More to Ponder

Yesterday I said that "the declarations of judgement against America (or any nation for that matter) due to a small minority of the population is not only unbiblical, it is Anti-Christ." Of course I'm referring to the diatribes of many preachers against homosexuality. Just recently a friend of mine visited a church in our area where the pastor seemed to bring up the issue on a continual basis. Every Sunday that he visited this particular fellowship, the pastor simply became fixated upon the subject. Unfortunately, so many others do the same.

Before I go any further into this discussion, I want to say that I do not embrace every lifestyle. While I know, and love, people who have chosen to live in homosexuality, I do not believe it is the life they were meant to live. For me, this belief simply comes from the way in which I understand our creation. Male and female. A partner who is equal but opposite. It's not so much a discussion about morality vs immorality, but a discussion about our design. I want to put that out there because some may think that I am affirming homosexuality. I am not. What I'm trying to say in this blog (much like yesterday) is that this group of people is a small minority of our population. If God were going to judge us according to lifestyles, doesn't He have much more to choose from than just our sexuality?

Some of the research that I have seen concerning American Adults who identify themselves as gay or lesbian puts the numbers below 2%. 2%! To hear some people talk about this "epidemic" in America, you would have thought that number to be much higher. That puts this number lower than the percentage of people who get divorced, lower than the number of deaths by homicide, lower than the percentage of abortions, etc. If God were so ready to judge America, it seems to me that He has much more to work with in these other areas.

"Well...the Bible says that it is an abomination unto God." So are all the things that we want to label as sin, and some of the things we don't want to label.
Dishonest scales
Lying
Cheating
A Proud Look
...
Do I need to go on?
Our fixation as believers upon this one thing reminds me of Jesus' teaching. We are so quick to point out the splinter is the eye of someone else while we disregard the beam in our own. We are so quick to judge the homosexual than the heterosexual who has multiple partners. Why this one thing? Why this one issue? Some will say it is because it tears at the fabric of family. So does lying, cheating, and divorce. But we rarely hear people rail upon these things as signs of God's judgement.

What you find when you look into the word "abomination" is that it's not necessarily something that is just detestable to God. It can also talks about practices that are against the culture, the tradition, and the societal norms. Could this be the reason for our fixation? Could it be that we have become so used to lying, cheating, a proud look, and idolatry that we pay less attention to them? What about those who are dishonest in their dealings? I mean...we make jokes about car dealers. As if that is okay. How did you feel the last time someone got more money out of you than they should have? You were angry I'm sure. But were you ready to call down the fire of God?

I also feel that it is important to understand that a lot of this waiting around for impending doom and a falling of judgement comes from a misunderstanding of the prophetic writings of the New Testament. Times where the Bible translators should have used the word "age" instead of "world." Other times when they should have used "land" instead of "earth." Of course, these minor details could have saved us all a lot of confusion. With that being said, the reality is that we have the tools to correct these mistakes in our eschatology and in our understanding of other matters.

Why don't we just stop judging less than 2% of the population and begin to love them?
I realize that this would put the Westboro Baptist Church crowd out of work, but for the rest of us it shouldn't be that difficult.
These are real people that we are talking about. Real people with real needs. Real people with real problems. What are we going to do about it? I realize that much of what I'm saying sounds like sympathy towards a particular part of our population, and maybe in some ways it is. But we have found a way to reach out to those who have had an abortion. We have discovered ways to minister to those who have divorced, remarried, etc. We have tools to reach out to those stuck in addiction. How are we going to be ministers of reconciliation to this small minority of our population?

The Good News is Good News for all people. The color of their skin, their economic status, their nationality, and event their sexual preference does not negate the Good News. I actually believe this is what Paul is trying to convey in his letter to the Romans. How could they judge certain people as "sinful" when they were all "sinful." In the same way they had all "fallen short of the glory of God", they were all "justified freely by His grace."

We lose nothing when we love people. A lesson we all need to learn. Including me.
We lose a lot by talking about the sky falling (over and over again). Like our credibility.