Transcript: Lesson 34 - Gay & Lesbian People
Welcome, friends, we are thinking about God's story, who God is as Creator and Redeemer, and how that big story intersects with our story, and specifically, our sexuality, how we think about our marriage, our singleness, how we think about our sexual identity and gender identity? And what those things say about who God is. And these last few units, and then in this final unit, as well, we're thinking about, what does it mean to be the family of God, and specifically how the family of God can walk with LGBT+ people, as we all seek to follow Jesus together, recognizing that we are all in need of the gospel, and recognizing that we all are loved by Jesus. And so as we think about this, so we reflect on this together, I just want to continue to keep in front of us, that reality of, of gospel sexuality, that what we're talking about here is not a, not a legalism, not let's add more rules. But it's it's understanding that God meets us where we're at as sinful people as broken people. But that God doesn't leave us where we're at it, that he is about the business of transforming us in the image of His Son, Jesus, and that through our marriage, or through our singleness, he wants to put on display his love for the world, whether that's in how I love my spouse, to my self giving self sacrificial care, or whether that's how through as a single person, I give of myself, to my brothers and sisters in the body of Christ and, and serve Jesus in that way. So we are all walking this path of discipleship we are all called to put on display the love of Jesus for the world around us. And that as we continually receive His love, we can be a channel of that love to those around us. And so in this unit, we're going to think about what does it mean for Christians to walk well with gay and lesbian people with our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters in Christ? And to wrestle with? What does scripture say? How does Scripture teach us on these matters? And how are we called together to follow Jesus. And so one of the first things I want to do in this first video, we're gonna lay some foundations for, for later videos. And the first thing I want to do is clarify some different terms of language that's often used. A lot of times, I will hear people ask a question like this, is it sin? Is it a sin to be gay? Is it a sin to be gay? And part of the problem with that is that that language actually, is not very precise. When people use the term gay or when people use the term lesbian they can, they can mean a number of different things. They might, for example, mean, when they when they use terminology like that, they might mean something like gay as an identity or gay as an orientation, that part of what they're trying to get at is that there is this, there's this deep seated predisposition or orientation, to be romantically or sexually attracted to people of the same sex. And that part of what this gets at is this, this identity piece that this is part of my experience of who I am, that I think it's become increasingly clear to people that for most folks, orientation is not something that they choose, you know, this is not something where somebody who wakes up one day and says, I want to be straight, or I want to be gay, but that in most people's experience, this is something that is that is deep seated in in who they are and their identity. Now notice when we talk about identity or orientation, that way, part of what we're talking about is is more of a general predisposition. We're not talking about any specific action. And so when we talk about gay or straight as an identity or as an orientation, it's it's more of that overarching sense of predisposition of identity. It doesn't really tell us much, or as we typically use those terms about somebody's sexual activity. Right? If I say that I'm straight, that doesn't tell you whether I'm single, whether I'm married, whether I'm in a relationship, whether I'm sexually active or not. And so one of the problems with how this is sometimes been framed, is that when somebody says something like was, is being gay a sin, this language is actually not very precise and clear. It's not very precise and clear. And so the problem with this, then is we end up saying, well, if somebody has this predisposition or orientation, even if they're not, they're following actually scriptures to command for sexual activity. They're not lusting after people. They're not engaged in sexual activity. But they are they're being honest about this since that I am as a general predisposition on romantically attracted to sexually attracted to people of the same sex, we do realize that that is far different from somebody who is sexually active and out there sleeping with people on a regular basis. And so we have to be clear here in how we're using terminology. Because if we're not we end up calling people to something maybe that Scripture doesn't even call them to. And so in other words, there could be somebody who is who is gay, but they're saying look, I recognize scriptures definition of marriage is that marriage is between a man and a
