Estimated reading time: 5 minute(s)

Every once in a while, a few of my friends from High School and I get into an e-mail discussion. You know, where everyone copies everyone and we’re all in on every reply. Sometimes that gets hard to keep up with, but last night i went through the past couple weeks worth and had some replies. One of the main topics has been this new rise of the gay marriage issue. If you have not heard, the mayor of San Fran has married thousands of gay couples… and then some ministers out east here did, and it’s really becoming an issue of public import in many states. I do have some opinions … I copied a bunch from the e-mails I was sending out… read at your leisure….

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Is this an issue of "racial" equality?

"Guess my issue is I believe the Bible is true. Homosexuality is not a race of people, or a disease or something… it is a choice to go outside the bounds of God’s creation. So… when we legalize homosexulaity, then gay marriage… eventually it could follow that we will "legalize" perhaps prostitution (when done lovingly and in a clean environment… isn’t it a woman’s right to do what she wants with her body?) and then perhaps consentual pedophilia? After all, some people just like little children? And then how about incest… (wait, that may already be legal in west virginia, I think…) 🙂 What’s wrong with marrying your sister if you’re going to provide a loving stable relationship? What about three-somes or MORE? (aka polygamy….) as long as they love each other… what’s wrong with that?

Well… God includes homosexuality in the same wrong category as all of those.

We as a society are not following his rules anymore… so, what we accept today in the name of inclusion or tolerance or progress will only continue to move toward all those other things.

In my opinion.

And, they will begin to not look as bad as they might seem in my email right now. 50 years ago we would not be talking about gay rights. (from my knowledge of history) As we move away from God’s standards… times do change. And, in my opinion, they change for the worse.

I am praying that God will help us move back to him.

That would be good."

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How can you equate this with prostitution and incest??? Some people are just born that way! Isn’t it just a matter of genetics?

"…there are already LOTS of folks trying to make genetic excuses for behavior that goes against God’s standards… alcoholism is a disease, ADHD (kids shouldn’t be expected to focus… they need to be DRUGGED UP!) and so on and so on… more than 50% of the commercials on tv are about drugs to fix our problems. it’s all about genetics and science and stuff… courtrooms and lawyers talk about insanity pleas and all that stuff where no one is held accountable for their actions – they couldn’t help it because of their genetic make up or the current altered state or something. While I will grant you that we are certainly controlled by a very many things (including things that impair our judgment and stuff) we still need to be held accountable for our actions… not just make up new categories of people to make something "OK" that God specifically says is not."

I think.

🙂

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Can we legislate Christian morality anymore in this secular country?

"What I may have been trying to say here (don’t know at this point… it’s nearly 2 am…) was that years ago when laws were made that said homosexuality (the ACT, cause there was no such thing as A homosexual PERSON) is wrong (illegal) and stating that marriage was between a man and a woman… we were a homogeneous people then… with a homogeneous faith and belief system. (just wanted to say homo two more times…)

Now we are not. And, public policy should be determined accordingly. I don’t like it. It will hurt us (according to what God says) … but… where we as a country have chosen to go… Christians can not dictate behavior by legislation stemming from their morals and ethics and beliefs."

I think.

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Slightly different topic… was Jesus out to conform people with a set of rules to follow? (Like Christians seem to be today in the courts and elsewhere…)

I think with a deeper look at what Jesus said and did… you’ll see that he was certainly not a conformist… he clashed with the establishment all the time… and when he "preached conformity" he was not talking about following rules (like, he didn’t teach folks to follow all the current rules of the day – was accused often of the opposite) he was more about a new way of thinking… love each other, love your enemy, help the poor and hurting and rejected… are those rules? Read Matthew 5 if you want… it’s Jesus’ famous "sermon on the mount" — it’s some good preaching about not-rule-following, but a new way of thinking.

AND, later on, Jesus goes through some rules of the day and says, "Dude, it’s not about like murder and stuff… it’s even deeper. When you’re ticked off at someone… it’s just like murder. AND, you know, like, adultery is bad and stuff… well, when you are diggin’ a chick a little too much – wishin’ you could… ya know… well, you have already committed adultery in your heart" Jesus’ point was not to create more rules (as the church today has so nicely done in many cases…… but that’s another topic…..) He was saying that in fact it is NOT ABOUT following all those rules… it’s about a new way of thinking, about doing life with a kingdom view. And then… the cool part? He lived it out! He didnt’ just tell other folks to do it, and make them feel bad if they did not… he loved people who others wouldn’t (they were not loved because they were sinners, doing bad stuff… so people didn’t want to be seen with them) BUT Jesus did. Cause he ROCKS.

I’m pretty glad to say he wants to be seen with me. I think that’s amazingly cool. And I look forward to thanking him in person.

🙂

Sorry… tangent…

All that to say… if you read again the NT (especially gospels, where Jesus is) you really see that Jesus was nothing like the Jesus that churches present today. Churches are good at making folks follow rules and feel guilty when they don’t … I can’t remember a story at the momeht of Jesus doing that to someone…

You?

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more to come…