Grace: Christians as Free from the Law
Grace! Your loveless pharisaism leaves no room for God's
grace. Why are you keeping gays out of the kingdom of God?
Have you no sense of mercy or justice?
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Grace: Christians as Free from the Law
Grace! Your loveless pharisaism leaves no room for God's
grace. Why are you keeping gays out of the kingdom of God?
Have you no sense of mercy or justice?
Martin Luther was wrong in saying that the Law convicts of
sin, restrains sin, and is an ethical guide. Those functions
in the NT are the work of the Holy Spirit. (Johnston 73)
answer
Jesus' Attitude toward Homosexuality
Jesus was silent on the question of homosexuality.
Jesus loved and respected eunuchs, the sexual minority of
his day. (Matthew 19:12) He acknowledged that some eunuchs
were from birth incapable of sex with a woman. (Johnston 124) In the last days eunuchs
will have a memorial in God's house. (Isaiah 56:1-8 NASV)
This is a change from the Law of Moses, at least for the
eunuchs who were so by castration. (Deuteronomy 23:1 as
cited by Johnston 123) That a eunuch from Ethiopia was
baptized (Acts 8:26-29) is proof that eunuchs, outcasts in
the OT, were not outcast in the NT.
Alfred Kinsey was wrong with his 10% statistic, we agree. The
issue is not how many of us there are, but whether Jesus
approves of gays. He does.
Who here is missing an eye or a hand because they took
Jesus seriously in the Sermon on the Mount? (Matthew 5:27-30)
Jesus loved Lazarus (Goss) and
John son of Zebedee, both homosexually.
Jesus said that all who are weary should come to Him, not
just heterosexuals. The gospel is for everyone. Jesus
specifically condemned the Pharisees "for their bigoted and
exclusionary legalism ... (Matthew 23:13)." (Johnston xi) Christians who exclude
gays "fan the flames of demonic prejudice." (Johnston xi)
If -- and I do not concede that it is true --
homosexuality is a result of the Fall, Jesus put a new spin
on such things. When Jesus was asked whether a man was blind
because he had sinned or because his father had, Jesus
answered that it was to allow God to be glorified. (John 9:1-5)
answer
The Early Church's Experience in the Acts of the Apostles
The word of God to Peter in a vision about clean and unclean animals
argues that the OT law does not apply to Christians. (Acts 10)
The word of God to Peter also reminds us to keep the canon
of Scripture open. If Peter didn't have the last word on the
OT, then we don't have the last word on the NT. Why can't
you accept gay Christians in the same way in which Peter was
taught to accept gentile Christians like Cornelius? (Acts
10)
The Jerusalem Council argues that most of the law that
pharisaical Christians want to impose on gays doesn't apply
in the age of grace. Christians who eat red meat don't pay
attention to one of the laws that the Council retained.
(Acts 15)
answer
Paul
General
The immorality that Paul condemns is "adultery,
prostitution, promiscuity, and lustful, erotic obsession,"
not "a holy union." (Johnston 88)
Paul condemned gay lust, but he knew nothing of committed
gay love or of the homosexual orientation out of which it
grows. (Johnston 110)
Paul was bound to the culture of his time. For example, he
subordinates women in the family, keeps them silent in the
church, and has them wear a veil. Is that what we want to
model in the church today? Paul was simply mistaken. (Johnston 97)
Paul was in anguish about his own homosexual problems, his
"thorn in the flesh." He was hard on homosexuality out of
self-hatred. (Spong 116ff.)
answer
Romans 1: "Against Nature"
In Romans 1, Paul borrows from a vice list available at
the time to make a rhetorical point that all have sinned. He
himself is not committed to the particulars. (Boswell [1980] 107-117)
A homosexual invert is not perverting his true nature. (Bailey) `Against nature' means against
the "personal nature of the pagans in question." (Boswell [1980] 111-112)
God Himself acts "against nature" in Romans 11:24. (Boswell [1980] Appendix 1) Airplanes
aren't ungodly just because flying is unnatural for
humanity. (Johnston 31)
"Against nature" means against culture, whether Jewish Law
or respectable Gentile society. If our cultural were gay-friendly,
homosexuality would not be against nature. (McNeill 56, as cited by Johnston 96)
answer
I Corinthians 6; I Timothy; Ephesians
Paul says that sex with a prostitute is a one-flesh
relationship. (I Corinthians 6) He knows therefore that one-flesh
relationships are possible. How can his complaint against
homosexuality be that a one-flesh homosexual relationship is impossible?
Paul wants "humanizing, loving,
committed" relationships. (Johnston 26)
Paul says "all things are lawful." (I Cor 6:12; 10:23) (Johnston 84-85)
Paul says that in the last days men would be lovers of
themselves rather than lovers of God. (II Tim. 2:2) This
does not refer to the selfless giving of psychologically
healthy gay relationships, about which Paul knew nothing. If
anything it applies to your pharisaism. The next verse about
"without natural affection" only applies to homosexual
activity by heterosexuals or vice versa. As evidence, gay
Christians are lovers of God.
Paul says that sexuality mirrors the relationship of
Christ and the church. (Ephesians 5) Thus it cannot be the gender of the
sex partners that is in focus.
If homosexuals are not in the kingdom of God because of I Corinthians 6:10,
then so are those who revile homosexuals. (Johnston 13, quoting Marty)
In Christ there is no more "male and female."
(Galatians 3:28) This shows that Paul is ready to reconsider
male and female as more than just polar opposites, like
slaves/free or Jew/Gentile. God's good news removes
distinctions based on sexual object choice.
Paul vacillates between discriminating against women as
his culture did (I Timothy 2:9-15) and resisting his culture
to support women. (Galatians 3:28) Paul did not know about
psychologically healthy homosexuality as we do today. If he
did, he would have similar difficulty in knowing whether to
support "his Orthodox Jewish background" or "his revelation
of equality in Christ." (Johnston
97)
Christ brought an end to the Law. (Romans 10:3-4) Paul
told the Galatians not to be circumcised. (Galatians 5)
This is a clear metonomy: don't allow the Law to be a
bondage to you. You are trying to bring gay Christians under
bondage. Paul says that "the only think that counts is faith
expressing itself through love." (Galatians 5:6) There is no
Law against the things that the Holy Spirit works in a
Believer. (Galatians 5:23; Johnston
87)
Circumcision as a "quasi-sexual ritual" marked the
subservience of the flesh to the spirit. Its end as a
religious observance for Christians is symbolic of the end
of "sacrificing sexuality" to earn salvation. (Scanzoni and Mollenkott 71)
"In the middle of a discourse dealing with ... sexually
related matters" about situations not freely chosen, Paul
says "remain in the condition in which [you] were called."
(Johnston 7; I Corinthians 7:17-24)
21 August 1996. Not a home page. Do not link to this page. Copyright information is available.