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November 18 - December 11, 2018
I call myself gay to remind broader groups that what I choose to do with my sexuality as a Christian is caught up in my worship of God, and that the fundamental human desire for intimacy is ultimately fulfilled in a relationship with Jesus and what he accomplished on the cross for us all.
I felt like Christians were explaining me away, not entering into my experience. That was bad enough, but their explanation wasn’t even any good! I found it frustratingly hypocritical that Christians, who worshiped a savior of transparency and truth, couldn’t deal with my being honest about my humanity. Their obvious prejudice toward gay people only pushed me farther away. I perceived that perhaps homosexuality unearthed deeper problems in the church, especially an obsession with sexual desire. All I knew was that
My unchosen desire was incompatible with the term righteous, so I was hopelessly stuck in the “sinful” category.
He talked about God’s love for gay people, but I still couldn’t comprehend how, if I were to become a Christian, my homosexuality was reconcilable with Scripture. I just didn’t see it.
The Bible was a dangerous book. It taught, I thought, that simply by being who I was, I was the worst of sinners, unable to inherit the kingdom of God and unacceptable to the very one who made me. What kind of God makes a person with one hand and condemns him with the other? What kind of good news is that? No good news at all. I saw it with a terrible finality that, for the moment, ended all my questions.
“Incredible! You are very blessed! I need to tell you this now. You are a child of the light, destined to be with the greatest mediator in the spiritual realms, Jesus Christ. He has chosen you!”
Jesus was an unmarried, childless man in a Jewish society of family values, and a celibate in a Roman society of sexual liberation that mocked singleness. In a world of two-sided sexual obsession, Jesus invited others into pure intimacy, modeled loving friendship, and lived in life-giving singleness.
When the focus was on God’s kingdom, I could belong, but as soon as romantic relationships were the focus, I felt alienated. I often wanted to run out of meetings in tears.
heteronormative dream that church often elevated.
tore it open. It was a book. “Washed and Waiting,” I read, “by Wesley Hill.” It was a reflection on homosexuality and Christian faithfulness.
“Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.” David, do not try to give him the love only I can give him, God’s voice whispered. You are my son. Remember who you are.
Jesus taught that both the worst sin and the most sacred worship originate from the same place: the heart. Think of that revolutionary concept!
regarded as an abnormality. Yes, biblical marriage is a beautiful expression of romantic love that glorifies God. But as Wesley Hill says, “The New Testament views the church—rather than marriage—as the primary place where human love is best expressed and experienced.”
Hear me well: homosexuality is not an evangelistic issue. It is a discipleship issue. So we must approach it that way.
No Christian should carry a cross alone,
In the 1950s and 1960s, medical speech described homosexuality as a dangerous perversity that threatened the utopic stability of the nuclear family.
They view sex and marriage as the place where true intimacy is found and see a lack of it as a deprivation of our humanity.
This new apologetic must further permit us to form a deeper Christian response to homosexuality, one that honors both Scripture, the wisdom of tradition, and people’s real experience.
The opposite of homosexuality is not heterosexuality. It is holiness.
Promiscuity and sexual orientation must be separated in our thinking.
Appeals to our human experience were not enough to convince me. God’s vision for marriage was profound and beautiful. I could not dismiss it.
“the norm as ought.”39
Wesley Hill notes, “Male and female is the creational intention not because we can see that clearly in our present contexts but rather because it is given to us in the pre-fall, pre-sin-and-death narratives of Genesis 1 and 2.”42 In Judaism, human nature was related
Paul portrays homosexual behavior as a ‘sacrament’ of the anti-religion of human beings who refuse to honor God.”43 Augustine’s solution is summed up in his
God condemns homosexual behavior and amazingly, profligately, at great cost to himself, lavishes his love
Human beings can live without sex, but we cannot live without love. God
