Of Babies and Bathwater Today's Three-minute Bible Study Print, Study and Apply Title: Of Babies and Bathwater ------------------- Date: 2/25/2001 Keywords: "ascetics" "sensualists" Welcome to eXXit, the web site designed to help you stand strong in the face of sexual temptation. Passages: Deuteronomy 20:19* When you lay siege to a city for a long time, fighting against it to capture it, do not destroy its trees by putting an ax to them, because you can eat their fruit. Do not cut them down. Are the trees of the field people, that you should besiege them? Questions 1. What is the point of this verse?   2. What can we learn from it?   Practical help In the Bible, a little levity goes a long way — even when the subject is total annihilation. This passage teaches the Israelites that it's not a smart idea to destroy the fruit-bearing trees that will one day feed them instead of their enemies. (Apparently, orchard preservation was an issue.) Today, we'd call this bit of council not throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Yet we're also given to senseless extremes on the subject of sexuality. Here's a quick primer: To denigrate the body is gnostic, to worship the body is . . . American. Rest assured God favors neither fringe view. Nor should we. Work hard to maintain a biblical view of sexuality, untainted by the body-hating ascetics and the body-loving sensualists. That may sound obvious, but such lessons are the stuff of holy writ. eXXit homepage Index of three-minute studies Copyright 2001 by eXXit *Scriptures are from The Holy Bible: New International Version © Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. All rights reserved.