You can be a Gay Christian article
This one is a response to the article above. As a preface it is important to establish that scripture does not offer any less condemnation to a sexually immoral life of a homosexual than a heterosexual. Too often churches will attack and rally against homosexuals without addressing the rampant divorce, infidelity, and lust that goes on within its own walls. Christians are not here to judge the world, in 1 Corinthians Paul mentions that we should “judge our own” for the sake of the gospel, it is not the churches’ reign to turn the homosexuals into heterosexuals it is the churches’ job to introduce people to Jesus, the Jesus in the Bible.
First Premise: I agree most people don't know the Word of God nor treat it as such, however I am not one of those people and I do know the Word fairly well and have the resources to understand it, in addition I have the Holy Spirit in me to guide my studies among other things.
As I recall Jesus talks about sex on numerous occasion, such as defining lust and addressing the situation with the woman caught committing adultery to name a couple. Jesus was very clear in defining lust that sexual sin occurs far before the physical realm. The Jewish prophets did not mention homosexuality, okay they are prophecies the books of the law did mention it, and I will get there on that point. That does not mean the epistles have not addressed this issue.
In response to the claim “homosexuality as it is known today” is never mentioned in scripture, I refer to Romans 1 when Paul describes how people exchanged the truth and continued to exchange they get to the point of "exchanging natural desires for unnatural ones... men being enflamed with lust for one another".
Second Premise: I agree that misinterpretations have lead to many deaths and bad things, the Crusades and Spanish Inquisition are among some of the worse things the church has lead. I do not believe we should go about killing homosexual or abortionists as some "Christian" organizations promote, I think that is far from sharing the love of Christ.
Third Premise: I agree being open to the truth of Scripture we must be actively seeking, new truth... I am not entirely sure about that new truth being the same truth found in Scriptures and the same God since the beginning of existence. I don't think we should condemn people with their sins; that is God’s duty. Sin affects every person, how we deal with it makes all the difference. What I see in this site and in other debates with similar resources are people arguing that they can live the lifestyle they want to and be Christians. That is like me saying I can look at all the porn I want to without it affecting my relationship with Christ, or me saying that I can get drunk every night and be a good Christian. If we think God is not interested in these intimate details of our life then we are not believing in the personal God described throughout the Scriptures. God knows the hairs on our head, how could something as important as this, which has such a huge role in our lives not be important to God?
Fourth Premise: Interesting claim, it starts out claiming that God is not interested in our sex lives, I disagree. The bible is a guide to human life on the earth that we do not belong on (See 1 Peter, We are a chosen people, royal priesthood ect..) I don't see how showing spots in the scriptures that are controversial helps the argument that this is going for, is it trying to divert our attention or what? Keep the focus on the issue at hand.
Fifth Premise: I believe the Word of God literally, I think when God said it is "good" that was a comment on how it should be done. Take note that during creation everything created was "good" but when Adam had Eve as his partner they were "Very good".
Interesting claim that the destruction of Sodom was not related to the homosexuals raiding Lot's home to have sex with the angels; other resources say they wanted to "know" the guests, which in Hebrew is true. The only part they failed to mention is that "know" was the same Hebrew word used when Adam "knew" Eve and she got pregnant. Anyways, I think that is wishful thinking to say that the group of men wanting to rape the Angels had nothing to do with God's judgment on the city. God did make a covenant with Abraham if 10 righteous people could be found the city would be spared, which 10 could not be found, so yes the city was not to be spared. I take the crowd of lustful men as one of the many traits of the evil city, not a separate incident the eve of its destruction.
The approach to Leviticus is funny, at least to me. Once again pointing out other ways we follow or don't follow the Books of the Law correctly and it tries to downplay its message by adding the condemnation of shellfish and playing with pigskin. I have never felt a need to argue for the validity of the laws in the Books of the Law seeing that was the old covenant, Jesus is the new covenant. I understood the Law as an implicit message that the Jews would need to see how impossible it was to do all of those things and rely on God to forgive them of their sins. In the same way we look back to the Messiah to save us, they should have looked forward to the Messiah to save them.
Wow, I am impressed it does address Romans 1:26-27, I disagree with the reason Paul wrote those 2 verses that the link suggests. The links says that those behaviors were behaviors used to honor the Greek gods and that is why they were condemned. I very much disagree, if you look at the greater context of that passage you see that it is talking about people exchanging the Truth of God for something different. Each paragraph people exchange the Truth of God and what they exchange it for gets more debauched each time. I can identify that with my own battles against sin. When I battle it is something that for the most part can be seen as harmless, but that little bit of sin gets me to want more; that is how sin works. We give in to a little bit and as we give in it goes further and further. Jeffery Dalmer provided a good example, he started with pornography and that drove him to pedophile to murder to cannibalism ect...
The bit about the further mentions of homosexuality being different, well I understand that it was common at the time for older men to have sexual relationship with young people, both boys and girls. This was a social thing for the empire, I like to take special note that as that practice became widely accepted in the Roman empire, the empire collapsed, I site that as the social breakdown being the primary problem of the empire breaking down. The final point in that premise was pretty much saying that the condemnation of homosexuality was not as it is in this culture. I still think Romans 1 best explains and describes why people are homosexual and what God thinks of it.
Premise Six: Homosexuality did not exist until the 19th century... that is if you believe that the descriptions at Sodom was not homosexuality. As well as the mentions of homosexuality in the Epistles as not actually being homosexuality.
Premise Seven: My studies of Scripture has lead me to believe that in order to follow God I must give up my desire to do things that I want to do. This is where I have the most disagreement with the homosexual lifestyle, it promotes the idea to do what people want. With this line of thinking it is hard to find real reasons against homosexuality in the secular atmosphere, but in the Christian lifestyle I cannot see a place for it. It is a behavior that people want hold onto and do, that selfish attitude is what waves my mental flags that this is not a good thing spiritually. Based on my studies of the Bible, love is expressed by us living our lives for God, not for ourselves and abandoning our selfish desires. Every sin in humanity is selfish in someone way or another, selfishness is the root of sin.
Premise Eight: I am not arguing people for their rights, I am arguing if homosexuality is consistent or inconsistent with the Christian life. Marriage is something created by God, don't touch it. As far as rights as a person, I think they already have that until someone infringes on their rights.
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