February 10, 2025 • 36 mins
🎧 Episode Overview
If you're ready for a conversation that’s both spicy and eye-opening, this episode is for you! Today, we sit down with Angela Griffith, the Christian Sexpert, to challenge long-held taboos around sex and intimacy in Christian culture.
Angela is a sex and intimacy coach, influencer, and speaker who is on a mission to help couples embrace mutual pleasure in marriage, dismantle damaging purity culture beliefs, and bring biblical-based sex education to the forefront.
In this episode, we dive into:
✅ Angela’s journey to becoming a Christian sex educator.
✅ How purity culture has shaped intimacy in marriage—for better or worse.
âś… The pushback she faces from both men and women.
âś… How to build emotional intelligence in relationships.
âś… Whether sex has become an idol in your marriage.
This conversation is raw, real, and challenges traditional mindsets about sex and faith. Buckle up, because this one’s a game-changer!
đź’ˇ Key Takeaways from This Episode
âś… Faith & Sexuality Can Coexist
- Biblical sex education is needed in Christian spaces.
- Mutual pleasure in marriage isn’t just important—it’s biblical.
✅ Breaking Free from Purity Culture’s Harmful Messages
- Many women were taught that sex is an obligation, not an intimate, enjoyable connection.
- It’s time to reframe intimacy as something both partners fully embrace.
âś… Pushback and Misconceptions
- Angela receives strong criticism—mostly from men—who feel threatened by the idea that sex isn’t just for their pleasure.
- Many women also resist her message because it challenges deeply ingrained beliefs.
âś… Emotional Intelligence & Intimacy
- Sex should be a celebration of intimacy—not the foundation of it.
- There are 13 types of intimacy, and emotional connection is just as vital as physical connection.
âś… Has Sex Become an Idol?
- If you feel entitled to sex or react emotionally when your spouse says no, it might be time to reassess your mindset.
- The Bible was never meant to be used as a weapon of obligation in marriage.
đź’¬ Wisdom from Angela Griffith
"Sex is designed to be mutually pleasurable. If it’s not mutual, you shouldn’t be doing it." – Angela Griffith
đź“š Resources Mentioned
đź“– Books & Courses by Angela Griffith:
🔍 Further Learning:
- Search #13TypesOfIntimacy on Angela’s socials for free content.
- Explore Dr. Andrew J. Bauman’s work on the pornified mindset.
🎧 Connect with Angela Griffith
Angela Griffith, known as The Christian Sexpert to her 100,000+ social media followers, has spent over 20 years studying human sexuality through a biblical lens. As a sex and intimacy coach, she challenges traditional purity culture while staying rooted in faith,...
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Grace and theGrind, the podcast where we dive
deep into the journeys ofheart centered and purpose driven
leaders and entrepreneurs.
We're here to equip andencourage you on your journey.
So let's get started and findthe grace within the grind.
This is Grace in the Grind.
And now your host, Jim Burgoon.
(00:24):
Welcome to Grace in the Grind.
We're here to get theinspirational stories behind some
of the most successful entrepreneurs.
And today I have a brand newfriend to the show.
Angela Griffith, the Christian sexpert.
So this ought to be a great conversation.
Welcome to the show.
Thank you for having me.
So the first thing that wealways do with our experts that are
(00:44):
on the show is take 30 to 90seconds and just tell the audience
what you do.
I'm Angela, the Christian sexpert.
I am a sex and intimacy coach,influencer, public speaker, and I'm
working on getting my book published.
So.
A book published.
First, let's dive into thebook published.
What is the book?
So I'm vacillating between twoworking titles.
(01:06):
The first and most practicalone is Go have good sex.
That is my social mediatagline, go have good sex.
But as I was working on aproposal for the book, another title
came to me which is Prayingagainst my gag reflex conversations
the church aunties never hadwith you.
And.
And that just makes my heartsparkle and I'm having trouble letting
(01:31):
go of it.
Write both books.
There you go.
So write both.
I think that's an amazing.
The old aunties.
My goodness.
All right, we're going to getin here and into our conversation.
So what does like a Christiansex influencer like?
Use the word influencer.
And so we get thisunderstanding of what influencer
are.
But here we are.
(01:52):
Your faith is Christian andyou're a sex influencer.
What does that look like?
Unpack that for me.
It looks unexpected.
And it took me a long time toembrace the influencer title because
as a 40 something year oldwoman, I don't.
First of all, I don't looklike an influencer.
I don't fit the mold.
(02:12):
I'm not 20 years old, young,skinny, and making dancing tiktoks
all day long.
So it took me a long time toembrace the influencer title.
But I have over 150,000 followers.
And I got to a point where I'mlike, you know what?
This is part of your job.
This is a big part of your job.
This is how you.
How I managed to do all theother things is because people find
(02:37):
me on TikTok and Instagram and things.
I was invited to speak atWoman Evolve with Sarah Jakes Roberts
in front of 40,000 people.
Wow.
Because she found my TikTok.
It was a journey to embracethe influencer title.
But what I do for influencingis the whole reason that I started
(02:59):
doing what I do.
It started with TikTok becauseI see the damage of purity, culture
and Hollywood and the damagethat causes two Christian marriages.
And I want to be part of the solution.
So I provide Christian based,biblical based sex education and
all of my content issurrounding that sort of thing.
(03:23):
So it could be I keep all ofthe spicy things for my private Patreon
community, which is where Iteach sexual techniques.
Because there's no other spacethat an evangelical Christian can
go to learn how to give a blowjob or to learn about choosing a
vibrator.
(03:44):
There's no other space whereyou can go and get science backed
information in a biblicallybased, nudity free environment.
And so that's what my Patreondoes, is creates that science backed,
biblical based, nudity freeenvironment for very specific education.
That you can't just go to yourpastor and ask, hey, got any blowjob
(04:06):
tips?
So I created that space andthen my public platforms are about
building a better marriage,about mutual pleasure in sexuality.
It's about what the Bible hasto say about sex and marriage.
So I cover a huge range oftopics on my public platforms.
Awesome.
And just for the listener,we're going to make sure to have
(04:27):
all of that in the show notes.
So it'll make it easier foryou to find, connect, check out the
Patreon, all of that.
So make sure you're checkingthe show notes after the show because
all the links will be there.
All right, so with that beingsaid, you just had a whole lot of
stuff and there's a whole lotof questions that now I now have.
Okay.
And I think one of the mostimportant questions in this whole
(04:49):
conversation is where did youdeveloped, where did you develop
the mindset that an influencerhad to be a 20 something year old
dancing person on Tick Tock?
Where did that come from?
Ask any 40 year old woman wholooks like a librarian, a single
librarian with 17 cats athome, and she's going to tell you,
(05:11):
no, I'm not an influencer.
Like influencers areculturally young.
Charlie D'Amelio.
I don't know.
I'm such a.
I'm such a bad influencer.
I don't know how to say her name.
But that is the stereotype ofwhat an influencer is.
And for people of mygeneration, it influencer as a profession
is definitely side eyed.
(05:32):
If I say, if I call myself aninfluencer to people of my generation
because I'm 44 and if I saythat to someone who's 44 or older,
I'm getting side eye, I'mgetting go get a real job thing.
And like y'all have no ideahow much work it is to create content.
(05:52):
It is a real job.
Yes.
And I just actually did a liveon that too.
There's some questions I'mgoing to dive in here because I'm
also, I'm about to be 47, so Iam also said generation.
So walk me through embracingthat because you've got to be dealing
with imposter syndrome, someself doubt.
Walk me through embracing that.
(06:14):
So I honestly, in a lot ofways I don't deal with imposter syndrome
because I, I know what I'm doing.
I know I have degrees inreligion and psychology.
I have been studying humansexuality for over 20 years.
I know what I'm doing.
I know that I can help youhave a better sex life and a better
marriage.
(06:35):
I don't care how good your sexlife or your marriage is.
I know I can help it be betterbecause I know what I'm doing.
I know my techniques work.
I know my advice is solid.
