Thursday, July 07, 2005

The Problem with Homosexuals

I am about to offend everyone—right, left, straight, gay, young, old. This article is so offensive you probably shouldn’t read it at all. Heck, I shouldn’t be writing it.

You will find yourself suddenly cheering as if I “really get it” then you will be raving mad when you realize I disagree with you completely.

So you have been warned. Don’t blame me if you are rushed to the hospital with sky-high blood pressure. Go ahead and have a stiff drink now—before you begin—if that’s your kind of thing. (If you think Jesus made non-alcoholic wine, you probably should stop reading right now and get your daily enema.)

Ready? Here goes…

I hate a lesbian.

Don’t hear me saying something I didn’t say. I didn’t say, “I hate lesbians.” That isn’t true. I simply hate one lesbian in particular. Her name is Francis.

Francis used to do my wife’s nails—you know, put those long plastic things on the ends of her fingers. $50 a pop, but that’s not why I hate her.

She and her partner got married a few years ago in Vegas. They live in a decent house. They enjoy playing with their pugs.

None of those things explain my disgust.

I hate Francis because she’s, well, an asshole.

Now I don’t use that type of language often. In fact, I can’t think of one other person I would call such a crude, crass name. Nobody. But if anyone qualifies for the brown shriveled sphincter award, it’s her.

Now, I don’t hate her because she’s a lesbian. I would hate her no matter what her sexual orientation. She’s an asshole who just happens to be into chicks.

What’s my point? You can’t lump people together into a group and say “they’re all the same.” They’re not. Some of them are cool. Some are, well, human gas vents.

Let me explain why the so-called church is having so much trouble dealing with the issue of homosexuality—it creeps out a majority of them.

It creeps some of them out because they’re deeply scared they might be gay and just “suppressing it.” Some of them truly believe there is an unusually strong hatred in God for that part of His creation. Others think homosexuals are the ones who molest children (most often it’s heteros who abuse kids.)

Bottom line: Homosexuality gives a bunch of people the heebie-jeebies.

As such homosexuality gets treated differently than almost every other thing called “sin” in the institutional church. Pastors like to preach against it because it lets them look good without actually accomplishing anything. Congregations like it because it reminds them of the “wall of separation” between gay and straight.

No pink shirts here.

There’s only one problem…none of it is very Biblical. The Bible talks about sexual sin. It calls lots of things sexual sin—everything from sleeping with a sheep, to sleeping with your wife when she is on her period. All called sexual sin in the Bible.

Guess what folks? The Bible also differentiates between temptation to sin and actually committing the sin. I know there can be mental sins—like malice—but I would rather you hate me than kill me; lust after me than rape me.

So how does God view homosexuality?

First, for the heteros among you, I have to begin our journey with some familiar territory.

Let’s start with good-old pubescent teenage, hormone driven, male. He likes girls. He likes girls a lot. And he likes lots of girls. Pretty much anything that walks by with the right shape will send him drooling.

Anthropologists will tell you the human male is designed—both physically and mentally—to have multiple sexual partners. He notices women.

In fact, polygamy is never forbidden in scripture (we’ll look at that another time.)

Despite his design, he understands because of his commitment to his faith he must remain a virgin until married and remain faithful to his wife.

He eventually settles down and commits himself to just one woman. They get married, have lots of emotionally and sexually well-adjusted children, and live happily ever after.

If he didn’t have sex before marriage and was faithful to his partner during marriage he avoided both premarital sex and adultery.

Despite his inbred design to have multiple sexual partners, he made a conscious choice to honor a commitment made to his God and his wife.

Now lets move to our more “hetero challenged” brethren:

Just for the sake of argument, let’s assume they are born gay—they are born with a sexual attraction to men in chaps.

Now if he chooses to accept Christ, he understands he must not indulge that desire—just like his hetero brother did not indulge his desire for multiple partners.

There is no difference. If the Bible calls adultery sin and the Bible calls homosexuality sin, they ought to be treated the same. Sexual sin is sexual sin.

But of course, they aren’t. Jimmy Swaggert was caught with a prostitute and given a second chance. Then a third. I doubt the church would have been so forgiving if the prostitute was named Victor rather than Victoria.

Look the Bible is clear—homosexual behavior is sin. So is premarital sex with your hetero fiancé. There isn’t any difference. That’s what it says. Don’t waste my time trying to prove it doesn’t say that. It does.

We have just a few options:

1. We decide the Bible is archaic and doesn’t apply the same way today that it did 2,000 years ago. We can sleep with our special others whether we are married or not. Those sexual restraints just don’t apply now.

2. We decide the Bible is relevant today and determine to do what it says even if it’s hard at times—or hard all the time.

3. We decide the Bible is relevant, but it’s too hard to follow. We decide not to do what the Bible says.

Which ever you decide, just be honest with yourself. Own your actions. If you are going to sleep with every person you can, stop pretending you’re not a whore. If you’re going to practice your homosexuality, do it.

I have tremendous faith in Philippians 3:15:

“If on any point you think differently, this too God will make clear to you. Only let us live up to what we have already attained.”

If you are saved and I am saved, God will eventually bring both of us where He wants us to be.

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