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What Married Men Need to Know About Sex

QUESTION:   If men and women were created to be compatible sexually, why do we have so many sex problems in marriages today?

ANSWER: After working for more than 20 years as sexual therapists, the answer to that question becomes clearer to us each day.

The enemy of our souls will do whatever he can to distort sex and rob the beauty from it. He knows that a God-breathed view of sex is a threat to his domain.

This is clear:

To understand and experience sex as God intended can reveal amazing clues about spiritual truth.

And the converse is true:

To understand spiritual truth will send the sexual relationship into orbit.

But few people enjoy out-of-this-world sex. Why?   Because few men understand what it means to love their wive as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her. Ephesians 5 reads,

"Husbands, go all out in your love for your wives, exactly as Christ did for the church - a love marked by giving, not getting" (The Message, emphasis ours).

Giving. It is a key word for great sex. As the husband moves in the direction of his wife’s needs, he will discover greater love, passion and intimacy in his sex life. Let’s look at 10 specific ways to give to your lover.

1. Give of yourself rather than claim your rights.

Scripture tells spouses to give their bodies to each other for mutual pleasure and enjoyment. This command is for the giver to give his/her body, not for the getter to demand his/her rights. The Message, Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase of the bible, has a beautiful express in this passage.

"The marriage bed must be a place of mutuality - the husband seeking to satisfy his wife, the wife seeking to satisfy her husband. Marriage is not a place to 'stand up for your rights.' Marriage is a decision to serve the other, whether in bed or out" (1 Corinthians 7:3-5).

2. Go for enjoying rather than scoring.

If you like sports, you like your team to win – and you like to win. You learned early in life to be in the game for the score. You probably feel the same way when you have sex with your wife: you want to be a winner. Rather than enjoying her body like you would enjoy a Boston Philharmonic concert with its crescendos and decrescendos, you go for the goal!

Your wife’s responses are the scores you make. The faster and more often you get a response, the higher your score and the more your excitement builds. You go for the hot spots. If she doesn’t respond, you get tense and rub harder. You get frustrated when something does not work like it should. After all, if you were a real man, you could bring her to orgasm, or  more than one orgasm, during intercourse. If you can’t you see yourself as a loser.

Now hear this: Sex is not about conquering, achieving or scoring. Sex is about relating. No woman wants to be a conquest, a goal achieved or a win scored. Results-oriented sex leads to pressure, demand, self-consciousness, and detachment from the good feelings of the moment.

Try something new. Enjoy the process. As you focus on mutual pleasure rather than response, you will discover a deeper ecstasy than you ever anticipated.

3. Affirm rather than pursue.

Now let’s learn something from the greatest lover of all time: King Solomon. Read through the erotic poetry of the Song of Solomon to find the model of how sex works best between a husband and wife.

First, King Solomon adores her. “You are altogether beautiful, my darling, and there is no blemish in you” (Song 4:7, NASB).

Next, she invites him: “Awake, O north wind, and come, wind of the south…may my beloved come into his garden…” (4:16).
Then, he responds: “I have come into my garden, my sister, my bride; I have gathered my myrrh…I have eaten my honeycomb and my honey; I have drunk my wine with my milk” (5:1).

Remember this order next time you are together: (1) The husband adores his wife, (2) then his affirmation ignites her passion, (3) then her invitation.

4.    Negotiate differences rather than expect similarities.

Along with Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady, you may have wondered, Why can’t a woman be more like a man?

It certainly would make sex easier. But it’s the ever-changing complexity of the woman that keeps sex interesting. Think how boring sex would get if women were as predictable and easy as men. We are convinced that the combination of male constancy, and every-changing, complex femininity is the key to keeping sex alive in marriage.

As you allow your wife to listen to her complex sexuality and you listen to her, you both win. You need to free her to take – to take in touch, pleasure, arousal and passion. Her ability to know what her body hungers for and invite what she needs will work best when you are able to keep your pace lagging behind her pace and allow her to lead in both sexual activity and intensity. Learn how to respect her complexity and make her differences work for you.

5. Plan rather than wait for spontaneity.

For some couples, unplanned sex and “quickies” are fine. But for most couples, the anticipation of being together builds quality, while having longer time together increases quantity.

Quickies can be fine for variety, but make sure your wife is ready. And make sure you also have quality events that are planned for a time when neither of you is fatigued or rushed and both can pursue pleasure without demand.

An occasional smorgasbord is fun. Each of you take turns asking for exactly what you’d like in a sexual experience. The only boundary is that no activity is to violate or be negative for either.

Bottom line: give your love life some variety.

6. Express yourself rather than question her.

This advice may surprise you.

Questions are a form of hovering, watching and comparing:” Was that good for you, honey?”   or “Are you feeling anything?” or “What about tonight?”

Replace questions with” “Wow, did I enjoy you tonight!” or “I love touching you there,” or “I’d like to play tonight.”

7. Delight in her rather than watch her response.

Sex is not a spectator sport!

Watching for how well you are doing in producing a response in your wife (rather than delighting in the enjoyment of her body for the sake of the pleasure it brings you) will interfere with both the pleasure and the result.

Remember, watching is demanding, and demands inhibit.

8. Do not bring anger, shame, control and guilt into the bedroom.

When negative emotions are allowed in the bedroom, sex becomes encumbered with conflict and despair.

Some men bring anger into their marriage because they resent how their mother treated their father. Others take their anger with their wife to the marriage bed. All kinds of shame and guilt can keep men from pursuing passion with their wife.

And some men have a need for control, which interferes with the sexual relationship. It may be that when she approaches him sexually, he cannot respond – while at the same time he complains because she doesn’t want sex as often as he does.

Work out your emotional issues outside the bedroom and at a time totally removed from your sexual experience.

Create erotic adventures with your wife rather than look for passion elsewhere.

If you are looking for some erotic spark in your life, the best place to look is at home.

It does not matter how long you’ve been married; you can have an erotic relationship.

9. But a deeper and fulfilling passion is a lifelong possibility that must be nurtured.

How do you add passion to your marriage? Plan something new, take risks, have secrets with each other, plan special times together, entice her.

10. Work to keep sex fun rather than a routine.

Is sex to be work or fun? Sex is to be fun, but it’s a lot more fun when you work at it.

When you think about sex, plan for sex, talk about your sexual likes and dislikes, learn about sex, practice new techniques, negotiate your difference, and keep changing – sex will be fun!

You will laugh together, have fun experimenting and enjoying surprising each other.

Use a little shock to tap new passionate energy, give her treats, tease kindly, pleasure continuously, resist playfully and create new additions to your love life.

Bless you fresh-flowing fountain!

Enjoy the wife you married as a young man!

Lovely as an angel, beautiful as a rose – don’t ever quit taking delight in her body.

Never take her love for granted! (Proverbs 5:18-19, The Message).

This article originally appeared in New Man Magazine, September 1997.

Dr. Clifford and Joyce Penner are internationally recognized sexual therapists, educators and authors. They work as a team in full time practice in sex therapy and counseling. They also lead sexual enhancement weekends for couples and lecture on human sexuality at colleges and universities.

Clifford L. Penner, Ph.D. – a clinical psychologist with Associated Psychological Services in Pasadena, California – has a B.A. from Bethel College, M.A. from Fuller Theological Seminary and a Ph.D from Fuller’s Graduate School of Psychology.

Joyce J. Penner, R.N., M.N. – a clinical nurse specializing in sexual and parenting issues – is author of over eight books with her husband, Dr. Clifford Penner, including The Gift of Sex. She holds a B.S. in nursing from the University of Washington and a master’s degree in psychosomatic nursing and nursing education from UCLA.