakes, and a good thing, too.
But is orgasm enough? Is reaching the big O the goal? Or is there something more?
For many men it would hardly seem to matter. Scoring, getting your leg over, a quick fumble under the sheets, ejaculating, was it all right for you, falling asleep – that equals a good sex life. Maybe in an age of equality women will feel the same. Happy to respond to a bit of foreplay, give it all you’ve got, work yourself off against him, orgasm, ahhh, that was nice, fall asleep.
The Christian understanding of marriage is that two people become one flesh. That is literal insofar as there is an exchange of bodily fluids involved. It is also psycho-spiritual. Two people set out to become spiritually and emotionally one in an act of total commitment and bodily union. The big O, beyond orgasm, is oneness. Instead of orgasm being the end in itself, oneness becomes the goal, with orgasm as its supreme expression.
What does that mean in practice? Well, potentially, Christians can have the best sex lives on earth. It’s all to do with engaging your total lives with each other, and that’s a challenge in a society where it is possible for a husband and wife to live almost separate lives. So you have to make the effort not only to communicate to a higher degree than most but also to challenge the lifestyle expectations of our culture where these militate against oneness. That doesn’t mean women reverting to staying at home looking pretty all day, but it does mean both partners should set a limit on how much work dominates their relationship. It means ensuring that you have adequate leisure time together and that you talk a lot about your deepest feelings – yep, men too! This can only take place when we create the emotional and practical time space.
Achieving this big O means that lovemaking is a way of life – lots of sexy signals to each other throughout the day, romantic gestures, encouraging words, love talk. All this is so that when you do come to make love, you are really feeling in love and desiring nothing more than to be together as whole people. Your lovemaking will probably be more leisurely than most - though that isn’t to rule out by any means a frantic, passionate session on the dining room table, or wherever – because you are wanting to savour the total union of your personalities.
Of course, you will wish to ensure that your partner reaches orgasm – that is part of the oneness and is its supreme expression – but you will be reaching for more. You want to possess and be possessed totally by your spouse. When you reach your orgasm you will focus your entire being on this ecstatic union – body, soul and spirit you become one. Your orgasm will be fantastic, but you will also be resonating to the eternal love of Christ for his church – a cosmic climax, no less!
