The Pleasure Of Masturbation

It is a travesty that the church does not celebrate sensuality, much less sexuality, in an open manner, since a Biblical worldview is very supportive of both.  Deep asceticism has conditioned many Christians to act if they believe that God despises sensual pleasures, especially when those pleasures are sexual in nature.  This discourages Christians from both accepting their physicality and understanding their personal sexualities.  Consequently, Christians might feel guilt over engaging in completely amoral or innocent sexual behaviors, one such behavior being masturbation.

God clearly allowed the human body to have the capacity for both engaging in self-stimulation and receiving immense pleasure from doing so.  It does not follow from this alone that masturbation is not sinful, but it does follow from the fact that Mosaic Law, Jesus, and New Testament authors never condemn masturbation that sexual self-pleasuring is nonsinful according to the moral epistemology and framework prescribed by the Bible itself (Deuteronomy 4:2, Romans 7:7, 1 John 3:4).  Biblical ethics is a matter far more straightforward and simple than many are comfortable with.

Societal and church stigmas against sexual expression often result in shame over discussing or practicing masturbation; people who would quickly affirm that masturbation is not sinful might hesitate to call it a legitimate pleasure, or might be unwilling to actually acknowledge that they enjoy it (if they practice it to begin with).  Because of the fact that even those who are otherwise open about their sexual activities and feelings might avoid directly talking about masturbation, either as a general topic or in the context of sharing their personal habits, it is easy for evangelical figures to trivialize or demonize self-stimulation.

Even if the subject embarrasses some when they explicitly convey such a thing, there is still a need for Christians to at least implicitly communicate that self-stimulation is an innocent pleasure for singles and married people alike.  Some might need to have more emphasized to them beyond the fact that it is nonsinful: there is nothing perverse, selfish, or damaging about it in itself whatsoever.  Furthermore, masturbation is not a sign that a person rejects marital sexuality or cannot find a romantic partner.  It is an innocent pleasure that is completely without any inherently problematic moral, physical, or psychological aspects.

If more Christians were to renounce legalism and sincerely embrace what logically follows from this renouncement--complete ideological apathy or hostility towards social pressures and norms--more in the church would quickly realize that there was never anything dangerous or shameful about simple masturbation.  Since the evangelical church, for all its grave errors, still influences American culture to a significant extent, abolishing legalism in the church would dispel at least part of broader cultural anxieties about sexuality.