A response to Brad Chilcott - Jesus and Homosexuality

Although Jesus did not speak explicitly about homosexuality, His implicit references amount to a condemnation of homosexual activity and thought. 

Such implicit references exist in references to Sodom, and they complement His teachings on the nature of marriage, on inward purity, and His insistence on upholding the righteous standards of the Law.

The New Testament speaks with one voice on this subject. Many terms in the lists of vices found in the New Testament correspond closely to language in earlier Jewish literature where writers cite or discuss Sodom and its sin(s). Some terms in the lists of vices are broad enough to include homosexuality, or the words are associated with homosexuality elsewhere. Other references are so narrowly phrased, using such terms as bdelygma and kyōn, that they can hardly refer to anything else.

Opponents might charge that this study reads into the vice lists references to same-gender activity and thought. 

This, of course, is a danger whenever an argument is based upon implicit or circumstantial evidence. On the other hand, implicit references are real references that may have been quite explicit to the culture in which they were communicated. We have sought to peel away the differences in cultural context to show that that the references are so solid that they cannot be ignored.

Any study that overlooks the implicit connections with previous Jewish literature is incomplete. Knowing the reluctance of the biblical writers to be explicit about sexual matters, as witnessed by their employment of euphemism, justifies this inquiry into the literature. 

We summarize the evident attitude: While “fornication,” “lawlessness,” or “arrogance” is not homosexuality, homosexuality is “fornication,” “lawlessness,” or “arrogance.”

It seems inconceivable that a church or individual could appeal to the lack of explicit condemnation by Jesus as implicit approval. This is precisely what occurs at the highest levels of church government. Active homosexuals have become respected members of the church and even ordained for ministry. This rejects explicit ethical demands of the Old Testament as irrelevant, in a new form of Marcionite thinking. Has Brad Chilcott fallen into the same trap? 

If the religious community rejects its own religious documents, or reinterprets them for political correction to find no condemnation of homosexuality, the implications for public morality and public institutions are enormous. 

Why does Jesus stress that we must “Remember Lot’s wife”? Is it not that sudden destruction will come upon a society that abandons itself to depravity? 

Jesus’ warnings were not simply to individuals but to entire communities. Sodom’s judgment, meted out before there was a Jewish people, warns that every society is liable to present and future judgment (Rom. 1:18–2:9; Jude 7). This ongoing revelation is both special and general.

In the words of the church father, Chrysostom, “Sodom is hell revealed before its time.” Brad, we fail to read the warning at our peril.


So What?

Points and implications from this include:

    1.      Jesus implicitly condemns Sodom and the same-gender activity associated with it.

    2.      New Testament catalogs of vices use terms broad enough to include homosexuality, or terms associated with homosexuality elsewhere, or terms that are narrow and certainly refer to homosexuality.

    3.      Jesus and all of the New Testament authors except Luke were Jews, and they drew their concepts and terminology about sexuality from the Old Testament, usually the LXX.

    4.      For Jesus and the early Christians, the Old Testament provided the guidelines for ethics and morals, including homosexuality. The Old Testament ethical system continues in the New Testament. This is particularly true in the area of sexual morality.

    5.      Jesus’ warning about unbelief is a sober warning for contemporary society—sober because it bears the ongoing relevance of God’s judgment on the iniquity of Sodom and its inhabitants, and the sin of Lot’s wife (a lesbian?).

    6.      The warning regarding Sodom and Lot’s wife has both an individual significance as well as a corporate, communal, societal one. Contemporary society, the church, and the individual cannot escape the purview of Jesus’ words.

    7.      The message of the Bible’s teaching on homosexuality, is a reiteration of the message that a homosexual person can change. As is the case for anyone else, forgiveness and deliverance await the homosexual who confesses sin, repents, and puts faith in Christ as Savior. 

Christ became sin on our behalf (2 Cor. 5:21) and became our atonement or satisfaction for our sin (1 John 2:1–2). The act of faith appropriates Christ as deliverer from the karet penalty and makes one a new person, a new creation (2 Cor. 5:17). 

Similarly, the transformation accomplished in the Christian prohibits hating any sinner, including the homosexual. We must not encumber the person, keeping him or her from coming to Christ. By our love the whole world will know that we are Christians (John 13:34–35).


De Young, J. B. (2000). Homosexuality: Contemporary Claims Examined in Light of the Bible and Other Ancient Literature and Law (pp. 229–230). Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications.