Can’t get around it.   Romans 1.26-27

So high, you can’t get over it … so wide, you can’t get around it, so low, you can’t get under it … you must come in at the door

Click on the following, and treat yourself to a minute or two:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJGtctkZ6fY&feature=related

What am I talking about?  Homosexuality. 

‘Since men chose not to honor God, God gave them over to their sinful desires for sexual impurity; they degraded one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator . . .

Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Women chose to be with women, men chose to be with men. Both reaped the consequences.

And besides that, because they chose to ignore the God they had known, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done.’          My paraphrase of Romans 1.24-28

Here’s the thing—you may not want to talk about it—but it is where we are in Romans 1, and we can’t get over it, around it, or under it.  As the song says, we must come through the door, and honestly ask ourselves, ‘what does God’s Word have to say about homosexuality?’  As Christians, we believe the God-breathed Scripture is our standard; your opinion, my opinion—each is irrelevant.  

We discussed it at Women of Passion this morning – ‘wasn’t the easiest of discussions for me …’see, I know one whose loved one died of AIDS, I know another who adores her gay cousin, and those who are trying to help their children figure it all out.  But I can’t just act like it isn’t there, because it is controversial, because some will disagree, and others will want to argue the genetic predisposition for homosexuality, etc.  It must be addressed. 

What else does the Bible have to say on the matter?  1 Corinthians 6.9-11 -  “Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And that is what some of you were. 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.”  It is listed along with other sins … yes, sins.

Homosexuality goes against the created order.  It is not the way God intended for his creation, and God does not violate himself.

NOW, since we are speaking plainly here, I should now like to set something else straight.  We are no one’s judge, and if you think you might be, remember that Jesus said, “Judge not, lest ye be judged.” Matthew 7.1.  With the measure you judge another, so you will be judged.  Consider the log in your own eye before you go after the speck in another’s.  (Are you struggling with being judgmental?  Spend some time in Matthew 7, Friend.)  When the woman was caught in adultery, John 8, and brought before Jesus, he had every right to judge her—why, she was caught in the very act!  Instead, he refrained from doing so, and helped all her would-be judges to see the logs in their own eyes; they found they could not judge her either.  Jesus looked at her and said, “Go your way, and sin no more.”  He loved her.

Christian, that is the standard for you and me.  We are to love with abandon.  Trust me, if your gay friend knows you are a Christian, she already knows your doctrine—she knows what the Bible teaches about homosexuality—therefore, she doesn’t need to hear your indictment.  In terms of loving gay people well, I do not think the track record of Christians has been too stellar.  What do you say…how about you and me changing that?  You can’t get over it, around it, or under it—your part and my part is to LOVE well.

Christine