Randy Alcorn offers a simple answer to the often asked question, “How far is too far?” in a dating relationship.

God made sex drives. When those drives are stimulated, they move toward a climax. This is a simple fact of biology. Caressing each other in sexually stimulating ways is foreplay. And foreplay is designed by God to culminate in sexual intercourse.

Logically, then, since intercourse is forbidden outside marriage, so is foreplay. Since sexual intercourse before marriage is wrong, it is also wrong to engage in activity that propels mind and body toward it.

This means that the line must be drawn before either person become sexually stimulated. Fondling – and anything else that results in a turn-on – is forbidden. Once you let your body cross that line, it will neither know nor care about your Christian convictions. Men are more quickly and easily stimulated than women. A woman often thinks extended kisses and hugs are fine, but the man is sexually stimulated and is tempted to push for more. You must make sure you draw the line far enough back that neither of you crosses it.

If one of you begins to be stimulated even by apparently innocent physical contact, then both of you should back off immediately. If you don’t, you’re choosing to stay in a canoe headed toward a waterfall. Those who engage in sexual stimulation should not be surprised when they finally have intercourse. It is simply the natural, predictable result of the choices they’ve made.

If you want to different outcome, make different choices. (Take from The Purity Principle, p72-72).

Do you wish to avoid sexual immorality? Then flee from anything and everything that causes sexual arousal. Allowing sexual arousal is choosing sexual immorality sooner rather than later. Don’t stay on the canoe that’s heading toward a waterfall.

For a helpful picture of what sexual immorality is, check this out.