[hellbender]

Sex is good, as is everything else God created for us. But nobody needs it the way we need food and water. If one partner willfully withholds sex from the other, especially to punish him/her or bargain for something else, that is very sinful. But suppose one person cannot physically provide everything the other wants? I've actually read of couples where there was no sex at all, due apparently to physical problems, yet they stayed together in love Agape love trumps eros every time in God's book. Husbands are called to love their wives as Christ loved the church, i.e. sacrificially and unselfishly. Certainly that's grounds for some self-denial. It's just hard for me to believe that today, in a culture obsessed with sex and drenched in sexual information, that anyone is still inhibited or embarrassed by it, as many were in the past. I think these ministers are falling for a worldly view tempting us to be dissatisfied with whatever it is we have.

[time4good]

I 100% agree that Agape love is the foundation and source for the three others (phileo, storge(sp?) and eros). But I think, as I just posted, that this can be done in a Godly, Spirit-led way so as to combat the ever-increasing satanic twisting of what is good into perverted and/or condemning. I see nothing wrong with the ever-diligent task to inform the world that what God called good can and should be enjoyed and any substitute is a cheap rip-off.