'Come with me on a thought experiment for a moment. Let us assume for the sake of argument that the priority of Christian leaders and pastors is to encourage and bring about, by every mean possible, the steady growth, maturity and integrity of those in their care. Now let's assume that these leaders are also able to categorize and prioritize the obstacles and challenges that these disciples face in their normal lives. Perhaps they could loosely rank each issue on the basis of its frequency: for instance, "faced every day," "once per week," and so on. Perhaps they could further categorize each issues on the grounds of its severity, such as "ability to resist or resolve this issue from 1 to 10." To complete out thought experiment, the leaders might rank how much time and attention they give to each issue within the teaching and discipleship of the church: for instance, "focus by the church from 1 to 10."
Now it's time for me to place my poorly disguised cards on the table. Surely we can affirm the assumptions described above: that the goal of Christian leaders is indeed to pursue growing maturity within their churches, and that they can also understand and rank the issues that Christians are facing in their everyday experiences. My strong suspicion is that issues relating to sexuality and relationships, for young Christians in particular, would appear right at the top of these lists as the most frequent and the most severe. And yet these same issues would most likely rank near the bottom of our lists regarding the amount of focus wee give these challenges within the church. Why is that?' Jonathan Grant, Divine Sex: A Compelling Vision for Christian Relationships in a Hypersexualized Age, p.19.