I know the scriptures likepeople, I make people really angry
when I say things like theBible talks about oral sex and they
get into my comment sectionand they're like, you've clearly
(06:57):
never read the Bible.
That's out of me.
Blah, blah, blah.
I'm like, no, it's not, it's no.
First of all, bold of you tothink that I haven't read my Bible
since this is my actualliteral job.
Right?
Research these things andcreate content about it.
I don't put anything out on mypublic socials that I am not a thousand
percent convinced of.
(07:17):
The statistics, the history,the context.
And I can give you all thereasons that I'm right.
I know what I'm doing.
I love this.
I love your confidence.
So then how did you embrace it?
What were the struggles toembrace it?
Walk me through some of that.
Some of it was being,honestly, some of it was being on
Tik Tok and this sound.
The people accuse me all thetime of like hating men.
(07:40):
And I'm like, no, I don't hate men.
I think that society andevangelical culture sells men short
and men are so much betterthan what evangelical culture wants
to give them credit for.
But just today popped up in mymemories, a video where I did.
Where I said I embraced myfull sexuality to have this amazing
(08:01):
sex life.
And the audio over that textwas, if a man did it, why can't I?
And part of it was like thecultural phenomenon of that sort
of messaging on social mediaof, if a boy can do it, so can I.
If a man can have this muchaudacity, so can I.
And really, that sort of.
But also, God created me tohave a challenger sort of personality.
(08:25):
I have never.
I.
If you want someone to calmyou down and talk you out of fighting,
I'm not the one, don't callme, because I will show up with the
matches and burn everything tothe ground.
I love it, I love it, I love it.
That is a hundred percent mypersonality, and it always has been.
And so part of it was thecultural phenomenon of the messaging
(08:49):
on social media, of I.
I have worked just as hard asany man in my field.
I deserve these things because I.
I have put in the work and I'm obsessed.
I've been obsessed lately withAlona Mar.
And she had an interview acouple of weeks ago where this interviewer
asked her, how do you dealwith imposter syndrome?
(09:11):
And she's, I don't.
I love it.
Worked for everything thatI've got.
I deserve everything that I've got.
And I'm like, so much of themessaging that I put out on my socials
is fighting the status quo ofwhat has always been.
My official speaker bio says,a challenger of what has always been.
(09:32):
And this is part of it, isthat evangelical women in particular
are not supposed to be strong.
We're not supposed to be bold.
We are not supposed to be outspoken.
We are supposed to be meek andquiet and submissive and not get
angry and not challenge anyone.
And if someone tells us thatwe're wrong, we're supposed to really
think about it.
(09:52):
And are they right?
Am I wrong?
Do they have a point?
That's not what I see in theBible, because what I see in the
Bible says, the Holy Spiritwill come and empower you to do great
works in my name.
Yeah.
And that doesn't say, but onlyif you have a penis.
I love that.
Man.
This is so rich.
(10:13):
This is amazing.
And I have two daughters, so I.
We've taught them to be bold.
And I love that you have this message.
And so this, now, this comesback into the pushback.
So you're in a.
You're in a.
An area that has a lot ofstigma, whether it be from the old
Timey aunties like youmentioned earlier or the, the new
age stuff, all kind of clashing.
(10:34):
And now you're getting pushback.
So first and foremost, walk methrough how you got interested or
how you got into the whole sextherapist thing.
And then after that we'regoing to deal with the pushback.
So let's talk about thejourney into it first.
So a million years ago when Iwas in college, good girls from small
towns didn't go to school tobecome sex coaches.
(10:55):
Good girls from small townswent to school to get their Mrs.
Degree.
And being a good girl from asmall town, I graduated with my degree
in religion and psychology anda few weeks later got the Mrs.
By getting married.
And I remained fascinated withhuman sexuality, studied everything
I could get my hands on andalso remain fascinated with theology,
studied everything I could getmy hands on.
(11:17):
Eventually we got pregnant.
Later in life, I joined aninternational online women's ministry
and I would contribute to theconversations about marriage and
sex.
And I was after a whilegetting brought into those conversations
specifically about marriageand sex.
I was eventually asked to jointhe leadership team for the ministry.
And we were talking and I waslike, you know what?
(11:38):
I want to do this full timewhen my son doesn't need me so much
anymore.
I want to help women havebetter sex.
Because God tells us that hewants abundance for us in all areas
of our life and that includesour sex life.
And it's not just men thatdeserve abundant sex lives.
Women deserve to enjoy sex asmuch as men.
And I want to be part of the solution.
And that was the end of theconversation a couple months later
(12:00):
when a sex had come up againand somebody had tagged me as paging
Angela, the group sexpert.
And we were, the leaders werelaughing about that privately.
And they were like, you know,that should be your tick tock handle
is the Christian sexpert.
And I was like, yeah, sure, whatever.
But I ran over and I reservedthe handle because I was like, maybe
I'll do something with this someday.
And guy laughed at me and he'sthat's not later thing.
(12:21):
This is a now thing.
This is you're gonna do this now.
And the same leader was liketo really make it on TikTok you have
to post four times a day.
I was like excuse me, that's aggressive.
But on I'm also have raging adhd.
And so my brain was like, why not?
So I started posting fourtimes a day.
(12:42):
I started my account in late January.
By Easter, I gone viral with avideo at over 5 million views.
And the whole time God'sgoing, okay, we're gonna do this
next thing.
Okay, here's the next step.
So I the ADHD hyper fixationnever wore off.
And God, the whole time is,okay, you're gonna start coaching.
Okay, you're gonna startdeveloping products to help intimacy
(13:05):
that you're going to publicdigital downloads that you can publish
on your website.
Last, last winter, I got theinvite for the conference in front
of 40, 000 women.
I was like, okay, this is thenext step.
And then immediately afterthat, God said, okay, start writing
your book because you're goingto be po.
You're after the conference,you're going to need a manuscript
started.
So I started writing.
(13:26):
Just yesterday I got a book up online.
It's like a self publishedjournal full of sex prompts.
It's over a hundred sexjournal prompts for you to share
with your spouse.
So the way that it works is ithas a prompt on a page, you choose
a page, you write yourresponse, you give it to your spouse,
(13:47):
they get the opportunity toread your response and answer it,
respond with their ownthoughts, ask questions.
And it's designed to helpcouples have a deeper sexual intimacy
in that area of their lives.
And every step of the way,it's just been me going, okay, God,
I don't know how this is goingto work out, but sure, let's try
(14:07):
it and see what happens, right?
What's the worst that can happen?
It doesn't sell.
Oh, we'll do the next thing.
I love that.
I love that about you and Ilove the confidence that comes off
you like this.
It's refreshing.
It's very refreshing.
And so you're building allthis stuff.
Things are happening.
God's leading you step by step.
Let's move into the pushbackbecause I'm sure there was a bunch.
(14:29):
So much.
I deeply anger a lot of men.
Oh, you anger men more than women.
Some women, but men aredefinitely more vocal about it.
Let's go back to the audacityof a man.
So if you are listening tothis podcast and you aren't watching
the video, I am a fat, shortwoman who, who looks like a librarian
(14:50):
with 17 cats and no husband.
I have a mirror.
I know what I look like, andthat's okay.
I don't look like someone whoshould have any expertise in sex,
let alone be able to teach youhow to do kinky sex, but I can.
And so people get really upsetwhen they hear me talking about sex
(15:13):
education, particularly when Istart talking about mutual pleasure.
When I talk about sex isn'tjust for men.
Women are just as sexual as men.
We are just socialized andconditioned to not be allowed to
express our sexuality in thesame way that men are.
And men get so angry, andthey're like, you just hate men and
(15:33):
you don't want.
You're not having any sex, soyou don't want anybody else having
any sex either.
And I get all of these hatefulcomments all the time on my socials.
And depending on the severityor what they're saying, I may respond
or I may delete the comment.
I tend to delete comments thatare just horrifically attacking my
(15:57):
appearance.
I have a hard line on anyonethat attacks my husband.
So if you make a comment aboutmy husband, I am the one who has
chosen this for my profession.
My husband does not activelychoose to be attacked online, and
that's a hard boundary for me.
So if anybody makes a commentabout disparaging my husband in any
(16:19):
way, that's immediately goingto get deleted because you don't
have he.
That isn't his choice.
I understand that when I'mchoosing to put my image out online
that I am opening myself upfor hateful comments about my body.
And that's.
I accept that's the reality.
That doesn't mean I have totolerate them.
I accept that's the reality.
And so that's why I delete anycomments related to my husband.
(16:41):
But some of the comments Irespond to because not because I
think I'm going to change thisparticular man's mind with any sort
of education that I can provide.
I'm putting it out therebecause I hope that his wife sees
it and knows that she deservesbetter, that she deserves a marriage
in which she does not have tohave sex to keep him from having
(17:04):
a temper tantrum, to know thatshe deserves a marriage where she
can.
She and her children are safefrom the whims of a man addicted
to orgasms.
And that's why I respond toangry comments.
But also there is the factthat the algorithm doesn't care whether
they're commenting in supportor disagreement.
(17:27):
Correct.
The algorithm just sees engagement.
And so you want to fight mefor 50 comments in my comment section,
you go for it because you're winning.
Yeah, I'm winning.
I'm getting paid with everycomment you leave.
So my.
My engagement rates and mypayment just go up the more angry
comments I get.
(17:47):
So you want to fight, go for it.
I don't care.
I love that.
And definitely you are livingout your challenge, your Personality.
I love it.
So I.
This brings up two questions,one about the men and one about the
women.
So the man question, what doyou feel is the percentage?
Do you think that the people,the men who are angry is a lower
percentage compared to theones that may not say anything?
(18:09):
Or is this most men?
What does that look like?
I think that it's indicativeof a lot of the things that we see
in society is might makes right.
So it's the ones that are theloudest that people think are the
truest or whatever.
And I don't think that this isall men.
In fact, I have a very loyalfollowing of a small group of men
(18:33):
who are very supportive of my work.
Multiple.
I have multiple mutualrelationships with therapists, sex
addiction therapists who aremen who support my work every day.
But the thing is, and becausemy message is countercultural to
what you're going to see inany sort of evangelical marriage
(18:54):
book, because you pick up anymainstream evangelical marriage book,
it's men need sex, women needemotional connection, men need sex.
And I'm like, that's straight trash.
That is.
There's no scientific orbiblical backing for that.
We have a society of modernAmerican men who have been conditioned
to wrap their entire identityup in their sexual performance.
(19:15):
And they don't have any sortof emotional intelligence education.
And so they think that theonly way that they can connect with
their spouse is through their penis.
And that threatens the statusquo of so many marriages because
that's expecting the man to bebetter, that's expecting the man
to grow.
And so it makes sense that I'mgoing to anger those men because
(19:38):
that means he's going tosuddenly have to start working for
what was freely on offer.
They don't want to do that.
Nobody wants to have thestatus quo of their life threatened
when they've already got it oneasy street.
So it makes sense.
I don't think that it's all men.
I don't even think it's most men.
I think it's men who feelpersonally threatened by my messaging.
(20:00):
So that's good.
That and good.
Please engage with me.
Because if you're engagingwith me, then maybe your wife will
see my content and she'lllearn something.
I love that.
So we're saying like the menwho are more in that alpha male,
dictator, manipulative role.
Yes.
Then this brings theconversation to the women, because
now I'm curious what kind ofpushback you get from them.
(20:23):
Because I can see the pushbackfrom the women, from the men.
And you've even said it like,they're attacking your appearance.
They're attacking differentthings like that.
But help me understand, whatare the pushback from the women you're
getting?
So if I'm receiving pushbackfrom women, it is usually women who
have swallowed the patriarchywhole and like, really believe that
(20:44):
sort of messaging forthemselves as well.
And it makes sense, because ifa woman is upset by the messaging
of mutual pleasure in hermarriage, then she has to take a
hard look at her marriage andthink really hard about what she
has been subjecting herself tofor many years and what she has possibly
taught her children and whather daughter might be subjecting
(21:05):
herself to in her own marriage.
And that is a hard thing tolook at, to know that maybe I got
this wrong all these years andI could have had better.
That's a huge pill to swallow.
So then, what are some of the comments?
What do they tend to attack you?
Is it just, no, you're wrong,or is it.
Do they attack the way you look?
What does that look like?
(21:26):
It's rare that a woman attacksthe way that I look.
Okay?
It's happened.
In fact, the only one time Ican think of it, I made a response
video showing my entire bodydancing very badly because I'm completely
uncoordinated and.
Made the point that I am too.
Made the point that I'm fat.
I know that I'm fat, but thatdoesn't make me wrong.
(21:48):
Here's the attention that youwere looking for with your comment.
So the comments that I usuallyget from women are, the Bible says
you can't deprive each other.
And we need to look at thatverse, first of all, in its proper
historical and cultural context.
Right?
Because that verse has beentaken out of its context and tried
to.
(22:08):
People want to shove that intoa modern American context.
And that verse is weaponizedprimarily against women to say that
women can never say no totheir husbands.
Or you can say no, but not toooften, first of all.
Or you can say no, but youhave to have a good reason.
Who decides how much is toooften and who decides what a good
reason is?
First of all, yeah, definitely.
(22:29):
Second of all, that verse waswritten to a people who were living
wildly different lives than weas modern Americans are living.
They were.
They were worshiping false gods.
And one of the gods in Corinthdemanded celibacy as a form of worship.
(22:49):
And when Poe was writing tothem, he we've got this congregation
of new believers because,remember, everybody was a new believer
then.
There was no esteemestablished Church fathers, everybody
was a new follower of Jesus.
All we had was Jewishtradition to fall back on.
We didn't have 2000 years ofChristianity to fall back on.
So we've got these newbelievers that have been using celibacy
(23:12):
as a form of worship to theirfalse gods.
They're meeting Jesus, getting saved.
We love to see it.
But now they think in order toworship a God, I have to be celibate.
Okay, I'll be celibate as worship.
Because that's what theyunderstood as a form of worship.
And Paul was saying, Jesusdoesn't want your celibacy.
There's no reason for you tobe celibate as a form of worship.
(23:34):
If you're married, have sexbecause it's good.
Yeah, it was not saying.
Yeah, exactly.
It was not saying that youcan't ever say no.
It was literally saying thatsex is supposed to be mutually pleasurable
and if it's not mutuallypleasurable, you shouldn't be doing
it.
Yeah, but we have so many pastors.
I have, I get sent almost weekly.
(23:57):
Pastors in American pulpitstoday preaching a gospel of obligation
sex, that it is sacrificiallove to have sex even if you don't
want to be having sex.
And there is zero model forthat in the Bible because these men
are taking that verse out ofcontext and creating entire sermons
around it and telling thewomen in their congregations that
(24:18):
you need to be having bad sexthat you don't want because that's
what makes God happy.
Yeah, absolutely.
Sermons every week.
And when I'm getting pushback,it's primarily the Bible says you
can't deprive each other.
And I'm saying that's not it.
That's not what it's saying.
So I think that's a momentjust for the listener.
I do want to say this is agreat opportunity for the listener
(24:39):
to challenge long held beliefs.
And ask yourself a reallyimportant question, what is traditional
and what is biblical?
Because they oftentimes don'tgo together.
And so we've had 2,000 yearsof tradition that some faiths will
say is greater than the actualwhat the Bible says.
So make sure you'rechallenging yourself and going back
like the Bereans.
It said the Bereans were seenas a noble because they went back
(25:01):
and challenged Paul.
So to you, the listener, makesure you go back and challenge some
long held beliefs and see whatthe Bible actually says about that.
So I wanted to take a momentand share that with them because
I'm loving this conversationand I'm absolutely so grateful for
you to be on because like,even at the time, you know, the.
As a former pastor, as aformer thing, I'm very big because
(25:22):
I was saved out of witchcraft.
So I didn't come in, grow upinto the church.
So I actually had a differentmindset reading scripture.
And a lot of what was writtenin Ephesians and things like that
was because the church, notthe church, but the local religions
were worshiping sex throughgoing in, hiring prostitutes.