woman in this one flesh, sexual union. And so I'm a person who is gay, I'm attracted to people of the same sex, but I am bringing my sexuality under the Lordship of Jesus empowered by His Holy Spirit, I believe that I'm called to either walk in this life of celibacy, and singleness, or to enter into a mixed orientation marriage where I'm married to somebody of the opposite sex, even though that's maybe not my, my first inclination. And so somebody could say, Yeah, I'm gay, but they're still living in line with scripture. Whereas, of course, somebody could be straight and be living totally out of line with God's intentions for human sexuality, that, that they could be hooking up with people sexually, that they could be, you know, getting married and divorced for no good reason multiple times have multiple partners. And so we have to be really careful here. Because again, sometimes the way these terms have been used for the church, that has been to kind of say, well, if you're straight your sexuality is, is maybe not fallen not not sinful in the way that a gay person's is. But when we start to think about the complexity of these terms in this language, we start to realize it's more complicated that. Greg Coles in his book, which I'd highly recommend a called "Single, Gay, Christian", even makes what struck me as a really interesting point. He said that as a gay man for him, some of one of his female friends said, you know, I feel comfortable with you in a way that I don't necessarily feel comfortable sometimes with, with straight men. And Greg observes, interestingly, he says, "you know, my gay body knows what most straight men, what will straight Christian men have to learn, which is that a woman's body is not just to be an object, not just to be a sexualized object." And I thought that was interesting, because again, a lot of times we tend to think of, we tend to think of gay Christians, gay people as like, well, they're their sexuality is more broken than straight people. And part of what Greg Coles points out is that, but there's a sense in which he actually has an advantage over me. Because of my straight orientation, I'm more likely to see a woman as just a sexual object. And so when I think about his struggle, it would be that he would tend to see men that way. And I would tend to see women that way. Well, that's a struggle that we both share that we both have in common, there's not a sense in which my, my struggle is better or morally superior to his. And so I really appreciate that because again, it I think it puts us all in the same boat, it helps us recognize we all need the gospel, and we all need Jesus. Now, when we think about some of the discussion around marriage, and how to understand marriage, that has happened in the last several decades within, within Christian circles, I want to highlight a couple of different theological positions, because this is an area where people don't always agree. And so two different positions here, when people think about their theology of marriage and understanding same sex relationships. The the historic view is called this because this, this has been the historic position of the church. This is when you look at 2000 years of church history. There are a lot of things that Christians have disagreed on. But But interestingly, up until the last couple of decades, you know, the definition of marriage is something that the Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Protestants, you know, people all across the board Pentecostals, Presbyterians, you know, Conservative Fundamentalist, Anglicans, right people all across the board, typically held to the view that marriage is between a man and a woman again, going back to Genesis 1 and 2, looking at the creation narrative, seeing how God defines marriage as this one flesh union between a man and a woman two sexually different people. And so you have the historic view, but in especially in the last 30-40 years, and really the last maybe 10 or 15 years in the in the popular level of most churches. You start to you start to see the revisionist view, gain some traction. In this view, sometimes this is called the affirming it's affirming of same sex marriage. And so this view says that marriage is just between two people, that it doesn't matter if they're male and female, it doesn't matter if they're two men or two women, that marriage is really between two people who love each other, who commit themselves to each other, with all that that entails. And so we're going to think a little bit about these, these different positions. One thing that that I want to be clear about, and I'll put my cards on the table, I hold to the historic view that marriage is between a man and a woman, you can probably see that through if you go back and reflect on the previous units, and how we've talked about marriage and thought about the importance of procreation. But, but one thing I want to make really clear here is that I think that you can hold to the historic view, that marriage is between a man or woman and still genuinely love,
gay people, that what's going on what it means to love somebody what it means to care for somebody, what it means to be gracious, and kind, and gentle to people, that all of those things are biblical values, too. And so the point here, in emphasizing in talking to these things, and holding to the historic view, the point here is not to hold that view, with a kind of hatred in my heart, or hold that view with the kind of superiority like I'm better than somebody else. But simply to try to acknowledge this is what Scripture teaches, it is God's intention it is God's best for humanity and, and to do my best to live that out in my own marriage context, and be willing to walk alongside people who are themselves struggling to get this. And so again, here, I think it's really important that Christians are consistent. And so I'm willing to walk alongside my friends or people in my church who are struggling sexually with straight sexual sin. So people struggling with pornography, people struggling with marriages that are not functioning as they should people involved in sex outside of marriage, and figuring out how to how to heal broken relationships there. I recognize that even where there's brokenness and sinfulness, God can still be at work. And I'm still called to walk alongside people. And so I think it's utterly inconsistent and hypocritical, if we're willing to walk alongside each other as we struggle with straight sexual sin. But then we were to say, Well, if you're a gay person and struggling with, with sexual sin, as a gay person, I'm not going to walk alongside of you, I'm not going to be present in