Which is why Christians who are upset about homosexual behavior are equally upset about interplanting crops, failing to return property in the Jubilee year, and breaking the Sabbath, right?
Not to mention a whole lot of other things in the law and the prophets.
Well, yes: If they were living a wicked lifestyle, Jesus would ask them to repent and give it up.
But, having done so, they would still be homosexual. Homosexuality itself is an orientation and is not something someone can give up.
because the gay Christians aren’t the hypocritical bigots that most fundamentalist Christians are. Though I think you were actually being facetious.
Additionally Jesus was against divorce but I know quite a few divorced Christians that rail against gays. See previous statement above.
Where in the Bible does Jesus describe homosexuality as a wicked lifestyle?
I believe that, today, Jesus would know and accept that homosexuality is an orientation and not an activity one gives up.
What an interesting question. Would Jesus be a science believer or a science denier?
Can’t it be both?
Ever hear of the Jerusalem Council of the Apostles?
The distinctions between the Ceremonial & the Moral Laws of Torah?
What applies strictly to the nation Israel & what applies universally to all humanity?
I do give you credit for going beyond the “what about eating pork & shellfish & wearing mixed fabrics, huh?” that I usually see in these discussions.
However, check out this elaborately produced & scholarly deep cartoon.
Sweet. Can you point to those Bible verses, or better yet, the actual word of God that states those things? I don’t remember those parts of Leviticus or John.
OK, in Acts 10, Peter has a dream of God telling him to slaughter unclean animals & eat them, then awakens to get a request from a Roman centurion to come tell him & his loved ones about God/Jesus. He goes to share the Gospel with them, they believe & receive the Holy Spirit, which shows Peter that God is disrupting the old Jewish/Gentile barriers, so he goes ahead & baptizes them without putting any Judaic demands on them.
In Acts 15, the whole issue as to what God requires of Gentile believers, including circumscision, kosher diet, and other aspects of the law of Moses, finally forces the Apostles to consider the issue, with input of Peter regarding his dream & experience with the centurion’s household, and from Paul regarding his ministry to the Gentiles. The final result, endorsed by James “the brother of the Lord”, that Gentiles need not get clipped nor be bound to the Israel-specific laws of Moses, but they are forbidden from idolatry & eating things offered to idols, “blood” (either violence or eating blood), eating strangled (inhumanely slaughtered) animals, and sexual immorality.
Those things were forbidden in what the Rabbis considered the Noahic Law given to all humanity. That was what’s often called the Jerusalem Council.
In Leviticus 18 & 20, the sexual taboos are listed: incest, adultery, male-male intercourse, bestiality, along with child-sacrifice, with the notation that it was for those practices that the pagan peoples are being displanted by Israel.
Leviticus 19:19 is the law against mixing plant seeds, interbreeding animals, & mixing fabrics (specifically wool & linen), as symbolic of Israel/Gentile distinction.
Paul in Romans 1:26-27 & I Corinthians 6:9-11 includes same-sex relations among forbidden practices to all people. Now, to Christians, Paul was the Apostle to the Gentiles- Christ’s Agent to bring us the Gospel & what He required of us, even as Peter & the rest were sent to Israel. Throughout his letters, he emphasizes the freedom of believers from kosher diet, circumscision, Sabbath & festival obligations. That does not free them from the moral obligations.
Now WWJD regarding gays? Same thing He did with everyone- show compassion on them where they were mistreated & weak, call them to repentance where they mistreated others or sinned against God’s requirements, and hold them to account if they persisted in sin.
I see no reason to think He would bless (or does bless) same-sex marriage, or approve of same-sex relations- any more than He would approve of adultery, incest, or bestiality, nor would He consecrate sexually-active gays into ministry. He would not deny them food or shelter or work, nor would He condone anyone who does so. But neither would He endorse their sexual activity, nor would He require anyone to do so.
No, I do not equate gays with those who practice incest, who cheat on their spouses, or have sex with animals. I only say that those practices are similarly forbidden, not just in Torah, but since Christ’s coming.
I still don’t get why Jesus would think homosexuality would be wrong in the first place. How does being gay affect how you treat everyone else?
Jesus treated sin as sin. In John 8:1-11
John 8 New International Version (NIV)
8 1 but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives.
2 At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. 3 The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group 4 and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. 5 In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” 6 They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.
But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. 7 When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8 Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.
9 At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. 10 Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”
11 “No one, sir,” she said.
“Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”
So Jesus told them “He who is without sin, cast the first stone.” Quickly all the men walked away. What was their sin? Maybe it was theft. Maybe they had cheated on their wives or with anothers wife. Maybe it was alcohol abuse. maybe it was homosexuality. It doesnt matter. They had sin in their lives and they knew it. When all had left he told the woman to "go and live your life without sin.
Problem is for far too long homosexuality has been given too much of a spotlight and attention from “Christians” when far more other sins were ignored. For too long Christians had the idea they could be sinners throughout the week but still good christians on sunday. I remember watching “Hee Haw” with the scantily clad women and the sexual innuendos and the songs glorifying drinking- well that was ok because the show ended with someone singing a Christian song.
The truth is Jesus called us to “sin no more” and to live sinless lives everyday and to love and care for our neighbors.
Let’s assume that Jesus was just a man of his time & place, a Torah-believing Jew who had compassion for people who violated the rules but who called people to come back to the God of Torah & was toughest on those who made life difficult for people struggling to be faithful. Torah condemns same-sex relations in the same section in which it condemns adultery, incest, bestiality, & child-sacrifice.
What makes you think that Jesus would isolate that particular violation from that section of Torah & be OK with it?
So he would believe it to be a sin because of the cultural and religious standards of his time and place? If and when he comes back, what could we expect once he takes a look around and sees that those standards have evolved? How does making homosexuality a “sin” bring people back to God?
I don’t think Jesus believed same-sex relations to be a sin only because of the standards of his day. I just said that if he was just a man, there is no reason that he would think differently than what the standards of his day was, but that he would probably be kinder & more forgiving about it. I think Jesus held that to be a sin because He was the Express Agent of YHVH God. And no, if He came back, I don’t think He’d change His mind because culture has changed. His Return would be to judge the culture, not to be judged by it.
Sure it can. That’d be equivalent to abstinence, practiced by some heterosexuals.
The sentence I bolded sounds circular in nature and awfully close to “I think God said it, therefore it must be true.”
If Jesus wants to be taken seriously when he comes back, then he needs to back off the people his daddy made different. I think you’re interpreting sin from your own perspective and not his.
This is saying “God needs to bend to accommodate human culture.”
If such an entity exists, it has always done exactly that.
No. If something is innate, then it cannot also be an activity someone chooses to practice. I am white. I cannot practice being white. I just am white. I am male. I cannot practice being male. And I am straight, and I cannot practice being straight. I am cisgender. I cannot practice being cisgender.
I make no choice to be straight. Gay people make no choice to be gay.
Oh, and since you’re Assembly of God, I can make a specific argument for why homosexuality is not a sin: Gay people can speak in tongues. They receive the infilling of the baptism of the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in tongues.
And the Lord God is one. If one person of the Trinity is okay with them, then so would Jesus be.