So a lot of what in the Bibleis written in counteraction to the
(25:43):
local practices.
So with that all being said,okay, so we're now in a modern day
and you're finding thesechallenges where you've got the traditions
versus not understanding whatthe Bible actually says and why it
was written to counteractthose false teachings.
What are some, I think yousaid it earlier, emotional intelligence.
What are some things to buildthe emotional intelligence in the
(26:04):
relationship to make sure thatwe get more into a biblical alignment
as opposed to a traditional alignment?
That's a really big question.
That could be like a whole series.
By itself, really could.
Let's, let's give a couplebullet points.
Let's go for that.
Let's start with therapy.
The answer nobody wants tohear, but everybody needs therapy.
If you realize that you havebeen looking to sex to create and
(26:31):
maintain the intimacy in your marriage.
If you need to have sex inorder to feel emotionally connected
to your spouse, because it'snot just.
There are some women who fallinto this trap as well, please get
therapy, because that istelling me that at some point there
was a breakdown and yourealize that the chemicals produced
during sex feel really goodand they help you to numb out maybe
(26:56):
some hard things in your life.
And so you may well needcoping tools, healthy coping tools
to deal with hard things inyour life that don't involve the
use of someone else's body.
So that's the first one.
And then let's say you're like.
That feels drastic.
I don't think that ourmarriage is.
Is that serious, but I feellike we could maybe just use a little
(27:17):
direction to move towards amore balanced approach.
There's actually 13 differenttypes of intimacy that we can experience
in marriage, and sex is onlyone of them.
And so I think it's reallyhealthy if listeners understand that
there's multiple forms of intimacy.
And sex is supposed to be thecelebration of intimacy that you've
already established beforeyou've ever reached the bedroom.
(27:39):
And when you frame it that wayand when you start intentionally
investing into the otherintimacies, sex starts to flow naturally
because you have something to celebrate.
And on my website, I have aproduct called the 31 days of intimacy.
It walks you through each ofthe different intimacies in very
practical ways.
But you can also go on mysocial media accounts and search
(28:01):
hashtag 13Intimacies.13 searchhashtag 13Types of intimacy to see
the educational videos where Italk about these things.
It's not.
I.
This is not just like a salespitch because I do put out a lot
of content about the differenttypes of intimacy.
So to the listener, just tolet you know, just a reminder, everything
(28:24):
will be in the show notes foryou to just click on and shoot over
to where these things are located.
Because we want to make thingseasy for you to connect with our
guests, because our guestshave spent a lot of time building
their expertise.
And for you, we want to makesure it becomes so easy to be able
to connect with them.
And you should be connectingwith Angela because this is powerful
stuff.
All right, this brings upanother interesting question, and
(28:46):
I'm enjoying this conversationa lot.
So rich with so much stuff.
How do you tell if sex in yourmarriage has become an idol?
Oh, my gosh.
That's a.
Another huge question.
I'm big on huge questions.
Apparently you are.
I'm not sure that I've everhad that question phrase that way
to me either.
So that's really interesting.
I would say one of the firstthings is, do you feel entitled to
(29:10):
sex?
Do you feel like you are owed sex?
Do you have an emotionalreaction if your spouse says, I'm
not interested tonight?
And when I say emotionalreaction, people get really upset
because they're like, they'rerejecting me.
I should be upset, blah, blah, blah.
I'm like, okay, first of all,your spouse not being interested
in sex does not automaticallyequate a personal rejection.
(29:30):
As you have a person.
That's not what that means.
It means that they had a hardday at work.
It means that she's been homewith three puking kids all day, and
there is nothing in the worldthat's going to make her feel sexy
after being puked on for 12 hours.
Sure.
That's not a personalrejection of you as a person.
Right.
So if you have a lot of bigfeelings that you accept, expect
(29:52):
your spouse to resolve for youwhen they say no to sex.
You probably have made sexinto an idol and you might have a
pornified mindset.
And if you are curious tolearn about a pornified mindset,
I encourage you to look up Dr.
Andrew J.
Bauman's work.
He does a lot of work with menand pornified mindsets in particular.
(30:16):
But a pornified mindset turnswhat is supposed to be a mutually
pleasurable spiritualexperience between a married couple
into a commodified somethingfor personal consumption and personal
pleasure.
It is turning sex into.
It's not about celebrating intimacy.
It's about, I want to feelgood, I want to get off.
(30:39):
And you as my spouse are thelegal way for me to do that.
So you owe this to me.
That's good.
So then here's the thing.
Here's another question.
This is.
This conversation has been so good.
Like, I'm.
I know we're ready to almostland the plane on this particular
episode, and I am 100 going tohave you back on a future episode
as well, if you're willing tocome back, because this has been
(31:00):
very, absolutely powerful, andit's been very empowering.
And I hope you, as thelistener gets this as well.
So this kind of runs down intoa question I had.
And.
And at first I was like, wait,what was the question I was asking?
But then I was like, oh, yeah,that's the question.
What happened?
Would.
Would you read Dr.
Andrew Baum about thepornified mind, which I'm fascinated
(31:22):
about that.
Have you found.
And I know we dealt with men,but have you found that some women
have the same type of mindset?
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Women using pornography is nottalked about nearly enough in evangelical
culture because it goes backto this idea that sex is for men,
and women don't enjoy sex asmuch as men do.
(31:43):
And it pres.
It often presents differentlyin women.
This is when I start to pissoff the women.
We need to talk about thespicy books.
Okay.
Because that's.
Yes, talk about it.
Let's go.
Let's hear this.
That.
That is.
That's stereotypicalpornography for women is the spicy
(32:03):
books.
And I have a lot of women whoask me, is it a sin to read a spicy
book?
And I'm like, first of all,like, why are you.
Why.
Why do you want to read that?
And a lot of women are tellingme we're.
We're in a season.
We have a lot of young kids.
I don't.
It's really hard for me tohave an orgasm.
We don't have a lot of time.
(32:24):
And so reading this turns meon so that we don't have to take
as much time in bed.
And, like, you arecircumventing the real authentic
work of intimacy in your marriage.
You are turning to Somethingand somebody else for what is meant
to be your and your husband's job.
I understand not having a lotof time.
(32:47):
We co slept with our son forthe first seven years of his life.
Like he would not get out ofour bed.
He has a spicy brain.
It wasn't a matter ofdiscipline, it was a matter of survival.
And we had to be creative with when.
And my husband for a seasonwhen my son was 3, was an over the
road truck driver.
(33:08):
He would be gone for threeweeks at a time.
I wouldn't see him, he'd behome for three days.
Then he'd be gone for anothermonth and I wouldn't see him.
And so if we were gonna havesex, like there was a lot of pressure
to have sex in those threedays that he was home.
And we know that obligationkills desire.
So that further complicates things.
And so that spicy books are away that women turn sex into a commodity
(33:31):
for consumption is a quick fixto a problem that needs addressed
by both.
By both spouses.
And rather than investing thetime and the work and the emotional
energy, it feels like a quickway to solve the problem.
That's great.
I appreciate the answer.
And just for you, thelistener, we're an equal opportunist
here at the Grace and the Grind.
(33:52):
We like to piss everybody off,so we like to do both sides.
Matter of fact, we just liketo challenge long held beliefs and
whatever your emotionalresponse to that is on you.
But we pray for you all the time.
So with that being said, Ithink this is a great place to start
landing the plane of thisepisode and then just plan for another
one a few months down the road.
And I just want to say, if youare a wife who has been using spicy
(34:15):
books as a way to jump startyour sex drive, it is most likely
that you lack an understandingof the way that your body is physiologically,
emotionally, mentally designedto respond to sexual context.
And that is one of the thingsthat I love to work out with couples
in coaching is to figure outhow you can work together to get
(34:39):
that same jump start withoutturning to external sources like
spicy books.
I love that.
With that all being said,there's two last things that we want
to do.
Number one, I want to get youto do a wisdom bomb.
If you're a long time listenerof the show, you know what that means?
It means a portable truth thatyou can take and leave right now
and apply to your life.