your life, you have to get everything together. And then you can come and be part of our church and walk with us. And so, you know, life is, is complicated life is messy. As we walk on this journey of following Jesus together, I think it's important that we, that we be consistent that we that we are gracious and truthful, to everybody. And so that, that's just my disclaimer, I hope as we walk through this, that you can hear that come through, in my tone and my my posture, that sense of love and care for everybody. I want to make a couple of biblical observations that I think are important here, especially because of the way gay people have have often been almost demonized within Christian circles. So So here are a couple of observations first, same sex sexual activity is not commonly named or or it's not commonly called out in Scripture as a sin. So this is this is on the people point out in a number of different contexts. I want to highlight here, just the fact that it's not like, Scripture repeatedly says, here is let me tell you the worst sin, it's same sex, sexual activity. In fact, you know, we realize when the Bible talks about sexual immorality, it usually does talk about it in that broad sense. It doesn't just say, well, this kind of sexual immorality is really bad that this kind is okay. And so if we look at our churches, if we look at how Christians approach gay and lesbian people, if I see that my church is like calling out and pointing out the sin of gay people, in a way that is just disproportionate to how scripture talks about it, then that's probably a problem. Right? And it's an indicator to me that, you know, oftentimes we kind of block out the sins that the Bible might be pointing out in our lives, so that we can focus on sins going on in in others. And so just realize that Scripture, the Scripture is not about harping on gay people. It's not about repeatedly calling out same sex sexual activity as a sin. I think this is more about translation. And that is, when we look at the Bible, which is originally written in Hebrew. And in Greek, it's important to think through what are the words in the Hebrew and Greek, trying to communicate. And this is where when you look at a little bit older translations, I think it's not. Some older translations will translate Greek words with English words like homosexuals. And part of the problem with that, I think, is that it's not precise enough. In other words, if you go back to the previous slide, where we were talking about how people use the term gay, that when people use the term homosexual, which, again, is not a term that people use all that much today, partly because it's clinical, it sounds a little bit disconnected. But when we think about a word like homosexual, that doesn't clear it sounds like just orientation. When in fact, what happens when you dig into the words that are going on there in Scripture, what you find is that the words are actually talking about sexual activity. So it's not just that somebody has a certain orientation, it's that somebody is actually engaging in same sex, sexual activity. And so this is where again, it's important that we are precise and clear about what the Bible is prohibiting and what it isn't. It's not saying that just a gay orientation in and of itself is sinful. And so all gay people have to become straight. But in fact, it's calling out same sex sexual activity. And that's that's what the focus is. The other thing I want to note here is that when the Bible does mention same sex, sexual activity, it's
always in the context of other sins. This is similar to the point I made in the first bullet point here, which is that it's not held up as like, here's the worst of all sins. It's listed, even when it's talks about in Romans 1, it then Paul talks about all kinds of other sins in terms of things, including things like gossip and drunkenness, and being disobedient to parents. All right, so there's a whole list of sins here. The point is not that this is held up as being something really bad, but it's actually generally listed along with with other sins, that that many of us are involved in as well. And so, again, part of what this does, is it helps deconstruct this idea that somehow same sex sexual activity is the sort of the worst of all sins and kind of set apart. Finally, just to continue to drive this point home, same sex, sexual activity is never seen in Scripture as more heinous more disgusting, more problematic than other sins. You know, in fact, this is where people you know, rightly point out if you want to talk about what kind of sins Scripture does focus on, Scripture says far more about the sin of greed and how we use money, how do we use our possessions. But for a lot of North American Christians, at least, we can kind of turn a blind eye to that. Even though if you if you look statistically, if, if you make more than $30,000 a year, as an American, you are in the 1% of the world's population when it comes to wealth. And so it's easy for us to kind of turn a blind eye to text that might hit closer to home, and focus on something that that really makes us feel good, because we can then talk about the sins of other people and maybe how they struggle. And so all this is, is to say that when you look at scripture, Scripture never sets apart gay people and never sets apart same sex sexual activity as as this really bad thing as this most horrible of sins. And so this is where I think we have to let how we talk about things, imitates scripture that we make sure that we're not engaging in rhetoric that talks about same sex sexual activity as though it's, it's, it's worse or as though gay people are somehow worse than straight people or the other sins that we might wrestle with. I also want to make a couple of pastoral observations here. I would encourage you and in our short time together, we don't have a lot of time to to walk through this. But