Why Sex is So Important to Men

In 4 out of 5 marriages, men have the higher sex drive and are the primary initiator of sexual experiences. If you are in one of these marriages this comes as no surprise to you. It may seem like your husband is constantly wanting sex and acts like a wounded puppy dog if you’re not in the mood. It begs the question: Why is sex so important to my husband?

It’s the way God made him

He came from the factory this way. That’s how God made him. It’s actually part of the whole created in God’s own image thing talked about in the Bible. You see, a man’s passionate and unrelenting pursuit of intimacy with his wife reflects God’s passionate pursuit of people’s hearts. When we were still completely disinterested in Him, He loved us and pursued us, wooing our heart that we might be in an intimate relationship with Him.

Repeatedly in the Bible God uses the marriage relationship, husband and wife relationship, to illustrate the kind of relationship he wants to have with people; He being our husband and us His bride. In this relationship, God is always interested in connecting intimately with us. There’s never a day of the week or time of day or any place that He isn’t willing to connect with us if we make the time to do so. You’ll never get an “I’m too tired, come back later” message from Him. He’ll also never demand connection from you or coerce you into intimacy.

There’s also this amazing metaphor for the intimacy that God desires to have with us displayed through intercourse. In every other religion, God is out there somewhere and we are trying to get to god. In Christianity, the message of the Gospel is that God came for us, and when we embrace Him he literally indwells our body, alive inside of us. This closeness of relationship is mirrored as a husband literally indwells his bride’s body through intercourse when she accepts him.

Sex is a significant way a man emotionally bonds with his wife

Again we’ll blame God for this since in His perfect wisdom God designed your husband’s body to release the bonding hormone oxytocin in enormous quantities when experiencing orgasms with his wife. Wives experience this too, but men do so 400% more.

You may be familiar with oxytocin if you have vaginally delivered children. The synthetic form, Pitocin, is often administered during baby delivery to move labor along. It’s because of the massive amounts of this bonding hormone in your blood when your baby arrives that doctors believe you want to snuggle with your baby instead of killing it after all the pain it caused you. It’s also the hormone that triggers a nursing mom’s milk let down when her baby nuzzles and causes the feeling of closeness when your kids snuggle on your lap while you read them a story.

God wired your husband so that when he connects with you sexually, the skin to skin contact and hormone release with orgasm would create deep emotional bonding between he and you. It’s this oxytocin flood through his body that also makes him very sleepy after sex. In the absence of regular oxytocin events like sex, your husband will be emotionally disconnected from you. Not that sex is the only way men connect, an emotionally intimate relationship is important for both husbands and wives.

Sex is a huge part of a man’s identity

In more than 10 years of therapy I have yet to have a man sit on my couch and say “Josh, my wife only loves me for my penis. Sex, sex, sex, it’s all she wants. It’s like she doesn’t even care about me as a person. All I am to her is a walking penis.” Now maybe that guy exists, but I’ve not met him yet. I have, however, had many wives express the sentiment concerning their husbands – that they feel their husband isn’t interested in them as a person, only as a sex object.

No one should be made to feel like a sex object. The point is this idea is largely foreign to men because their sexuality is very much integrated with their identity. While women experience their sexuality as largely separate from their personhood. For a man, to reject him sexually feels like a rejection of his personhood.

To accept a man sexually is to accept him

The reason for this is that men’s identity and sexuality are so integrated. To accept a man sexually is to accept him. To reject a man sexually is to reject him. Often times women will say this to their husband, thinking they are paying him a compliment: “Honey, I love you so much, appreciate you as dad, and enjoy being married to you – if we never had sex again, I would be OK with that, I just don’t need that part of our relationship – it’s you that are so precious to me.”

A man hearing this from his wife feels about the same as a wife feels hearing, “Honey, I love having sex with you so much, if we never have another meaningful conversation, if I never have to hear your voice again, but we can keep having great sex – I would be OK with that, I just don’t really need that whole conversation part of our relationship.”

Most wives would be understandably crushed hearing this – husbands feel the same. Only, instead of expressing it in tears men tend to express hurt in the form of anger. They may blow up or just shut-down and withdraw from the relationship. This isn’t a good response, but it is what often happens.

It’s a big way he feels affirmed and accepted by you

Since a man’s sexuality is such a big part of his identity it’s also a significant way he feels affirmed and accepted by his wife. Words, acts of service, quality time, non-sexual physical touch, and sometimes gifts all matter – but none of these love languages replace a man’s longing to feel wanted sexually by his wife. Nothing says, “I love you, thank you, I think you’re great,” to a man quite like, “You’re a stud and I look forward to having sex with you.”

The entire pornography and illicit sex industry is built on the exploitation of this powerful reality for men. Porn and illicit sex is never rejecting, always affirming, and always wants you sexually. While this is a fantasy and no real woman could ever live up to this, nor should they, it illustrates what the industry knows about a man’s heart. Every man wants to be found sexually desirable by his wife and to feel accepted/affirmed sexually by her. This doesn’t justify a man shooting himself, and his wife, and his sex life in the foot by using porn when he feels sexually rejected.

NO “OBLIGATION SEX”

The focus of this article is to promote mutual understanding by helping wives get into the shoes of their husband and reduce shame around the normalcy and value of a husband’s sex drive. Lest this focus be misunderstood to be endorsing a perspective on sex that says “men NEED sex” and wives are obligated to provide it, otherwise something bad will happen, let’s be clear here:

Men do NOT “need” sex – nothing will explode or fall off and no one will die if husband does not have “release”.
Engaging in sex that is not mutual or leaves one person feeling used is not God honoring and violates the law of love – Don’t do it!
If you feel obligation or demand in sex, that is an indicator that something is wrong – don’t ignore that and press on, get curious about what’s wrong.
If you have to have sex in a relationship to keep something bad from happening that is coercion (i.e. marital rape) and is not what God wants for you, no matter what you might have heard from a pastor or Christian author.
Sex isn’t the problem. All things being equal, men and women mutual enjoy connecting sexually. If that’s not the case in your relationship, something is wrong and the sexual difficulties are the symptom of that, not the real problem. Get curious about what the real problem might be, and maybe look into connecting with a sex therapist to help you.

A Christian author and influencer that I think speaks to this well is Sheila Wray Gregoire check out her article 10 Questions to Ask if Your Wife Doesn’t Want Sex. and her podcast on the subject, “The Ultimate Anti “Obligation Sex” Episode.

Men and women are different by design

Men experience their sexuality differently than women. While this may be confusing to wives, it’s not because men are broken or defective – it’s how God made us. Believe it or not, the differences are actually complementary.

Sex is God’s idea. He came up with it and it is good. When it’s not, something is wrong. Men and women are different, on purpose. Let’s lead with curiosity about how we each experience our own sexual self and sex in our relationship. A great sex life doesn’t just happen, it’s cultivated between two people in a context of mutual respect and curiosity.

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