And then we also want to know,how do we find you?
(35:00):
So go for it.
The wisdom bomb would be thatsex is designed to be mutually pleasurable
and if it's not mutuallypleasurable, you shouldn't be doing
it.
We all, we only do mutualpleasure here.
And if you want to find me, Iam the Christian sexpert across all
socials and my website isthecri.com wonderful.
Thank you so much for beinghere on the show and thank you to
(35:22):
the listener for making it tothe end of this episode.
This has been a fiery episode.
Leave some reviews, ask somequestions, and I will highly recommend
that you check the links outand go see Angela on all of her socials
so that you can learn deeperon how to have proper biblical sex
as well as deeper emotionalintimacy with your spouse.
(35:43):
And with that being said,Angela, thank you so much for being
on the show.
Thank you for having me.
And go have good sex.
That's it.
And then so make sure youagain, check the show notes.
And we're just going to inviteyou to go check out an episode previously
to this that you may havemissed or wait for the future episodes
that come out weekly.
With that being said, we'llsee you on the next one.
This has been Grayson the Grind.
(36:04):
We hope you've enjoyed the show.
If you did, make sure to like,rate and review and we'll be back
soon.
But in the meantime, find uson social media at Lead with Jim.
Take care of yourself andwe'll see you next time on Grace
in the Grind.
Welcome to Grace and theGrind, the podcast where we dive
deep into the journeys ofheart centered and purpose driven
leaders and entrepreneurs.
We're here to equip andencourage you on your journey.
So let's get started and findthe grace within the grind.
This is Grace in the Grind.
And now your host, Jim Burgoon.
(00:24):
Welcome to Grace in the Grind.
We're here to get theinspirational stories behind some
of the most successful entrepreneurs.
And today I have a brand newfriend to the show.
Angela Griffith, the Christian sexpert.
So this ought to be a great conversation.
Welcome to the show.
Thank you for having me.
So the first thing that wealways do with our experts that are
(00:44):
on the show is take 30 to 90seconds and just tell the audience
what you do.
I'm Angela, the Christian sexpert.
I am a sex and intimacy coach,influencer, public speaker, and I'm
working on getting my book published.
So.
A book published.
First, let's dive into thebook published.
What is the book?
So I'm vacillating between twoworking titles.
(01:06):
The first and most practicalone is Go have good sex.
That is my social mediatagline, go have good sex.
But as I was working on aproposal for the book, another title
came to me which is Prayingagainst my gag reflex conversations
the church aunties never hadwith you.
And.
And that just makes my heartsparkle and I'm having trouble letting
(01:31):
go of it.
Write both books.
There you go.
So write both.
I think that's an amazing.
The old aunties.
My goodness.
All right, we're going to getin here and into our conversation.
So what does like a Christiansex influencer like?
Use the word influencer.
And so we get thisunderstanding of what influencer
are.
But here we are.
(01:52):
Your faith is Christian andyou're a sex influencer.
What does that look like?
Unpack that for me.
It looks unexpected.
And it took me a long time toembrace the influencer title because
as a 40 something year oldwoman, I don't.
First of all, I don't looklike an influencer.
I don't fit the mold.
(02:12):
I'm not 20 years old, young,skinny, and making dancing tiktoks
all day long.
So it took me a long time toembrace the influencer title.
But I have over 150,000 followers.
And I got to a point where I'mlike, you know what?
This is part of your job.
This is a big part of your job.
This is how you.
How I managed to do all theother things is because people find
(02:37):
me on TikTok and Instagram and things.
I was invited to speak atWoman Evolve with Sarah Jakes Roberts
in front of 40,000 people.
Wow.
Because she found my TikTok.
It was a journey to embracethe influencer title.
But what I do for influencingis the whole reason that I started
(02:59):
doing what I do.
It started with TikTok becauseI see the damage of purity, culture
and Hollywood and the damagethat causes two Christian marriages.
And I want to be part of the solution.
So I provide Christian based,biblical based sex education and
all of my content issurrounding that sort of thing.
(03:23):
So it could be I keep all ofthe spicy things for my private Patreon
community, which is where Iteach sexual techniques.
Because there's no other spacethat an evangelical Christian can
go to learn how to give a blowjob or to learn about choosing a
vibrator.
(03:44):
There's no other space whereyou can go and get science backed
information in a biblicallybased, nudity free environment.
And so that's what my Patreondoes, is creates that science backed,
biblical based, nudity freeenvironment for very specific education.
That you can't just go to yourpastor and ask, hey, got any blowjob
(04:06):
tips?
So I created that space andthen my public platforms are about
building a better marriage,about mutual pleasure in sexuality.
It's about what the Bible hasto say about sex and marriage.
So I cover a huge range oftopics on my public platforms.
Awesome.
And just for the listener,we're going to make sure to have
(04:27):
all of that in the show notes.
So it'll make it easier foryou to find, connect, check out the
Patreon, all of that.
So make sure you're checkingthe show notes after the show because
all the links will be there.
All right, so with that beingsaid, you just had a whole lot of
stuff and there's a whole lotof questions that now I now have.
Okay.
And I think one of the mostimportant questions in this whole
(04:49):
conversation is where did youdeveloped, where did you develop
the mindset that an influencerhad to be a 20 something year old
dancing person on Tick Tock?
Where did that come from?
Ask any 40 year old woman wholooks like a librarian, a single
librarian with 17 cats athome, and she's going to tell you,
(05:11):
no, I'm not an influencer.
Like influencers areculturally young.
Charlie D'Amelio.
I don't know.
I'm such a.
I'm such a bad influencer.
I don't know how to say her name.
But that is the stereotype ofwhat an influencer is.
And for people of mygeneration, it influencer as a profession
is definitely side eyed.
(05:32):
If I say, if I call myself aninfluencer to people of my generation
because I'm 44 and if I saythat to someone who's 44 or older,
I'm getting side eye, I'mgetting go get a real job thing.
And like y'all have no ideahow much work it is to create content.
(05:52):
It is a real job.
Yes.
And I just actually did a liveon that too.
There's some questions I'mgoing to dive in here because I'm
also, I'm about to be 47, so Iam also said generation.
So walk me through embracingthat because you've got to be dealing
with imposter syndrome, someself doubt.
Walk me through embracing that.
(06:14):
So I honestly, in a lot ofways I don't deal with imposter syndrome
because I, I know what I'm doing.
I know I have degrees inreligion and psychology.
I have been studying humansexuality for over 20 years.
I know what I'm doing.
I know that I can help youhave a better sex life and a better
marriage.
(06:35):
I don't care how good your sexlife or your marriage is.
I know I can help it be betterbecause I know what I'm doing.
I know my techniques work.
I know my advice is solid.
I know the scriptures likepeople, I make people really angry
when I say things like theBible talks about oral sex and they
get into my comment sectionand they're like, you've clearly
(06:57):
never read the Bible.
That's out of me.
Blah, blah, blah.
I'm like, no, it's not, it's no.
First of all, bold of you tothink that I haven't read my Bible
since this is my actualliteral job.
Right?
Research these things andcreate content about it.
I don't put anything out on mypublic socials that I am not a thousand
percent convinced of.
(07:17):
The statistics, the history,the context.
And I can give you all thereasons that I'm right.
I know what I'm doing.
I love this.
I love your confidence.
So then how did you embrace it?
What were the struggles toembrace it?
Walk me through some of that.
Some of it was being,honestly, some of it was being on
Tik Tok and this sound.
The people accuse me all thetime of like hating men.
(07:40):
And I'm like, no, I don't hate men.
I think that society andevangelical culture sells men short
and men are so much betterthan what evangelical culture wants
to give them credit for.
But just today popped up in mymemories, a video where I did.
Where I said I embraced myfull sexuality to have this amazing
(08:01):
sex life.
And the audio over that textwas, if a man did it, why can't I?
And part of it was like thecultural phenomenon of that sort
of messaging on social mediaof, if a boy can do it, so can I.
If a man can have this muchaudacity, so can I.
And really, that sort of.
But also, God created me tohave a challenger sort of personality.
(08:25):
I have never.
