GAY TRUTH

So-called “same-sex marriage” has never been more popular in America, and whatever garners cultural popularity seeps into the church. You know this. According to the Pew Research Center, among white evangelicals in America, 29 percent now favor allowing gays and lesbians to marry legally — 29 percent of white American evangelicals.  That’s up from 11 percent just fifteen years ago. So that’s a long and steady increase in a rise in affirmation among white evangelicals in America — up from 11 percent to 29 percent in fifteen years. Bill, who is here with us this morning, asks, “Hello, Pastor John. As the LGBT movement strives to become mainstream, I’ve watched more and more believers give in to the culture by posting rainbow-colored affirmations on social media, hanging rainbow flags outside their homes, and even attending pride rallies in my city. I want to believe the best, but I am perplexed. How should we respond to fellow believers who make such affirmations?” How yo...

Let brotherly love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares. Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body. Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous. Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you. So we can confidently say, “The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?” This article by John Piper is built around eight points designed to give a biblical vision of marriage in relation to homosexuality, and in relation to the proposed Marriage Amendment.  I asked that Hebrews 13:1–6 be read not because I will give an exposition of it, but to highlight that one phrase in verse 4: “Let marriage be held in honor among all.” That is what I...

Jesus died so that heterosexual and homosexual sinners might be saved. Jesus created sexuality, and has a clear will for how it is to be experienced in holiness and joy. His will is that a man might leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife, and that the two become one flesh ( Mark 10:6–9 ). In this union, sexuality finds its God-appointed meaning, whether in personal-physical unification, symbolic representation, sensual jubilation, or fruitful procreation. For those who have forsaken God’s path of sexual fulfillment, and walked into homosexual intercourse or heterosexual extramarital fornication or adultery, Jesus offers astonishing mercy. 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 ) But today this salvation from sinful sexual acts was not embraced. Instead there was massive institutionalization of sin. In a 5-to-4 decision, the Supreme Court of t...

Amid ongoing "gay pride" celebrations and the push for gay marriage, influential evangelical John Piper wants to put it all in perspective for the church. "My sense is that we do not realise what a calamity is happening around us," Piper, pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis , wrote in a commentary on Thursday. "Christians, more clearly than others, can see the tidal wave of pain that is on the way. Sin carries in it its own misery." It's been nearly a week now since marriage for gay and lesbian couples was legalised in New York and since hundreds of thousands of Americans celebrated homosexuality with gay pride parades , not only in New York but also in Piper's home state of Minnesota . Homosexuality and its celebration are nothing new, the Reformed pastor clarified. "[Homosexuality] has been here since we were all broken in the fall of man," he wrote. "What’s new is not even the celebration of homosexual sin. Hom...

John Piper (theologian) (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) In modern cultures, every Christian is faced with the problem of homosexuality. Churches are pulled into the tension, too, because “there is  no demilitarized zone  in the homosexual debate.” Shrugging isn’t an option. The implications are all around us, in schools, in politics, in denominational tensions, and — maybe most importantly — in determining how the Church lives out her faithful witness to a culture in desperate need of Christ. With the marriage amendment on the Minnesota ballot, and with a growing list of personal questions, I contacted Dr. Robert Gagnon, a professor of New Testament at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary and a man who has for many years bravely addressed homosexuality from a biblical and theological perspective. In 2002 he published the 500-page book  The Bible and Homosexual Practice: Texts and Hermeneutics . A decade later his work remains the most thoroughly exegetical and herme...

Evangelical leaders across the country are grappling with how to address the issue of homosexuality. They are debating one another through public tweets. Sermons ring with worried qualifications, many of which amount to a plea of desperation: Were against homosexuality but love homosexuals , so please dont hate us. Such pleas are met with derision by many homosexual activists, who say that loving the sinner but hating the sin is a false formulation, since their identity as persons is rooted in their sexual self-identification and practice. When a physician sees a bleeding wound, he can do one of three things: Ignore it; demean it as minor and put a band-aid on it; or treat it appropriately, even if to do so causes pain. Some Evangelical pastors and speakers appear eager to treat the wounds of broken human sexuality in one of the first two ways. Palliative affirmation and willful blindness come more easily than speaking the truth in love. Why? Because it is a natural human tendency no...

The Temptation of Christ, 1854 (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Evangelical leaders across the country are grappling with how to address the issue of homosexuality. They are debating one another through public tweets. Sermons ring with worried qualifications, many of which amount to a plea of desperation: We're against homosexuality but love homosexuals , so please dont hate us. Such pleas are met with derision by many homosexual activists, who say that loving the sinner but hating the sin is a false formulation, since their identity as persons is rooted in their sexual self-identification and practice. When a physician sees a bleeding wound, he can do one of three things: Ignore it; demean it as minor and put a band-aid on it; or treat it appropriately, even if to do so causes pain. Some Evangelical pastors and speakers appear eager to treat the wounds of broken human sexuality in one of the first two ways. Palliative affirmation and willful blindness come more easily than speakin...

Image via Wikipedia John Piper   In view of the recent actions of the Supreme Court in regard to Sodomy laws , and the controversy over actively homosexual bishops in the Episcopalian and Anglican denominations, it is important to bring forward again the position of Bethlehem Baptist Church which the Elders established in the fall of 1992. I drafted this statement with the help of Joe Hallet who came out of the homosexual life by the power of Christ and lived faithfully with AIDS , and eventually with his wife, until his death in 1997. Beliefs about Homosexual Behavior and Ministering to Homosexual Persons Our affirmation that the Bible is the infallible Word of God with "supreme authority in all matters of faith and conduct," and our affirmation that "a Christian should live for the glory of God" include the following six beliefs about heterosexuality and homosexuality: 1. We believe that heterosexuality is God's revealed will for humankind and that, si...