What is the deal with "Sensuality"

I have to admit, I have often read in the scriptures about "sensuality" in a negative sense, and have just as often wondered what was so wrong with sensuality. Oxford's English Dictionary defines sensuality as "gratification of the senses, self-indulgence", and although our western mindset may tend to place a sexual spin on this, the gratification of our senses can be done in any number of ways. From eating a candy bar, to sitting on a beach feeling the breeze, to sleeping late, to taking a hot bath, to even drinking our favorite soft drink...all of these things are done as a self-indulgence and are not strictly necessary for our health.

There are no less than 10 separate scriptures which speak of sensuality in a negative light (Mark 7:22, Romans 13:13, 2 Corinthians 12:21, Galatians 5:19, Ephesians 4:19, 1 Peter 4:3, 2 Peter 2:2, 2:7, and 2:18, and finally Jude 4). Let's take one for example: Galatians 5:19 lists sensuality as one of the 15 "works of the flesh", later juxtaposing them against the fruits of the Spirit. Further, we are earlier in Galatians 5 told that the desires of the flesh (of which this is one) are against the desires of the Spirit. Sounds like some pretty serious stuff.

So what is the deal? Why is something as seemingly innocuous as drinking a soft drink or taking a hot bath in the same ballpark as idolatry, sexual immorality (which is listed separately in the Galatians passage), sorcery, and fits of anger?

Bible translations other than the ESV list this as debauchery, licentiousness, or lasciviousness. The actual Greek word used here (and in all of the other 9 instances in the New Testatment) is ἀσέλγεια (ah-thel-gay-ah). This word's actual meaning makes it much more clear as to which behavior the scriptures are referring. One of the best definitions for this word I have found lists it as "an absence of restraint and/or an insatiable desire for pleasure, carried to the extreme of complete disregard for the integrity or dignity of oneself or others.".

This is one of those cases in which a word in our time (sensuality) just doesn't carry the meaning very well (and the overwhelming majority of us simply don't use words like licentious or lasciviousness in sentences these days...or even well know what they really mean). Clearly someone who is so completely ruled by their senses is not ruled by the Spirit, and we know that man cannot serve two masters, whether those masters be money or earthly pleasures.

Clearly as God's children we are free to enjoy life's physical pleasures within the confines of God's directions for our lives, so these things are not sinful, and neither is the frequent enjoyment of such things.

But when these become (or remain to be) more important to us than God and his will, it is there that we must test ourselves to see if we are really in the faith. Those reborn by the mercy of God will have a changed heart (and over time, a changed mind as well), and their desires for such things will not rule over them, but these desires will be ruled by them.