I.
If you want someone to calmyou down and talk you out of fighting,
I'm not the one, don't callme, because I will show up with the
matches and burn everything tothe ground.
I love it, I love it, I love it.
That is a hundred percent mypersonality, and it always has been.
And so part of it was thecultural phenomenon of the messaging
(08:49):
on social media, of I.
I have worked just as hard asany man in my field.
I deserve these things because I.
I have put in the work and I'm obsessed.
I've been obsessed lately withAlona Mar.
And she had an interview acouple of weeks ago where this interviewer
asked her, how do you dealwith imposter syndrome?
(09:11):
And she's, I don't.
I love it.
Worked for everything thatI've got.
I deserve everything that I've got.
And I'm like, so much of themessaging that I put out on my socials
is fighting the status quo ofwhat has always been.
My official speaker bio says,a challenger of what has always been.
(09:32):
And this is part of it, isthat evangelical women in particular
are not supposed to be strong.
We're not supposed to be bold.
We are not supposed to be outspoken.
We are supposed to be meek andquiet and submissive and not get
angry and not challenge anyone.
And if someone tells us thatwe're wrong, we're supposed to really
think about it.
(09:52):
And are they right?
Am I wrong?
Do they have a point?
That's not what I see in theBible, because what I see in the
Bible says, the Holy Spiritwill come and empower you to do great
works in my name.
Yeah.
And that doesn't say, but onlyif you have a penis.
I love that.
Man.
This is so rich.
(10:13):
This is amazing.
And I have two daughters, so I.
We've taught them to be bold.
And I love that you have this message.
And so this, now, this comesback into the pushback.
So you're in a.
You're in a.
An area that has a lot ofstigma, whether it be from the old
Timey aunties like youmentioned earlier or the, the new
age stuff, all kind of clashing.
(10:34):
And now you're getting pushback.
So first and foremost, walk methrough how you got interested or
how you got into the whole sextherapist thing.
And then after that we'regoing to deal with the pushback.
So let's talk about thejourney into it first.
So a million years ago when Iwas in college, good girls from small
towns didn't go to school tobecome sex coaches.
(10:55):
Good girls from small townswent to school to get their Mrs.
Degree.
And being a good girl from asmall town, I graduated with my degree
in religion and psychology anda few weeks later got the Mrs.
By getting married.
And I remained fascinated withhuman sexuality, studied everything
I could get my hands on andalso remain fascinated with theology,
studied everything I could getmy hands on.
(11:17):
Eventually we got pregnant.
Later in life, I joined aninternational online women's ministry
and I would contribute to theconversations about marriage and
sex.
And I was after a whilegetting brought into those conversations
specifically about marriageand sex.
I was eventually asked to jointhe leadership team for the ministry.
And we were talking and I waslike, you know what?
(11:38):
I want to do this full timewhen my son doesn't need me so much
anymore.
I want to help women havebetter sex.
Because God tells us that hewants abundance for us in all areas
of our life and that includesour sex life.
And it's not just men thatdeserve abundant sex lives.
Women deserve to enjoy sex asmuch as men.
And I want to be part of the solution.
And that was the end of theconversation a couple months later
(12:00):
when a sex had come up againand somebody had tagged me as paging
Angela, the group sexpert.
And we were, the leaders werelaughing about that privately.
And they were like, you know,that should be your tick tock handle
is the Christian sexpert.
And I was like, yeah, sure, whatever.
But I ran over and I reservedthe handle because I was like, maybe
I'll do something with this someday.
And guy laughed at me and he'sthat's not later thing.
(12:21):
This is a now thing.
This is you're gonna do this now.
And the same leader was liketo really make it on TikTok you have
to post four times a day.
I was like excuse me, that's aggressive.
But on I'm also have raging adhd.
And so my brain was like, why not?
So I started posting fourtimes a day.
(12:42):
I started my account in late January.
By Easter, I gone viral with avideo at over 5 million views.
And the whole time God'sgoing, okay, we're gonna do this
next thing.
Okay, here's the next step.
So I the ADHD hyper fixationnever wore off.
And God, the whole time is,okay, you're gonna start coaching.
Okay, you're gonna startdeveloping products to help intimacy
(13:05):
that you're going to publicdigital downloads that you can publish
on your website.
Last, last winter, I got theinvite for the conference in front
of 40, 000 women.
I was like, okay, this is thenext step.
And then immediately afterthat, God said, okay, start writing
your book because you're goingto be po.
You're after the conference,you're going to need a manuscript
started.
So I started writing.
(13:26):
Just yesterday I got a book up online.
It's like a self publishedjournal full of sex prompts.
It's over a hundred sexjournal prompts for you to share
with your spouse.
So the way that it works is ithas a prompt on a page, you choose
a page, you write yourresponse, you give it to your spouse,
(13:47):
they get the opportunity toread your response and answer it,
respond with their ownthoughts, ask questions.
And it's designed to helpcouples have a deeper sexual intimacy
in that area of their lives.
And every step of the way,it's just been me going, okay, God,
I don't know how this is goingto work out, but sure, let's try
(14:07):
it and see what happens, right?
What's the worst that can happen?
It doesn't sell.
Oh, we'll do the next thing.
I love that.
I love that about you and Ilove the confidence that comes off
you like this.
It's refreshing.
It's very refreshing.
And so you're building allthis stuff.
Things are happening.
God's leading you step by step.
Let's move into the pushbackbecause I'm sure there was a bunch.
(14:29):
So much.
I deeply anger a lot of men.
Oh, you anger men more than women.
Some women, but men aredefinitely more vocal about it.
Let's go back to the audacityof a man.
So if you are listening tothis podcast and you aren't watching
the video, I am a fat, shortwoman who, who looks like a librarian
(14:50):
with 17 cats and no husband.
I have a mirror.
I know what I look like, andthat's okay.
I don't look like someone whoshould have any expertise in sex,
let alone be able to teach youhow to do kinky sex, but I can.
And so people get really upsetwhen they hear me talking about sex
(15:13):
education, particularly when Istart talking about mutual pleasure.
When I talk about sex isn'tjust for men.
Women are just as sexual as men.
We are just socialized andconditioned to not be allowed to
express our sexuality in thesame way that men are.
And men get so angry, andthey're like, you just hate men and
(15:33):
you don't want.
You're not having any sex, soyou don't want anybody else having
any sex either.
And I get all of these hatefulcomments all the time on my socials.
And depending on the severityor what they're saying, I may respond
or I may delete the comment.
I tend to delete comments thatare just horrifically attacking my
(15:57):
appearance.
I have a hard line on anyonethat attacks my husband.
So if you make a comment aboutmy husband, I am the one who has
chosen this for my profession.
My husband does not activelychoose to be attacked online, and
that's a hard boundary for me.
So if anybody makes a commentabout disparaging my husband in any
(16:19):
way, that's immediately goingto get deleted because you don't
have he.
That isn't his choice.
I understand that when I'mchoosing to put my image out online
that I am opening myself upfor hateful comments about my body.
And that's.
I accept that's the reality.
That doesn't mean I have totolerate them.
I accept that's the reality.
And so that's why I delete anycomments related to my husband.
(16:41):
But some of the comments Irespond to because not because I
think I'm going to change thisparticular man's mind with any sort
of education that I can provide.
I'm putting it out therebecause I hope that his wife sees
it and knows that she deservesbetter, that she deserves a marriage
in which she does not have tohave sex to keep him from having
(17:04):
a temper tantrum, to know thatshe deserves a marriage where she
can.
She and her children are safefrom the whims of a man addicted
to orgasms.
And that's why I respond toangry comments.
But also there is the factthat the algorithm doesn't care whether
they're commenting in supportor disagreement.
(17:27):
Correct.
The algorithm just sees engagement.
And so you want to fight mefor 50 comments in my comment section,
you go for it because you're winning.
Yeah, I'm winning.
I'm getting paid with everycomment you leave.
So my.
My engagement rates and mypayment just go up the more angry
comments I get.
(17:47):
So you want to fight, go for it.
I don't care.
I love that.