I would encourage you to recognize that one of the main callings here for for folks in ministry, and even those who are lay leaders in church is to do good pastoral care. What I found is that most gay lesbian people are more than more than aware of what Christians believe about marriage. And so what they don't necessarily need is, you know, here more verses telling you about God's intentions for marriage. Here's what God says about sex. They need people to walk alongside them and listen to their struggles, listen to their, their hurt and the pain that they carry, and, and even to listen so that you can get a sense of what they know about what it means to follow Jesus and how, oftentimes how difficult that that is and listen to the kind of suffering that they have experienced. And so it's important that we do pastoral care in a way that says, that makes people feel safe that says, if somebody comes out to you, that you know how to respond and say, Wow, thank you for being courageous enough to, to tell me about that. And you know, and then just gently, ask loving, caring pastoral questions are What? What can I do to walk alongside you? What can I do to support you. And this is the case as well, in cases of parents who are maybe wrestling with a child who's, who's come out that our number one goal, there is pastoral care. And that doesn't mean just coming up with all the right answers to toss at people, but really doing more listening and hearing what they have to say about their story and about who they are. I also think it's helpful to note or at least interesting to note, why people often shift their view from the historic view of marriage between a man and a woman to an affirming view that marriage is between any two people, I think a big part of that is that they know somebody who's gay or lesbian, and that as they know, this person, it becomes, you know, more difficult for them to say, wow, you know, to say that, that person can't get married to somebody of the same sex. That is a difficult path. That's a path that that does involve suffering. And so a lot of times, there's a sense that people shift out of the desire to, to reduce the suffering of others people to show care and concern and compassion for them. And so I think, again, I think that impulse is right, to say, you know, we need to walk alongside people. But I think this is where to go back to our overarching discussion. This is why we need the church to be functioning as the family of God, because because if I'm going to say to somebody, I recognize that you are that you're gay or lesbian. So for you, attraction, and sexual attraction is toward the same sex, but I really believe God's best is is marriage between a man and a woman or celibacy. But here's
how I think God wants us as the church body to walk alongside you in your suffering, that we want to be brothers and sisters to you in that, recognizing that it is a hard calling that God's put on your life, just just like, in a lot of ways, celibacy for a straight person is a hard calling is a difficult calling. And so we want to be there. I think it's also important to recognize it, a lot of people shift their views, because of just bad theology, or bad assumptions about gay people. So for example, if, you know if you're taught that gay people are, you know, monsters, or gay people are just out of control sexually, or gay people are, you know, just just horrible people, then all of a sudden, when you actually encounter a gay person, or you have a child or family member who's gay, then you're like, Well, wait, wait a second, they're not a monster. They're They're, they're, they're not just out of control sexually. And so the more that we kind of perpetuate myths about gay people, the more it shall I think it'll lead people into this mindset where well, the only way to be loving, the only way to be caring is to be affirming. And so I think it's really important that we don't perpetuate those stereotypes. So that we can walk well with people as they go through this journey. And finally, this goes for everybody to think about pastoral observations. Gospel sexuality is, is it's not legalism, it's not about do all these rules, and you'll be good enough for Jesus Gospel sexuality says Jesus comes to you in your sin in your brokenness. But whereas a lot of conservatives lean toward a kind of legalism that says, Do this, and you'll be good, you'll be okay. A lot of people who may be more theologically progressive or affirming can tend toward a kind of relativism, that essentially say, Well, Jesus loves you and forgives your sins. So you kind of do what seems best to you do what you think is going to be most fulfilling. Do what you think is going to make you happy. And that can lead not only to affirming same sex marriage, it can lead to affirming people in divorce or adultery. It can lead to affirming polyamory, which is where you have three or more people in a sexual relationship. It's really dangerous to just say, God loves you, God forgives you now, do whatever you want. Now Now follow the desires of your heart. And so this is where we have to understand the gospel meets us where we're at it meets us recognize we are sinners in need of Jesus. And it also recognizes that we're empowered by the Spirit of Jesus, to walk in newness of life. It doesn't mean that we're perfect, but it does mean that day by day, we're called to live in line with God's intention for our sexuality, so that we can communicate something about the love of Jesus to the to the world around us that's watching. But in the next, in the next video, we're going to think a little bit more about some of the arguments in favor of gay marriage from Scripture. And review it a little bit more detail the historical view, and look at how we think about these these two different angles on this discussion, and how that affects our theology of marriage. So until next time, blessings