History: About 50 years ago or so an organization developed called The World Council of Churches. The WCC eventually decided to the whole Christian church part was a bit cumbersome and decided to basically become a glorified Salvation Army. Nothing wrong with the Salvation Army. It's just not really the church.
So there was a WCC guy on along with the Christian Coalition guy and of course, since this was NPR, he got very little heat and lots of backing from the callers.
What was particularly vexing, although of course not surprising, was his argument surrounding gay marriage. He had a reasonable point that Scripture has a variety of odd marital arrangements/customs in it--fair enough. But his bottom line? "God just really wants us to love people."
The early church had a variety of Greek words to choose from for the word "love." They chose "agape" which to that point was a seldom-used word. This suited their purposes perfectly, as God's love was beyond any human experience of love and the fact that this word was rarely used gave them permission to freight it with their own meanings.
It's unfortunate that in the English language we've only got one word for love. And the WCC guy was glad to tag God with being "loving" which of course meant we just leave people alone to do what they want to do.
It's interesting that when parents do that, they call it neglect. When God does it, they call that love.
God DOES want us to love people. His love also includes limits, just as any good parent offers limits. There's lots of times my son does not understand my 'no.' There are some 'no's' from Scripture that I do not understand. But I submit to them, because God is God and I'm not. He is love, and I am not. I am not free to take my own definition of love and thrust that onto God. God is love, and so whatever he gives me, whatever blessings he sends my way, whatever he says no to, all that is necessarily what love truly means. If my own definitions do not fit God's actions, it must be my own definitions that are skewed.
And so I'm opposed to gay marriage, even though I think it's truly a raw deal for people who have those inclinations (and I do think that some folks are genetically pre-disposed to homosexuality, just as some folks are genetically pre-disposed to alcoholism). It's not that I hate gay people or am closed off to their struggles, it's just that it's pretty clear from the Scriptures that the God who loves people says that this is not His way.
8 comments:
So I get why you think that gay marriage is wrong for the a "christian." are you opposed to gay marriage from a person that doesn't choose to follow the ways of the Bible?
I think it's also pretty clear from Scripture to give all your belongings to the poor, not retaliate but turn the other cheek when someone punches you, not be rich, let homeless people come into your field and eat your crops, not let menstruous women into church, and not eat pork.
If you expect homosexuals to do what is pretty plain in the Scriptures, do you follow the other moral guidelines that are pretty plain in Scripture?
Royale,
This is so not the point. Of course we recognize that living faithfully and uprightly before God is terribly difficult. But admitting this is not what is being asked of us. We are being asked to affirm behavior that we know to be sinful as holy and good.
Once we establish what goodness is, we of course have the hard task of living it out. And humility is absolutely essential! I admire and feel for Christian homosexuals who have the difficult task of resisting temptation in our culture. But it is not humility to call bad good.
Wonders,
I think was Royale said is the point. The homosexuality question is not pretty plain in scripture.
Let's start with the NT. I'm sure you have heard from the gay agenda or whatever that homosexuality referred to by Paul, was actually referring to the pagan worship rituals and orgies. Well, obviously we can't be sure that is what Paul is referring to or not. But, maybe it is.
So then we have to go back to Mosaic law to back up our beliefs. But wait, we don't follow the cermonial law anymore. We reference the freedom passages of Paul as well as a convaluded dream sequence in Acts to justify eating pork and hanging out with menstating women.
Now I know the difference of cermonial and moral code, but that's because I have been "chiristianized." If one were to take a step back and not apply the many layers of theology, you can see why picking and choosing which Mosaic laws to follow seems to lose some of its creditibilty (especially in light how society has acted towards homosexuals in the past). God forbid our prejudices affect how we read His word, but we know it happens because I do it all the time.
I don't think it is wrong for anyone to believe that homosexuality is wrong. That's our right, and based on how we read scripture, I can see the arguments. I would just caution anyone who says that a controversial issue is "pretty plain" especially when there is so much at stake.
Sads summarized my thoughts quite well. Personally, I think Christians pick and choose which Biblical rules to follow, despite being "plain."
Basically, unless someone does everything the Bible says, no matter how irrational it may seem now, then they must give the benefit of the doubt in other areas, such as homosexuality.
Great dialogue. Alex, I'm glad to see so many people I don't know commenting on your blog.
I guess my thought has to do with the final sentence of the last post. As a Christian, I certainly don't claim to follow all of God's commands. I'll assert publicly to Alex's hundreds (and thousands!) of readers that I regularly fail to fulfill God's most simple and basic commands. I'll go ahead and claim the same for our blog author if I could be so bold.
My understanding of sin is that these failures are not only wretched in themselves but show a much greater issue in my own separation from God. What being a Christian means in my own words is that I accept Christ's perfect life in place of my own and can live forgiven and freed to know God in a real way.
Only from this place to our lives begin to be changed by God to reflect more of who he has made us to be. This is definitely evidenced through a changed life and not an excuse to go on sinning. Our forgiveness also doesn’t change what God is calling us to, which I think follows with Alex’s general thoughts about how sin is established in the Bible. There is still right and wrong in God’s eyes, regardless of how we live. But the reality is that I would be hard pressed to find any Christians who would claim to have stopped sinning completely. They would most likely only claim to be loved by God and invited back into a real relationship with him in spite of their continued sinning because of Christ.
I was going to complain about the title, but then I realized I didn't know if "liberal" referred to theology or politics or both in this case. I'm only complaining if it was used to mean political liberal, hehe.
That is all. ;o)
*politically, not political
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