6.12.2008

Issues of Homosexuality

As I write this post I am at the annual conference of the West Ohio Conference of our denomination, and I am deeply disappointed. In a close vote our conference voted to explore material about homosexuality with an open mind and to seek God’s will concerning inclusiveness. The legislation that passed was not and out and out endorsement of homosexuality as valid and moral expression of human sexuality, however it was a step in that direction. I do not typically post on these issues, because with the primary audience of this blog this is a settled issue, but today I am going to post on this today for various reasons which I will form as questions.

Question #1
Should the Church of Jesus Christ be inclusive?

YES – The Church should be inclusive, actively seeking the lost for the purpose of bringing them to repentance and faith in Jesus Christ. We should indeed bring the gospel invitation to all people of all colors, gender, class, sexual orientation and so on. I do not believe this to be up for debate and my assumption is that all peoples both liberal and fundamental agree with this.

Question #2
Does nature point to the will of God?

YES – Scripture is clear that the glory of God is revealed through nature in many ways. Nature is a means of inspiration to us, and we can draw countless parallels of nature to Godliness and so on. In a sense we can even consider the revelation of nature as authoritative considering that God holds those who have not heard the gospel accountable based on His truth revealed in nature. (You have to be very careful here.)

Question #3
Does homosexuality occur in nature?

YES – It does, and that really is not up for debate. Murder, rape, polygamy, promiscuity, theft, deception, and so on also occur in nature as well as a plethora of other sins. Moreover sin is natural to all unconverted peoples, as original sin is evident in all of humanity. Natural certainly does not mean excusable.

Question #4
Is there any reason to believe that someone who engages in physically homosexual relations is any less a candidate of salvation than anyone else?

NO – It is important as fundamental Christians that we do not segment homosexual behavior into a separate class away from all sin in general. I know that most agree with this in theory, however in discussion and practice typically fundamental individuals will treat homosexuality in a completely different light than they do other sin. Remember, homosexuality is not the only ‘abomination’ in scripture.

Question #5
Should the Church of Jesus Christ be open to the acceptance of homosexuals into their membership, and moreover allow them to preach, teach, and lead?

YES – Under the condition of repentance, genuine conversion, and repudiation of their sin. A homosexual is as much a candidate for membership and Christian service as any other sinful person. The conditions for their membership and employment in Christian service ought to be no different then any other person. Recall the conversion of any genuine Christian and know that they have been brought to a place of loathing sin and desiring righteousness.

So what is the point??
I have posed 5 basic questions answered them with a simple yes or no and then appended an explanation. The explanations and answers are biblical, however if you remove the explanations and leave the questions as a simple yes or no you could see a very different picture emerge. Look at it this way.

Should the church of Jesus Christ be inclusive? – Yes
Does nature point to the will of God – Yes
Does homosexuality occur in nature – Yes
Is there any reason to believe that someone who engages in physically homosexual relations is any less a candidate of salvation than anyone else? – No
Should the Church of Jesus Christ be open to the acceptance of homosexuals into their membership, and moreover allow them to preach, teach, and lead? – Yes

You see if you just take the questions and the yes or no answer to them you can paint a pretty strong picture that tends to embrace what many call the homosexual agenda. These questions are posed over and over in order to get people to come to the logical conclusion that homosexuality within the Church is proper and acceptable. With out any biblical search into why the answers to these questions are yes or no we will not get a true picture of what God’s will is in this issue.

Now, there is another issue at hand here, and I believe that the forces of wickedness behind the homosexual movement are merely using homosexuality as a decoy. Fundamentalists, Focus on the Family, all the end timers, and so on have become so focused and intent on pulling the weeds of homosexuality out of the church that they have allowed giant oak trees of lust, deceit, divorce, pride, and so on grow with out even noticing. The professing church has completely abandoned holiness, and has even come to the point were she does not even have any real expectation of holiness from its ranks. However everyone feels good about themselves as long as they are against something unholy.

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