Weighing in on the Gay Rights/Marriage debate

Disclaimer: This may be unpleasant for some. It’s an assessment of the current and past debates on gay rights and gay culture. I will say upfront I believe it is a sin, as convicted by Scripture (inerrant and infallible).

What could one more person’s post possibly have to say about this issue? Why should you care?

I want to encourage you to think about this issue for yourself. However, realize the impact of this issue reaches to and points to our heart and disposition towards the Bible. Wherever you stand I hope the information in here affects you, makes you feel something and think deep about what this really means.

My own thoughts on the scripture debate are that it is clear, in OT and NT writings how God has weighed in on this.

Leviticus 18:22 You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination

Romans 1:26b-27a …[T]heir women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary with nature and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another…

The first is a judgment on the act. The second illuminates that the sin was a judgment of the unbelief of the people. The people desired sin because they did not desire the Lord’s will.

John Frame, Professor of Systematic Theology and Philosophy at RTS Orlando writes:

“The pro-homosexual exegesis  of these passage is so unpersuasive that it is hard to take as anything other than a cultural reflex.” Doctrine of the Christian Life, 424 (published 2008)

Frame’s analysis is from a few years ago and is more relevant than ever with our current times. The gay exegesis has found its way into our current culture and is now being supported by those who look and talk like conservative evangelicals, but who are using the language only in a connotative way. (They are being persuasive now by questioning the meaning of words, critically assessing the text in light of culture over the whole council of God’s word. See this link from Homebrewed Christianity in 2012).

In the garden of Eden it was noted that man and woman were meant to be together. That this was how the world would work. Love would produce the children and the history of man would unfold likewise. For man to say he knows better and to be with another man is as beautiful as the love of a man and woman is ‘the primal heresy’ (Frame DCL 757). This is Satan’s tactic from the beginning. We believe we know better than God and can run the show better.

The gay argument is that they are in love. It is still sin. The gay exegesis tries to say that our “clobber” word for homosexuality is inaccurate, not biblical etc.

The role of man and woman is made clear in Ephesians 5:22-23. The husband (imperfectly) models Christ. He suffers, works for, builds up, loves, provides for and enriches her life. She, as reflective of the church-the bride gives him sanctuary for his heart, provides, works for, loves and encourages him. There is no such image of Christ and bride as man and man or woman and woman.

However, as with our former selves this sin can be washed away and hope is found in Christ. The Apostle Paul writes “And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God” 1 Corinthians 6:11.

To reach people in sin we do have to understand them and go to them. If we are honest, we will know the measure of grace each of us has received, and continues to be trained by, in order to meet the needs of those around us. We do not have to, and must not, compromise the life that God has called us to in Christ.

Grace and Peace