Carnal Calisthenics

Before we jump off into premature ejaculation, let’s cover an exercise that helps both men and women better enjoy sex. The PC muscle exercises—often called Kegels and pronounced KAY-gulls—are performed by squeezing or contracting the muscles that stop the flow of urine.

As you contract the PC muscle, you can feel your rectum tighten and your genitals pull back. Try it as you read. (No one will notice.) Just squeeze like you are peeing by your car on the side of a highway and have to stop because a police car pulls up. That happens to other people, right?

As you squeeze, try not to tighten your legs or back. Focus on those pelvic floor muscles that go from your genitals to your rectum. All the muscles work together as one.

As you pretend to stop the flow of urine, you will also feel your rectum tighten like you are “pinching off a loaf” or trying to avoid flatulence. If you’re feeling adventurous, see if you can feel tightening around a finger inserted into the vagina or anus.

You know the exercise now, but why should you bother to do it on a regular basis? Women, your vagina is not particularly sensitive to touch but is sensitive to pressure—one of the only parts of the body like this. As the vagina squeezes a penis (the squeeze strengthens when the PC muscles are stronger), the pleasure of sex increases substantially for both partners.

For both men and women, the intensity of orgasms increases substantially when these muscles are in better shape (and—bonus—urinary incontinence improves). Kegels make the vagina feel tighter and the penis last longer and work better. If you want better sex, do Kegels.

Like all exercise programs, begin with moderation and build up slowly:

1.     Start with “Quick Pumps.” A few times a day, squeeze and release 10 times. Build it up to 25 or 50 times over a few days or weeks. You may eventually work up to 100.

2.     After you work up to 25 quick pumps, move on to “Slow Squeeze and Slow Release.” Take a few seconds to go from relaxed to fully contracted. Then, hold a couple seconds and slowly relax. As your muscle control improves, go from 10 to 25 of these.

3.     After you can do 25 slow contractions, move to “Thirds.” Start fully relaxed, then slowly squeeze to about 1/3 of full contraction and hold for a moment. Then, squeeze harder to 2/3 of full contraction. Then go to full contraction. Hold for a few seconds and then move back down through that cycle.

You can do them in bed, while driving, while doing some other type of workout, when working, or while you read (that means now). This is the perfect multi-tasking exercise. If you want better sex and stronger orgasms, start doing Kegels immediately.

Is Oral Sex for You?

I have no idea if you and your spouse should be going down on each other. If you struggle with the concept, go to the Lord in prayer and the Holy Spirit will give you guidance.

Remember, if you’re very interested and your partner is very opposed, please don’t try to force your will. The Bible tells us many times to be kind and to try not to force our will on others. So please don’t use the above verses as a hammer to get your way. Hopefully your sex life, like the rest of your life, involves a constant striving to control your own selfishness and laziness while loving your spouse.

In our relationships with others, especially our spouse, we should be looking to I Corinthians 13 as our behavior guide. Let’s look at it now and see how we fair:

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Whether you’re talking about oral sex or deciding where to have supper, this self-sacrificing love should be your model. When you both try it, even in our vastly imperfect humanness, the results amaze.

What if one of you thinks that oral sex is simply disgusting? As challenging as these things are to discuss, it’s worth the effort. You may conclude that it’s not for you and your marriage. That’s fine. We all get to decide how to live our weird, short little lives. Just don’t default to “No” on everything that takes you out of your comfort zone. Too many Christians tiptoe through life to get to death safely.

So what other objections to oral sex, besides “it’s sinful” or “I just don’t want to,” are there? Cleanliness tends to be another big one. Lots of women have the idea that they are dirty or smelly down there (it seems few men have that concern for themselves).

In reality, genitals of a healthy person that have been recently washed tend to be cleaner than our mouths. Men, assure your partner that God made the female genitals as one of the most self-cleaning and self-maintaining areas on her body. Generally, the slight odor from clean female genitals are a turn-on for the male. Men are designed to like that musky smell.

If it’s a new act for you, take a bath or shower together first. The act of washing each other builds intimacy and trust and helps remove the smell concern. As with all sexual techniques, don’t just start in like you’re going to work. Remember romance, preparation, relaxation, and fun.

