This article is based on two assumptions:
First, God sent his Son into the world for all of us. According to John 3:16, 17 there are no conditions on God’s love. The only condition set on obtaining everlasting life, or salvation, is to believe in Jesus.
John 3:16-17
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. (KJV)Second, what we are to believe about Jesus is that he died and was raised from the dead on the third day. If we believe this with our hearts and confess with our mouth that "Jesus is Lord" then we will be saved according to the Bible:
Romans 10:9-10
That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. (KJV)TRADITIONAL TEACHING: Gays are an abomination...
According to the general Church community gays are an abomination. Gays are told that they have a no hope in God; they will end up like the people of Sodom and Gomorrah; and they are treated as though they embody all evil. A Christian co-worker once told me that the antichrist is going to be a homosexual man. She believed that he was going to be in the closet at first to make everybody like him. She said that when the time comes for him to show his evil he will come out of the closet. I want to proclaim to you that the concept that gays have no hope in God, as gay people, is not a Biblical teaching but a traditional teaching.
Colossians 2:8
Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. (KJV)There are many examples of traditional teachings that served no other purpose but to separate people from God.
- Galileo discovered that the earth revolved around the sun. The Church considered this heresy according to their misinterpretation of Genesis 1. They sentenced him to life imprisonment under house arrest.
- The Church used Genesis 9:21-27 to "prove" that Blacks were cursed by God into a life of slavery in order to justify what was done to them during the plantation days and to justify racism. The fact is that the curse fell upon Canaan, one of Noah’s grandson’s. Canaan was one of four brothers. His three brothers settled in Africa but Canaan settled in the Middle East.
- Another example of a traditional teaching with no basis in Scripture is the hatred of Jews. Some think that God condemned the Jews because they killed Jesus. If it were not for the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ there would be no salvation. Jesus himself was a Jew!
The God of the Bible is full of justice, mercy and love. Yes, He has gotten and will get angry with people, but this anger is always precipitated by three things: abandoning Him in exchange for another god, abusing others morally, financially, sexually or otherwise, and abusing ourselves in the same manner. You will see this consistent theme from Genesis to Revelation.
SOURCE: Inspiritus
Good words on a Sunday Morning...and any other morning as well!!!
ReplyDeleteBeautifully-stated, Joe. Definitely words to remember. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteI can't believe that you're still questioning yourself about if God is loving gay or any other people on Earth.
ReplyDeleteRemember when the first to come to America were saying that Indians didn't even have a soul. Even women in the far middle ages were consider as almost animals.
Religion based on those so ancient writings is, to me, more folklore and words that are obsolete.
My main way of thinking of God is that HE is LOVE with a way that is far more unbelievable than we can humanly understand.
He (suppositivly) created ALL living creatures on Earth,women and men are his main achievements. There is no doubt that He loves ALL of US no matter our race, sex, sex orientation or other...
BTW, just see how «religion» in your country is creating more «hate» than real LOVE.
Your new president is the real fact that HATE is in charge now.
Each time I see him on TV, I cannot keeping to see that this man is always showing anger and speaks negatively except when he talks about HIM.
He doesn't act like a real President of ALL Americans.
NOW GOD must take care of USA because you'll need Him for the next 4 years.
Gays will continue to complain about Christianity while cowering in terror from this : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vev-OzHQy94 Which is why, with the growing Muslim population in the western world, the homosexual culture on earth is probably coming to an end.
ReplyDeleteFairy-stories and superstition for the weak.
ReplyDeleteRemy
Joe-
ReplyDeleteI ran across your blog while researching the Picts (I may have Scottish ancestors) and was intrigued by your entry “God Loves You.” We stand on opposite ends of this question, but I would be interested in a dialogue that could be enlightening for both of us. I hope you will agree.
Let me begin by responding to your January 22, 2017 entry. I agree with your two initial assumptions, although I prefer to consider them spiritual facts: God did send His Son into the world for all of us, and if we believe and confess that Jesus is Lord, then we will be saved. God is love, and Jesus, as the Word of God made flesh, manifested (and manifests) that love in a concrete fashion we humans can comprehend, at least in part.
However, in my reading of the Bible (which is my guide in such matters), I can’t help but notice that the bus does not stop there. Mark 10:17-22 tells of a man who came to Jesus and asked what he had to do to be saved. Jesus did not say, “You’re here. That’s all you need to do.” On the contrary, he said, “You know the commandments,” insinuating that a certain lifestyle went with salvation. But when the man informed him that he had followed the commandments from his youth, Jesus told him that even that wasn’t enough. He needed to sell all that he had and follow Him. We are told specifically that Jesus loved him, so if God’s love and accepting Christ were the end of the story, this man should have been in good shape. But he wasn’t, and went away sorrowing because he could not give up his great possessions. We can assume that Jesus also loved the Pharisees and the money-changers in the temple, but he quite obviously did not love their actions or the condition of their hearts.
