Living the Seventh Commandment – “You Shall Not Commit Adultery”

The Dynamic Interplay of “You Shall Not Commit Adultery” and the Virtues and Sins

Introduction

Faithfulness is the foundation of trust. The seventh commandment, “You shall not commit adultery,” protects the sacred bond of covenant, not only in marriage but in all relationships where loyalty is promised. It speaks to the purity of love, the integrity of commitment, and the discipline of desire. Adultery begins long before the act itself; it begins when the heart permits devotion to drift from its rightful place. This reflection explores how chastity, temperance, and diligence strengthen obedience to this commandment, and how lust, gluttony, and sloth undermine it. Together, they reveal that purity is not the denial of desire but its right direction toward faithfulness and honour.

“You shall not commit adultery.” — Exodus 20:14

“You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” — Matthew 5:27–28

The Commandment and Its Essence

This commandment upholds the sanctity of relationship. It defends fidelity, trust, and integrity, which together form the structure of love as God designed it. Adultery, in any form, damages that structure by replacing devotion with desire and faithfulness with self-indulgence.

The heart of this commandment is not simply prohibition but protection. It safeguards the unity that mirrors God’s own faithfulness. In every relationship, marriage, friendship, community, purity of intention ensures peace of conscience.

The virtues of chastity, temperance, and diligence preserve this purity. The sins of lust, gluttony, and sloth corrupt it. Their interplay determines whether love matures in holiness or decays in indulgence.

The Dynamic Interplay of Virtue and Sin

Chastity vs Lust

Chastity is not the absence of affection but its discipline. It orders desire toward love, commitment, and respect. Chastity values the person, not merely the pleasure. It allows intimacy to flourish within the boundaries of honour, ensuring that affection reflects truth rather than impulse.

Lust rejects these boundaries. It seeks satisfaction without responsibility and passion without promise. Lust sees people as means of gratification, not as souls with dignity. It erodes self-control and blinds judgment, turning what should be sacred into something self-serving.

1 Thessalonians 4:3–5 teaches, “For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honour, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God.” Chastity brings honour to desire by keeping it under love’s direction. Lust removes that direction, and in doing so, it destroys love’s depth.

Temperance vs Gluttony

Temperance sustains purity through balance. It recognises that desire is a gift meant to serve love, not to control it. Temperance teaches moderation, helping the believer manage emotion and appetite with grace. It enables joy within limits and strengthens faithfulness through restraint.

Gluttony in this moral sense extends beyond excess of food. It is the unrestrained craving for pleasure or experience, the refusal to be satisfied. Gluttony feeds discontent, convincing the heart that enough is never enough. In relationships, it leads to restlessness and infidelity, because devotion gives way to indulgence.

Proverbs 25:28 warns, “Whoever has no rule over his own spirit is like a city broken down, without walls.” Temperance builds those walls. It guards the heart from temptation and keeps commitment safe from the erosion of excess.

Diligence vs Sloth

Diligence preserves love through attention and effort. It invests in the relationship, maintaining care, communication, and consistency. Diligence reminds the believer that faithfulness requires action, to nurture connection, to resolve conflict, and to renew affection continually.

Sloth weakens that commitment. It neglects effort, allowing distance to grow. In spiritual terms, sloth leads to apathy toward moral responsibility, treating love as something that maintains itself. The idle heart becomes vulnerable to temptation because it ceases to protect what is precious.

Proverbs 10:4 says, “He who has a slack hand becomes poor, but the hand of the diligent makes rich.” Applied to relationships, this means that neglect impoverishes love, while diligence enriches it. The slow decay of care often precedes betrayal. Faithfulness fades not through crisis but through complacency.

Living the Commandment Through Balance

The commandment “You shall not commit adultery” calls for devotion that is disciplined, deliberate, and divine in origin. The dynamic between virtue and sin exposes the hidden movements of the heart: chastity channels desire toward love, temperance regulates passion with discipline, and diligence protects commitment through action. Lust, gluttony, and sloth, by contrast, dismantle these foundations.

Lust corrupts purity by confusing love with possession. Gluttony corrupts gratitude by demanding more than what God has given. Sloth corrupts loyalty by failing to nurture what once was sacred. Together, they dissolve the trust that binds hearts, families, and communities.

To live this commandment faithfully is to guard the inner life as much as the outer. It means recognising temptation’s subtle beginning, in discontent, fantasy, or distraction, and addressing it before it becomes betrayal. It means choosing daily devotion, even when emotion falters.

The virtues do not suppress desire; they sanctify it. They transform affection from impulse into covenant and pleasure into partnership. In this way, obedience to the commandment becomes not merely avoidance of sin but celebration of love rightly ordered under God.

Summary

The seventh commandment calls humanity to integrity in love. It honours covenant, purity, and perseverance as reflections of divine faithfulness. Through chastity, temperance, and diligence, relationships remain strong and sincere. Through lust, gluttony, and sloth, they fracture under selfishness and neglect.

Faithfulness is more than fidelity to another person; it is fidelity to one’s own word and to God’s design for love. When chastity guards the heart, temperance guides desire, and diligence sustains devotion, the commandment is fulfilled in both spirit and truth.

To keep this commandment is to honour the sacred trust that binds two lives together and to remember that love’s truest expression is not passion without limit but devotion without end.

Scripture References

Exodus 20:14 – “You shall not commit adultery.”

Matthew 5:27–28 – “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”

1 Thessalonians 4:3–5 – “For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honour, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God.”

Proverbs 25:28 – “Whoever has no rule over his own spirit is like a city broken down, without walls.”

Proverbs 10:4 – “He who has a slack hand becomes poor, but the hand of the diligent makes rich.”