Homosexuality and the Christian Response

This is always a touchy subject to write or speak on and is avoided by the church generally because of its complexity. There are also many translations of the bible and many versions i.e. New Living Translation, New International Version, and the King James Version. All bibles have the same message but, some just use different words to keep up with contemporary language and to make it more easily understood.

My Goal isn't to argue or say that I'm definitively correct but, to share my interpretation of what I read in the scriptures. If you disagree, please feel free to explain your point in the comments area but, please do so in a respectful manner.

My belief is that the bible speaks out against homosexuality as a sin and I have laid out a few references from different translations and versions of the bible to reinforce my point. While believing that the bible shows us that homosexuality is a sin, I also have the strong belief that we need to love all people regardless of their life choices and lifestyles.

The Christian Bible is very clear in saying that God is not pleased with homosexuality. God loves sinners, so much so that He died for us but, He also despises and condemns sin itself.

First of all we have to remember the story of Sodom and Gomorrah from the book of Genesis 19:1-11. In this passage two angels went to visit Lot in the city of Sodom and after they had been invited into his home and had eaten they were surrounded by a group of men, young and old, who demanded that Lot send the men out to have sex with them. The angels struck them men surrounding the house with blindness so that they could not find the door. Soon afterwords the angels told Lot to flee the city with his family and not look back for the Lord was to destroy it because of the wickedness that lived in it.

The second passage I have found is Leviticus 18:22 in which the Lord says, "Do not practice homosexuality, having sex with another man as with a woman. It is a detestable sin." (NLT)

Finally, 1 Corinthians 6: 9-11 says, "Don't you realize that those who do wrong will not inherit the Kingdom of God? Don't fool yourselves. Those who indulge in sexual sin, or who worship idols, or commit adultery, or are male prostitutes, or practice homosexuality, or are thieves, or greedy people, or drunkards, or are abusive, or cheat people-none of these will inherit the Kingdom of God. Some of you were once like that. But you were cleansed; you were made holy; you were made right with God by calling on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God." (NLT)

As I had said earlier in the message, God does not endorse or tolerate homosexuality in our lives just as He detests all sin. The thing to keep in mind through all of the trials we go through involving this subject is that we must show compassion and need not judge, this is God's job. Our job is to show love and let God's light shine through our lives.

Recently, my church had a vote on if we should or should not marry homosexual couples in the church. The vote was overwhelmingly no, we should not marry them in our church. I agreed with this vote but, there were a few who actually left our church because of the decision.

This kind of opened my eyes to how we, as Christians, are being desensitized to think that it is okay to do this, and tolerating homosexuality.

Marriage of same sex couple in the church is, in my opinion, wrong. If we allow marriage of these couple aren't we also, in a way, saying that it's alright? We have to stand strong for our beliefs and also know what the Bible has to say about subjects of this nature.

This article isn't a hate message or anything of the kind but, we also must remember that in God's eyes homosexuality is an abomination and we must not endorse it. On the same token, we have to continually show love as God has commanded us and cannot judge their sins as all sins have the same penalty.

When we do things like public protest in a way that is either negative or could easily be constrewed as negative we create a bad name for ourselves as Christians. We need to be focused on what God wants and not start our own personal vendetta against the things in this world that displease us and call it God's will. We aren't the judge of whether people go to heaven or hell, our job is to try to save them and share the good news of Jesus Christ.

Do you have insight on the subject? Do you want to share? Just leave me a comment and let me know! I'm not perfect and I don't know everything so any insight, positive or negative, is always appreciated! Thanks for the help!