MY VIEWS ON HOMOSEXUALITY
I have been asked to give my views on what I believe regarding homosexuality and civil unions.
First let me say that my views may differ from what mainstream Christianity has to say today BUT I believe it is in line with what God’s Word says.
In Genesis we find the story of Sodom. Lot was willing to give up his virgin daughters but instead the group wanted his two guests the male strangers to have “sex with them.”
Lot pleads with the group “please do not do this wicked thing.”
So Lot was told to leave the town and Sodom was destroyed. (Genesis 19:1-10)
We have the Levitical Laws which were Jewish laws. They say…..
Lev 18:22 (ESV): You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.
Lev 20:13 (ESV): If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.
Now I have had people say. What about wearing cotton/polyester blends or eating shellfish. That is against the Judaic law as well. Some Christians say that we are not under the law but under grace. While that is true we have to remember to take in the whole council of God. Scripture truly does interpret scripture.
The New Testament lets us know what portions of the Law that are no longer binding to the Christian. When portions of the Law are specifically mentioned in the NT as no longer binding, then we are no longer obligated to keep them. Hebrews 12 says that we are no longer bound to sacrifice animals to atone for sin, because Christ's sacrifice on the cross is sufficient. The earlier Judaic law said we do. We are just recognizing that Christ was the final sacrifice. We are no longer bound by the dietary or ceremonial laws as modern day Christian believers. (Galatians 3:10-13)
In Romans we are told:
18The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
21For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.
24Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
26Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. 27In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.
28Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. 29They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32Although they know God's righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.
And again in 1st Corinthians 5:
1It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that does not occur even among pagans: A man has his father's wife. 2And you are proud! Shouldn't you rather have been filled with grief and have put out of your fellowship the man who did this? 3Even though I am not physically present, I am with you in spirit. And I have already passed judgment on the one who did this, just as if I were present. 4When you are assembled in the name of our Lord Jesus and I am with you in spirit, and the power of our Lord Jesus is present, 5hand this man over to Satan, so that the sinful nature may be destroyed and his spirit saved on the day of the Lord.
6Your boasting is not good. Don't you know that a little yeast works through the whole batch of dough? 7Get rid of the old yeast that you may be a new batch without yeast—as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. 8Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old yeast, the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with bread without yeast, the bread of sincerity and truth.
9I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— 10not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. 11But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat.
12What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? 13God will judge those outside. "Expel the wicked man from among you."
So there you have it. In the Old Testament God tells us the He see’s homosexuality as an abomination.
In the New Testament Paul is giving us the reason why. God gave them over……
Our mandate is not to hate the homosexual outside the church but to show him or her God’s love and try to bring them into fellowship with a loving God.
We are however not to accept a brother who is caught up in homosexuality or sexual sins or any of the other criteria mentioned in 1 Corinthians 5. We are not to even eat with them.
It is not my job to judge those outside but I am to judge the fruits of those who claim to be brothers in the Lord. We have enough to worry about in our own fellowships. Love the homosexual, pray for them but do not judge them for they are outside of the fellowship
First let me say that my views may differ from what mainstream Christianity has to say today BUT I believe it is in line with what God’s Word says.
In Genesis we find the story of Sodom. Lot was willing to give up his virgin daughters but instead the group wanted his two guests the male strangers to have “sex with them.”
Lot pleads with the group “please do not do this wicked thing.”
So Lot was told to leave the town and Sodom was destroyed. (Genesis 19:1-10)
We have the Levitical Laws which were Jewish laws. They say…..
Lev 18:22 (ESV): You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.
Lev 20:13 (ESV): If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.
Now I have had people say. What about wearing cotton/polyester blends or eating shellfish. That is against the Judaic law as well. Some Christians say that we are not under the law but under grace. While that is true we have to remember to take in the whole council of God. Scripture truly does interpret scripture.
