Jesus is Not Sexual

The Risen Jesus has No Genitals?

Grantley Morris

Multiple Personality Disorder


Most of the following is devoted to why it is logical and biblical to conclude that no resurrected humans (of the which Jesus was the first) have genitals. Before doing so, however, perhaps I should address a couple of issues raised by an alter reporting Jesus as saying that he digests food ‘perfectly.’

It is essential to affirm that no extra-biblical revelation should in any way be treated as being as reliable as the Bible. Nevertheless, this statement raised two objections in my mind that I feel inclined to comment on.

My first reaction was that the resurrected Lord never eats physical food and so does not digest it. I immediately realized, however, that I was mistaken. There are several biblical references to eating and drinking in the next life. For example:

    Luke 22:15-18 He said to them, “I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer, for I tell you, I will no longer by any means eat of it until it is fulfilled in God’s Kingdom.” He received a cup, and when he had given thanks, he said, “Take this, and share it among yourselves, for I tell you, I will not drink at all again from the fruit of the vine, until God’s Kingdom comes.”

    Luke 22:29-30 I confer on you a kingdom, even as my Father conferred on me, that you may eat and drink at my table in my Kingdom. You will sit on thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.”

We might be tempted to dismiss all of this as merely metaphorical but Scripture insists that the resurrected Lord ate and drank:

    Luke 24:41-43 While they still didn’t believe for joy, and wondered, he said to them, “Do you have anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of a broiled fish and some honeycomb. He took them, and ate in front of them.

    Acts 10:40-41 God raised him up the third day, and gave him to be revealed  . . . to us, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. (Emphasis mine.)

The other query raised by digesting food ‘perfectly’ is: if the design of our current bodies is imperfect why did the perfect Lord design them that way? The elimination of waste is such an integral part of our physiology that it is hard to believe all this was created after the fall. Much in the way of reproduction, such as spreading of seeds and the fertilizing of plants, hinges in animals eliminating waste. However, it is easy to see this as temporary and not needed in the world to come.

Let’s move on, however, to something far more important:

Jesus is not Sexual

Our gracious Lord freely forgives those who see the error of their ways and want his forgiveness. Nevertheless, Jesus insisted that lust is a grave sin:

    Matthew 5:27-29 You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery;’ but I tell you that everyone who gazes at a woman to lust after her has committed adultery with her already in his heart. If your right eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out and throw it away from you. For it is more profitable for you that one of your members should perish, than for your whole body to be cast into Gehenna.

Remember that it was not in our sex-obsessed society that Jesus declared lust to be as depraved as adultery. He was speaking to people who regarded adultery as such a heinous crime that it incurred the death penalty (John 8:3-5).

Jesus is no hypocrite. Indeed, he alone has never sinned:

    John 8:46 Which of you convicts me of sin? . . .

    2 Corinthians 5:21 For him who knew no sin [Jesus] he made to be sin on our behalf; so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

    Hebrews 7:26 For such a high priest [Jesus] was fitting for us: holy, guiltless, undefiled, separated from sinners . . .

    1 Peter 1:19  . . . as of a faultless and pure lamb, the blood of Christ

    1 Peter 2:22 who did not sin, “neither was deceit found in his mouth.”

    1 John 3:5 You know that he was revealed to take away our sins, and in him is no sin.

The holy Son of God has never lusted. The Son of God is as sexually innocent as a newborn. Moreover, in heaven, where he is now enthroned, there is no sex.

Even for humans who are currently very sexual, their sex drive is temporary. It usually slowly rises from nothing as a newborn to intense in their late teens and early twenties and then gradually fades until it completely disappears in the next life.

    Mark 12:25 For when they will rise from the dead, they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven.

It is there, in that place where there is no sex, that the bodies of all deemed worthy of heaven will be like that of the eternal Son of God:

    1 Corinthians 15:42-44 So also is the resurrection of the dead. . . . It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. . . .

    1 Corinthians 15:49 And just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so shall we bear the likeness of the man from heaven. (NIV)

    Philippians 3:20-21 For our citizenship is in heaven, from where we also wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ; who will change the body of our humiliation to be conformed to the body of his glory . . .

    1 John 3:2 . . . when he is revealed, we will be like him; for we will see him just as he is.

One of the similarities between the bodies of people in heaven and that of our risen Lord is lack of sex drive. He has no sexual feelings. Jesus has a resurrected body and resurrected people do not have sexual relations.

Jesus declaration that there is no sex in the next life makes sense. Since there is no death in the next life, there is no need to reproduce to replace those who have died. And in a world of perfect love and fellowship, exclusive relationships, such as marriage, would be out of place, and emotionally needless. And no marriage implies no sex, since over and over the Bible teaches that sex must be limited exclusively to marriage and that sex creates an exclusive relationship by making two people one.

Moreover, Jesus said what he did about the next life because of this question:

    Mark 12:19-23 Teacher, Moses wrote to us, ‘If a man’s brother dies, and leaves a wife behind him, and leaves no children, that his brother should take his wife, and raise up offspring for his brother.’ There were seven brothers. The first took a wife, and dying left no offspring. The second took her, and died, leaving no children behind him. The third likewise; and the seven took her and left no children. Last of all the woman also died. In the resurrection, when they rise, whose wife will she be of them? For the seven had her as a wife.

Although the scenario concocted by the Sadducee was stretched to humorous extremes by being repeated seven times. It was, nevertheless, a possibility orchestrated by God himself. Under Old Testament law, if a man dies, leaving a childless widow, his unmarried brother was divinely expected to marry her (Deuteronomy 25:5-10). So the question itself suggests that God has ordained that marriage be restricted to this side of eternity. And if there is no marriage in heaven, there is no sex and resurrected bodies will have no need of sexual organs. What makes this particularly relevant to the Jesus is that, as indicated in Scriptures already cited, Jesus’ resurrected body is the prototype of all resurrected bodies. He became flesh and blood like us so that we could gain a resurrected body like his.


We might find it perplexing, frustrating or even embarrassing, but for all of us the unavoidable reality that a basic feature of fear is that it is stubbornly resistant to rational thought. No matter how intelligent we are, fear bypasses our intellect and spreads from one disturbing experience to safe things that bear a superficial similarity.

Logically, if the all-powerful Lord were an abuser, keeping our distance from him would be no protection. Like no one else, however, the Almighty is worthy of infinite power because he will never abuse that power, but will use it for your good.

Some people were blessed with parents who were non-sexual with them and were continually warm, gentle, compassionate, supportive, faithful and forgiving. Such people are ideally placed to understand God’s love, not merely intellectually, but on an emotional and subconscious level. The sad reality, however, is that, for many of us, our backgrounds are a handicap rather than a help. Our presumptions about God’s love for us are alarmingly warped, both by our shallow understanding of God and by our observations and experiences of ‘love’ from other sources. Nevertheless, when alters push through their fear and get to know Jesus, they find in him the perfect father they have always craved and gain a father superior to any that those with more privileged backgrounds have ever enjoyed and they are blessed with deeper spiritual revelations.

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