Masturbation

Many Christians judge masturbation to be sinful, yet no biblical prohibition exists. In fact, The Bible hardly mentions masturbation at all.

In Genesis 38:8-10, Onan has sex with his dead brother’s wife (per custom) but pulls out and spills his “seed” on the ground so Tamar won’t get pregnant. He doesn’t want to share his inheritance with the child that would result from the union. He didn’t masturbate, but it was coitus interruptus. He was punished because he was selfish.

There are also stories about God’s bride, Jerusalem, melting down gold, silver, and jewels to make male idols with which to act promiscuously.[1] The fact that Ezekiel wrote this presumably means that his readers were familiar with the concept of a dildo. Remember, in these times, women were thought unable to control their passions.

The OT Law mentions wet dreams as making one unclean till evening.[2] This again seems to be treated as a normal occurrence. No Biblical ban on masturbation exists. But the lack of a ban doesn’t necessarily make it good either. Just recognize here that any teaching that masturbation is “sinful according to the Bible” is not accurate.

We’ve talked about the difficult to understand texts of the Bible in their cultural contexts.  We’ve explored the ways in which ideas about slavery, homosexuality, patriarchy, and masturbation have changed, failed to change over time, or never really existed with any concrete evidence. Now let’s look at one concept that has remained consistent since Christ, Paul, and countless other biblical and non-canonical writers taught about it: lust. If you want to be biblical in your sex life, you can’t avoid discussing lust.

[1] Ezekiel 16:17 and 23:7

[2] Leviticus 15:16-17

Recipe for Making Love

Do you ever ponder why God gave us sex? He designed this amazingly intimate activity that we do regularly for our entire lives (if we’re lucky). It seems to me that sex is a special intersection where the spiritual meets the physical. The previous chapter covered the spiritual, now let’s look at one practical recipe for the physical.

1.     The “Before You Start” List:

a.     Clean yourself. Pheromones are nice, but funky smells repel. Clean every area that may be dirty, including armpits, genitals, butt, feet, ears, mouth, etc.

b.     Consider shaving. Bristly hair feels like sandpaper.

c.     Perform fingernail and toenail maintenance. Remember that scene in Dumb and Dumber where they use an industrial high speed grinder to trim the toenails? Funny; not sexy. Make sure your nails are clean, trimmed, and smooth.

d.     Consider applying perfume or cologne. Go light here, though, as your lover will hopefully soon be licking those locations, and those products aren’t designed to taste good. Some natural essential oils (peppermint, vanilla, or lavender) can be wonderful for smell and taste.

e.     Set the mood with low lighting, candles, flowers, and whatever beauty you can create.

2.     A Recipe for Lovemaking:

a.     Massage her body over her clothes. Pay attention to her back, neck, and scalp.

b.     Transition to kissing. Have a nice make-out session. Take off shirts as kissing moves down to chests, torsos, and backs.

c.     Go back to massaging her, with a massage oil candle burning nearby. Put some of that hot oil on her back and give a good, deep-tissue back massage. Work up around her neck and scalp.

d.     As you are massaging, work your way down to her butt and take off her pants. Use that oil to massage each leg and foot.

e.     Have her turn over and start massaging her feet with massage oil. Massage up her legs, hips, belly, breasts, shoulders, neck, and face. Don’t linger on her private parts here; show some restraint, man!

f.      After some more kissing, let her take the lead. Kiss his neck, chest, belly, around the pubic area, thighs, balls, and finally work up to the penis. Don’t go to orgasm here, just work him up close to the edge, then transition to something else that feels good, but not quite that good.

g.     Now some more kissing and hugging and just rubbing your naked bodies against each other, rolling around into different positions.

h.     With him on top, look deeply into each other’s eyes and slowly slide the penis into the vagina. Don’t pound away for orgasm here, just slowly move in and out. See if he can ride up a bit higher and rub his penis against her clitoris. As he gets to the edge of orgasm, pull out and start just kissing.

i.      Then kiss and fondle down her neck, breasts, stomach and to the vulva.

j.      Perform cunnilingus slowly and with love. Bring her to orgasm.

k.     Then come back into the missionary position and finish.

I offer this recipe to illustrate the give and take of one beautiful love making session. Use your creativity and your love to satisfy each other in your own unique ways. And remember, it’s good to giggle in bed, just don’t point and giggle.