And definitely you are livingout your challenge, your Personality.
I love it.
So I.
This brings up two questions,one about the men and one about the
women.
So the man question, what doyou feel is the percentage?
Do you think that the people,the men who are angry is a lower
percentage compared to theones that may not say anything?
(18:09):
Or is this most men?
What does that look like?
I think that it's indicativeof a lot of the things that we see
in society is might makes right.
So it's the ones that are theloudest that people think are the
truest or whatever.
And I don't think that this isall men.
In fact, I have a very loyalfollowing of a small group of men
(18:33):
who are very supportive of my work.
Multiple.
I have multiple mutualrelationships with therapists, sex
addiction therapists who aremen who support my work every day.
But the thing is, and becausemy message is countercultural to
what you're going to see inany sort of evangelical marriage
(18:54):
book, because you pick up anymainstream evangelical marriage book,
it's men need sex, women needemotional connection, men need sex.
And I'm like, that's straight trash.
That is.
There's no scientific orbiblical backing for that.
We have a society of modernAmerican men who have been conditioned
to wrap their entire identityup in their sexual performance.
(19:15):
And they don't have any sortof emotional intelligence education.
And so they think that theonly way that they can connect with
their spouse is through their penis.
And that threatens the statusquo of so many marriages because
that's expecting the man to bebetter, that's expecting the man
to grow.
And so it makes sense that I'mgoing to anger those men because
(19:38):
that means he's going tosuddenly have to start working for
what was freely on offer.
They don't want to do that.
Nobody wants to have thestatus quo of their life threatened
when they've already got it oneasy street.
So it makes sense.
I don't think that it's all men.
I don't even think it's most men.
I think it's men who feelpersonally threatened by my messaging.
(20:00):
So that's good.
That and good.
Please engage with me.
Because if you're engagingwith me, then maybe your wife will
see my content and she'lllearn something.
I love that.
So we're saying like the menwho are more in that alpha male,
dictator, manipulative role.
Yes.
Then this brings theconversation to the women, because
now I'm curious what kind ofpushback you get from them.
(20:23):
Because I can see the pushbackfrom the women, from the men.
And you've even said it like,they're attacking your appearance.
They're attacking differentthings like that.
But help me understand, whatare the pushback from the women you're
getting?
So if I'm receiving pushbackfrom women, it is usually women who
have swallowed the patriarchywhole and like, really believe that
(20:44):
sort of messaging forthemselves as well.
And it makes sense, because ifa woman is upset by the messaging
of mutual pleasure in hermarriage, then she has to take a
hard look at her marriage andthink really hard about what she
has been subjecting herself tofor many years and what she has possibly
taught her children and whather daughter might be subjecting
(21:05):
herself to in her own marriage.
And that is a hard thing tolook at, to know that maybe I got
this wrong all these years andI could have had better.
That's a huge pill to swallow.
So then, what are some of the comments?
What do they tend to attack you?
Is it just, no, you're wrong,or is it.
Do they attack the way you look?
What does that look like?
(21:26):
It's rare that a woman attacksthe way that I look.
Okay?
It's happened.
In fact, the only one time Ican think of it, I made a response
video showing my entire bodydancing very badly because I'm completely
uncoordinated and.
Made the point that I am too.
Made the point that I'm fat.
I know that I'm fat, but thatdoesn't make me wrong.
(21:48):
Here's the attention that youwere looking for with your comment.
So the comments that I usuallyget from women are, the Bible says
you can't deprive each other.
And we need to look at thatverse, first of all, in its proper
historical and cultural context.
Right?
Because that verse has beentaken out of its context and tried
to.
(22:08):
People want to shove that intoa modern American context.
And that verse is weaponizedprimarily against women to say that
women can never say no totheir husbands.
Or you can say no, but not toooften, first of all.
Or you can say no, but youhave to have a good reason.
Who decides how much is toooften and who decides what a good
reason is?
First of all, yeah, definitely.
(22:29):
Second of all, that verse waswritten to a people who were living
wildly different lives than weas modern Americans are living.
They were.
They were worshiping false gods.
And one of the gods in Corinthdemanded celibacy as a form of worship.
(22:49):
And when Poe was writing tothem, he we've got this congregation
of new believers because,remember, everybody was a new believer
then.
There was no esteemestablished Church fathers, everybody
was a new follower of Jesus.
All we had was Jewishtradition to fall back on.
We didn't have 2000 years ofChristianity to fall back on.
So we've got these newbelievers that have been using celibacy
(23:12):
as a form of worship to theirfalse gods.
They're meeting Jesus, getting saved.
We love to see it.
But now they think in order toworship a God, I have to be celibate.
Okay, I'll be celibate as worship.
Because that's what theyunderstood as a form of worship.
And Paul was saying, Jesusdoesn't want your celibacy.
There's no reason for you tobe celibate as a form of worship.
(23:34):
If you're married, have sexbecause it's good.
Yeah, it was not saying.
Yeah, exactly.
It was not saying that youcan't ever say no.
It was literally saying thatsex is supposed to be mutually pleasurable
and if it's not mutuallypleasurable, you shouldn't be doing
it.
Yeah, but we have so many pastors.
I have, I get sent almost weekly.
(23:57):
Pastors in American pulpitstoday preaching a gospel of obligation
sex, that it is sacrificiallove to have sex even if you don't
want to be having sex.
And there is zero model forthat in the Bible because these men
are taking that verse out ofcontext and creating entire sermons
around it and telling thewomen in their congregations that
(24:18):
you need to be having bad sexthat you don't want because that's
what makes God happy.
Yeah, absolutely.
Sermons every week.
And when I'm getting pushback,it's primarily the Bible says you
can't deprive each other.
And I'm saying that's not it.
That's not what it's saying.
So I think that's a momentjust for the listener.
I do want to say this is agreat opportunity for the listener
(24:39):
to challenge long held beliefs.
And ask yourself a reallyimportant question, what is traditional
and what is biblical?
Because they oftentimes don'tgo together.
And so we've had 2,000 yearsof tradition that some faiths will
say is greater than the actualwhat the Bible says.
So make sure you'rechallenging yourself and going back
like the Bereans.
It said the Bereans were seenas a noble because they went back
(25:01):
and challenged Paul.
So to you, the listener, makesure you go back and challenge some
long held beliefs and see whatthe Bible actually says about that.
So I wanted to take a momentand share that with them because
I'm loving this conversationand I'm absolutely so grateful for
you to be on because like,even at the time, you know, the.
As a former pastor, as aformer thing, I'm very big because
(25:22):
I was saved out of witchcraft.
So I didn't come in, grow upinto the church.
So I actually had a differentmindset reading scripture.
And a lot of what was writtenin Ephesians and things like that
was because the church, notthe church, but the local religions
were worshiping sex throughgoing in, hiring prostitutes.
So a lot of what in the Bibleis written in counteraction to the
(25:43):
local practices.
So with that all being said,okay, so we're now in a modern day
and you're finding thesechallenges where you've got the traditions
versus not understanding whatthe Bible actually says and why it
was written to counteractthose false teachings.
What are some, I think yousaid it earlier, emotional intelligence.
What are some things to buildthe emotional intelligence in the
(26:04):
relationship to make sure thatwe get more into a biblical alignment
as opposed to a traditional alignment?
That's a really big question.
That could be like a whole series.
By itself, really could.
Let's, let's give a couplebullet points.
Let's go for that.
Let's start with therapy.
The answer nobody wants tohear, but everybody needs therapy.
If you realize that you havebeen looking to sex to create and
(26:31):
maintain the intimacy in your marriage.
If you need to have sex inorder to feel emotionally connected
to your spouse, because it'snot just.
There are some women who fallinto this trap as well, please get
therapy, because that istelling me that at some point there
was a breakdown and yourealize that the chemicals produced
during sex feel really goodand they help you to numb out maybe
(26:56):
some hard things in your life.
And so you may well needcoping tools, healthy coping tools
to deal with hard things inyour life that don't involve the
use of someone else's body.
So that's the first one.
And then let's say you're like.
That feels drastic.
I don't think that ourmarriage is.
