I grew up in church in the 90s, which meant I grew up in the midst of the purity culture movement.
There were good elements of that movement. The desire to be pure is a noble and good desire to have. But because we are fallen human beings, that good desire seemed to turn into a pharisaical one as the movement gained traction.
The purity rings worn and vows taken to not have premarital sex were good, but they also slowly became a status symbol which caused young men and women who were in danger of burning with lust to view their potential future spouses as those who would solve that problem. The movement placed too much weight on other fallen human beings and did not leave much room for grace if that purity status was lost.
I remember thinking something was wrong with this movement when some friends told me they would never even think about marrying a woman who was not pure, even if that was through no fault of her own.
While the movement began well enough, the movement sadly deformed fairly quickly. Many in the current “deconstruction” movement of our day, when talking about why they left, mention the moral demands heaped upon them, and how their knees buckled under all that weight.
In one way that makes sense. As Christians, we are supposed to fight sin and to avoid even the appearance of sin. Those demands, if one is not in Christ, are crushing. Only Christ carried that weight perfectly, and to attempt to carry that burden without Him will inevitably lead one to be crushed.
But it was not simply those who deconstructed their faith who were affected by the purity culture movement. Many fellow Christians my age, as we near our forties, still struggle with the negative effects.
I think I know why.
In those sermons and talks that ended with youths giving vows to be pure, the end goal was too low, and the reason for remaining pure was placed on another person in marriage who could never hope to fulfill us.
There was no true telos, no true end goal. Without an end goal, without a purpose, we are left holding the moral weight of resisting sin for as long as we can. We thought holiness meant not doing what the world wanted us to do. We thought holiness was like those old “World’s Strongest Man” competitions, where contestants would see how long they could shoulder heavy weights.
In the end, no matter who won, everyone dropped the weight. No one could bear that burden forever.
The command to be holy includes refraining from sin. Yet that command is only part of the definition.
When we are told, “You shall be holy, for I am holy” (1 Pet. 1:16), do we picture the holiness of God as boring or stifling? Do we picture His holiness more as what He does not do and not as one of His attributes, of who He is? If we think holiness is boring, and holiness is one of His attributes, do we think that God is bored with Himself?
I hope the answer to those questions is a resounding “No.” How can God, who is perfectly satisfied in Himself, ever be bored? But that is the logical implication when we define holiness simply as not doing what we want. Our stunted view of holiness can negatively shape our walk with Christ.
So what is holiness?
Holiness is defined as being set apart for a purpose. The reason Christians do not run after the desires with which the world, the flesh, and the devil present us is that we have been set apart for something better. As God is perfectly happy and satisfied in Himself, so too we are to find our full and lasting pleasure in glorifying and enjoying our union with Christ for eternity. We are saved and set apart from sin to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.
Holiness is not a shackle we wear to keep us from doing what we want but is more like giving us wings to fly above sinful desires in pursuit of the higher pleasure of following Christ.
Christianity is not about doing the least bad thing. It is not about choosing the lesser of two evils. But it is about being saved from death to life, of being set apart for a purpose. Yes, the life of the Christian involves self-control, self-denial, and even death to self. But all of this is for a purpose: to pursue the good, the true, and the beautiful, and chiefly therefore to pursue excellence in all things as children of God.
Paul Washer hit the nail on the head when he said, “A lot of people think that Christianity is you doing all the righteous things you hate and avoiding all the wicked things you love in order to go to Heaven. No, that’s a lost man with religion. A Christian is a person whose heart has been changed; they have new affections.”
The vow to remain pure that many of us took was a good one. But anyone can take that vow. Anyone can think that being holy, being pure, means not doing what we want to do and doing the things we do not really want. But that is not Christianity. That is not what the Scriptures mean when they promise that the LORD Himself “will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you” as well as “remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh” (Ezek. 36:26).
Our desires, though still pulled down by the world, the flesh, and the devil, have been changed. Our new heart, and the Holy Spirit within us, have fundamentally changed our desires and given us new purpose. That purpose is more than resisting evil but means we resist evil, we resist the transitory desires of the world because we are pursuing far greater satisfaction found in Christ alone.
We are the ones who have been set apart. We are told to, “Go, and from now on sin no more” (John 8:11), but we are indeed given more. We are given life eternal, true, and lasting joy, and the desire to follow Christ who shows us the better way because He is the way, He is the truth, and He is the life.
About The Author
1689 Federalism | Amillennialism
Joseph L. Hamrick III is a Reformed Baptist Christian who serves as a pastor at Commerce Community Church (C3) in Commerce, TX, where he and his wife, Jesse, live. Joseph holds a BA in Liberal Studies from the Texas A&M University-Commerce and writes a weekly column via Substack where he writes about the Christian life. When he is not at work, he can usually be found with a Bible, a work of Dostoevsky, or some other book in his hands.