The New Testament lets us know what portions of the Law that are no longer binding to the Christian. When portions of the Law are specifically mentioned in the NT as no longer binding, then we are no longer obligated to keep them. Hebrews 12 says that we are no longer bound to sacrifice animals to atone for sin, because Christ's sacrifice on the cross is sufficient. The earlier Judaic law said we do. We are just recognizing that Christ was the final sacrifice. We are no longer bound by the dietary or ceremonial laws as modern day Christian believers. (Galatians 3:10-13)
In Romans we are told:
18The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
21For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.
24Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
26Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. 27In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.
28Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. 29They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32Although they know God's righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.
And again in 1st Corinthians 5:
1It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that does not occur even among pagans: A man has his father's wife. 2And you are proud! Shouldn't you rather have been filled with grief and have put out of your fellowship the man who did this? 3Even though I am not physically present, I am with you in spirit. And I have already passed judgment on the one who did this, just as if I were present. 4When you are assembled in the name of our Lord Jesus and I am with you in spirit, and the power of our Lord Jesus is present, 5hand this man over to Satan, so that the sinful nature may be destroyed and his spirit saved on the day of the Lord.
6Your boasting is not good. Don't you know that a little yeast works through the whole batch of dough? 7Get rid of the old yeast that you may be a new batch without yeast—as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. 8Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old yeast, the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with bread without yeast, the bread of sincerity and truth.
9I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— 10not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. 11But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat.
12What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? 13God will judge those outside. "Expel the wicked man from among you."
So there you have it. In the Old Testament God tells us the He see’s homosexuality as an abomination.
In the New Testament Paul is giving us the reason why. God gave them over……
Our mandate is not to hate the homosexual outside the church but to show him or her God’s love and try to bring them into fellowship with a loving God.
We are however not to accept a brother who is caught up in homosexuality or sexual sins or any of the other criteria mentioned in 1 Corinthians 5. We are not to even eat with them.
It is not my job to judge those outside but I am to judge the fruits of those who claim to be brothers in the Lord. We have enough to worry about in our own fellowships. Love the homosexual, pray for them but do not judge them for they are outside of the fellowship
Tags: gay, homosexuality, judge, pride
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by John D. McDonald on -
Thanks Jim for another great post.
We demonstrate love to our covenant brothers by holding them accountable to the Word of the covenant, which is an individuals rights and responsibilities in the covenant. If we don't hold them accountable then we do not demonstrate love, we demonstrate the opposite of love which is apathy or indifference. Which then means you don't care about the one in sin, for you won't correct them, neither do you care for the rest of the family, because your failure to address sin, then leave the rest of the family in a position to face judgement.
As to those outside the camp, we have to give them the love of Christ by living righteously, so they see there is a better way, and will enquire of us, why are you different.
When we deal with sin in the camp, those outside will recognise we are different.
After all sinners will sin, what God is concerned about is those in the family sin.
John
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Permalink Reply by Jim Wright on -
Thanks John. Took me a while to put my thoughts down on this subject. I am definitely NOT from the Fred Phelps school of theology.
God Bless you Brother
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Permalink Reply by Pathways Of Grace on -
The Law is the judgement of sin. The promises under Grace are the gift from God to free us from the bondage of sin. That being the case sin is being dealt with either the Law or by Grace. Forgiveness is the cornerstone of Grace, however we find judgement again when it comes to sin.
So what does all that mean?
It means if you are a Christian struggling with overcoming a sin, God's grace holds you until you do. However if you embrace the sin then you are under condemnation through the judgement found in the Law. Homosexuality is an abomination before the Lord. He destroyed two city/states that were reveling in that particular sin.
I think God has an opinion on this!
Every sin puts you under condemnation IF there is no repentance. Truly it is said that there are the sons of perdition and the sons of God. One is under the Law and the penalties that go with it. The other is under Grace by profession of faith and the living of it. Repentance is the foundation for forgiveness and that is the cornerstone of Grace. If there is no repentance there is no forgiveness.
And ultimately there is no Grace.
Be blessed, be loved and be at peace,
Jonathan
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Permalink Reply by Jim Wright on
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hey thats what i said lol
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