Is that serious, but I feellike we could maybe just use a little
(27:17):
direction to move towards amore balanced approach.
There's actually 13 differenttypes of intimacy that we can experience
in marriage, and sex is onlyone of them.
And so I think it's reallyhealthy if listeners understand that
there's multiple forms of intimacy.
And sex is supposed to be thecelebration of intimacy that you've
already established beforeyou've ever reached the bedroom.
(27:39):
And when you frame it that wayand when you start intentionally
investing into the otherintimacies, sex starts to flow naturally
because you have something to celebrate.
And on my website, I have aproduct called the 31 days of intimacy.
It walks you through each ofthe different intimacies in very
practical ways.
But you can also go on mysocial media accounts and search
(28:01):
hashtag 13Intimacies.13 searchhashtag 13Types of intimacy to see
the educational videos where Italk about these things.
It's not.
I.
This is not just like a salespitch because I do put out a lot
of content about the differenttypes of intimacy.
So to the listener, just tolet you know, just a reminder, everything
(28:24):
will be in the show notes foryou to just click on and shoot over
to where these things are located.
Because we want to make thingseasy for you to connect with our
guests, because our guestshave spent a lot of time building
their expertise.
And for you, we want to makesure it becomes so easy to be able
to connect with them.
And you should be connectingwith Angela because this is powerful
stuff.
All right, this brings upanother interesting question, and
(28:46):
I'm enjoying this conversationa lot.
So rich with so much stuff.
How do you tell if sex in yourmarriage has become an idol?
Oh, my gosh.
That's a.
Another huge question.
I'm big on huge questions.
Apparently you are.
I'm not sure that I've everhad that question phrase that way
to me either.
So that's really interesting.
I would say one of the firstthings is, do you feel entitled to
(29:10):
sex?
Do you feel like you are owed sex?
Do you have an emotionalreaction if your spouse says, I'm
not interested tonight?
And when I say emotionalreaction, people get really upset
because they're like, they'rerejecting me.
I should be upset, blah, blah, blah.
I'm like, okay, first of all,your spouse not being interested
in sex does not automaticallyequate a personal rejection.
(29:30):
As you have a person.
That's not what that means.
It means that they had a hardday at work.
It means that she's been homewith three puking kids all day, and
there is nothing in the worldthat's going to make her feel sexy
after being puked on for 12 hours.
Sure.
That's not a personalrejection of you as a person.
Right.
So if you have a lot of bigfeelings that you accept, expect
(29:52):
your spouse to resolve for youwhen they say no to sex.
You probably have made sexinto an idol and you might have a
pornified mindset.
And if you are curious tolearn about a pornified mindset,
I encourage you to look up Dr.
Andrew J.
Bauman's work.
He does a lot of work with menand pornified mindsets in particular.
(30:16):
But a pornified mindset turnswhat is supposed to be a mutually
pleasurable spiritualexperience between a married couple
into a commodified somethingfor personal consumption and personal
pleasure.
It is turning sex into.
It's not about celebrating intimacy.
It's about, I want to feelgood, I want to get off.
(30:39):
And you as my spouse are thelegal way for me to do that.
So you owe this to me.
That's good.
So then here's the thing.
Here's another question.
This is.
This conversation has been so good.
Like, I'm.
I know we're ready to almostland the plane on this particular
episode, and I am 100 going tohave you back on a future episode
as well, if you're willing tocome back, because this has been
(31:00):
very, absolutely powerful, andit's been very empowering.
And I hope you, as thelistener gets this as well.
So this kind of runs down intoa question I had.
And.
And at first I was like, wait,what was the question I was asking?
But then I was like, oh, yeah,that's the question.
What happened?
Would.
Would you read Dr.
Andrew Baum about thepornified mind, which I'm fascinated
(31:22):
about that.
Have you found.
And I know we dealt with men,but have you found that some women
have the same type of mindset?
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Women using pornography is nottalked about nearly enough in evangelical
culture because it goes backto this idea that sex is for men,
and women don't enjoy sex asmuch as men do.
(31:43):
And it pres.
It often presents differentlyin women.
This is when I start to pissoff the women.
We need to talk about thespicy books.
Okay.
Because that's.
Yes, talk about it.
Let's go.
Let's hear this.
That.
That is.
That's stereotypicalpornography for women is the spicy
(32:03):
books.
And I have a lot of women whoask me, is it a sin to read a spicy
book?
And I'm like, first of all,like, why are you.
Why.
Why do you want to read that?
And a lot of women are tellingme we're.
We're in a season.
We have a lot of young kids.
I don't.
It's really hard for me tohave an orgasm.
We don't have a lot of time.
(32:24):
And so reading this turns meon so that we don't have to take
as much time in bed.
And, like, you arecircumventing the real authentic
work of intimacy in your marriage.
You are turning to Somethingand somebody else for what is meant
to be your and your husband's job.
I understand not having a lotof time.
(32:47):
We co slept with our son forthe first seven years of his life.
Like he would not get out ofour bed.
He has a spicy brain.
It wasn't a matter ofdiscipline, it was a matter of survival.
And we had to be creative with when.
And my husband for a seasonwhen my son was 3, was an over the
road truck driver.
(33:08):
He would be gone for threeweeks at a time.
I wouldn't see him, he'd behome for three days.
Then he'd be gone for anothermonth and I wouldn't see him.
And so if we were gonna havesex, like there was a lot of pressure
to have sex in those threedays that he was home.
And we know that obligationkills desire.
So that further complicates things.
And so that spicy books are away that women turn sex into a commodity
(33:31):
for consumption is a quick fixto a problem that needs addressed
by both.
By both spouses.
And rather than investing thetime and the work and the emotional
energy, it feels like a quickway to solve the problem.
That's great.
I appreciate the answer.
And just for you, thelistener, we're an equal opportunist
here at the Grace and the Grind.
(33:52):
We like to piss everybody off,so we like to do both sides.
Matter of fact, we just liketo challenge long held beliefs and
whatever your emotionalresponse to that is on you.
But we pray for you all the time.
So with that being said, Ithink this is a great place to start
landing the plane of thisepisode and then just plan for another
one a few months down the road.
And I just want to say, if youare a wife who has been using spicy
(34:15):
books as a way to jump startyour sex drive, it is most likely
that you lack an understandingof the way that your body is physiologically,
emotionally, mentally designedto respond to sexual context.
And that is one of the thingsthat I love to work out with couples
in coaching is to figure outhow you can work together to get
(34:39):
that same jump start withoutturning to external sources like
spicy books.
I love that.
With that all being said,there's two last things that we want
to do.
Number one, I want to get youto do a wisdom bomb.
If you're a long time listenerof the show, you know what that means?
It means a portable truth thatyou can take and leave right now
and apply to your life.
And then we also want to know,how do we find you?
(35:00):
So go for it.
The wisdom bomb would be thatsex is designed to be mutually pleasurable
and if it's not mutuallypleasurable, you shouldn't be doing
it.
We all, we only do mutualpleasure here.
And if you want to find me, Iam the Christian sexpert across all
socials and my website isthecri.com wonderful.
Thank you so much for beinghere on the show and thank you to
(35:22):
the listener for making it tothe end of this episode.
This has been a fiery episode.
Leave some reviews, ask somequestions, and I will highly recommend
that you check the links outand go see Angela on all of her socials
so that you can learn deeperon how to have proper biblical sex
as well as deeper emotionalintimacy with your spouse.
(35:43):
And with that being said,Angela, thank you so much for being
on the show.
Thank you for having me.
And go have good sex.
That's it.
And then so make sure youagain, check the show notes.
And we're just going to inviteyou to go check out an episode previously
to this that you may havemissed or wait for the future episodes
that come out weekly.
With that being said, we'llsee you on the next one.
This has been Grayson the Grind.
(36:04):
We hope you've enjoyed the show.
If you did, make sure to like,rate and review and we'll be back
soon.
But in the meantime, find uson social media at Lead with Jim.
Take care of yourself andwe'll see you next time on Grace
in the Grind.
Host
Jim Burgoon
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!