There are a number of Biblical commands to strive to live righteously (e.g.Isaiah33:14-16, Titus 2:11-12, I Peter 3:12). Regarding the homosexual lifestyle, Paul includes it in a list of activities including immorality, adultery and idolatry that are repugnant to God (I Corinthians 6:9-10). While it is true that Jesus Himself did not overtly condemn homosexuality, He did condemn divorce, explaining that in the beginning, God intended for one man and one woman to be united (Matthew 19:3-6). He did not say two men or two women, or two human beings, indicating that what is now referred to as “traditional marriage” was the expected norm.
You have obviously been hurt by the reaction of the Church and Christians, and I have to admit with sorrow that we have failed to show you Christ’s love on many occasions. I can only say that all of us are “works in progress,” and the natural repugnance many feel toward same gender sexual activity has too often led us to shut out practicing homosexuals entirely. This is not say that such a lifestyle is to be accepted and certainly not commended. We are to do as Jesus did with the Pharisees: love the person, but point out the error. In fact, pointing out error is a sign of truly loving someone. I would be remiss in my duty as a parent to allow my children to pursue choices I know to be harmful to them without warning them of the consequences. Believe me, it would be far easier to let you go on your way without a word than it is to engage in what could easily degenerate into a nasty argument (although I have no intention of letting that happen). The true response of the Christian to error is given by Paul immediately after that list in I Corinthians: “And such were some of you….” Paul condemned wrong actions, but he never gave up on the person. The important word is “were.” Those welcomed into full fellowship had turned away from their old, unacceptable lifestyles, and were striving to please God. That may not be, and rarely is, easy, but it is necessary.
I would like to comment on your list of traditional teachings that “separate people from God,” but this has gone on quite long enough. Maybe in a future post. I look forward to your response.
Allan,
ReplyDeleteIt appears to me that there are two fundamental differences between your beliefs and mine.The first is whether are not people are born gay since I assume you are not homosexual, then you cannot understand the fact that I was born the way that I am. There is no question about this in my mind. Since I do not believe in predestination, I do not believe that God created certain people to be predestined to Hell. I also do not believe God makes mistakes. If homosexuality, as we understand it today is a sin, then God made a mistake in creating me, which I do not believe he did. God is perfect in all ways. Second, you believe that the New Testament declares homosexuality a sin. I do not. I believe it declares certain homosexual acts, such as pederasty, prostitution, and sexual practices in religious context. Biblical translations that use the word homosexuality are seriously flawed and are lazy in their treatment of the original text. If you will go back and read my posts on the Churches of Christ you will see how this is flawed.
I believe that two people in a committed relationship can have a holy union. I believe that God created us as we are, and did not create sexual orientations just for us to fail. I was born the way I am, a homoseuxal, God did not make me as a mistake. Furthermore, Jesus nor Paul condemn homosexuality in the New Testament. The modern conception of homosexuality is nowhere mentioned in the Bible.
I will also add that I have not been hurt by the reactions of the church and Christinas, I have been saddened by them. They go against the teachings of Christ. I have seen many people who have been profoundly hurt by other so-called Christians, so much so that they left the church altogether. That is a sin more on the Christians who abandoned them then on the person who abandoned God. We need to learn to love an accept one another.
I am enjoying reading your views on religion and Christianity. I am a gay man who has recently begun contemplating the idea of returning to the church after many years as an atheist. Thanks for sharing your story.
ReplyDeleteLGBT life thrives which tells theorists that it is either an evolutionary success by passing more children on else LGBT has some kind of supernatural protection.
ReplyDeleteSupernatural backing may come from a just God for LGBT that asks fair rights to arguably include rights theology. There is authentic or legitimate theology of Jesus’ time involving a parallel world of spirits that is not in favour today. That theology is a legal field of depth and complexity described in my books as to be above heads of the religious to have falsified, eluding modern scholars till now. Evolutionary science has meanwhile corrupted established religion to enable homophobic ‘theology’. Legitimate science does not cherry pick for a cause so evolutionary science is not legitimate science. Legitimate science points it out.
Fair LGBT life may then have a messianic role for God of turning established religion back to God and ruining evolutionary science. Selfish LGBT may back evolutionary science. LGBT can ask authorities to verify that rights theology exists and its significance for homophobic science and religion. That may prevent much hate crime.
For introduction please read the back cover image to my book .The Fair Rights Foundation to Science and Theology’ Amazon.
just because we are who we are, don't mean we lose faith in our creator
ReplyDelete